WolfeNotes.com

Gov. Murphy, the BPU Energy Master Plan, and DEP Commissioner Oppose a Moratorium

Not Realistic For The Legislature To Rely On Executive Power, Given Gov. Murphy’s Record

We Need Legislation With Enforceable Standards Like New York State

yours truly (right) gets in Sweeney’s face in his District (Earth Day, 2005)

Sheriff John Brown always hated me
For what I don’t know
Every time that I plant a seed
He said, “Kill it before it grows”
He said, “Kill it before it grows” ~~~ I Shot The Sheriff, Bob Marley

Just days after I urged legislators to amend NJ climate laws to mandate emissions reductions – including a direct challenge to Chairman Bob Smith –  the Senate Environment Committee today announced that they will consider a non-binding Senate Resolution #17 that would urge Gov. Murphy to impose a moratorium on fossil projects. The Resolution will be heard during the next Committee hearing on Nov. 15, 2021 in Trenton.

There are several technical flaws with the text of the Resolution as drafted.

But the real problem with the Resolution is the overall approach and reliance on Gov. Murphy’s exercise of executive authority to mandate emissions reductions, which is something that he and his administration have refused to do for 4 years and publicly have opposed.

A non-binding Resolution urging the Gov. to act may have been appropriate during Gov. Murphy’s first 100 days. But after 4 years, it is absurd.

We need legislation with enforceable goals, timetables, and standards, like New York State climate law provides.

The last thing we need during this climate emergency – and after 15 years of failed aspirational goals of the Global Warming Response Act, small bore market based programs (RGGI), voluntary programs, subsidies,”nudges”, moral appeals, and incentives – is more symbolic gestures.

The Legislature must step up and and legislate!

We need clear legislative goals, standards, and timetables, based on the most recent (“best available”) science and backed by enforceable DEP regulations. DEP’s discretion to delay and weaken any such legislative standards also must be limited, given their 15 year track record of loopholes, revolving door abuses (current DEP Commissioner LaTourette worked for the Gibbstown, NJ Fortress LNG Export plant), and foot-dragging.

(Unfortunately, I must note that way back in 2004, DEP Commissioner Brad Campbell first established regulatory control over GHG emissions as a regulated “pollutant” under the NJ Air Pollution Control Act. DEP has done nothing with this authority since then.)

I strongly urge climate activists not to fall for and support another failed symbolic gesture. Demand real actions!

So let us stop talkin’ falsely now
The hour’s getting late ~~~ “All Along The Watchtower” Bob Dylan (Hendrix version)

I fired of this letter to the sponsor, Senator Weinberg and Senate Environment Committee Chair and members:

Dear Senator Weinberg:

I just reviewed your Senate Resolution 17, which would urge the Gov. to impose a moratorium on (new? expanded?) fossil projects (just infrastructure, or all major emission sources?), pending adoption of unspecified regulations (and deadlines for adoption) designed to achieve Statewide greenhouse gas emissions reduction goals established by the Global Warming Response Act (for 2050).

The Resolution was posted for hearing by the Senate Environment Committee on 11/15/21.

While I strongly support the legislative findings and intent of this Resolution, and I have several technical concerns with how it is drafted, I can not support the resolution itself for the following reasons and instead suggest an alternative legislative approach:

Gov. Murphy has been urged to impose such a moratorium during virtually his entire first term in Office. Climate activists have launched a public campaign to pressure him to do so.

Yet, not only has the Gov. failed to support such an approach, his administration has actively opposed it multiple times.

For example, his BPU Energy Master Plan does not support such an approach. In fact the EMP justifies huge expansion in electric demand, much of the renewable power will rely on continued operation (and expansion) of fossil infrastructure and generation, some fossil power sources are redefined as renewable or net carbon zero.

His Commissioner of the Department of Environmental Protection has publicly not only opposed a moratorium, but has touted continued reliance on fossil fuels. DEP has also issued permits to significant capacity in new fossil infrastructure. Many new or expanded fossil infrastructure projects are pending DEP approval, as the Resolution notes, yet the DEP Commissioner has failed to aggressively propose and adopt the long delayed “Climate PACT” regulations that could block these hazardous fossil projects.

Given these unfortunate political, policy, and regulatory realities, it is unrealistic to rely on the Gov.’s executive power and discretion to follow the will of the Legislature and the policy of SR 17.

Instead, the Legislature should craft and pass amendments to the NJ Global Warming Response Act that provide enforceable standards and timetables based on the best available science (which would accelerate the goals of the NJ Global Warming Response Act). Put a bill on his desk and challenge him to veto it!

A few days ago, I urged Chairman Smith to do exactly that, based on the model climate legislation in New York. (for details and links to the NY State legislation, see:

http://www.wolfenotes.com/2021/11/what-a-difference-a-state-law-makes/

I would be glad to work with you, Chairman Smith, and OLS to craft such legislation.

I urge your favorable consideration and timely reply.

Please consider this as my testimony and submit it into the record on the SR17 for the Senate Environment Committee hearing.

Respectfully,

Bill Wolfe

NY DEC Denies Air Permits For Proposed New Fossil Gas Plant

NY Climate Law Provides Strong Contrast To Toothless NJ Global Warming Response Act

Although it got no press coverage in NJ, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) just denied air pollution control permits for a proposed new natural gas plant in NY City,  another major victory for NY climate activists, see:

• New York denies gas plant permits in first-ever decision citing climate law

The DEC’s decision provides a model for enforceable State climate laws and State environmental regulatory leadership.

It also exposes major flaws in NJ’s toothless, unenforceable, and aspirational Global Warming Response Act and the total failure of leadership by the Murphy DEP.

You can read the powerful precedent setting NY DEC decision here. 

I strongly encourage you to read the entire decision – and then demand that NJ law be amended to provide the same enforceable standards the NY law does (see below letter as an example of how to do this). Here are 3 excerpts:

This is how to use a big regulatory stick to implement climate goals. 

There’s lots of talk about goals and timetables. But no one is demanding that those greenhouse gas emission reduction goals be linked to enforceable regulatory authorities (i.e. State permits). If not, they are merely aspirational, or slogans not policy.

The power of State governments to drive greenhouse gas emissions reductions has become even more important, given the US Supreme Court’s intervention and very likely limitation on US EPA’s power to regulate greenhouse gas emissions, see:

• What the Supreme Court’s move means for EPA climate rules

(BTW, this is exactly what we predicted:

• Confirmation of Judge Kavanaugh Would Cement Corporate Capture Of The Supreme Court

State laws and regulatory power are what NJ climate activists should be focused on right now, especially with DEP soon to propose climate PACT regulations – NY State again shows exactly how to do it.

Previously, NY DEC paved the way in enforcing the Clean Water Act Section 401 Water Quality Certificate power to kill proposed gas pipelines. Those precedent setting NY DEC decision also got no coverage in NJ media and were ignored by NJ climate activists.

Maybe what the climate activists need is a State legislative and regulatory policy clearinghouse to provide model state laws, much like the  climate denying corporate right wing benefits from by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and The Federalist Society, among many others.

But the anarchist leaning Left, particularly climate activists, rarely thinks institutionally. They do little legislatively, especially at the State level, and do virtually nothing on regulation.

I wrote the following letter on 10/28/21 to NJ Senate Environment Committee Chairman Bob Smith, for which I’ve received not even the courtesy of a reply telling me to fuck off. Maybe that will change after Senate President Sweeney’s defeat:

Dear Chairman Smith:

The NY State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) yesterday denied a Title V operating permit for a proposed new natural gas plant.

The regulatory basis for this permit denial was:

“As described further below, and as initially indicated by the Department in the Notice of Complete Application, the Project would be inconsistent with or would interfere with the attainment of the Statewide greenhouse gas (GHG) emission limits established in Article 75 of the Environmental Conservation Law (ECL).”

For the complete DEC decision, see:

https://www.dec.ny.gov/docs/administration_pdf/nrgastoriadecision10272021.pdf

I bring this decision to your attention for two reasons:

1) to illustrate major loopholes in NJ’s Global Warming Response Act, as recently amended – compared to NY’s State Climate Act (Article 75) – particularly regarding the lack of enforceable greenhouse emissions reductions requirements in NJ law, on both a Statewide and individual source basis.

I urge you to strengthen NJ’s aspirational and toothless climate law with real regulatory teeth such as those that obtain in NY State law; and

2) to prompt oversight hearings before NJ DEP proposes upcoming Climate PACT regulations, in the hopes that DEP can rely on existing authority under the NJ Air Pollution Control Act to adopt enforceable GHG emissions reduction standards.

I urge your prompt attention to this matter and am available to provide detailed statutory and/or regulatory recommendations to advance such efforts.

Respectfully,

Bill Wolfe

Dual Sexed Fish Found In NJ Rivers

Industry Strategy Is To Manufacture Scientific Uncertainty And Delay And Avoid Regulation

Was It Big Pharma Or Big Foundation That Buried The Study?

BMS, Pennington, NJ

Theo Colborn’s 1995 book “Our Stolen Future” put the public health and ecological harms of an unregulated class of chemicals known as endocrine disruptors on the public radar screen.

Given the powerful corporate interests and huge economic stakes that book impacted, it’s no surprise that Big Pharma has effectively mounted a strategy to avoid regulation, much like the oil industry’s denial, delay and diversion campaign that sabotaged climate science and delayed regulation. As a result, the endocrine disruptor issue has virtually disappeared and environmental regulators were neutered, particularly in NJ, the corporate home of Big Pharma.

I’ve written many times about the issue, but there’s been no crossover to mainstream media and my work has been ignored by the Foundation funded and neutered environmental groups. I summarized those efforts in this 2015 post:

• More Dual Sexed Fish Documented In NJ Rivers

And this February 2016 post:

• USGS Study Documents High Levels of Prescription Drugs In Streams – Source is Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Plants

More recently, back in June 2021, when DEP issued the Statewide Dirty Water Report, I again tried to get some focus on these issues. I wrote:

5. DEP Is Ignoring The Impacts Of Toxic Unregulated Chemicals, Like Pharmaceuticals and Endocrine Disruptors

Unfortunately, not everyone knows that DEP knows that there are over 500 unregulated chemicals present in NJ waters and that those chemicals have unknown toxic effects on ecosystems, fisheries, and human health. …

Two major categories of those unregulated chemicals include pharmaceuticals and endocrine disruptors.

For the implications of endocrine disruptors, see:

• Conducting Forensic Autopsies On the Canaries, While the Miners Are Poisoned

For the implications of pharmaceuticals, see:

• USGS Study Documents High Levels of Prescription Drugs In Streams – Source is Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Plants

As far as I know, the endocrine disruptors story was engaged only once by NJ media. On January 31, 2016, the Bergen Record reported on the USGS study:

• Sexual mutations in fish in protected waters raise alarm

Male fish in two of North Jersey’s most protected areas have developed female sexual characteristics, suggesting parts of the Wallkill River in Sussex County and the Great Swamp in Morris County are contaminated with chemicals that throw hormone systems radically off.

The Delaware River, and now the Wallkill and Great Swamp have dual sexed fish? I guess that Bergen Record story shocked the NJ public and put pressure on DEP regulators. In response, the Big Pharma public relations people sprang into action.

Shortly after the Record story ran, in early April 2016, I revealed the Big Pharma/Big Foundation gameplan:

Our friends at the Pinelands Commission jumped on the canary autopsy bandwagon last friday, with this corporate friendly Penn Foundation grant proposal (note how the forensic autopsy funder, the Wm. Penn Foundation, is not even mentioned by Pinelands Commission):

Grant Proposal Presentation Endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) have been linked to reproductive and developmental abnormalities in fish and amphibians. Surface-water discharge of wastewater is a major point source of EDCs to aquatic systems and on-site septic systems and chemical use associated with development and agriculture represent non-point sources of EDCs. Commission and USGS scientists propose to sample surface water, fish, and frogs at on-stream and off-stream sites with potential point and non-point sources of EDCs and compare these results to minimally impacted reference sites. All animals will be assessed histologically for measures of endocrine disruption and surface water from all sites will be analyzed for approximately one hundred known or suspected EDCs. A letter of intent was accepted and a full proposal requested for possible funding through the Delaware Watershed Research Fund. 

So, 3 years from now, we will get a report that there are dual sexed fish and/or abnormal frogs in the Pinelands. 

Meanwhile, pregnant women are drinking water that contains chemicals that can cause harm to their developing fetus at extremely low levels – parts per quadrillion – and Big Pharma has EPA and NJ DEP regulators on a short leash, safely doing more forensic autopsies and non-action “screening” of “emergent contaminants” that never seem to fully emerge.

At the time, I found it odd that the Pinelands would be the focus of an endocrine disruptors study. The Pinelands are perhaps the most pristine environment in NJ, and perhaps the last place to look for these chemicals. Although the Commission has strong expertise on ecological science, the Pinelands Commission lacks the toxicological expertise to evaluate human health impacts.

Most importantly, the Pinelands Commission lacks regulatory jurisdiction over the use and discharge of these chemicals.

All of that belong to the NJ Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), where the study should have been conducted. 

I initially thought that the Pinelands Commission study would take 3 years.

But it’s been over 5 years, so I looked into the status of the Penn Foundation’s grant and research project.

According to the Pinelands Commission’s 2020 Annual Report: (@ page 16-17)

Endocrine Disruption Study

The William Penn Foundation is funding scientific research in the Delaware River Watershed through the Delaware Watershed Research Fund, which is administered by The Academy of Natural Sciences. The Kirkwood-Cohansey aquifer, which underlies the Pinelands, was identified as one of the research areas eligible for funding. Commission scientists and U.S. Geological Survey scientists Kelly Smalling, Dr. Vicki Blazer, and Heather Walsh proposed a study to investigate point and non-point sources of endocrine disrupting chemicals and the potential impacts on fish and frogs in the Pinelands. The study was awarded funding in 2016.

The endocrine system is a collection of tissues in animals that produce hormones to regulate essential life processes, such as metabolism, tissue function, reproduction, and development. A large group of natural and synthetic chemicals are known to disrupt endocrine function. Examples include plant hormones, plastic components, flame retardants, surfactants, fragrances, and pesticides. Endocrine disrupting chemicals, or EDCs, are a global environmental problem and have been linked to reproductive and developmental abnormalities in a variety of animal species, especially fish and amphibians.

Commission and U.S. Geological Survey scientists proposed to sample water chemistry and fish above and below municipal wastewater treatment plants, which represent direct point sources of EDCs, and water chemistry and frogs at ponds and stormwater basins, which may receive indirect non-point sources of EDCs from runoff and the aquifer. Results from these sites will be compared to those from appropriate, minimally impacted reference sites.

In 2017, 2018, and 2019, green frogs were collected from ponds and stormwater basins for histological analysis, and water chemistry was sampled at the sites on multiple occasions. In 2019, fish were collected from stream sites above and below a sewage treatment plant for histological analysis, and water chemistry was also sampled. In 2020, fish were collected at lakes above and below a different sewage treatment plant for histological analysis by U.S. Geological Survey scientists. All field work for the project has been completed.

Taos Plateau, Rio Grande Del Norte National Monument

White River National Forest (Fletcher Mountain)

Lead Mine, Colorado (Sheep Mt./Tenmile Tailings Pond

Wolf Creek Pass, San Juan Mountains

San Juan National Forest

Apex Ghost Town, Colorado (sunrise in mining town, 10,000 ft.)

Christie DEP Abandoned Proposed Standard For Perchlorate

Murphy DEP Still “playing Russian roulette with the public’s health”

DEP Science Advisory Board Diverted Attention From That By Focusing On Trump EPA

NJ Spotlight reported today on important scientific work on the impacts of climate change on NJ’s coastal wetlands. The work was led by Rutgers University professor Judith Weiss, who Chairs the Murphy DEP Science Advisory Board (SAB). (we wrote about this 7 years ago, see “Ghost Trees”)

The reference to Professor Weiss and the DEP SAB sent me to the DEP SAB webpage, to read the study cited in the story. As I searched, I found a more interesting recent research Report by the SAB, which I will write about today.

While I am writing today on a different issue, I must make a few comments on today’s coastal wetlands story, first to note that it once again ignores the role of DEP regulations.

Perhaps worse, it absurdly implies that scarce Blue Acres funds be used to acquire wetlands.

The story also  essentially praises DEP Commissioner LaTourette’s “re-imagination” of Blue Acres and “managed retreat“.  This ridiculous unrelated paragraph is injected into the story, seemingly out of nowhere, to praise LaTourette:

LaTourette expanded upon his suggestion that changes could be on the way for the Blue Acres program in a recent interview with NJ Spotlight News. “The program needs to be reimagined,” LaTourette said. “New Jersey is going to have a wetter, more flooded future and making Blue Acres proactive is reflecting that reality.”

As I’ve written, DEP is denying the need for “managed retreat” and I’ve harshly criticized DEP Commissioner LaTourette’s “imagination” on that issue.

It is absurd to suggest Blue Acres as an approach to wetlands, because wetlands are regulated by DEP. DEP must strengthen those regulations to protect wetlands and limit future development, not modify them to accommodate even more destructive coastal development and dredging as suggested in the story.

For example, this is crazy:

If future development is conducted in nontraditional ways that avoid “coastal squeeze,” as the study’s authors put it, and instead allow for marsh migration pathways, the state’s wetlands might be sustained.

That approach might work for planning on where to remove current development to allow wetlands to migrate. But new development should be restricted by DEP regulations, not accommodated by “non-traditional ways” (whatever that means!).

And so is this absurd “solution” – not all “soft” non-engineering solutions make sense – which is designed to promote more dredging to benefit recreational boating:

“Soft” solutions, like the distribution of sediment dredged from navigational channels, which has been conducted in the back bay waters around the Wetlands Institute, to build up several rapidly eroding marsh islands, along with others presented in the study, represent the multi-pronged approach to sea level rise that both Tedesco and Weis say the state needs to take.

Finally, the focus of today’s Spotlight story (i.e. on DEP SAB and coastal wetlands) illustrates long-standing flaws in their news coverage.

For example, I frequently write about the DEP SAB, most recently, this:

• Murphy DEP Commissioner LaTourette Re-Appoints *Dupont And Corporate Hired Guns To DEP Science Advisory Board

I also sometimes write about wetlands, most recently this:

• Murphy DEP Approves PSE&G Request To Eliminate Protections For Wetlands At Salem Nuclear Plant Site

And I write about warehouse development and the need to preserve what’s left on NJ’s forests and farmland:

• The Final Frontier In NJ’s Long Running Land Use War

Of course, NJ Spotlight rarely if ever covers those kind of stories – it seems like they just don’t write about DEP regulations or any stories critical of DEP, or of donors (like PSE&G), or of powerful corporations (like Dupont).

Actually, they often write stories that give readers exactly the opposite story and impression that they should be getting, and find a way to twist the stories I write.

For example, writing a story about a Rutgers academic as Chair of DEP SAB (the first Spotlight coverage of the DEP SAB I am aware of) gives readers an impression of academic rigor, while downplaying and ignoring the corporate influence on DEP science that I write about.

Same problem with ignoring the PSE&G wetlands destruction approved by DEP, implying leadership by Commissioner LaTourette, and promoting development under the guise of protecting wetlands.

I don’t think this is just a coincidence, because it has happened so many times on so many issue and for years.

Now, to the topic of today’s post: rocket fuel in your drinking water: DEP “playing Russian roulette with the public’s health”

In scanning the SAB Reports, I noted that in August 2020, the DEP Science Advisory Board published a Report:

The chronology of scientific and regulatory developments documented in that Report is quite revealing. Follow:

The SAB Report was initiated in December 2019:

Notice that the sole target was the Trump EPA proposal.

Not surprisingly – I won’t go into details (read the whole Report) – the DEP SAB Report was highly critical of the Trump EPA proposal as insufficiently protective of public health.

The SAB found:

In light of this SAB conclusion that perchlorate is a “significant health hazard” and that an MCL is warranted – considering that NJ DEP has legal authority to adopt an MCL and had previously proposed one back in 2009 – why would a legitimate DEP science investigation designed to protect public health target exclusively the Trump EPA?

Why would a legitimate SAB review ignore the fact that back in 2009, the outgoing Corzine DEP proposed a drinking water standard (MCL) for the chemical perchlorate, which is actually found in, among other things, rocket fuel (thus the title of this post).

Obviously, Murphy DEP Commissioner McCabe was playing political games, pointing the finger at the Trump EPA, and diverting from her own failure to act. And the scientists on the SAB went right along with that corrupt game.

McCabe issued the “charge question” to the SAB and she limited their review to EPA, thereby intentionally excluding the DEP’s prior 2009 MCL proposal and, by definition, obscuring her own failure to act. Repeat: the scientists on the SAB went right along with that corrupt game.

This could not have been an accident, because McCabe dissembled on the MCL issue during her Senate Confirmation hearing (a misleading abuse I protested at the time in a letter to Senate Environment Committee Chair Bob Smith (see point #2).

Prior to Murphy DEP Commissioner McCabe’s testimony, I specifically flagged the issue and requested that the Senate ask McCabe:

23. Will the Murphy DEP revive and adopt drinking water MCL for perchlorate proposed by the Corzine DEP and killed by the Christie DEP, as well as 14 other hazardous drinking water contaminants previously recommended by the Drinking Water Quality Institute?  ~~~ See:

• “Forty Policy Questions For Gov. Murphy’s DEP Commissioner’s Senate Confirmation Hearing”

So let’s get back to the regulatory history, because it is relevant to where we are today.

Before the Corzine 2009 DEP perchlorate MCL proposal could be adopted, in 2010 the incoming Christie Administration imposed a moratorium on regulations and then Christie DEP Commissioner Martin killed the Corzine proposal.

The Christie DEP was harshly and visibly criticized for this irresponsible action. Harsh criticism came from all quarters, including negative media news coverage, editorials, environmentalists, and legislators, see.

• Senate Dems Blast Christie Global Warming Cuts and DEP’s Abandonment of Perchlorate Drinking Water Standard

A huge part of the 2010 Christie controversy focused on the relationship between EPA and DEP responsibility to regulate perchlorate. Christie DEP Commissioner Martin justified his killing of the Corzine DEP proposal by falsely claiming that EPA would soon regulate perchlorate, a lie that I exposed and wrote about at the time, see:

• DEP Commissioner Martin Lied About EPA Perchlorate Standard

My claim was validated by a killer 4/25/10 Bergen Record story and an April 30, 2010 highly critical editorial titled “Cleaner Water”. The Bergen Record editorial hammered Martin’s lie:

Cleaner water 

… [DEP Commissioner] Martin’s new opinion came about after he was embarrassed publicly. The Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility released e-mails sent to Martin from the EPA that made clear that even if the agency imposed a limit, 6 1/2 years could elapse before the rule was in place, Staff Writer James O’Neill reported. Martin would have been playing Russian roulette with the public’s health.

Let that sink in: the Bergen Record editorial board [correctly] accused the Christie DEP of “playing Russian roulette with the public’s health”

Here’s how Commissioner McCabe’s directed SAB Report whitewashed all this, without even mentioning the prior DEP proposed MCL, which the DEP Commissioner McCabe’s “charge question” intentionally ignored:

On June 18, 2020, as the Committee was finalizing its report, EPA announced its decision not to regulate perchlorate in drinking water. While this possibility was included as an alternative in the EPA’s proposal, NJDEP’s charge questions did not ask the Committee to evaluate this issue and the committee proceeded under the assumption that regulation of perchlorate in drinking water is protective of public health.[…]

The Committee was not charged with recommending an MCL and did not quantitatively evaluate occurrence data. The Committee concluded that EPA should not have abandoned the regulation of perchlorate in drinking water.

You have to get all the way to the small font fine print of a complex spreadsheet on page 38 of Appendix 1 to even find mention of the DEP’s 2009 MCL proposal. It was buried there so few could find that crucial fact. That’s a classic whitewash technique.

So here’s a “charge question” for the SAB: should the Christie NJ DEP have abandoned its own proposed State MCL? Should the current Murphy NJ DEP propose an MCL?

A decade later, while DEP is still “playing Russian roulette with the public’s health“, the dispute re-emerged in the news – a one day story that has since fallen off the radar again – in a May 2020 story by NJ Spotlight:

• Renewed Calls for NJ Limit on Toxic Chemical as EPA Reportedly Rejects National Regulation

So, here we are, over a decade after the Corzine DEP proposed an MCL and the Christie DEP killed that proposal, and current DEP Commissioner LaTourette is still “playing Russian roulette with the public’s health“.

But where are the media, environmental groups Democrats and SAB members who were so critical of the Christie Administration and the Trump EPA?