As the Obama administration increases approvals of deepwater oil drilling permits in the Gulf of Mexico, environmental advocates have seen little meaningful increase in the transparency of the permitting process. A lack of transparency in the regulatory process was identified as a contributing factor in BP's Deepwater Horizon oil spill disaster and the highly criticized response effort.
"Emergency plans for natural gas pipelines are effectively withheld from the public and industry watchdogs because the U.S. government's pipeline safety agency itself doesn't have copies. Because the government doesn't have the plans, the public can't use the nation's open records law to request them...Officials in San Bruno and San Mateo County said PG&E didn't share its emergency plan for the pipeline with their emergency response agencies prior to the disaster. They said it is information they'd like to have."
Sen. Lautenberg (D-NJ) introduced the Secure Water Facilities Act and the Secure Chemical Facilities Act, which will "close a gap that leaves millions of families vulnerable to an attack on America's chemical plants and water treatment facilities." According to Lautenberg, this legislation will "ensure a thorough review of risk, and help us move toward more secure plants and safer communities."
Oil companies drilling off the coast of Texas at depths far greater than BP's Deepwater Horizon are relying on similarly inadequate emergency response plans. Evidently, "the Minerals Management Service has not increased its scrutiny when companies sought to drill at extreme depths."
Elected officials and emergency responders say they’re being kept in the dark about rail shipments of hazardous cargo. "Regulations issued last year give the railroads too much control over secret rail routing decisions that impact public safety," according to one emergency response official.
EPA will collect information from electric utilities on the structural integrity of their coal ash impoundments and conduct on-site assessments. According to EPA, "The assessment and analysis of all such units located at electric utilities in the U.S. will be compiled in a report and made available to the public." The actions are in response to the 2008 coal ash spill in Tennessee.
Sen. Frank R. Lautenberg (D-NJ) marked the 25th anniversary of the Bhopal gas leak disaster by calling for stronger security measures at chemical plants across the country. Lautenberg is currently working on a bill to ensure strong protections are in place to secure chemical facilities and to prevent chemical disasters or attacks within the United States.
Dec. 3 marks the 25th anniversary of the most catastrophic industrial accident in history: the leak of poisonous gas from a pesticide plant in the Indian city of Bhopal. Twenty-five years after the tragedy, much progress has been made, but much remains to be done to provide a minimum level of protection against chemical releases.
In response to oversecrecy during the investigation of a fatal chemical plant accident, Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) introduced legislation that would prevent inappropriate use of federal secrecy laws.
According to the Washington Post, the EPA "informed BP officials...that the company has 24 hours to choose a less-toxic form of chemical dispersants to break up its oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico...and must apply the new form of dispersants within 72 hours of submitting the list of alternatives." Of course, there's still a lot of information we don't know about these chemicals...
The EPA launched a new "Rulemaking Gateway" to improve the public's ability to search, understand, and comment on the rules being considered by the agency. This new website complements the government-wide www.regulations.gov, which recently was redesigned.
A report released in November 2008 by the NRDC Health Program documents many examples of Bush Administration budget cuts to key data collection programs that monitor hazardous pollutants in our air, water, food, and even our bodies.