In a Dec. 7 letter (PDF) to Congress, a group of 14 agricultural, mineral and pulp and paper industries write that they “wish to support the inclusion of certain important provisions aimed at encouraging economic growth and reining in excessive regulation.” Among those provisions: one that “would prohibit EPA from using funds to implement, administer or enforce” a set of federally required water quality standards, known as the “numeric nutrient criteria.”

Industry interests have long been critical of the EPA’s draft, arguing that their implementation could add as much to $700 to the average resident’s water bill.

Several studies “indicate the impact of the EPA’s mandates to Florida’s citizens, local governments and businesses will be in the billions,” reads the Dec. 7 letter.

Though the criteria were mandated by the EPA, the agency has agreed to allow the Florida Department of Environmental Protection to implement its own rules in their place. In an interview last week with The Florida Independent, the Department of Environmental Protection’s Drew Bartlett said that recent studies reveal the cost of the state’s version to be somewhere between $50 and $130 million per year. During a River Summit held in Jacksonville last year, one state representative said that the department estimated the federal version to cost somewhere between $5 and $8 billion.

“The cost figures for EPA’s rules were higher,” said Bartlett. “We include so many provisions, certainty and speed by which they get implemented, and we recognize that it won’t cost as much to implement them.”

A separate letter, signed by more agricultural and industry interests, also references cost estimates “in the billions.”

In that second letter, which was published on Dec. 18 in the Jackson County Floridian, the groups also request the inclusion of the Numeric Nutrient Criteria Amendment  — which is part of the Department of the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2012 (H.R. 2584)  — in the final version of the spending package.

That amendment, which is sponsored by Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, R-Miami, would also block funding for implementation of the EPA numeric nutrient criteria. The bill also includes language that stops the attempted expanded regulation of waters under the Clean Water Act during fiscal year 2012.

“Florida’s existing nutrient water quality programs are more effective than the new EPA regulations because the current policies are based on scientific evaluations of the state’s vast, varied and unique ecosystems,” reads the letter. “We respectfully request that you stop EPA from implementing or enforcing its NNC rule for Florida, and allow the experts in Florida to take back control of its water quality programs.”

Florida’s current standard is ineffective, according to many state environmentalists, and hasn’t done enough to ward off harmful algal blooms and fish kills that negatively affect the bottom line in many communities across the state.

The rules will next require legislative ratification and then EPA approval before they can be implemented in the state.

After the House this week passed the Farm Dust Regulation Prevention Act, H.R. 1633, the White House announced that President Barack Obama will veto it if it lands on his desk, citing an administration policy statement that says the bill “purports to address a problem that does not exist.”

The “ambiguously written bill would create high levels of regulatory uncertainty regarding emission control requirements that have been in place for years,” the Obama administration’s statement reads.

But U.S. Reps. Cory Gardner, Scott Tipton and Doug Lamborn, all Republicans from Colorado, co-sponsored the legislation anyway. Gardner claims he is wary of EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson’s insistence that her agency has no designs to regulate farm dust.

“The EPA is notorious for trying to implement regulations through the back door, and that is exactly what is happening with regard to farm dust,” Gardner said. “Despite denials from agency officials saying they don’t regulate farm dust, the Energy and Commerce Committee has demonstrated that these denials are nothing more than semantics. During an October hearing on H.R. 1633, the ‘Farm Dust Regulation Prevention Act,’ a top EPA official acknowledged that the EPA does regulate ‘course particles in the air,’ which includes farm dust. Therefore, the EPA is in fact regulating farm dust.”

Or could it be the polluters who are trying to go through the back door with H.R. 1633?

“The bill is sweepingly overbroad, creating numerous damaging consequences that appear to be unintended but that would cause real harms to Americans,” John Walke, a senior attorney and associate director for the Natural Resources Defense Council, wrote last month. “The result would be increases in harmful soot pollution – not just coarse particulate matter (PM10) but deadly fine particulate matter (PM2.5) – across the country. And not just in rural America but urban and metropolitan areas too. The legislation inexplicably eliminates, weakens or blocks federal Clean Air Act authority over overwhelmingly industrial soot pollution from power plants, manufacturing facilities, mines, other industrial facilities and even the nation’s fleet of motor vehicles …”

The Farm Dust Regulation Prevention Act — an extension of the GOP-led House’s crusade to undermine the nation’s bedrock environmental laws — is spurring its share of confusion.

National Cattlemen’s Beef Association President Bill Donald issued a statement after the vote saying Americans are worried about being fined for moving cattle, tilling a field or driving down a dirt road.

Still, not everyone is buying it.

Roger Johnson, president of the National Farmers Union, said he is “disappointed” the legislation passed the House and that representatives are wasting taxpayer time and money.

“As EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson has repeatedly said, both verbally and in writing to members of Congress, the EPA is not proposing to revise farm dust regulations,” he said yesterday. “Despite this assurance, misinformation regarding potential dust regulation continues to spread across the country, creating unnecessary concern for farmers and ranchers. Congress should stop politicizing this issue and move on to passing meaningful legislation to help farmers, ranchers and rural communities.”

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The EPA seal (Photo: sentryjournal.com)

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency today announced that it had issued Consent Agreements and Final Orders against 25 entities throughout the Southeast for violations of the Clean Water Act. Three Florida wastewater utilities were also penalized, for improperly disposing of sewage sludge.

As part of the settlements, the responsible parties have agreed to pay $184,317 in civil penalties, and spend  an additional $284,791 to come into compliance.

Ten entities were cited for alleged stormwater-related violations of the Clean Water Act, which are a leading cause of impairment to the nearly 40 percent of water bodies nationwide which are not currently meeting water quality standards.

Wastewater utilities in 14 municipalities, including Florida, were also penalized for “failing to provide biosolids reports and/or otherwise failing to comply with Section 503 of the CWA covering requirements for land disposal of sewage sludge.” Plantation, Lake City and Starke were each fined $900 for their failure to comply.

“By taking these enforcement actions, we are sending a strong message about the importance of protecting rivers, lakes and streams,” said EPA Regional Administrator Gwen Keyes Fleming in a press release. “By addressing the violations noted in our inspections, these entities will prevent millions of pounds of pollution from entering the environment, in addition to protecting the quality of life for families across the Southeast.”

Pollutants of concern include nutrients, sediment, oil and grease, chemicals and metals. When left uncontrolled, water pollution can deplete needed oxygen and/or otherwise result in the destruction of aquatic habitats, as well as the fish and wildlife that depend on them. Water pollution can also contaminate food, drinking water supplies and recreational waterways, and thereby pose a threat to public health.

A coalition of environmental groups, including the St. Johns Riverkeeper and Sierra Club, recently filed a petition against a set of water standards recently drafted by the state Department of Environmental Protection. The groups allege that the standards are not strong enough to comply with the Clean Water Act, since they allow waterways to further degrade before they are cleaned up.

The Environmental Protection Agency has come under fire for its decision to allow the state of Florida to write its own water pollution rules (known as “numeric nutrient criteria”). EPA Regional Administrator Gwendolyn Keyes Fleming is now firing back, writing that the Agency commends the state Department of Environmental Protection for its draft of a proposed standard.

The EPA seal (Pic via sentryjournal.com)

A host of environmental groups filed suit in 2008, seeking to compel the EPA to implement a strict set of water pollution standards in Florida, arguing that the state was in violation of the Clean Water Act. In 2009, following what many have deemed years of stalling on the part of the state department, the EPA agreed to implement its criteria.

Industry leaders and lawmakers have blasted the EPA’s mandate, arguing that the state of Florida should implement its own standards, without federal intervention. The state did have its chance, however: As early as 1998, the EPA told the state to develop its own standards.

Fast-forward to 2011, and the state is finally developing its own criteria — with the approval of the EPA.

A recent St. Petersburg Times editorial accused the EPA of rewarding Florida “for dragging its feet on cleaning up dirty waters,” a sentiment shared by environmentalists who have championed tougher water standards in the state. Not so, says the EPA’s Keyes Fleming, in a response to the editorial published today.

“The Clean Water Act envisions — and the EPA agrees — that states should have the primary role in establishing and implementing water quality standards for their waters, allowing them to innovate and respond to local water quality needs,” she writes. “These standards must meet the requirements of the act, but they need not be identical to standards the EPA would adopt on its own. The FDEP’s proposed standards, in our judgment, meet this test.”

According to Keyes Fleming, the Florida standards don’t mirror every aspect of the federal standards, but they come awfully close.

“The FDEP’s proposed criteria for estuaries are based on methodologies similar to what the EPA has been using in developing its own criteria,” she writes. “The FDEP’s numeric criteria for streams are very close to the EPA’s criteria but will be applied in combination with biological information. Although the EPA did not adopt this approach, we believe it is reasonable to factor in site-specific information.”

Florida currently relies on a narrative water quality standard, the wording of which (.pdf) has been criticized as too vague to be effective. The rule reads: ”In no case shall nutrient concentrations of a body of water be altered so as to cause an imbalance in natural populations of aquatic flora or fauna.”

Stricter criteria would specifically govern the amounts of phosphorus and nitrogen present in state waterways, and should lessen the amount of fish kills and large-scale algal blooms across Florida.

According to a new report published by Common Cause, a nonprofit government watchdog group, Rep. John Mica, R-Winter Park, is one of the top 100 recipients of campaign funds from the natural gas industry.

As the study reports, natural gas interests have spent “more than $747 million during a 10-year campaign … to avoid government regulation of hydraulic ‘fracking,’ a fast-growing and environmentally risky process” that aims to tap underground gas reserves.

The toxic chemicals commonly used during fracking procedures can enter an area’s underground drinking water supply or later be dumped as wastewater into waterways around the country.

“A faction of the natural gas industry has directed more than $20 million to the campaigns of current members of Congress,” reads the report, “and put $726 million into lobbying aimed at shielding itself from oversight. ”

Mica, number 89 on the list of top contributors, received a total of $67,600 from natural gas interests. The vast majority of that ($57,500) came from PACs, while $10,100 came from individuals working for the industry.

According to the report, many of the natural gas industry’s political donations favor lawmakers, like Mica, who supported the 2005 Energy Policy Act, which exempted fracking from regulations under the Safe Drinking Act. A resolution that aims to repeal that exemption (and thus require the contents of fracking fluids to be publicly disclosed) was recently introduced in the House, by Rep. Diana DeGette, D-Co. The resolution has 63 co-sponsors, Mica not among them.

“Players in this industry have pumped cash into Congress in the same way they pump toxic chemicals into underground rock formations to free trapped gas,” said Common Cause President Bob Edgar in a press release. “And as fracking for gas releases toxic chemicals into groundwater and streams, the industry’s political fracking for support is toxic to efforts for a cleaner environment and relief from our dependence on fossil fuels.”

The Environmental Protection Agency is slated to publish new findings on the potential dangers of fracking in 2012. The forthcoming report, which could shape public opinion about the practice, is likely an incentive for the industry to pump more money into campaigns before the New Year.

ProPublica reports:

A pair of environmental monitoring wells drilled deep into an aquifer in Pavillion, Wyo., contain high levels of cancer-causing compounds and at least one chemical commonly used in hydraulic fracturing, according to new water test results released yesterday by the Environmental Protection Agency.

The findings are consistent with water samples the EPA has collected from at least 42 homes in the area since 2008, when ProPublica began reporting on foul water and health concerns in Pavillion and the agency started investigating reports of contamination there.

Last year – after warning residents not to drink or cook with the water and to ventilate their homes when they showered — the EPA drilled the monitoring wells to get a more precise picture of the extent of the contamination.

The Pavillion area has been drilled extensively for natural gas over the last two decades and is home to hundreds of gas wells. Residents have alleged for nearly a decade that the drilling — and hydraulic fracturing in particular — has caused their water to turn black and smell like gasoline. Some residents say they suffer neurological impairment, loss of smell, and nerve pain they associate with exposure to pollutants.

While the EPA has not claimed certainty that the contamination came from fracking at this point, the presence of 2-Butoxyethanol (2-BE), a chemical used in fracking, and the lack of contamination with nitrates and fertilizers that would indicate an agricultural source, suggest a link.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently announced that next year it will require oil and gas companies to publicly disclose the release of hydrogen sulfide (H2S) gas, which can be deadly in high enough concentrations.

The industry has been exempt from divulging the release of H2S to the federal Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) for 17 years. The removal of the exemption was first published in the Federal Registry in October and finalized last week. Conservation groups praised the decision.

“[H2S] may leak from drill rigs and refineries, but is often also deliberately burned off, exposing nearby communities to its harmful effects,” the environmental group Earthworks stated in a press release.

Hydrogen sulfide, which occurs naturally in oil and gas drilling, can sicken workers and community members who are exposed to high enough concentrations of the gas.

“Common symptoms of exposure to long-term, low levels of hydrogen sulfide include headache, skin complications, respiratory and mucous membrane irritation, respiratory soft tissue damage and degeneration, confusion, impairment of verbal recall, memory loss, and prolonged reaction time,” Earthworks warns. “Exposure to high concentrations can cause unconsciousness and can be fatal.”

The gas was a hot topic on Colorado’s Western Slope this summer when state regulators were accused of misleading the public concerning the release of H2S at several Noble Energy natural gas wells on the Roan Plateau in 2009.

Regulators for the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC) were accused of not being totally forthright on the issue of H2S release at Noble wells in 2009 until a whistleblower came forward.

Silt Mesa resident Carl McWilliams was a contractor for Noble when he became sick—an incident that led to a U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) fine. Another contractor died of what the coroner determined was a heart attack unrelated to H2S emissions, but McWilliams disputes that conclusion and now says he’s been ostracized by the industry.

The COGCC found that four Noble wells had H2S levels greater than 100 parts per million (PPM) in 2009, and the agency in September posted its findings on the COGCC website (pdf). In a separate fact sheet (pdf), the COGCC states that levels of between 200 and 300 PPM can lead to “marked conjunctivitis and respiratory tract irritation after 1 hour of exposure.” Levels higher than 500 PPM can lead to loss of consciousness and possibly death in 30 minutes to 1 hour.”

“Our initial priority, obviously, was to look at current circumstances and to ensure that there were not significant risks to public health, safety or welfare, and I think we satisfied ourselves that there is not,” COGCC director David Neslin told the Colorado Independent in September.

The EPA is engaged in a rulemaking process on hydraulic fracturing emissions, which has prompted threats of litigation from states such as North Dakota, where a major drilling boom is going on in the Bakken Shale.

Community activists in Colorado and elsewhere in the nation say the EPA must do more to regulate the industry as domestic oil and gas production steadily increases in areas with more dense populations than the Western Slope of Colorado. Groups around Colorado accuse local and state regulators of dropping the ball on issues ranging from air emissions to water quality to setbacks for rigs near homes, businesses and public buildings.

New Mexico is considering reversing former Gov. Richardson’s cap and trade program on carbon dioxide emissions because the upfront costs are proving too much to bear.

Deputy Secretary of the state’s Environment Department, Butch Tongate, testified before the Environmental Improvement Board to explain why New Mexico alone cannot combat pollution, and why efforts to curb toxins should be a national and global priority.

From the AP:

“The cap-and-trade program does not come free. It requires significant investment from industry as well as the state and it will have an impact on every citizen of the state,” he said.

While he acknowledged not being an economic expert, Tongate pointed to the 80,000 New Mexico households that received federal assistance to pay their energy bills in 2009. He also said nearly 20 percent of New Mexicans live below the federal poverty level.

“With the cap-and-trade rules and increases in energy and transportation costs, the poorest people of the state will be required to pay higher bills and that’s equivalent to a regressive tax,” Tongate said.

The arguments over whether New Mexico should regulate greenhouse gases haven’t changed since the debate first began nearly three years ago. Approval of the regulations last year followed battles before the state’s highest court and days of testimony by economists, climate experts and the public.

And while federal greenhouse measures have been a divisive issue among pundits and the business community community, influential figures in New Mexico have also griped about Washington intervention on environmental matters.

On Friday Navajo Nation President Ben Shelly criticized the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s announcement that it would pressure a coal-fired plant that services and employs tribal members.

Also from the AP:

Shelly says in a letter to the EPA that he supports the state of New Mexico and Public Service Company of New Mexico in their efforts to appeal the agency’s decision.

New Mexico contends the agency infringed on its ability to adopt its own plan for curbing haze-causing pollution at the San Juan Generating Station.

Shelly describes the EPA’s mandate as “enormously burdensome.” He accuses the agency of ignoring the culture, geography and economics of the Four Corners region.

And yesterday, a public health scare  in La Bajada, a roughly 40-resident area in the center of Santa Fe county,* was caused over detection of the bacterial strain E.Coli in the city’s water supply. The Environment Department issued a “boil water advisory,” and made specific mention of the risk children and the elderly have in growing ill from the water.

In 2010, a New Mexican article cited a scientific report that Santa Fe water exceeded EPA limits on contaminants on numerous occasions over a multi-year period.

*This post as been updated to clarify the specific area within Sante Fe county affected by the E. Coli detection

A holding pond for fracking fluids in Texas.

“The final study plan looks at the full cycle of water in hydraulic fracturing, from the acquisition of the water, through the mixing of chemicals and actual fracturing, to the post-fracturing stage, including the management of flowback and produced or used water as well as its ultimate treatment and disposal,” EPA officials said in a press release. “Earlier this year, EPA announced its selection of locations for five retrospective and two prospective case studies.”

One of those retrospective study areas is in Colorado – a state where new fracking regulations are being drafted and an independent review recently recommended a more comprehensive look at water resources available for fracking.

The process, which can use up to 1 million gallons of water per frack job, also includes sand and frequently undisclosed chemical additives. Fracking fluids are injected under higher pressure deep into oil and gas wells to fracture tight sand and rock and free up more gas or oil. Critics of the process say it can lead to groundwater contamination.

The EPA’s “Plan to Study the Potential Impacts of Hydraulic Fracturing on Drinking Water Resources (pdf)” is now available on the agency’s website. Initial EPA findings will be released to the public in 2012, although the final report won’t be ready until 2014.

U.S. Rep. Maurice Hinchey, D-N.Y., wrote the legislation to authorize the study and also is a co-sponsor, with Colorado Reps. Diana DeGette and Jared Polis, of the Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals (FRAC) Act. His district in New York includes the heavily drilled Marcellus Shale.

“I applaud the EPA for releasing a final research plan for its study on hydraulic fracturing,” Hinchey said in a prepared statement. “I wrote the legislative language that initiated this study and, as I had intended, the final study will look at the full cycle of water used in the hydraulic fracturing process.

“Our country is in the middle of shale gas rush, but unbiased, scientific research into hydraulic fracturing is almost non-existent. This EPA study will provide invaluable information to the public and policy makers interested in understanding the impact of hydraulic fracturing on our water resources.”

An article released yesterday in a special agri-business edition of Highlands Today dubs a set of federally mandated water pollution standards “way too extreme for Florida.” The article is the latest in a long series of critiques of the EPA’s decision to implement its “numeric nutrient criteria,” rules that would help thwart algal blooms and fish kills in Florida waterways.

Via Highlands Today:

Every reasonable person is willing to sacrifice to protect the water quality in our Florida rivers and lakes. It all falls apart, though, when extreme measures threaten to break the bank with too many people in our state, and that’s exactly what’s going on with the Environmental Protection Agency’s idea on “numeric nutrient criteria” regulations being implemented in March.

Numeric nutrient criteria is a fancy way of saying that the EPA has come up with convoluted, complicated and unfair demands on water quality standards. It’s supposedly to protect against algae blooms and red tides.

The article also contends that attempts to thwart algal blooms with the EPA rules would be akin to “killing a fly with a bazooka,” and the regulations would “most likely put some people out of business.”

Though the EPA has contended in the past that the agricultural industry won’t be affected by the rules, industry interests remain strongly opposed.

Recently, the Department of Agriculture’s Rich Budell outlined his department’s objections to the clean water rules, arguing that any assertions that ag. wouldn’t be affected are “naive at best.” The Highlands Today piece takes those assertions a step further — arguing that the criteria will lead to a spike in the cost of food: “Consumers are much more likely to see food prices climb as agricultural operators and producers are forced to shell out huge amounts of money to abide by these regulations.”

Currently, the state Department of Environmental Protection is drawing up its own set of rules which, if they are approved, will be implemented in place of the EPA’s criteria.