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The concept of cap and trade took another hit recently with disclosures that hackers had been able to get into the accounts of several holders of carbon emissions allowances in Europe and steal some of the account balance. This, along with the continued snowstorm in Washington, D.C. seems to fill those opposing a federal comprehensive […]

In a welcome move, EPA recently took polluters to task for their attempt to downplay the risks to human health and the environment from the Portland Harbor superfund site along the Willamette River in Portland, Oregon (h/t Oregonian for noting the EPA action). As part of the cleanup effort for the site, the polluters, known […]

After laying dormant for decades, industries’ abuse of EPA’s permissive confidential business information program (CBI) is finally getting some serious attention. An investigation in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, and more recently articles in the Washington Post and Risk Policy Report; a report by the Environmental Working Group; and posts by Richard Denison at EDF, are […]

Cross-posted from Legal Planet. The US Fish and Wildlife Service has completed its review of the status of the cute little American pika. The verdict is good news for the pika, at least as far as it goes and if FWS is right about the science. FWS has decided that the pika is not endangered […]

Cross-posted from Legal Planet. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has existed since 1970, but it has never had the direct imprimatur of Congress. According to Congressional Daily, Rep. Bart Gordon (D-TN), chair of the House Committee on Science and Technology has announced that an organic act for NOAA is one of his committee’s priorities […]

Sue Sturgis has a nifty post at Facing South checking in on the doings of members of congress who represent states or districts that have cases of groundwater pollution from coal ash sites. Writes Sturgis: On July 9, 2007, EPA’s Office of Solid Waste published a report titled “Coal Combustion Damage Case Assessments” pdf documenting […]

This post is the fourth in a series on the new CPR report Obama’s Regulators: A First-Year Report Card. During the Bush Administration, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) simply fell further and further behind in terms of achieving its regulatory mission of protecting people from unsafe drugs, medical devices and food. A series of […]

Senator Murkowski’s proposal to disapprove EPA’s scientifically and legally justified finding that greenhouse gases endanger the public health and welfare would strip the federal government of its primary legal mechanism for addressing catastrophic climate change. If Congress does not think the Clean Air Act (CAA) is the best mechanism for regulating greenhouse gases, it should […]

This post is the third in a series on the new CPR report Obama’s Regulators: A First-Year Report Card. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is the biggest and most powerful of the protector agencies. Consequently, it has also become the agency that was most decimated by regulatory opponents in recent decades. Thus, when President Obama […]