Remember the huge coal ash impoundment ruptures/breeches dumping coal ash all over? THIS is why treatment and use of coal ash matters:

TVA coal ash slide – UPDATES

And even in Minnesota: TVA coal ash — we had our own ash slide here in MN

There was a rule update and comments in 2018, and it was remanded, and so here we go around again…

FEDERAL REGISTER ANNOUNCEMENT: Disposal of Coal Combustion Residuals from Electric Utilities

Comments must be received on or before October 15, 2019!

From the EPA’s announcement (CLICK HERE):

Public Hearing on the Proposed Changes to the Regulations for Coal Combustion Residuals: Enhancing Public Access to Information and Reconsideration of Beneficial Use Criteria and Piles

Wed, October 2, 2019

9:00 AM – 8:00 PM EDT

DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel

300 Army Navy Drive

Arlington, VA 22202

The public hearing will consist of three sessions:

• A morning session starting at 9:00 am and ending at noon.
• An early afternoon session starting at 1:00 pm and ending at 4:00 pm.
• An evening session beginning at 5:00 pm and ending at 8:00 pm.

CLICK HERE FOR THE PROPOSED RULE!

Just do it, comment away!!! Comments must be received on or before October 15, 2019.

tRump’s “Affordable Clean Energy Rule” would be quite the legacy (though he leaves so many, how to choose).

EPA’s Affordable Clean Energy Rule page

Here are the fact sheets from that page:

Fact Sheets (these are links below!):

• Overview of the proposed ACE rule
• CO₂ emissions trends
• Costs and benefits 
• Legal overview
• Permitting improvements under New Source Review program
• Side-by-side comparison of ACE and CPP

And the proposed rule as published in the Federal Register yesterday:

Affordable Clean Energy Rule-Federal Register-8-31-2018-18755

It’s 68 pages long, and intense.

Comments due October 30 — how to comment?  From their site:

Coal ash, remember that big impoundment release, photo above, not all that long ago?

Good grief, it was a DECADE ago, and it’s still a mess.  From the EPA page:

EPA’s response to the TVA coal ash release in Kingston, TN

And another ash impoundment failure, our friends at Duke Energy, from EPA page:

EPA’s response to the Duke Energy coal ash spill in Eden, NC

It’s an issue in Minnesota too:

Who cares?  Well, once a rule is proposed, there’s not much variation, because if there is, then it has to start all over again and go through this process.  This is proposed to “amend” the 2015 final rule, so it can’t be good.  Speak up NOW!  Go to EPA’s Regulations.gov and make Comments under Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-OLEM-2017-0286 — open for 45 days after the proposed rule is published in the Federal Register, which is/was when?  Figure it’s published NOW, and just do it.

From the EPA’s site, here’s the rule proposed to gut the 2015 final rule, because gutting regulation, that’s what this administration does:

View a pre-publication version of the proposed rule

And here’s the poop cut and pasted direct from the source:

Proposed Amendments to the National Regulations (Phase One)

On March 1, 2018, EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt, signed the first of two rules that proposes to amend the April 2015 final rule. The proposal:

1. Addresses provisions of the final rule that were remanded back to the Agency on June 14, 2016 by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit;
2. Provides states with approved CCR permit programs (or EPA where it is the permitting authority) under the Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation (WIIN) Act the ability to set certain alternative performance standards; and
3. Addresses one additional issue that has arisen since the April 2015 publication of the final rule.

EPA is proposing six provisions that would allow states or EPA the ability to incorporate flexibilities into their coal ash permit programs. These flexibilities would also be available to facilities with U.S. EPA-issued CCR permits.

Additionally, the proposal:

• Clarifies the type and magnitude of non-groundwater releases that would require a facility to comply with some or all of the corrective action procedures set forth in title 40 of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) in sections 257.96 through 257.98 in meeting their obligation to clean up the release.
• Adds boron to the list of constituents in Appendix IV of 40 CFR part 257 that trigger corrective action.
• Determines the requirement for proper height of woody and grassy vegetation for slope protection.
• Revises the current regulations to allow the use of CCR in the construction of final cover systems for CCR units closing pursuant to 40 CFR section 257.101 that are closing with waste-in-place.
• Adds a new paragraph to 40 CFR section 257.103 to allow facilities to qualify for the alternative closure provisions based on the continued need to manage non-CCR wastestreams in the unit.

EPA will be accepting written comments on this proposal through Regulations.gov under Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-OLEM-2017-0286 for 45 days after the proposed rule is published in the Federal Register.

Additionally, EPA will hold a hearing on this proposed rule. Additional information about the hearing will be posted in the docket for this proposal and on this website in the near future.

And more, cut and pasted from EPA:

• Frequent questions about the coal ash disposal rule
• Frequent questions about implementing the coal ash disposal rule  
• Frequent questions about beneficial use of coal ash
• Frequent questions about the relationship between the CCR Rule and the Clean Water Act permit requirements

Contact Page for Trump’s White House

Comments: 202-456-1111
Switchboard: 202-456-1414

The Trump regime has published this “Energy Plan.”  WHAT?  Mitt Romney’s “Energy Plan” wasn’t much, and was grossly misguided, but it at least had SOME substance:

Romney’s Energy Plan – much ado about nothing

This is something a 5th grader could put together, nothing but blathering and slapped together code words.  It shows no thought or understanding of energy in the U.S. today.  I mean really, “clean coal” is so dead. During the Bush administration, they put billions in, between tax credits, grants, subsidies at state and federal levels — here’s a DOE announcement from 2006:

Energy Secretary and Secretary of the Treasury Announce the Award of $1 Billion in Tax Credits to Promote Clean Coal Power Generation and Gasification Technologies

The Bush Administration made coal gasification (IGCC) a priority, and even all that lobbying, subsidization, and wishful thinking couldn’t make it happen.  Minnesota’s Excelsior Energy’s Mesaba Project is one example of that abject failure (see also www.camp-site.info).  Delaware’s NRG coal gasification plant is another (note another NRG coal gasification plant proposed for NY went south too).

Meanwhile, existing coal is not economical, that’s why the older plants are being shut down, not anything to do with “Clean Power Plan,” and instead, that there’s a surplus of electricity and coal plants’ production costs a lot more than other available electric generation.  The market says no!  How does Trump think he can trump the market?  And even if he could, how is that in our interest?

Here’s a map of MISO market — note all the blue on these maps — I love using these as wallpaper, a constant reminder:

MISO LMP map

Here’s the PJM market map:

PJM LMP map

And the joint MISO/PJM market map:

Joint MISO/PJM LMP map

Coal cannot compete in the market, even with its outright and embedded regulatory subsidies, even the existing plants.  There’s a glut of electricity, has been for a decade now.  As Xcel’s Ben Fowkes says, recorded in the Seeking Alpha transcript of the XEL Earnings Call, January 31, 2013. 

So I think the economies are in decent shape across all our jurisdictions. Doesn’t necessarily mean it translates to high sales growth. And that’s consistent with our forecast. I mean, we’re not anticipating that we’re going to see a tremendous rebound in sales, even as the economies start to improve. I mean, I think, that’s our new normal, frankly.

So…. drumroll….  Here it is, cut and pasted from the White House site in its entirety (emphasis added in red)(and parenthetical comments):

How clueless can Trump be?  Well, we’re seeing… and it’s unbelievable… UNBELIEVABLE!

The Terrible Mini-Trump of Minnesota — and the Progressive Who’s Running Against Him

This is an odd article.  Lewis is indeed terrible, and doesn’t even live in the district (not a requirement for Congress — that needs to be changed), and Angie Craig is a “progressive” NOT!  They’re both wealthy corporate toadies, with Craig’s flavor distinctly DFL and edging a bit left, but more in the middle, and not nearly far enough to be labeled “progressive” nor to offset the extreme reactionary Republican politics of Lewis.

But what’s most odd about this is the articles’ digging into the politics of oil in Minnesota, of pipelines, and of environmental groups doing the deals that benefit the Koch Bros.  It’s good to see this receive some scrutiny.  From the article:

Environmental issues are big in Minnesota, and one of the biggest polluters in the state is located in the district: the Pine Bend refinery, south of St. Paul, owned by the Koch brothers.

NOTE: PINE BEND/KOCH REFINERY IS LOCATED IN THE 2nd CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT.

The article then starts in on the EPA and the Clean Water Rule, contested by Republicans, and we know well of Republican efforts to eliminate the EPA.  But it also correctly reports that “our” Sen. Amy Klobuchar vote with Republicans against the Clean Water Rule, and only after pressure changed her vote the next time it came up.  There’s nothing green about Sen. Amy Klobuchar!

As for the refinery, here’s how they work, buying out local governments and “environmental” groups — from the article:

The refinery became notorious in the 1990s for toxic pollution, especially of the water. Flint Hills Resources, the Koch brothers’ company that runs the refinery, paid millions of dollars in environmental fines in the 1990s and 2000s. At the same time it launched a major greenwashing effort, which continues today: help for Minnesota ducks, support for Minnesota Public Radio, funding a children’s theater festival in St. Paul. An example of the Koch spin: As part of a 2013 plan to expand the refinery, the company announced that it had signed an agreement with two environmental groups to “cut greenhouse gas emissions at the refinery by about 52,000 metric tons per year.” Cutting emissions—what could be better? Except that the “cut” is “about a fifth of the total expected increase from the project.” That means the net increase in greenhouse-gas emissions will be 260,000 metric tons—into the air south of the Twin Cities—every year.

“… pollution… especially of the water.”  ???  Here’s the deal referenced above, one that anyone challenging pipelines, refineries, water pollution, and air emissions, should be aware of, a deal between “Flint Hills Refinery,” Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy (MCEA) and the Environmental Integrity Project (EIP) (can you believe that name?!?!) where the “environmental” orgs backed off on their air emissions permit challenge:

FHR Pine Bend Settlement Agreement- FINAL SIGNED

This deal was found online, on the EIP website, and then was removed from the page but the link remains (Here’s the link to EIP posting — download HERE NOW before it disappears).  I’d posted this back in 2013:

MCEA deal with the Koch Bros?

A cool $1 million went into a fund to “reduce PM 2.5” through a diesel program, that’s the part that was made public.  Is there other money passed out for this agreement?  And there’s this:

And this:

And this:

And most importantly, the Confidentiality clause!

Were there other deals?  This one was to be kept “confidential.”  (Again, the link to EIP posting — download HERE NOW before it disappears)  From my years of work and association with United Citizens Action Network (U-CAN) against the CapX 2020 transmission project, and knowledge of their isolation in fighting the MinnCan pipeline, which went from the Bakken oil fields to the Pine Bend/Koch refinery, that NO “environmental” groups intervened against that pipeline, and that only MPIRG tried to help U-CAN, it’s hard to believe that there was not a deal of some sort.  The silence was deafening.

To look up the MinnCan pipeline docket, go HERE and search for dockets 05-2003 for the Route Permit and 06-02 for the Certificate of Need (Note the pipeline company is sometimes “Minnesota Pipeline Company” and “Koch Pipeline Company.”).  Note the lack of an Environmental Impact Statement, the due process issues, and NO intervenors in the Certificate of Need, and none of the “environmental” orgs in Minnesota intervened in routing either… what a mess that was.

Do tell — what are the positions of Jason Lewis and Angie Craig on the air and water pollution from the refinery in CD2?  Where are the Minnesota “environmental” organizations on the air and water pollution from the refinery and the Bakken BOOM! oil trains in CD2?

Photo fair use from the Star Tribune