January, 22 2024, 01:31pm EDT
EPA Proposes to Exempt Most Slaughterhouses from Updated Water Pollution Control Rules
Environmental Groups Urge EPA to Require Meat Processing Plants to Comply with Modern Technology Standards for Nitrogen and Phosphorus Pollution
The federal governmenttomorrow is scheduled to publish proposed EPA rules that would require pollution reductions from fewer than half of the 3,879 slaughterhouses and meat processing plants that discharge waste to U.S. rivers, lakes, and streams.
The regulations would cut pollution significantly from the largest plants that pipe their waste directly into waterways, but largely ignore the far more numerous meat processing plants that send their effluent first to municipal sewage treatment plants, which are often overwhelmed and not equipped to treat the industrial waste.
Clean water organizations are responding by urging the agency to do more to crack down on slaughterhouses, which are the largest industrial source of phosphorus and nitrogen pollution (so-called “nutrients”) that feeds algal outbreaks and fish-killing “dead zones” in America’s waterways. EPA plans to hold an online public hearing on its proposed rules on Wednesday and a hearing at agency headquarters on January 31.
Dani Replogle, Food & Water Watch Staff Attorney, said: “Slaughterhouses have spent decades polluting our nation’s waters with abandon, leaving taxpayers to foot the bill. EPA must seize this opportunity to rein in this dirty industry by enacting the most environmentally protective regulatory option without further delay.”
"It is well past time for slaughterhouses to put in place modern pollution controls that EPA acknowledges are widely available," said Sarah Kula, Environmental Integrity Project attorney. "EPA proposes significant reductions in nitrogen and phosphorus dischargers from big slaughterhouses that pipe their wastes into public waterways, and that is welcome news. But its preferred option would allow thousands of slaughterhouses to continue to dump nutrients into public sewage treatment plants that aren't prepared to handle them. All communities deserve relief from the slaughterhouse industry's harmful nutrient pollution."
Earthjustice attorney Alexis Andiman said: “EPA admits that pollution from slaughterhouses and meat processing plants disproportionately harms under-resourced communities, low-income communities, and communities of color. We applaud EPA for taking action to strengthen the outdated and under-protective water pollution control standards that govern this industry—but we urge the agency to ensure that its new standards protect the people most at risk.”
A coalition of 13 environmental organizations sued the EPA in 2019 and 2022 demanding that the agency follow the requirements of the Clean Water Act and modernize badly outdated technology standards for water pollution control systems for slaughterhouses and meat processing plants, which have not been updated in two decades.
In response to lawsuits, EPA released proposed rules scheduled for publication in the Federal Register tomorrow that include three options for cleaning up wastewater from slaughterhouses. EPA’s “preferred option” would strengthen nitrogen pollution limits and, for the first time, limit phosphorus discharges from an estimated 126 facilities that directly discharge into waterways. The new standards, if adopted, would eliminate nine million pounds of nitrogen per year from these direct dischargers, as well as eight million pounds of phosphorus.
However, EPA’s preferred option is the weakest of the three alternatives it has proposed because it would require no nutrient controls from the 3,708 slaughterhouses and meat processing plants that send their wastewater to municipal treatment facilities, which often lack the necessary technology to treat this pollution. Instead, EPA’s preferred option would only control oil and grease, total suspended solids, and biochemical oxygen demand from about 719 of these indirect dischargers. These indirect dischargers have gotten a free pass for decades.
“Many municipal wastewater treatment plants cannot handle the slaughterhouse and rendering facility waste they receive, likely contributing to 73% of these treatment plants violating their clean water permit limits,” said Kelly Hunter Foster, Waterkeeper Alliance Senior Attorney. “EPA must establish pretreatment pollution limits for this industry rather than allowing it to either pollute waterways or pass their treatment expenses off to impacted communities and citizens that cannot, and should not, bear those costs.”
Fortunately, EPA’s proposal includes a more protective alternative that would require over 40 percent of these indirect dischargers to remove nutrients from the wastes they dump into public sewer systems. EPA estimates that this option would eliminate another 67 million tons of nitrogen and 20 million tons of phosphorus every year. EPA has also publicly acknowledged that nutrient contamination is the most significant contributor to the contamination that keeps so many rivers, streams, lakes, and estuaries from meeting the “fishable and swimmable” standards the Clean Water Act promised more than half a century ago.
The coalition of groups is demanding that EPA do more and, at a minimum, adopt the most environmentally protective alternative among the three that EPA has proposed to keep slaughterhouse wastes from overwhelming public sewer systems.
Background: The federal Clean Water Act requires the EPA to set water pollution standards for all industries and to review those standards each year to determine whether updates are appropriate to keep pace with advances in pollution-control technology. Despite this mandate, the EPA has failed to revise standards for slaughterhouses and meat processing plants for at least 19 years. Some slaughterhouses and rendering facilities are still subject to standards established in the mid-1970s. And the EPA has never published national standards applicable to the vast majority of slaughterhouses and meat processing facilities, which discharge polluted wastewater indirectly through publicly-owned treatment works.
In response to this failure of EPA to update its standards, the Environmental Integrity Project and Earthjustice sued the agency on behalf of Cape Fear River Watch, Rural Empowerment Association for Community Help, Waterkeepers Chesapeake, Waterkeeper Alliance, Humane Society of the United States, Food & Water Watch, Environment America, Comite Civico del Valle, Center for Biological Diversity, and Animal Legal Defense Fund.
This coalition initially challenged the Trump Administration’s decision not to update water pollution control standards for slaughterhouses and meat processing plants in 2019. In response to that challenge, the EPA pledged to strengthen its regulations, but it did not commit to a timeline for doing so. The coalition then filed a second lawsuit in December 2022 to press the EPA to act promptly, resulting in an agreement that committed the EPA to propose new standards by December 2023 and publish final standards by August 2025.
EPA now plans to conduct public hearings on the proposed rule, including an online-only hearing on January 24, 2024, and an in-person hearing at EPA Headquarters on January 31, 2024. To provide comment during the January 24 virtual hearing, participants must register here by 5 pm EST on January 22. To provide comment at the January 31 in-person hearing, participants are encouraged to register here before 5pm EST on January 26.
Supporting materials for the rulemaking can be found at EPA's docket at regulations.govs.gov.
QUOTES FROM ALLIED GROUPS:
John Rumpler, Clean Water Director for Environment America, said: "If the price of a slightly cheaper chicken nugget is dead fish, toxic algae or people getting sick from pollution, I think most Americans would say no thank you. The EPA should strengthen its proposed rule to keep more than 300 million pounds of slaughterhouse pollution out of our rivers and streams, as current technology allows."
Robin Broder, Deputy Director of Waterkeepers Chesapeake, said: “We are disappointed that EPA has chosen the least protective option, which is bad news for the Chesapeake region since we have far more indirect discharging slaughterhouses and rendering facilities than direct dischargers. In our region that is already suffering from nutrient pollution, the lack of limits on nitrogen and phosphorus for the majority of our plants is incredibly short sighted, especially given that the technology to do this exists.”
Rebecca Cary, special counsel for the Humane Society of the United States, said: “We are heartened that the EPA has begun the long overdue process of curbing the daily discharge of blood, fat, nitrogen and other pollutants from industrial slaughter and rendering facilities into our waters. Limiting pollution from inhumane factory farming systems will be an important step toward protecting both people and animals from this pollution.”
Larissa Liebmann, senior staff attorney for the Animal Legal Defense Fund, said: "Lax regulations allow industrial animal agriculture to profit while burdening communities with pollution and causing animals immense suffering. With these updated pollution standards, EPA is making slaughterhouses account for some of the costs of addressing their unsustainable business model."
For a copy of the proposed regulations, click here.
Food & Water Watch mobilizes regular people to build political power to move bold and uncompromised solutions to the most pressing food, water, and climate problems of our time. We work to protect people's health, communities, and democracy from the growing destructive power of the most powerful economic interests.
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TikTok Sues US Government Over 'Unconstitutional' Potential Ban
One expert said legislators' admissions "that the ban was motivated by a desire to suppress content about the Israel-Gaza conflict will make the law especially difficult for the government to defend," said one First Amendment expert.
May 07, 2024
A top First Amendment expert on Tuesday said TikTok has a strong case against the U.S. government as the social media platform filed a federal lawsuit against a potential ban—particularly since proponents of the law have admitted it is aimed at blocking Americans' access to news out of Gaza.
The platform filed the lawsuit against U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit nearly two weeks after President Joe Biden signed the Protecting Americans From Foreign Adversaries Act into law as part of a larger foreign aid package.
Under the law, TikTok parent company ByteDance, a Chinese firm, has 270 days to sell the platform, allowing it to continue operating in the U.S. If it does not sell TikTok, the app will no longer be available on U.S. networks and app stores.
As Common Dreams reported Monday, Republican lawmakers including U.S. Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) and Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) have linked TikTok to the burgeoning anti-war protest movement spreading across the U.S., with the latter saying in an interview with Secretary of State Antony Blinken last Friday that "there was such overwhelming support" in Congress to shut down TikTok because of the frequent posting of Palestine-related content on the app.
"Restricting citizens' access to media from abroad is a practice that has long been associated with repressive regimes, so it's sad and alarming to see our own government going down this road," said Jameel Jaffer, executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, on Tuesday. "TikTok's challenge to the ban is important, and we expect it to succeed. The First Amendment means the government can't restrict Americans' access to ideas, information, or media from abroad without a very good reason for it—and no such reason exists here."
"The fact that some legislators have acknowledged that the ban was motivated by a desire to suppress content about the Israel-Gaza conflict will make the law especially difficult for the government to defend," Jaffer added.
The law's sponsors claim it "is not a ban because it offers ByteDance a choice: divest TikTok's U.S. business or be shut down," reads the lawsuit. "But in reality, there is no choice. The 'qualified divestiture' demanded by the act to allow TikTok to continue operating in the United States is simply not possible: not commercially, not technologically, not legally."
Even if selling the app within the time frame was feasible, added TikTok and ByteDance, the law "would still be an extraordinary and unconstitutional assertion of power," ultimately allowing Congress to "circumvent the First Amendment by invoking national security and ordering the publisher of any individual newspaper or website to sell to avoid being shut down."
"And for TikTok, any such divestiture would disconnect Americans from the rest of the global community on a platform devoted to shared content—an outcome fundamentally at odds with the Constitution's commitment to both free speech and individual liberty," the plaintiffs continued.
At The Philadelphia Inquirer on Tuesday, columnist Will Bunch noted that about a third of Americans between the ages of 18-29 get their news from TikTok, according to a recent Pew survey—as Romney openly stated he fears last week.
As Bunch wrote:
During the war in Gaza, most mainstream Western journalists have been blocked from entering the war zone. The best source of real-time information is often the phone video of airstrikes and their aftermath either shot by Palestinian journalists—more than 90 of whom have been killed—or civilian bystanders. Look, there's disinformation about every issue on social media—it's a serious problem. I'm a clueless boomer myself about TikTok, but I do spend way too much time on X/Twitter and I can tell you exactly what is radicalizing young people about Gaza.
The reason so many under-30 folks have adopted the Palestinian cause isn't disinformation, from Hamas or China or anyone else. They've been radicalized by the truth—daily videos of young children, some of them bloodied, some of them already dead, covered in dust and targeted by 2,000-pound dumb bombs made right here in America.
"If the real motivation for zapping TikTok from your phone is to silence legitimate political speech, just because a lot of members of Congress don't like it," wrote Bunch, "then this bill is the worst attack on the First Amendment since the government was sending World War I critics like Eugene V. Debs and Kate Richards O'Hare to prison, more than 100 years ago."
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The Groundwork Collaborative's leader also said that "the Department of Justice should criminally prosecute Scott Sheffield," the former Pioneer CEO whom the FTC blocked from joining ExxonMobil's board.
May 07, 2024
Groundwork Collaborative executive director Lindsay Owens on Tuesday responded to U.S. government allegations of fossil fuel industry price fixing with calls for federal prosecution and congressional action to return money to the American public.
"Americans have been working harder and harder to cover rising energy costs, with the understanding that supply chain snags and geopolitical forces were keeping prices high," Owens said. "Now the Federal Trade Commission has uncovered the real source behind the price at the pump: collusion."
"The Department of Justice should criminally prosecute Scott Sheffield and Congress should tax back the industry's windfall profits and issue every American a refund," she added, referring to Pioneer Natural Resources' founder and longtime CEO.
Owens' statement came after members of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) declined to contest ExxonMobil's controversial $64.5 billion acquisition of Pioneer—which was completed Friday—but approved a consent order barring Sheffield from serving on Exxon's board of directors or as an adviser to the fossil fuel giant.
"This complaint is a wake-up call about the dangerous consolidation of Big Oil's economic and political power."
The FTC voted 3-2 to accept the order and place related documents on the record for public comment. Citing communications including in-person meetings, public statements, text messages, and WhatsApp conversations, a commission complaint accuses Sheffield of trying to collude with the representatives of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and OPEC+.
"Mr. Sheffield's past conduct makes it crystal clear that he should be nowhere near Exxon's boardroom. American consumers shouldn't pay unfair prices at the pump simply to pad a corporate executive's pocketbook," said Kyle Mach, deputy director of the FTC's Bureau of Competition. "The FTC will remain vigilant in its enforcement efforts to protect competition in these vital markets."
Pioneer toldFortune that the company and its founder "believe that the FTC's complaint reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of the U.S. and global oil markets and misreads the nature and intent of Mr. Sheffield's actions," but neither party would take "any steps to prevent the merger from closing."
ExxonMobil "learned of the FTC's allegations regarding Sheffield from the agency and said in a statement that they are 'entirely inconsistent with how we do business,'" according to Fortune. "Exxon has agreed to the terms of the consent decree," which also "prohibits the oil giant from appointing any Pioneer employee or director to its board for five years."
Still, since the FTC's allegations were initially reported by The Wall Street Journal last week and then confirmed with the complaint's release, demands for additional action by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and Congress have mounted.
Cassidy DiPaola, Fossil Free Media's director of communications, on Monday called the complaint "explosive" and said that Democrats "must respond with bold action to hold this rogue industry accountable," including:
- Aggressive congressional and DOJ investigations into the full extent of Big Oil's price fixing;
- A windfall profits tax to claw back ill-gotten gains; and
- End taxpayer subsidies for oil and gas.
"But accountability is just the first step. This complaint is a wake-up call about the dangerous consolidation of Big Oil's economic and political power. We can't let them use megamergers to entrench their control and crush clean energy competition," she stressed. "Ultimately, this is about the future we choose: One where we remain at the mercy of Big Oil's greed and destruction, or one where clean, democratically controlled energy powers our communities. It's time to make the right choice."
In response to the Journal's reporting, Tyson Slocum, director of Public Citizen's Energy Program, similarly said that "Congress must immediately hold hearings on Big Oil's alleged collusion with OPEC to raise gasoline prices for Americans."
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The reporting was notably published on the same day as the U.S. Senate Budget Committee's hearing about a nearly three-year investigation into fossil fuel companies and trade groups' decadeslong "campaign of deception and distraction," which has evolved from denying the planet-heating impact of their products to pretending to be part of the solution to the climate emergency.
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"His record clearly demonstrates a prioritization of carrier profits over the safety of rail workers and the traveling public," said Railroad Workers United.
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An alliance of unionized rail workers on Tuesday demanded that the U.S. Senate reject President Joe Biden's nomination of former Trump administration official Ronald Batory to serve on the board of Amtrak, the nation's passenger rail company.
In a statement, Railroad Workers United (RWU) said Batory's tenure as head of the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) under former President Donald Trump "was marked by policies favoring 'operational efficiencies' (i.e., corporate profits) over the safety and well-being of rail workers and the public."
"Notably, under his leadership, FRA attempted to override state laws mandating two-person train crews, promoting instead the adoption of single-person crews nationally," said RWU. "This push was part of a broader deregulation agenda, ostensibly aimed at reducing operational costs for the monopoly of carriers at the potential expense of safety and labor protections."
"Moreover, during the Covid-19 pandemic, Mr. Batory oversaw the FRA's issuance of emergency waivers that suspended numerous long-standing safety regulations," the group added. "These waivers were granted rapidly with limited opportunity for stakeholder input, raising significant concerns among rail labor organizations about their sweeping breadth and the lack of stringent oversight, which could compromise rail safety and worker security."
The statement urges rail workers across the country to contact their senators and demand they block Batory's nomination.
"His record clearly demonstrates a prioritization of carrier profits over the safety of rail workers and the traveling public," said RWU, calling the Senate to "derail Batory."
“Railroad Workers United urges all members of #raillabor to actively contact their Senators and argue against Mr. Batory's confirmation. His record clearly demonstrates a prioritization of carrier profits over the safety of rail workers and the traveling public.” #DerailBatory pic.twitter.com/8kVNNsBihD
— Railroad Workers United ✊ (@railroadworkers) May 7, 2024
Rail workers reacted with outrage last week after Biden announced Batory's nomination, given his ties to the railroad industry and policy moves under an administration whose deregulatory spree helped lay the groundwork for the toxic crash in East Palestine, Ohio last year.
Amtrak's board of directors is required to be both geographically and politically diverse. Greg Regan, president of the Transportation Trades Department of the AFL-CIO, noted in a statement Monday that while Batory "would never be our choice, we recognize that federal law requires the board to have three members from the minority party, in this case the Republican Party."
"Since the law also requires the president to consult with the Senate minority leader when making minority party appointments, the breadcrumb trail for this transparently anti-labor nominee leads directly to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's doorstep," said Regan, contending that the Kentucky Republican "owns this choice," not Biden.
In its statement Tuesday, RWU acknowledged that "some may argue that the Biden administration is procedurally obligated to forward this nomination."
But the group said Batory's nomination nevertheless "starkly contradicts the administration's stated commitments to worker safety and robust regulatory standards."
"The nomination of Mr. Batory, whose regulatory philosophy aligns with reducing workforce protections and operational oversight, does not serve the public interest," said RWU.
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