North and South Carolina have seen a steady increase in swine production over the last 15 years. In North Carolina alone, swine production generates approximately a quarter of the state’s gross farm receipts. The presence of so many large-scale pig farms leads to the problem of proper animal waste disposal.

The most common practice in the Carolinas is storing animal waste in anaerobic lagoons. They are primarily used to concentrate and passively treat urine and feces but because of the widespread use of this practice, the environmental impact could be quite severe. Conflicting reports implicate lagoon sites to be responsible for high emission rates of nitrogen gas and volatized ammonia.

A team of ARS-USDA scientistsexamined a series of commercial, anaerobic, swine wastewater lagoons in North and South Carolina for genes involved in the nitrogen cycling process. Nitrification and denitrification are the parts of the process responsible for turning ammonia into nitrogen gas. After analyzing eight lagoons and measuring the abundance of four nitrogen cycling genes, researchers concluded that the denitrifying and nitrifying organisms were not active despite there being a thriving amount. Acidification and eutrophication of the surrounding ecosystem could be the result of prolonged exposure to volatilized ammonia.

Gov. Mark Dayton signed legislation Thursday that hands the responsibility for environmental assessments to the corporations pushing the projects, drawing sharp criticism from environmentalists and giving a solid victory to the state’s business community.

That put the DFL governor in the unusual position of being praised by the likes of Twin Metals Minnesota, which is undertaking a $2 billion mining operation in northeastern Minnesota, while getting skewered by the environmental groups that are a longstanding part of his party’s base.

EPA: Cleaning Up Our Land, Water and Air [pdf]
http://www.epa.gov/cleanup/

The Environmental Protection Agency has been cleaning up the nation’s land, water and air for four decades, and there’s still much work to be done. This homepage provides information about cleanups around the country, what citizens can do to help, and the EPA’s long-term stewardship programs. On the homepage, visitors can use a clickable map to learn about cleanup
information by EPA region or program. Moving on, visitors can also read about available cleanup grants and funding opportunities in different communities. The site also contains a glossary of EPA terms, and helpful
cleanup publications, such as newsletters, “FedFacs” newsletters, and waste management documents that cover Native American reservations. The site is
rounded out by an “Other Publications” area that covers brownfields and the latest work on Superfund sites. [KMG]

Madame Chair, Ranking Member Inhofe, and Members of the Committee: Thank you for inviting me to testify about President Obama’s Fiscal Year 2012 budget request for the Environmental Protection Agency.

Congress enacted the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and America’s other bedrock environmental protection laws on a broadly bipartisan basis.  It did so to protect American children and adults from pollution that otherwise would make their lives shorter, less healthy, and less prosperous.  It did so to make the air and drinking water in America’s communities clean enough to attract new employers.  It did so to enable America’s local governments to revitalize abandoned and polluted industrial sites.  It did so to safeguard the pastime of America’s forty million anglers.  It did so to protect the farms whose irrigation makes up a third of America’s surface freshwater withdrawals.  And it did so to preserve the livelihoods of fishermen in American great waters such as the Chesapeake Bay and the Gulf of Mexico.

Congress gave EPA the responsibility of implementing and enforcing those laws.  And, each year, Congress appropriates the money that makes EPA’s implementation and enforcement work possible.
If Congress ever gutted that funding, then EPA would be unable to implement or enforce the laws that protect Americans’ health, livelihoods, and pastimes.  Big polluters would flout legal restrictions on dumping contaminants into the air, into rivers, and onto the ground.  Toxic plumes already underground would reach drinking water supplies, because ongoing work to contain them would stop.  There would be no EPA grant money to fix or replace broken water treatment systems.  And the standards that EPA is set to establish for harmful air pollutants from smokestacks and tailpipes would remain missing from a population of sources that is not static but growing.

So if Congress slashed EPA’s funding, concentrations of harmful pollution would increase from current levels in the places Americans live, work, go to school, fish, hike, and hunt.  The result would be more asthma attacks, more missed school and work days, more heart attacks, more cancer cases, more premature deaths, and more polluted waters.

Needless to say, then, I fervently request and deeply appreciate continued bipartisan support in Congress for funding the essential work that keeps American children and adults safe from uncontrolled amounts of harmful pollution being dumped into the water they drink and the air they breathe.

President Obama believes that our federal government must spend less money.  Decreasing federal spending is no longer just a prudent choice; it is now an unavoidable necessity.  Accordingly, the President has proposed to cut EPA’s annual budget nearly thirteen percent from its current level.

That cut goes beyond eliminating redundancies.  We have made difficult, even painful, choices.  We have done so, however, in a careful way that preserves EPA’s ability to carry out its core responsibilities to protect the health and wellbeing of America’s children, adults, and communities.

You have been reviewing the budget request for more than two weeks now, so I will not march through all its details.  Rather, I will provide just a few examples of the difficult choices we have made while preserving fundamental safeguards.

This request provides 2.5 billion dollars, a decrease of 947 million, for the Clean Water and Drinking Water State Revolving Funds.  Future-year budgets for the SRFs will adjust, taking into account repayments.  EPA, the states, and community water systems will build on past successes while working toward the Fiscal Year 2012 goal of ensuring that over 90 percent of the population served by community water systems receives drinking water that meets all applicable health standards.

This budget requests an additional 6.4 million dollars to conduct integrated pilot projects in several communities, including disadvantaged ones, to evaluate and reduce risks from toxic air pollution through regulatory, enforcement, and voluntary efforts.  An additional 3.7 million dollars will improve our monitoring of toxic air toxic pollution and our dissemination of that data to state, local and tribal governments, and to the public.

The budget contains 350 million dollars for programs and projects strategically chosen to target the most significant environmental problems in the Great Lakes ecosystem.  That represents a cut of 125 million dollars from Fiscal Year 2010, which was the first year of the initiative.  We will implement the most important projects for Great Lakes Restoration and achieve visible results.

With this budget’s 16 million dollar investment in the Enhancing Chemical Safety Initiative, we will take action to reduce chemical risks, increase the pace of chemical hazard assessments, and provide the public with greater access to information on toxic chemicals.  We will use the funds to implement chemical risk reduction steps that address impacts on children’s health and on disadvantaged, low-income, and indigenous populations.

Thank you, Madame Chair.  I look forward to the Committee’s questions.

This budget proposal represents about a 13 percent decrease from the FY 2010 budget of $10.3 billion.

“As millions of families are cutting back and spending less, they expect the same good fiscal sense out of their government. That is why this budget reflects the tough choices needed for our nation’s short- and long-term fiscal health – and allows EPA to maintain its fundamental mission of protecting human health and the environment,” said EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson. “This budget focuses our resources on the most urgent health and environmental challenges we face. Though it includes significant cuts, it provides EPA with what we need to fundamentally protect the health of the American people.”

Some key 2012 budget initiatives include:

$350 million for projects strategically chosen to target the most significant threats to people’s health in the Great Lakes ecosystem, a $125 million decrease from FY 2010, the first year of the initiative.

$2.5 billion–a decrease of $947 million– combined for the Clean Water and Drinking Water State Revolving Funds (SRFs).  EPA will continue to work with states and communities to enhance their capacity to provide clean water and safe drinking water to Americans. Federal dollars provided through SRFs will help spur efficient system-wide planning and ongoing management of sustainable water infrastructure.

$1.2 billion for the Superfund program to support cleanup at hazardous waste sites that addresses human health and environmental hazards at the nation’s highest priority sites.  While EPA will be exploring efficiencies in the program, the $70 million reduction to Superfund programs will slow the pace of new projects and completion of projects.

$27.5 million increase in enforcement and compliance, allowing for critical investments to increase efficiencies and streamline enforcement by using the latest e-reporting and monitoring tools. EPA will increase oversight and inspections at high risk chemical and oil facilities in order to protect Americans’ health.

$16.1 million more to reduce chemical risks, increase the pace of chemical hazard assessments, and provide the public with greater access to chemical information so they can make better informed decisions about their health. Learning more about these chemicals will help protect Americans from potential threats to their health.

$1.2 billion for state and tribal grants — an overall increase of $84.9 million over FY 2010. This funding will help communities take steps to meet the pollution standards EPA has developed under the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act.

An additional $46 million for regulatory efforts to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution and implement GHG reporting requirements under the Clean Air Act.  This includes $25 million for states and $5 million for EPA to address GHGs in Clean Air Act permitting activities.

$67.4 million to support EPA’s efforts to clean up America’s great water bodies, specifically in the Chesapeake Bay. This water body serves as an economic engine for an entire region of the country, and millions of Americans rely on it for access to clean, safe water. Investing in these waters will help local economies and protect Americans’ health.

$584 million to support research and innovation into new and emerging environmental science. This includes a $24.7 million increase to Science to Achieve Results (STAR) grants to ensure that EPA is using the best science to protect the air we breathe, the water we drink and the land we build our communities on. EPA’s research program is being restructured to ensure that scientific work is conducted more efficiently and effectively.

For more information on EPA’s proposed FY2012 budget: http://www.epa.gov/planandbudget/annualplan/fy2012.html

It can take a simple act like sorting your recyclables out of your trash to personally become a better steward to the environment; it can take years for the government to encourage the country as a whole do the same.

While many environmentalists lament the lethargic manner in which the government seems to pursue sweeping policy changes like a comprehensive climate change bill, the fact is that thousands of government employees at dozens of agencies and offices across the federal government have to weigh in before a new policy can become law.

The process usually begins when an independent federal agency, like the EPA or NOAA, produces research indicating an environmental risk or need. A department within the executive branch, such as CEQ or OECC, will devise a new policy to address the risk or need identified, and advise the President on its necessity.

Once the President gives the go-ahead, people within his administration begin lobbying members of Congress to propose legislation adopting the policy (unless an enterprising member of Congress has already taken the initiative to propose legislation without the President’s urging).

Confused yet? Thought so. Ease your bewilderment with this rundown of the key federal bodies that play a role in crafting America’s environmental policies.

Universalism and Ethical Values for the Environment (PDF)
Source: United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)

The report discusses the extent to which universal values can be agreed upon, exemplified by an empirical analysis of values contained implicitly and explicitly in UN treaties and international statements on the environment. The texts examined include the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), the Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage (WHC), the United Nation’s Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), The Kyoto Protocol, The Earth Charter, The Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), and the Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights (UDBHR). Some of the ethical values found in the texts include: human rights, sustainability, equity, common but differentiated responsibilities, precaution, participation, vulnerability, state sovereignty, peace and solidarity.

This report also examines whether there are universal environmental values, and how interpretations of the concept of “universalism” affect future policy options for addressing common environmental challenges. This question is central to current discussions on the ethics of climate change and of alternative energy technologies, as well as to environmental ethics. If we can agree upon international values such as principles of environmental ethics, then we can include these principles into economic models in order to develop policy that may better protect these values.

Hat tip: UN Pulse

Critical Materials Strategy (PDF)

Source:  U.S. Department of Energy

This report examines the role of rare earth metals and other materials in the clean energy economy. It was prepared by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) based on data collected and research performed during 2010. Its main conclusions include:

• Several clean energy technologies—including wind turbines, electric vehicles, photovoltaic cells and fluorescent lighting—use materials at risk of supply disruptions in the short term. Those risks will generally decrease in the medium and long term.
• Clean energy technologies currently constitute about 20 percent of global consumption of critical materials. As clean energy technologies are deployed more widely in the decades ahead, their share of global consumption of critical materials will likely grow.
• Of the materials analyzed, five rare earth metals (dysprosium, neodymium, terbium, europium and yttrium), as well as indium, are assessed as most critical in the short term. For this purpose, “criticality” is a measure that combines importance to the clean energy economy and risk of supply disruption.
• Sound policies and strategic investments can reduce the risk of supply disruptions, especially in the medium and long term.

Data with respect to many of the issues considered in this report are sparse

The 112th Congress officially kicks off at noon today, and with new GOP leadership in the House and a slimmed down Democratic advantage in the Senate, it’s clear that legislation of energy and environmental issues will be taking a new course.

Here’s a roundup of where things stand on energy and environment.