Hearing sees tribal wishes clash with resource needs: “The House Natural Resources Committee
yesterday grappled with the prospect of destroying a Native American holy site in Arizona to mine copper, a metal that is key to the energy transition. The debate centered around committee Chairman Raúl Grijalva's (D-Ariz.) H.R. 1884, which would cancel a
land swap Congress approved in 2014 that was meant to facilitate the proposed Resolution Copper mine. Republicans on the panel stressed the importance of stimulating local economies and highlighted the red industrial metal's use in electric vehicles. Democrats
said copper mining shouldn't come at the cost of diminishing Western water resources or decimating a place central to the Apache religion. "Since 2015, I've been introducing the 'Save Oak Flat Act' to uphold what I believe is essential: Indigenous people's
rights to protect the lands that many tribes in Arizona and outside of Arizona consider sacred," Grijalva said at the subcommittee hearing. The land exchange authorizes Anglo-Australian miners Rio Tinto PLC and BHP Group Ltd. to take ownership of 2,422 acres
in the Tonto National Forest in exchange for 5,344 acres elsewhere in Arizona. The 132,000-ton deposit of raw ore at the proposed Resolution Copper mine lies more than a mile below Oak Flat, an Emory oak grove important to the San Carlos Apache Tribe's religious
traditions. Members of Arizona's congressional delegation inserted a rider in the fiscal 2015 National Defense Authorization Act mandating the land swap. Grijalva took issue with how the land exchange became law because the measure didn't have the votes to
pass as a stand-alone bill. The real estate transaction was nearly finalized when the Biden administration withdrew the mine's environmental review last month, effectively delaying the swap. Mila Besich, mayor of Superior, Ariz., testified against Grijalva's
bill because she said the traditional mining town's opportunity for economic growth is tied to the land exchange.”
[E&E News, 4/14/21]
https://bit.ly/3mLL6xi
Final hearing on NEPA changes headed to court this month: “SELC is preparing for a federal
showdown on April 21 to determine the fate of the Trump administration’s gutting of the National Environmental Policy Act. It is expected to be the final hearing on a case that has spanned two presidential administrations and included years of planning and
preparation by SELC attorneys tasked with defending the Act, often called the “Magna Carta” of environmental laws. In the waning months of the Trump administration, officials made good on a campaign pledge to industry executives and lobbyists by slashing the
Act’s protections and limiting a community’s ability to question large projects. The Act has been a key tool for protecting Black and Brown communities from unwanted and damaging projects foisted upon them, like a high-pressure petroleum pipeline that risks
drinking water in Memphis, and a highway expansion sited through a historic Black community outside of Charleston to ease traffic congestion caused by expanding suburbs. “NEPA protects vulnerable communities from the environmental inequities and racism they
have suffered too often and too long,” said Kym Hunter, an SELC senior attorney. “The Trump rule makes it harder – or in some cases nearly impossible – for those communities to be meaningfully included in the process.” SELC filed a lawsuit in July claiming
the NEPA changes were illegal because the Trump administration broke the law to change the law. The lawsuit seeks to throw out the Trump administration changes and to restore the Act’s safeguards. With Trump’s defeat, the lawsuit now must be handled by the
Biden administration. That could make the impending legal clash unusual because Biden lawyers don’t support the Trump changes, writing in a filing they have “substantial and legitimate concerns with the 2020 Rule.’”
[SELC, 4/13/21]
https://bit.ly/3mOcr1L
Republicans warn about slippery slope on pipelines: “House Republicans warned yesterday
that motivations behind the White House's action to cancel the controversial Keystone XL pipeline have the potential to affect other pipeline networks caught in the midst of environmental backlash. During a virtual forum yesterday, Energy and Commerce Republicans
pointed to Enbridge Inc.'s Line 5, which crosses under the Straits of Mackinac in the Great Lakes. "Remember, Keystone is but one of many pipeline projects under the microscope," said Rep. David McKinley (R-W.Va.), ranking member of the Environment and Climate
Change Subcommittee. "Others like the Dakota Access pipeline, Mountain Valley pipeline and Line 5 in Michigan also face an uncertain future." Line 5 carries up to 23 million gallons of oil and natural gas liquids per day from Superior, Wis., to Sarnia, Ontario,
and has operated for decades. But a structural problem last year made it vulnerable to critics. Line 5 drew heightened attention after the company discovered an anchor support had shifted deep below the water surface. The pipeline was shut down while Enbridge
ensured its integrity. Michigan Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer directed Enbridge to shut down the pipeline by the middle of May over alleged failures to meet public easement permit requirements. The company has denied any wrongdoing and plans to continue
operations, saying the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration has allowed the conduit to stay online. Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Mich.) was among 14 House Republicans who pressed the White House last month against giving in to pressure from environmental
groups. They pointed to the pipeline's economic contributions. "It's important to let the American people know what's at stake here," Walberg said yesterday. "This isn't politics. This is life.’”
[E&E News, 4/14/21]
https://bit.ly/3wXbitu
What Comes Next for ANWR?: “The world’s largest unspoiled ecosystem sits atop an oil reserve
potentially large enough to fuel the entire United States for a year. Nestled in northeast Alaska, the oil supply underneath the Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) has caused controversy for decades. Extracting oil from ANWR would
create thousands of jobs, generate billions of dollars of federal and state revenue, and contribute to the nation’s independent energy supply. But extraction would also permanently scar the landscape, disturb polar bear and caribou nurseries, and threaten
the native Gwitch’in people’s way of life. Faced with the choice between preservation and development, the United States appears to have chosen oil—but the truth is more complicated than that. After debating the issue for 40 years, the U.S. Congress in 2017
opened parts of ANWR for oil and gas development. The Trump Administration issued the area’s first oil leases on January 19, 2021. The next day, shortly after his inauguration, President Joe Biden signed an executive order temporarily halting all development.
Oil advocates and opponents alike wonder what will happen now. Legislation adopted in 1980 to protect ANWR initially prohibited oil and gas development on the 1.57 million acre Coastal Plain “until authorized by an Act of Congress.” Forty years and more than
35 failed votes later, the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act ended that moratorium. The Trump Administration promptly got to work. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act tasked the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) with managing ANWR’s oil and gas development program. Throughout
the United States, the BLM sells leases that entitle private parties to extract resources on public lands. Typically, the agency takes years to develop a comprehensive leasing program plan and then an additional four months to complete the leasing process.”
[The Regulatory Review, 4/14/21]
https://bit.ly/3wUHzkS
Waste Isolation Pilot Plant aims to expand underground facility to hold nuclear waste: “A
plan to build two new areas to dispose of nuclear waste began taking shape at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant after the U.S. Department of Energy published a report on the feasibility of adding an 11th and 12th waste panel to the underground nuclear waste
repository. At WIPP, low-level transuranic (TRU) waste made up of equipment and materials radiated during nuclear activities is permanently emplaced in an underground salt deposit more than 2,000 feet underground. In its original design, WIPP was planned to
have eight panels for such disposal, but much of that space was restricted and abandoned following an accidental radiological release in 2014 that contaminated parts of the underground and led to a three-year pause of WIPP’s emplacement operations. It was
estimated, per DOE records, that 1.8 panels were lost in the incident for a total of 30,861 cubic meters (m3) of lost storage capacity. The two new panels would be used to replace the space lost in the incident, amid ongoing emplacement in the seventh panel
and mining of the eighth panel expected to be complete in 2021. A DOE-published supplemental analysis (SA) released on April 8 reported the new panels “do not represent a substantial change and will not impact the environment in a significant manner not already
evaluated,” read a WIPP news release.”
[Carlsbad Current-Argus, 4/14/21]
https://bit.ly/3tmQGca
Is a healthy environment a right? New Canadian CEPA bill says so: “A new law could soon
see toxic chemicals, including harmful plastics, undergo more rigorous assessments aimed at better protecting vulnerable Canadians, the Trudeau government has announced. Under the proposed law, agencies responsible for regulating toxic chemicals, Environment
and Climate Change Canada and Health Canada, would need to evaluate the cumulative impacts of exposure to multiple chemicals over long periods of time. The proposed bill tabled by Environment Minister Jonathan Wilkinson on Tuesday, would bring in sweeping
changes to the Canadian Environmental Protection Act (CEPA). It would fast-track the regulatory process for particularly harmful chemicals, making it easier to restrict their use; encourage companies to avoid toxic chemicals entirely; and force manufacturers
to be more transparent about the chemicals used in their products. The move comes nearly four years after the federal environment committee recommended updates to the decades-old law, which was last revised in 1999. The proposed update would help address long-standing
environmental injustices in Canada. It would also give the federal government better tools to deal with environmental threats and health impacts posed by the dizzying array of chemicals used in Canada. “The Canadian Environmental Protection Act really is the
cornerstone of federal environmental laws,” said Lisa Gue, senior policy analyst at the David Suzuki Foundation.”
[National Observer, 4/14/21]
https://bit.ly/3a71ymI
Justin McCarthy
He/Him/His
Director, NEPA Campaign
The Partnership Project
C: 540-312-3797
E: jmccarthy@partnershipproject.org
The Partnership Project, a registered 501 (c) (3) non-profit, is a collaborative effort of over 20 of the country’s most influential advocacy organizations, including Sierra Club, Earthjustice, League of Conservation Voters, and Natural
Resources Defense Council.