By Steven M. Siros, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health & Safety Law Practice

Almost two years to the date after U.S. EPA issued its regulatory determination for contaminants on the forth Contaminant Candidate List, U.S. EPA has issued its draft rule setting drinking water limits for several PFAS compounds.  Specifically.  U.S. EPA’s draft rule proposes a four part per trillion (ppt) maximum contaminant level (MCL) for perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS).  According to an U.S. EPA fact sheet that accompanied the proposed rule, the four ppt level is the lowest concentration that can be reliably detected within “specified limits of precision and accuracy during routine laboratory operations conditions”. 

These proposed MCLs are higher than U.S. EPA’s previously issued health advisory levels (HALs) of 0.004 ppt for PFOA and 0.02 ppt for PFOS.  The reason for the higher proposed MCL levels is due in large part to the fact that U.S. EPA is required to consider available treatment technologies and treatment costs when setting an MCL which it is not required to do when setting a HAL.  U.S. EPA’s proposed maximum contaminant level goal (MCLG) for these specific PFAS which doesn’t need to consider technical feasibility of cost is “0”.  With respect to its previously issued HALs, U.S. EPA specifically noted that following receipt of public comments and finalization of the PFAS MCL, it will decide whether to update or remove the HALs for PFOA and PFOS. 

U.S. EPA’s draft rule also proposes to regulate several additional PFAS, including hexafluoropropylene oxide dimer acid (commonly referred to as GenX), perfluorononanoate (PFNA), perfluorohexanesulfonic acid (PFHxS), and perfluorobutane sulfonic acid (PFBS).  Rather than proposing an MCL for these PFAS,  U.S. EPA instead seeks to regulate these PFAS utilizing a hazard index which is a screening level approach that provides a risk indicator rather than a risk estimate for a mixture of components.

This hazard index approach is sometimes used by other federal agencies, including the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.  Under this hazard index approach, U.S. EPA has identified health-based water concentrations (HBWCs) (i.e., the level at which no health effects are expected for that PFAS) for PFHxS (9 ppt); GenX (10 ppt), PFNA (10 ppt) and PFBS (200 ppt).  The detected concentration of each PFAS in drinking water is then divided by the HBWC to get a individual hazard quotient (HQ).  The hazard index is the summation of each of these HQs—if the hazard index value exceeds 1.0, then that would be an exceedance of the MCL.

The MCLs will become effective three years after they are finalized.   At that time, public drinking water systems will be obligated to test for these specific PFAS and take steps to mitigate any exceedances that are identified. 

U.S. EPA has proposed a 60-day comment period on the draft rule; however, in light of what are expected to be significant public comments, it is likely that this comment period will be extended. 

We will continue to provide timely updates on U.S. EPA’s ongoing efforts to regulate PFAS under the various environmental statutes at the Corporate Environmental Lawyer. 

By Allison A. Torrence 

On December 30, 2022, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (“Army Corps”) announced they had finalized the rule establishing the definition of “waters of the United States” (“WOTUS”) under the Clean Water Act (“CWA”) (the “WOTUS Rule”). This definition is one of the most controversial and highly-litigated aspects of the CWA, if not all environmental law, because it has wide-ranging implications.

The definition of “waters of the United States” is so important because it sets the jurisdictional limits of the CWA. Under the CWA, EPA and the Army Corps have the power to regulate, among other things, the discharge of pollutants to navigable waters from a point source (33 U.S.C. § 1362(12)) and the discharge of dredged or fill material into navigable waters (33 U.S.C. § 1344). “Navigable waters” are defined in the CWA as “the waters of the United States, including the territorial seas.” 33 U.S.C. §1362(7). “Waters of the United States” is not defined further under the CWA, so the agencies have been left to try to craft a definition.

The Army Corps and EPA first proposed a WOTUS definition in 1977 and it has faced revisions and legal challenges ever since. The WOTUS definition has faced Supreme Court review in three previous cases, and is currently pending review in the case of Sackett v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 19-35469, on appeal from the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

The WOTUS definition was revised in 2015 by the Obama Administration to expand the definition and then in 2020 by the Trump Administration to narrow the definition; with both definitions facing swift legal challenges, including vacatur of the Trump rule in 2021. At issue in all of these rules is how to treat non-traditional navigable waters, like ephemeral bodies of water and wetlands.

The current WOTUS Rule goes back to re-establish the pre-2015 definition of WOTUS, and also incorporates guidance from the most recent Supreme Court case, the 2006 case of Rapanos v. U.S., 547 U.S. 715. In Rapanos, the Court did not reach a majority opinion. Justice Scalia authored a plurality opinion, Justice Kennedy wrote a concurring opinion, and Justice Stevens wrote a dissenting opinion. EPA and the Army Corps are incorporating Justice Kennedy’s opinion, which provided that wetlands and other bodies of water that have a “significant nexus” to more traditional navigable waters should be included in WOTUS. Id. at 759. This was in contrast to Justice Scalia’s opinion, which limited WOTUS to “only those wetlands with a continuous surface connection to bodies that are "waters of the United States" in their own right…” Id. at 739-42.

Thus, the new WOTUS Rule includes the following categories of waterbodies: (1) traditional navigable waters (e.g., certain large rivers and lakes); (2) territorial seas; (3) interstate waters; (4) impoundments; (5) tributaries; (6) adjacent wetlands; (7) and additional waters. To determine jurisdiction for tributaries, adjacent wetlands, and additional waters, the WOTUS Rule looks at whether the body of water meets either the “relatively permanent standard” or “significant nexus standard”, as follows:

• Relatively Permanent Standard is a test that readily identifies a subset of waters that will virtually always significantly affect traditional navigable waters, the territorial seas, or interstate waters. To meet the relatively permanent standard, the waterbodies must be relatively permanent, standing, or continuously flowing waters connected to traditional navigable waters or waters with a continuous surface connection to such relatively permanent waters or to traditional navigable waters, the territorial seas, or interstate waters.
• Significant Nexus Standard is a test that clarifies if certain waterbodies, such as tributaries and wetlands, are subject to the Clean Water Act based on their connection to and effect on larger downstream waters that Congress fundamentally sought to protect. A significant nexus exists if the waterbody (alone or in combination) significantly affects the chemical, physical, or biological integrity of traditional navigable waters, the territorial seas, or interstate waters.

The WOTUS rule will be published in the Federal Register in the next few days, and will be effective 60 days after publication. Legal challenges will surely follow, and its future longevity will likely be determined by the Supreme Court in the Sackett case. EPA had tried to avoid Supreme Court review based on the fact that it was working on a revised rule, but that argument was not successful. Therefore, it is likely that the Court will go forward and make a ruling on WOTUS, potentially undermining the basis for the current WOTUS rule. As always, we will keep you updated on key developments in the Corporate Environmental Lawyer Blog.

More information about the new WOTUS Rule is available on EPA’s website.

 By Steven M. Siros, Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health & Safety Law Practice

                                                                                                                                                                                                                               
On November 2, 2022, U.S. EPA released the pre-publication version of the fifth contaminant candidate list (CCL 5) containing 66 chemicals, 12 microbes, and three chemical groups (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), cyanotoxins, and disinfection byproducts).  Under the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA), every five years, U.S. EPA is obligated to publish a list of unregulated contaminants and contaminant groups that are known or anticipated to occur in public water systems and that may require regulation.  Once on the CCL, U.S. EPA will compile and evaluate additional data and then proceed to make regulatory determinations for those contaminants that U.S. EPA determines present the greatest public health concerns.  A regulatory determination is a formal decision by U.S. EPA that is the first step in developing a national primary drinking water regulation for a specific contaminant. For example, U.S. EPA recently made regulatory determinations for perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS) and perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and is in the process of working on developing drinking water standards for these contaminants.

With respect to the PFAS chemical group included in CCL 5, U.S. EPA defined PFAS as a class of chemicals with the chemical structure R-(CF2)-C(F)(R’),R” where the CF2 and the CF moieties are saturated carbons and none of the R groups can be hydrogen.  The definition triggered opposition from both industry and environmental groups.  Industry groups opposed the class approach, noting that not all PFAS pose the same risks and that adopting a class approach can lead to the regulation of useful and necessary products.  Environmental group, on the other hand, sought a broader definition that would include any compound containing at least one fully fluorinated methyl or methylene carbon atom. 

U.S. EPA specifically acknowledged that this definition as limited to the CCL 5 and should not be reviewed as representing U.S. EPA’s definition of PFAS for all regulatory programs.  However, U.S. EPA does seem more sympathetic to the concerns raised by the environmental groups as evidenced by the following excerpt from the pre-publication notice: 

EPA is also aware there may be emerging contaminants such as fluorinated organic substances that may be used in or are a result of the PFAS manufacturing process (e.g., starting materials, intermediates, processing aids, by-products and/or degradates) that do not meet the structural definition. Those emerging PFAS contaminants or contaminant groups may be known to occur or are anticipated to occur in public water systems, and which may require regulation. If emerging PFAS contaminants or contaminant groups are identified, EPA may consider moving directly to the regulatory determination process or consider listing those contaminants for future CCL cycles. EPA will continue to be proactive in considering evolving occurrence and health effects data of these emerging contaminants.

We will continue to track U.S. EPA’s ongoing efforts to regulate PFAS in the various environmental media and provide timely updates on the Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog.

As Gay Sigel walked through the doors at One IBM Plaza in Chicago, fresh out of law school and ready to launch her career as an attorney at Jenner & Block, she could not have envisioned the tremendous impact she would have on her clients, her colleagues, and her community over the next 39 years. Gay started her legal career as a general litigator, but Gay and Bob Graham were quick to realize how the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) was creating a new and exciting area of the law that was increasingly important for the firm’s clients: Environmental Law. Gay and Bob saw an opportunity to specialize in that area and founded Jenner & Block’s Environmental Health and Safety Practice. Gay has been an ever-present force in the EHS community ever since.

Over her 39-year career at Jenner & Block, Gay has worked on some of the most significant environmental cases in the country for clients ranging from global Fortune 50 corporations to environmental organizations to individuals. For more than a decade, she taught environmental law at Northwestern University, helping shape the next generation of environmental lawyers. She has worked on issues of global impact, like those affecting climate change, issues of local impact like those related to combined sewer overflows to the Chicago River, and issues of individual impact like those involving employee safety and health. No matter the subject, Gay has always been a tireless advocate for her clients. We often describe her as the Energizer Bunny of environmental lawyers: she is the hardest working attorney we have ever met. 

Gay’s true passion is to make this world a better, more just place for others. So, throughout her career as an environmental, health, and safety lawyer, Gay has devoted her time, energy, and emotional resources to innumerable pro bono cases and charitable and advocacy organizations. Her pro bono work includes successfully protecting asylum applicants, defending criminal cases, asserting parental rights, and defending arts organizations in OSHA matters. Among her many civic endeavors, Gay was a founding member of the AIDS Legal Council of Chicago (n/k/a as the Legal Council for Health Justice); she was the Secretary and active member of the Board of Directors for the Chicago Foundation for Women; and she was on the Board of the New Israel Fund. Gay continues to promote justice wherever she sees injustice, including as an advocate for women’s rights, particularly for women’s reproductive rights.

In both her environmental, health, and safety practice as well as her pro bono and charitable work, Gay is a tremendous mentor to younger (and even older) attorneys. She is curious, committed, exacting, fearless, and demanding (though more of herself than of others). We all give Gay much credit for making us the lawyers we are today.

Gay is leaving Jenner & Block to embark on her next adventure. She is returning to public service as Assistant Corporation Counsel Supervisor with the City of Chicago's Department of Law where she will be focusing on environmental issues. The City and its residents will be well served as Gay will bring her vast experience and unparalleled energy to work tirelessly to protect the City and its environment. We will miss working with and learning from Gay on a daily basis, but we look forward to seeing the great things she will accomplish for the City of Chicago. We know we speak for the entire firm as we wish Gay bon voyage—we will miss you! 

Steven M. Siros, Allison A. Torrence, Andi S. Kenney

By Steven M. Siros, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health & Safety Law Practice

U.S. EPA issued its long anticipated interim updated drinking water health advisories for perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) that replace previous U.S. EPA health advisories for these per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) that had been set at 70 parts per trillion (ppt). The updated advisory levels, which U.S. EPA claims are based on new science and consider lifetime exposure, evidence that U.S. EPA believes that adverse health effects may occur with concentrations of PFOA or PFOS in water that are about as close to zero as you can get.  U.S. EPA notes that these interim health advisories will remain in place until EPA establishes a National Primary Drinking Water Regulation.

U.S. EPA has set a new health advisory level of 0.02 ppt for PFOS and 0.004 ppt for PFOA.  These new levels are dramatically lower than U.S. EPA's previous 70 ppt level that applied to both PFOA and PFOS.  U.S. EPA also set final advisories for hexafluoropropylene oxide dimer acid and its ammonium salts (also referred to as GenX) at 10 ppt and perfluorobutane sulfonic acid (PFBS) at 2,000 ppt.

Interestingly, U.S. EPA's health advisory levels for both PFOA and PFOS are set well below the current analytical detection limit of 4 ppt.   Responding to questions as to how the regulated community is supposed to demonstrate compliance with these health advisory levels, U.S. EPA acknowledged it was a "complicated matter" and U.S. EPA's advice was for water providers to test for PFAS using the currently analytical methodology that can test to 4 ppt.  

Environmental groups and the plaintiffs’ bar were quick to applaud the new health advisory levels, noting that any detectible levels of PFOA or PFOS represent unacceptable levels of these compounds in drinking water. The regulated community, on the other hand, blasted the new health advisory levels, claiming that the advisory levels ignored U.S. EPA’s commitment to embrace scientific integrity.

Regardless of which side of the fence that you find yourself, it is clear that U.S. EPA’s new PFAS health advisories will be relied upon by plaintiffs to file lawsuits in any instance where a detectible concentration of PFOA and/or PFOS is found in drinking water which in turn is likely to keep drinking water providers throughout the United States awake at night. 

We will continue to provide updates on U.S. EPA’s efforts to regulate PFAS at the Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog.

By Steven M. Siros, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health & Safety Law Practice

On May 18, 2022, U.S. EPA updated its Regional Screening Level tables to include five new per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS).  The five new PFAS compounds added to the RSL tables are hexafluoropropylene oxide dimer acid and its ammonium salt (HFPO-DA – sometimes referred to as GenX chemicals), perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS), perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), perfluorononanoic acid (PFNA), and perfluorohexanesulfonic acid (PFHxS). U.S. EPA added its first PFAS substance, PFBS or perfluorobutanesulfonic acid, to the RSL tables in 2014 and updated that listing in 2021 when U.S. EPA released its updated toxicity assessment for PFBS.

The RSLs are risk-based screening values for residential and industrial soils and tap water that U.S. EPA relies upon to help determine if remediation is necessary.  Although U.S. EPA is quick to point out that the RSLs are not cleanup standards, regulators at both the state and federal levels rely on these RSLs to drive decision-making at contaminated sites.  The regulators also rely on these RSLs notwithstanding that U.S. EPA has yet to officially designate any PFAS as a CERCLA hazardous substance or RCRA hazardous waste (although efforts are ongoing on both fronts--CERCLA hazardous substances /  RCRA hazardous wastes).

U.S. EPA set the screening levels for PFOA, PFOS, PFNA, and PFHxS based on the Minimal Risk Levels from the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry’s toxicological profiles.  The screening level for HFPO-DA was set based on a final, peer-reviewed toxicity value.  For example, the screening level for PFOS is set at 38 parts per trillion for tap water and 1.6 parts per million for industrial soils and the screening level for PFOA is set at 60 parts per trillion for tap water and 2.5 parts per million for industrial soils   

As we await further U.S. EPA action with respect to regulating PFAS under RCRA and CERCLA, it is interesting to note that U.S. EPA is currently engaged in a significant information gathering exercise related to historical PFAS use.  Relying on its authority under CERCLA Section 104(e), U.S. EPA has recently issued scores of information requests seeking information regarding facilities’ past PFAS uses and practices.  The use of these information requests is consistent with the statements in U.S. EPA’s 2021 PFAS Roadmap where U.S. EPA indicated that it intended to rely on its various enforcement tools to identify and address PFAS releases. 

We will continue to provide timely updates on PFAS-related issues at the Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog. 

By Matthew G. Lawson

“When the wind of change blows, some people build walls, others build windmills.” While this ancient Chinese proverb most likely did not envision the construction of large-scale, offshore wind farms, its wisdom remains strikingly applicable to the United States’ energy and infrastructure policies in the 21^st Century.  At a time of growing concern over fossil fuel availability, climate change and energy grid security, the Corporate Environmental Lawyer is taking a moment during Earth Day 2022 to look towards our nation’s investment into improved infrastructure and clean, self-sustaining energy sources.

Undoubtably one of the largest recent, public investments in the United States’ infrastructure and energy future occurred on November 15, 2021, when President Biden signed into law the bipartisan and highly anticipated $1.2 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.  According to the bill’s Summary, over the next five years, the legislation will provide significant infrastructure investments, including an additional $110 Billion in funding towards bridge and roadway repairs, along with approximately $30 Billion in public transportation.  In addition, the bill allocates approximately $65 Billion to the Country’s power infrastructure, with nearly $29 billion dedicated solely to bolstering and protecting the electric grid.  Finally, the bill includes $7.5 billion to deploy a national network of electric vehicle chargers across highway corridors throughout the United States.

Perhaps even more critical than the legislation’s investment is infrastructure spending, is its investment in future clean energy sources.  Funds allocated through 2025 for clean energy projects include $84,000,000 for enhanced geothermal systems, $100,000,000 for wind energy, and $80,000,000 for solar energy. Moreover, the Biden Administration is betting big on “Clean hydrogen”—an emerging form of clean energy that utilizes surplus from other renewable sources to create additional power by splitting water molecules—by earmarking approximately $8 million in funding for investment in the technology.

Looking beyond the United States’ public infrastructure investments, private investment into clean-energy assets also skyrocketed in 2021, reaching a record $105 billion.  This investment represents an 11% jump from 2020 and a 70% surge during the past five years, according to the Business Council for Sustainable Energy. Private backing into U.S. assets such as wind farms and solar plants represents about 14% of the $755 billion in global private investment made last year, including investment in the United States’ first commercial-scale offshore windfarm, the 30 MW Block Island Wind Farm, which is set to supply power to the energy grid by 2023.  The project is the first of what the Department of Energy (DOE) anticipates being a major rollout of privately-funded offshore wind, including an estimated addition of more than 30 gigawatts of offshore wind power by the year 2030.

At a time when Americans are increasingly feeling pessimistic about the future of our Country, it is important to embrace the opportunity for bilateral agreement presented through future investments in the nation’s infrastructure and clean energy.  Safe roads, reliable energy grids, clean air and new jobs are an area of common agreement between Americans at a time when such agreements appear to be increasingly rare.  As a nation, we would do well to embrace our changing world and new challenges by investing in ourselves and our future.

By Connor S.W. Rubin 

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has led to over 11 million people fleeing their homes, and 5 million who have reportedly left Ukraine – a staggering number for a conflict that began in late February. However, while the war in Ukraine is one of the latest events causing a surge of refugees, those fleeing Russian aggression are by no means alone. As of the most recent data from the United Nations High Commissioner on Refugees (“UNHCR”), which counts until mid-2021, there were 20,835,367 people qualified as refugees under the UNHCR’s mandate – an uptick from the 20,661,855 recorded in 2020. Additionally, the UNHCR tracked 50,872,901 “internally displaced persons of concern” during the same period in 2021.

These numbers reflect the staggering impact of human conflict and economic instability; however, they do not show the full impact of human activity. The term “refugee” has a specific definition, laid out in the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Protocol (together “the Convention”). The definition includes any person who crosses a border “owing to well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion.” That definition, written 24 years before Wallace Broecker first put the term “global warming” into the public domain, does not include those fleeing climate disasters in its definition. While recent legal guidance from the UNHCR notes that communities impacted by climate change “may be exposed to a risk of human rights violations that amount to persecution within the meaning of the 1951 Convention” due to limitations on “access to and control over land, natural resources, livelihoods, individual rights, freedoms and lives”, impacts of climate change alone do not qualify someone fleeing their homeland as a refugee. This is because fleeing formerly arable land that no longer sustains crops due to gradual desertification or fleeing cities that have become unlivable due to flooding, fires, or other extreme events do not inherently create “a well-founded fear of being persecuted.”

Is it time for an update to the definition? Some commenters believe so. According to the World Bank, by 2050 over 143,000,000 people could be intra- or internationally displaced from Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and Latin America by climate change. This is roughly equivalent to the populations of California, Texas, Florida, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, and Tennessee combined. Without changes to how we view refugees, many of these people may be forced from the areas they’ve lived for generations without any legal status or protections. Advocates who support such changes argue that the current definition of “refugee” under international law fails to include many people forced to flee their home for reasons that fit the spirit of refugee law, but not the strict limitations imposed by the 1951 Convention. The (aptly named) advocacy group “Climate Refugees” gives examples of hypothetical cases, including “the Bangladeshi family displaced across borders by a disaster, the subsistence farmer in Chad with no option but to leave his country because he lacks water for farming, or a mother forced to flee her country because of a climate change-induced resource war.” Such displaced people fall into the goals as stated in the preamble of the 1951 Convention that all people should be able to “enjoy fundamental rights and freedoms without discrimination.” As further articulated by Andrew Schoenholtz in the Chicago Journal of International Law, while “some individuals displaced by natural disasters and climate change may be ‘persecuted’ in connection with a characteristic protected by the Refugee Convention, the vast majority of these newest forced migrants will need new norms developed to address their unique situation.”

Other (though less ubiquitous) compacts or treaties such as the 1969 Convention Governing the Specific Aspects of Refugee Problems in Africa, by the Organisation for African Unity – subsequently adopted by the African Union (“the OAU Convention”) and the 1984 Cartagena Declaration have expanded the definitions of “refugee”, but these may also be inadequate for what advocates seek. The 1969 OAU Convention was organized as many African states were either newly freed from colonialism, or else still fighting for freedom. As such, the definition of refugee was expanded to include “every person who, owing to external aggression, occupation, foreign domination or events seriously disturbing public order in either part or whole of his country of origin or nationality.” The “events seriously disturbing public order” could likely be found to include natural disasters but may still not be fully inclusive of climate change’s pernicious, but slower-acting changes. Further, the requirement of “serious” disturbance of the public order may require large-scale disorder, which may not be present in each circumstance. The Cartagena Convention is a non-binding regional instrument signed by 10 Latin American nations. The definition of refugee is like that found in the OAU Convention’s and includes “persons who have fled their country because their lives, security or freedom have been threatened by generalized violence, foreign aggression, internal conflicts, massive violation of human rights or other circumstances which have seriously disturbed public order.” These two instruments are uniquely broad in their definition, and even they may not include the full sum of those advocates seek to include in a new definition of “climate refugee.”

However, that may not be the case for long. On February 4, 2021, President Biden signed Executive Order 14013 entitled Rebuilding and Enhancing Programs to Resettle Refugees and Planning for the Impact of Climate Change on Migration. This order required the National Security Advisor and Secretaries of State, Defense, Homeland Security, the Director of USAID, and the Director of National Intelligence to “prepare and submit … a report on climate change and its impact on migration, including forced migration, internal displacement, and planned relocation.” That report, released in October of 2021, advocates for an interagency working group to address growing climate migration and its effects, and an expansion of the use of Temporary Protected Status to help resettle those impacted most severely by climate disasters. While stopping short of what some advocates hoped for in terms of seeking to declare climate refugees protected, the report at least shows a willingness to substantively engage in the effects of climate change and its role in global movement.

As the world grapples with how to prevent climate change, and increasingly turns to how to adapt to the effects of climate change, climate refugees will continue to be a growing problem around the world. Addressing their legal status is just one step in a complex and quickly evolving landscape.

By Steven M. Siros, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health & Safety Law Practice

On the 60^th anniversary of the publication of Rachel Carlson’s groundbreaking book “Silent Spring”, the world continues to struggle to manage the human health and environmental risks associated with newly discovered emerging contaminants.  Silent Spring focused on the challenges associated with managing the risks associated with pesticides (and more specifically DDT), and even today, many of the largest personal injury verdicts are associated with alleged exposure to pesticides. 

Over the many years since Silent Spring, numerous contaminants have moved through the emerging contaminant life cycle, including asbestos, dioxins, PCBs, MTBE, BPA, 1,4-dioxane, and most recently, per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) (although PFAS seems stuck in the middle of the life cycle).      

The life cycle journey of emerging contaminants has been influenced significantly by our improved ability to understand the potential impacts of these emerging contaminants on human health and the environment.  As new contaminants are identified, resources are devoted to better understanding the potential environmental and health risks associated with these contaminants and regulations generally evolve to mitigate identified risks.  In response to increased regulatory pressure, industry’s use of chemicals evolves and the risks are mitigated.  Of course, industry’s use of these chemicals also evolves and is influenced by lawsuits when the regulations and/or the enforcement of the regulations lags.  

In addition to improved understanding of the risks posed by some of these emerging contaminants, the fact that we are able to measure smaller and smaller quantities of these contaminants also impacts the life-cycle journey of these emerging contaminants.  When I started practicing environmental law in the dark ages, contaminants in soil and groundwater were measured in parts per thousand.  As science evolved to detect lower and lower levels, regulatory levels moved from parts per million to parts per billion, and then parts per trillion, and PCBs are now regulated in parts per quadrillion.   As detection levels drop, the number of new emerging contaminants will increase and the life-cycle journey for each of these contaminants begins.  

A lot can be said for the progress that has been made since the summer of 1962.  Although some will argue it should still be faster, the time from discovery of the contaminant to identification of risks and regulation of these identified risks has greatly improved since the 1960s.  This is due in part to the fact society has a much lower tolerance for risks posed by emerging contaminants and is much quicker to demand a response from the regulators now than was the case in the 1960s when environmental laws in the United States were in their infancy. A reformed TSCA is better situated to address both environmental and health and safety impacts of chemicals (both newly manufactured chemicals and new chemical uses).   U.S. EPA, working in collaboration with manufacturers, implemented a global stewardship program to eliminate the manufacture and import of long-chain PFAS compounds.  In October 2021, U.S. EPA announced its PFAS Strategic Roadmap intended to implement a whole-of-agency approach to addressing PFAS.

As our understanding of risks evolves and our detection levels drop, it is inevitable that we will continue to identify new emerging contaminants that need to be regulated.  However, I think Rachel Carlson would be proud of the progress we have made and continue to make to ensure that the world is a safer place for everyone. 

By Allison A. Torrence

As we near Earth Day 2022, the United States may be headed toward a profound change in the way EPA and similar administrative agencies regulate the complex areas of environmental law. EPA began operating more than 50 years ago in 1970, and has been tasked with promulgating and enforcing some of the most complex regulations on the books. From the Clean Air Act to the Clean Water Act; to CERCLA and RCRA and TSCA; and everything in between.

EPA has penned voluminous regulations over the past 50 years to implement vital environmental policies handed down from Congress—to remarkable effect. While there is certainly progress left to be done, improvements in air and water quality in the United States, along with hazardous waste management, has been impressive. For example, according to EPA data, from 1970 to 2020, a period in which gross domestic product rose 272% and US population rose 61%, aggregate emissions of the six criteria pollutants decreased by 78%.

(source: epa.gov)

For the past 50 years the environmental administrative law process has worked mostly the same way: First, Congress passes a law covering a certain environmental subject matter (e.g., water quality), which provides policy objectives and a framework of restrictions, prohibitions and affirmative obligations. Second, EPA, the administrative agency tasked with implementing the environmental law, promulgates detailed regulations defining terms used in the law and explaining in a more comprehensive fashion how to comply with the obligations outlined in the statute. Depending on the subject matter being addressed, Congress may leave more details up to EPA, as the subject matter expert, to fill in via regulation. In some instances, there is a third step, where additional authority is delegated to the states and tribes to implement environmental regulations at the state-level based on the framework established by Congress and EPA. Occasionally someone thinks EPA overstepped its authority under a given statute, or failed to act when it was supposed to, and litigation follows to correct the over or under action.

Currently, this system of administrative law is facing challenges from parties that believe administrative agencies like EPA have moved from implementing Congress’s policy to setting their own. The most significant such challenge has come in the consolidated Clean Air Act (“CAA”) cases pending before the U.S. Supreme Court, West Virginia v. EPA, Nos. 20-1530, 20-1531, 20-1778, 20-1780.^[1] In West Virginia v. EPA, challengers object to the Obama-EPA’s Clean Power Plan (“CPP”), which used a provision in the New Source Performance Standards (“NSPS”) section of the CAA to set greenhouse gas emission standards for existing power plants. The biggest issue with the CPP, according to challengers, is that the new standards would require many operators to shut down older coal-fired units and shift generation to lower-emitting natural gas or renewable units. Challengers, which include several states, power companies and coal companies, argue the CPP implicates the “major questions doctrine” or “non-delegation doctrine”. These doctrines provide that large-scale initiatives that have broad impacts can't be based on vague, minor, or obscure provisions of law. Challengers argue that the NSPS provision used as the basis for the CPP is a minor provision of law that is being used by EPA to create a large-scale shift in energy policy. EPA argues that, although it is currently revising its greenhouse gas regulations, the actions taken in the CPP were authorized by Congress in the CAA, are consistent with with the text of the CAA as written, and do not raise the specter of the major questions or non-delegations doctrines.

While this case will certainly dictate how EPA is permitted to regulate greenhouse gases under the CAA, it will likely have broader impacts on administrative law. On the one hand, the Court may issue a narrow opinion that evaluates the CPP based on the regulations being inconsistent with the text or intent of the CAA. On the other hand, the Supreme Court may issue a broader opinion that invokes the major questions or non-delegation doctrines to hold that based on the significant-impacts of the regulation, it is an area that should be governed by Congress, not an administrative agency. If the Supreme Court takes the latter route, it could set more limits on Congress’s ability to delegate regulatory authority to administrative agencies like EPA.

Indeed, in the Supreme Court’s recent decision on the OSHA emergency temporary standard on employer vaccine or test mandate (“the OSHA ETS”), Ohio v. Dept. of Labor, et al., 595 U.S. ____ (2022), the Court struck down an administrative regulation in a preview of what might be coming in the EPA CAA case. As everyone knows by now, the Supreme Court struck down the OSHA ETS, holding it was an overstep of the agency’s authority to regulate safety issues in the workplace. The Court’s opinion focused on the impact of the OSHA ETS—that it will impact 84 million employees and it went beyond the workplace—instead of the statutory language. The Court stated, “[i]t is telling that OSHA, in its half century of existence, has never before adopted a broad public health regulation of this kind—addressing a threat that is untethered, in any causal sense, from the workplace.” Slip op. at 8.  

Justices Thomas, Alito and Gorsuch invoked the major questions doctrine in their concurring opinion, stating that Congress must speak clearly if it wishes to delegate to an administrative agency decisions of vast economic and political import. In the case of OSHA and COVID-19, the Justices maintained that Congress did not clearly assign to OSHA the power to deal with COVID-19 because it had not done so over the past two years of the pandemic. Notably, the fact that when Congress passed the Occupational Safety and Health Act, it authorized OSHA to issue emergency regulations upon determining that “employees are exposed to grave danger from exposure to substances or agents determined to be toxic or physically harmful” and “that such emergency standard[s] [are] necessary to protect employees from such danger[s]”, was not a sufficient basis for the Court or the three consenting Justices. In their view, in order to authorize OSHA to issue this vaccine or test mandate, Congress had to do more than delegate to OSHA general emergency powers 50 years ago, but instead would have had to delegate authority specific to the current pandemic.

Applying this logic to EPA and the currently-pending CAA case, Justices Thomas, Alito and Gorsuch may conclude that provisions of the CAA written 50 or 30 years ago, before climate change was fully on Congress’s radar, should not be used to as the basis for regulations that impact important climate and energy policy. Of course, many questions remain: Will a majority of the court adopt this view, and how far they will take it? If Congress can’t delegate climate change and energy policy, what else is off the table—water rights? Hazardous waste? Chemical management? If Congress can’t delegate to EPA and other administrative agencies at the same frequency as in the past, how will Congress manage passing laws dealing with complex and technical areas of law?

All of these questions and more may arise, depending on how the Supreme Court rules in West Virginia v. EPA. For now, we are waiting to see what will happen, in anticipation of some potentially significant changes on the horizon.

[1] Jenner & Block filed an Amicus Curiae brief in this case on behalf of Former Power Industry Executives in support of EPA.

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

On this 52nd anniversary of Earth Day, I am not writing yet another, typically not very funny, riff on one of Shakespeare’s most famous lines.^[1] Instead, I am inspired by one of the most popular of our blogs, written in 2017 by our talented former partner, E. Lynn Grayson, “Imagine a Day Without Water.” To start our Earth Week series of daily blogs by our firm’s EHS department, I offer words of hope and gratitude for the vast amount of work that has been done to improve and protect the environment – work done by lawyers, scientists, policy makers, and members of the public, to name a few.

Imagine what lawyers and scientists faced in 1970, the year of the first Earth Day. There was oppressive soot and polluted air throughout urban and industrial areas in the United States. The Cuyahoga River was so blighted it had caught fire. Although there was a new federal Environmental Protection Agency and two new environmental statutes – the National Environmental Policy Act and the Clean Air Act, one of the most highly complex and technical statutes ever written – both needed an entire regulatory structure to be created in order to be operationalized and enforced. This foundational work had to be done when there was not even an accepted method for determining, much less regulating, environmental and public health risk. Then two years later, in 1972, a comprehensively overhauled Clean Water Act was enacted, followed within the next decade by TSCA, RCRA, and CERCLA, to address the consequences of past waste and chemical use, and to control their future more prudently. Other laws were also passed in that time period, including the Safe Drinking Water Act and the Endangered Species Act.

Although Earth Day was created in the U.S. – the idea of Senator Gaylord Nelson (WI-D) and supported by Representative Pete McCloskey (CA-R) (both lawyers) and grass roots organizers – environmental consciousness also was growing worldwide. The 1972 Stockholm Declaration, from the first UN Conference of the Human Environment, recognized the importance of environmental protection amid the challenge of economic disparities. That work, including of the United Nations Environment Programme, led to the 1992 “Earth Summit” issuing the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, which adopted a focus on sustainable development and the precautionary approach to protecting the environment in the face of scientific uncertainty, and creating the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which itself led to the 1997 Kyoto Protocol and the 2015 Paris Agreement, as well as other global efforts focusing on climate change and resource conservation.

Thus, within a split-second on our earth’s timeline, humans were able to tangibly improve and focus attention on the environment, through laws, agreements, governmental and private commitments, and public support. I note these developments, which were stimulated by lawyers on all sides, not to naively suggest that the global climate change, water accessibility, toxic exposure, and other environmental challenges that we face today can easily be solved, nor do I suggest that only lawyers can provide the solution. Instead, let’s take hope from the fact that in fewer years than the average for human life expectancy, there have been significant environmental improvements in our air, land, and water, and our collective focus on preserving the planet has been ignited.

These past efforts have improved the environment – not perfectly, but demonstrably. The legal structure that helped make these improvements happen has worked – not perfectly, but demonstrably. Hopefully, we will continue to work on these issues, despite their seeming intractability, under a system of national laws and global agreements. The alternative is too painful to contemplate.

Closing on a personal note, our firm’s Environmental Law Practice lost one of the best environmental lawyers in the profession, when Stephen H. Armstrong passed away last week. Steve was one of the first in-house environmental counsel I had the opportunity to work with when I began my focus on environmental law in the 1980s. He demonstrated how to respect the science, embrace the legal challenges, fight hard for your client, and always act with integrity. Although I was a young woman in a relatively new field, he consistently valued my opinions, supported my professional development, and with his deep, melodious laugh and sparkle in his eye, made working together feel like we shared a mission. And a ”mission” it was for him; I have never met any lawyer who cared more or wrestled harder about their clients’ position, while always undergirded by a deep reverence for doing the right thing. Once he joined our firm more than a decade ago, he continued being a role model for all of us. Our firm’s Environmental Law Practice, and all those who worked with him, will miss having him as a devoted colleague, friend, and mentor. Our earth has been made better for his life on it.

[1]“The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.” William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part 2, Act Iv, Scene 2 (circa 1591).

By Steven M. Siros, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health & Safety Law Practice

On March 22, 2022, U.S. EPA released a new web tool designed to ensure that information regarding environmental violations and enforcement actions is more readily available to the public. The new tool, called ECHO Notify, allows users to sign up for weekly emails when new information is available with respect to violations of environmental statutes or enforcement actions in a specific geographic area or with respect to a particular facility. 

ECHO Notify provides information on both state and federal enforcement and compliance activities under the following programs: Clean Air Act (stationary sources), Clean Water Act (point sources), Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (hazardous waste handlers), and Safe Drinking Water Act (public water system). The tool provides U.S. EPA-specific enforcement-related information with respect to other environmental statutes. 

In a press release that accompanied the release of the new tool, U.S. EPA Administrator Michael Regan stated that “EPA is committed to empowering communities with the information they need to understand and make informed decisions about their health and environment.” Administrator Regan went on to state “EPA has developed ECHO Notify so that finding updates on environmental enforcement and compliance activities is as easy as checking your email.” 

This new tool is another example of U.S. EPA’s continued focus on environmental justice communities and its desire to ensure that information regarding environmental compliance and enforcement activities is readily available to those communities. We will continue to provide updates regarding U.S. EPA initiatives at the Corporate Environmental Lawyer.

By Allison A. Torrence

On March 11, 2022, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) announced it was proposing new regulations that would require certain facilities located close to navigable waters create and submit Facility Response Plans for worst case discharges of hazardous substances. These regulations would add to EPA’s existing regulations of worst case discharges of oil, which have been in place since 1994. Adding a new twist in these proposed regulations, EPA would grant Regional Administrators wide discretion to make the Facility Response Plan requirements mandatory at facilities that, in the Regional Administrator’s judgment, were vulnerable to climate change or potentially impacting an environmental justice community, even if the facilities are not near a navigable water.

The Clean Water Act (“CWA”) contains general spill response plan requirements, which require EPA to establish rules “to prevent discharges of oil and hazardous substances from vessels and from onshore facilities and offshore facilities, and to contain such discharges…” 42 U.S.C. § 1321(j)(1)(C). In response to this requirement of the CWA, EPA promulgated its Spill Prevention, Control, and Countermeasure (“SPCC”) Regulations, found at 40 C.F.R. part 112.

The proposed hazardous substance Facility Response Plan rules are being promulgated pursuant to Section 311(j)(5) of the Clean Water Act (CWA), a  slightly more specific provision that was added to the CWA in 1990. Section 311(j)(5)(A) directs EPA to issue regulations that require certain facilities to prepare and submit to EPA “a plan for responding, to the maximum extent practicable, a worst case discharge, and to a substantial threat of such a discharge, of oil or a hazardous substance.” 42 U.S.C. § 1321(j)(5)(A)(i). Specifically, the CWA states that facilities covered by this requirement include, a facility  “that, because of its location, could reasonably be expected to cause substantial harm to the environment by discharging into or on the navigable waters, adjoining shorelines, or the exclusive economic zone.” 42 U.S.C. § 1321(j)(5)(C)(iv).

In 1994, EPA promulgated regulations that require certain facilities that store and use oil to prepare and submit a Facility Response Plan. See 40 C.F.R. §§ 112.20-112.21. However, EPA never issued regulations requiring similar response plans for facilities storing hazardous substances. On March 21, 2019, several environmental groups (the Natural Resources Defense Council, Clean Water Action, and the Environmental Justice Health Alliance for Chemical Policy Reform) sued EPA alleging violations of the CWA and the Administrative Procedures Act for its failure to issue those regulations. The environmental groups and EPA entered into a consent decree on March 12, 2020, that resolved the lawsuit and required EPA promulgate hazardous substance response plan regulations by March 12, 2022.

By Allison A. Torrence

On January 24, 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear a case on the scope and authority of the Clean Water Act (“CWA”). The Court granted certiorari in the case of Sackett v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 19-35469, on appeal from the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.  

The question presented to the Court is, seemingly, straightforward: “Whether the Ninth Circuit set forth the proper test for determining whether wetlands are 'waters of the United States' under the Clean Water Act, 33 U.S.C. § 1362(7).” But, this question has wide-reaching implications. The definition of “waters of the United States” (“WOTUS”) sets the jurisdictional limits of the CWA. Under the CWA, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (“Army Corps”) have the power to regulate, among other things, the discharge of pollutants to navigable water from a point source (33 U.S.C. § 1362(12)) and the discharge of dredged or fill material into navigable waters (33 U.S.C. § 1344). “Navigable waters” are defined in the CWA as “the waters of the United States, including the territorial seas.” 33 U.S.C. §1362(7). “Waters of the United States” is not defined further under the Act, so the agencies have been left to try to craft a definition.

The Army Corps and EPA first proposed a WOTUS definition in 1977 and it has faced revisions and legal challenges ever since. The WOTUS definition has faced Supreme Court review in three previous cases:

• U.S. v. Riverside Bayview, 474 U.S. 121 (1985)
• Solid Waste Agency of Northern Cook County v. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, 531 U.S. 159 (2001)
• Rapanos v. U.S., 547 U.S. 715 (2006)

In the most recent Supreme Court treatment, the Court did not reach a majority opinion. Justice Scalia authored a plurality opinion, Justice Kennedy wrote a concurring opinion, and Justice Stevens wrote a dissenting opinion. Following the Rapanos decision, lower courts and the agencies have grappled with whether to follow the framework laid out by Justice Scalia or Justice Kennedy. The primary difference is how they dealt with bodies of waters on the fringe of jurisdiction, like wetlands. Justice Scalia would include in WOTUS: “only those relatively permanent, standing or continuously flowing bodies of water forming geographic features that are described in ordinary parlance as streams, oceans, rivers, and lakes…[and] only those wetlands with a continuous surface connection to bodies that are "waters of the United States" in their own right…” Id. at 739-42. Justice Kennedy went beyond wetlands with a “continuous surface connection” to include wetlands and other bodies of water that have a “significant nexus” to more traditional navigable waters. Id. at 759.

The WOTUS definition was revised in 2015 by the Obama Administration to expand the definition and then in 2020 by the Trump Administration to narrow the definition; with both definitions facing swift legal challenges, including vacatur of the Trump rule in 2021. Just recently, on November 18, 2021, EPA and the Army Corps announced that they were issuing a proposed rule to re-establish the pre-2015 definition of WOTUS. The current proposed rule includes the “significant nexus” standard for non-traditional navigable waters.

In the case currently before the Supreme Court, Petitioners Michael and Chantell Sackett purchased property in Idaho in 2004 intending to build a home. When the Sacketts began filling in the wetlands on the property, EPA issued an administrative compliance order stating the property contained wetlands subject to CWA authority. The Sacketts were ordered to restore the property or face daily penalties. The Sacketts sued EPA, challenging the compliance order. The case has wound through the courts for years, eventually landing in the Ninth Circuit, where that court applied Justice Kennedy's “significant nexus” test and held that “EPA reasonably determined that the Sacketts' property contains wetlands that share a significant nexus with Priest Lake, such that the lot was regulable under the CWA and the relevant regulations.” Sackett v. EPA, 8 F. 4th 1075, 1093 (9th 2021).

In their petition for certiorari, Petitioners asked the Court to take the case to clear up the deep confusion over what standard applies and how it is interpreted by lower courts and the agencies. EPA tried to resist certiorari by arguing that the decision below was correctly decided and not in conflict with any opinion of the Court or other courts of appeals. Now, EPA faces an uphill battle before a Court that is more conservative than in 2006 and, in all likelihood, will be receptive to adopting Justice Scalia’s “continuous surface connection” standard, thereby narrowing the scope of the CWA.

By Steven M. Siros, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health & Safety Law Practice

On January 10, 2022, U.S. EPA forwarded to the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) a proposed rule that seeks to designate perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS) as “hazardous substances” under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA).  Although not unexpected since this was of the key elements of U.S. EPA’s PFAS Strategic Roadmap, U.S. EPA’s proposed rule is unique in that it represents one of the first times that U.S. EPA has by rule sought to designate a chemical as a CERCLA hazardous substance.  U.S. EPA's actions in sending the proposed rule to OMB may also be foreshadowing for a similar effort to designate PFOA and PFOS as "hazardous wastes" under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) which would subject these substances to RCRA's cradle to grave regulatory scheme.     

The effect of listing PFOA and PFOS as CERCLA “hazardous substances” is significant for the following reasons:  

• New Sites: By designating PFOA and PFOS as CERCLA “hazardous substances”, due to the ubiquitous nature of these contaminants in the environment, hundreds of sites could become CERCLA Superfund sites. For example, PFAS chemicals can be found in the soil and groundwater at sites that historically used firefighting foams, including airports, refineries, and military installations. It is also a contaminant of concern at manufacturing operations associated with cookware, stain-resistant clothing, and various packaging products. Finally, it may be a concern at municipal landfills and wastewater treatment facilities. There may also be trickle-down effects at the state level since many states automatically include federally-designated substances in the state definition of hazardous substances.  

• Existing/Closed Sites: Moreover, at existing Superfund sites (including sites where a final remedy has been selected and is being  implemented), U.S. EPA can require that the sites be investigated for PFOA and PFOS.  If found, U.S. EPA can require that existing remedial strategies be modified to address these contaminants in the soil or groundwater.  Similarly, even at sites where remedial measures have been completed, U.S. EPA could still seek to reopen the sites and require that these newly designated hazardous substances be remediated.  

• Cost-Recovery Claims:  Designation of PFOA and PFOS as CERCLA hazardous substances would open the door for both U.S. EPA and private-party PRPs to bring CERCLA cost recovery and/or contribution claims to pay for the costs to investigate and remediate these chemicals. In light of the increased scrutiny of these compounds in drinking water supplies, one could expect numerous CERCLA cost-recovery lawsuits by drinking water providers to recover the costs to treat public drinking water system. 

• Reporting Requirements: Designation as a CERCLA hazardous substance also triggers release reporting under CERCLA. CERCLA § 103 (42 U.S.C.  § 9603) requires that releases of “reportable quantities” (RQ) of CERCLA hazardous substances be reported to the National Response Center. Until such time as U.S. EPA promulgates a specific RQ  for PFOA and PFOS, the default RQ for these chemicals will be one pound.  Although many states are moving towards banning the use of fire-fighting foam that contains per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, if PFOA and/or PFOS are designated as CERCLA "hazardous substances", it is likely that any use of fire-fighting foam containing these substances would trigger CERCLA release reporting.    

Once U.S. EPA receives the review back from OMB  and publishes the proposed rule for comment in the Federal Register, U.S.EPA can expect to receive robust comments both against and in favor of the designation.  We will continue to follow U.S. EPA’s efforts to designate PFOA and PFOS as CERCLA “hazardous substances” at the Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog. 

By Allison A. Torrence

EPA faces continuing pressure to improve the way it protects communities from lead in drinking water. One focus of the current EPA has been the Lead and Copper Drinking Water Rule Revisions (“LCRR”), promulgated under the Trump administration. As it grappled with what to do with the LCRR, the Biden EPA delayed the LCRR’s effective date and compliance deadlines on two occasions, most recently making the LCRR effective on December 16, 2021 and pushing the compliance deadline back nine months, from January 16, 2024 to October 16, 2024. National Primary Drinking Water Regulations: Lead and Copper Rule Revisions; Delay of Effective and Compliance Dates, 86 FR 31939 (June 16, 2021). Then, in conjunction with the LCRR’s effective date, on December 16, 2021, EPA announced its plans to revise and strengthen the LCRR, while leaving the rule in place for now. Review of the National Primary Drinking Water Regulation: Lead and Copper Rule Revisions (LCRR), 86 FR 71574 (Dec. 17, 2021).

In response to the delays of the LCRR’s effective date and compliance deadlines, the states of Arizona, Louisiana, Ohio, Oklahoma, and Texas filed a challenge in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, in the case of Arizona et al. v. U.S. EPA et al., Case No. 21-1159. On January 6, 2022, the states filed their opening brief, explaining that they wanted the court to vacate the recent EPA actions, which were, in their view, unlawful delays of the compliance deadlines in the LCRR.

The Lead and Copper Rule Revisions (“LCRR”)

By Steven M. Siros, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health & Safety Law Practice

On December 20, 2021, U.S. EPA finalized its Fifth Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule (UCMR) that will require public water systems (PWS) to collect monitoring data for 29 per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) and lithium in drinking water. Every five years, the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) requires U.S. EPA to publish a new list of unregulated contaminants that will be monitored by PWS.  UCMR 5 focuses almost exclusively on PFAS and targets 29 of the more than 4,700 PFAS that have been identified to date. 

Starting in 2023, all PWSs serving more than 10,000 customers are obligated to monitor for these UCMR 5 contaminants while smaller PWSs (those serving less than 10,000 customers) must monitor subject to availability of appropriations (U.S. EPA is responsible for all analytical costs associated with PWSs serving less than 10,000 customers) and laboratory capacity. In response to comments on the draft UCMR 5 expressing concern about the lack of laboratory capacity to support the PFAS monitoring, the final rule notes that U.S. EPA expects laboratory capacity to quickly grow to meet UCMR demand. The final rule identifies applicable U.S. EPA test methods for each of the 29 targeted PFAS compounds. However, some commenters were critical that the final rule did not identify a testing technique to determine “total PFAS” in drinking water. The final rule acknowledges this issue but notes that U.S. EPA “has not identified a complete, validated peer-reviewed aggregate PFAS method” at this time. 

The data collected is expected to inform U.S. EPA as it evaluates whether to set a specific drinking water limit or treatment standard under the SDWA for perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS). U.S. EPA has committed to establishing a national drinking water regulation for PFOA and PFOS by the fall of 2023 and it is likely that additional PFAS will be in the SDWA regulatory pipeline in the near future. 

We will continue to track U.S. EPA regulatory agenda at the Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog.

By Steven M. Siros, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health & Safety Law Practice

On Monday, October 18, 2021, U.S. EPA released its PFAS Strategic Roadmap (Roadmap) outlining the agency’s three-year strategy for addressing per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). The Roadmap acknowledges that U.S. EPA cannot solve the problem of “forever chemicals” by tackling only one route of exposure or one use at a time. Instead, the Roadmap outlines a multi-pronged approach with specific emphasis on the following:

• Accounting for the full lifecycle of PFAS, their unique properties, the ubiquity of their uses, and the multiple pathways for exposure;
• Focusing on preventing PFAS from entering the environment in the first instance which is a foundational step in reducing the exposure and risks of PFAS contamination;
• Holding polluters accountable for releases of PFAS into the environment;
• Investing in scientific research to fill gaps in understanding PFAS to drive science-based decision making; and
• Ensuring that disadvantaged communities have equitable access to solutions. 

In order to achieve these objections, U.S. EPA’s Roadmap identifies the following specific agency actions:

• U.S. EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention commits to:
  • Publish a national PFAS testing strategy to generate toxicity data on PFAS compounds (Fall 2021);
  • Ensure robust TSCA review for new PFAS chemical submissions (ongoing);
  • Review previous TSCA regulatory decisions to ensure that the those decisions were sufficient protective of human health and the environment (ongoing);
  • Enhance PFAS reporting under the Toxics Release Inventory (Spring 2022); and
  • Finalize new PFAS reporting under TSCA Section 8 (Winter 2022).

• U.S. EPA’s Office of Water commits to:
  • Finalize the Fifth Unregulated Contaminants Monitoring Rule to require testing for 29 PFAS substances (Fall 2021);
  • Establish an MCL for PFOA and PFOS (Fall 2023);
  • Finalize the toxicity assessments for GenX and five additional addition PFAS compounds (Fall 2021);
  • Publish health advisories for GenX and PFBS (Spring 2022);
  • Set Effluent Limitations Guidelines to restrict PFAS discharges nine different industrial categories (2022); and
  • Leverage the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) program to reduce the discharges of PFAS and obtain more comprehensive information on PFAS discharges (Winter 2022).

• S. EPA’s Office of Land and Emergency Management commits to:
  • Designate PFOA and PFOS as CERCLA hazardous substances (Summer 2023);
  • Evaluate designation of other PFAS compounds as CERCLA hazardous substances (Spring 2022);  and
  • Issue updated guidance on the destruction of PFAS and PFAS-containing materials (Fall 2023). 

In addition to U.S. EPA’s Roadmap, the White House announced ongoing efforts by the following seven agencies to address PFAS pollution: the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), the Departments of Defense, Agriculture, Homeland Security, and Health and Human Services, Food and Drug Administration, and the Federal Aviation Administration. We will continue to track these ongoing efforts to regulate PFAS at the Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog.

By Steven M. Siros, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health & Safety Law Practice 

A recent article published in Politico highlights some of the potential impacts of cannabis production on the environment.   As the production of cannabis accelerates across the United States, it is becoming increasingly likely that the environmental impacts of cannabis production will become more regulated especially in the areas of energy use and water reliance.   Cannabis companies would be well served to ensure that they have effective environmental management strategies in place to not only ensure continued compliance but also to reduce the companies’ environmental footprint that could in turn result in significant cost savings.   

For example, according to the article, a typical growing operation can consume up to 2,000 watts of electricity per square meter for indoor growing operations as compared to 50 watts of electricity for growing other leafy greens such as lettuce.  According to a recent study, at least one expert estimates that cannabis production accounts for about one percent of electricity consumption in the United States.  Depending on the source of electricity, greenhouse gas emissions may be generated in the course of energy production that could be attributable to the cannabis operation’s carbon footprint.  President Biden is focused on reducing greenhouse gas emissions and one the key focus industries for President Biden is the agricultural industry.  Implementing an energy efficiency program with a focus on renewable energy sources may allow cannabis companies to be better positioned to comply with future regulations while at the same time reducing overall energy costs.       

Although not discussed in the article, cannabis production can be a fairly water intensive process with some studies estimating usage as high as six gallons per plant.  A recent study concluded that by 2025, total water use in the legal cannabis market is expected to increase by 86%.  As water scarcity issues become more prevalent especially in light of the changing climate, ensuring adequate sources of water will be critical to ensuring the ability to continue to grow cannabis plants.  At the same time, adopting effective water conservation procedures will allow facilities to reduce their environmental footprint with resulting cost savings. 

For more detailed insight on these issues, please click here for an article that was recently published in the Cannabis Law Journal. 

By Steven M. Siros, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health & Safety Law Practice 

As part of the infrastructure package that was just approved on a bi-partisan basis by the Senate and is now moving on to the House, the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (“GLRI”) could receive approximately $1 billion for the remediation of impacted site and waterways in the Great Lakes region.   

Since its inception in 2010, the GLRI has provided funding to 16 federal organizations to strategically target the biggest threats to the Great Lakes ecosystem and to accelerate progress toward achieving long term goals:

• Fish safe to eat;
• Water safe for recreation;
• Safe source of drinking water;
• All Areas of Concern delisted;
• Harmful/nuisance algal blooms eliminated;
• No new self-sustaining invasive species;
• Existing invasive species controlled; and
• Native habitat protected and restored to sustain native species.

One of the primary areas of focus of GRLI’s most recent action plan is the remediation of “Areas of Concern” (“AOCs”) that are defined as "geographic areas designated by the Parties where significant impairment of beneficial uses has occurred as a result of human activities at the local level."  There are currently more than 26 AOCs in the Great Lakes basin that could be cleaned up using monies appropriated in the current version of the infrastructure bill. 

We will continue to track the progress of the infrastructure bill and the availability of funds to address AOCs in the Great Lake basin at the Corporate Environmental Lawyer.

By Allison A. Torrence

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”), under Administrator Michael Regan, has begun the process of reviewing and revising two key Clean Water Act (“CWA”) rules: The Navigable Waters Protection Rule and the CWA Section 401 Certification Rule. In recent court filings in cases where litigants have challenged both of these Trump-era rules, EPA has requested those cases be remanded because EPA has commenced new rulemaking processes that will revise or replace the challenged rules. However, if the courts grant EPA’s requests, EPA has requested that the existing rules remain in effect until EPA finalizes replacement rules through the formal notice and comment rulemaking process.

The first of the two key CWA rules at issue is the Navigable Waters Protection Rule, which defines “Waters of the United States”. This is a significant rule and definition because the jurisdiction of the CWA is limited to Waters of the United States. Thus, by setting the definition of Waters of the United States, EPA establishes the reach of the CWA. Due to the significance of this definition, it has been widely contested throughout the years and every attempt by EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to promulgate a definition has faced legal challenges.  

In 2019, the Trump Administration rescinded the Obama-era Waters of the United States rule and in 2020, issued the Navigable Waters Protection Rule, narrowing the definition of Waters of the United States. The most significant change in the Trump rule is that the new definition excludes ephemeral waters (those flowing only in direct response to precipitation) and many wetlands that are near other jurisdictional waters but lack a physical or surface connection to them.

In several court filings in June, EPA has stated its plans “to commence a new rulemaking to revise or replace the [Navigable Waters Protection] rule.” Notably, EPA is not requesting vacatur of the existing rule during the rulemaking process.

The second CWA rule facing a similar fate is the CWA Section 401 Certification Rule. Under the CWA, a federal agency may not issue a permit or license for an activity that may result in a discharge into a Water of the United States unless a Section 401 Certification has been issued verifying compliance with water quality requirements. States and authorized tribes are generally responsible for issuing Section 401 Certifications, and they are required to act on a Section 401 Certification request “within a reasonable period of time (which shall not to exceed one year) after receipt” of such a request. 33 U.S.C. § 1341(a)(1).

The Trump EPA issued the final CWA Section 401 Certification Rule on July 13, 2020, with the goal of expediting infrastructure permitting by making the 401 Certification process quicker. The biggest changes made by this rule were limiting the scope of state and tribal certification review and limiting the imposition of conditions in the certifications. Just as with the Navigable Waters Protection Rule, EPA has now indicated in court filings (and on its website) that the Section 401 Certification Rule is under review and will be revised or revoked, but also will not be vacated in the interim.

EPA has a lot of work ahead to propose new versions of these rules for public review and comment. Promulgation of final rules will therefore be many months, if not more than a year away. In the meantime, environmental groups and other challengers have indicated they will continue to challenge the Trump-era rules still in effect. The Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog will keep a close watch and report on all key developments.

By Matthew G. Lawson

1. Introduction

According to a report released in February 2021 by the organization Safer States, at least 27 US states will consider proposed legislation to regulate toxic chemicals in 2021. While a large driver of the proposed state laws is growing public concern over drinking water contamination from “emerging contaminants,” including PFAS (per- and polyfluorinated alkyl substances) and 1,4-dioxane, a secondary focus has been to minimize the risk of adverse human health effects from exposure to these toxic chemicals in cosmetics and personal care products. Two states—New York and California—are spearheading these efforts through recently enacted laws to limit or prohibit certain toxic chemicals in cosmetics and personal care products that are set to take effect in 2022 and 2025, respectively. As other states consider their own bills to enact similar regulation of chemicals in cosmetics and personal care products, heightened attention will likely be paid to what extent the existing federal regulation of these products may preempt this new wave of state legislation.

2. Federal Regulation of Chemicals in Cosmetics and Personal Care Products

At the federal level, chemicals used in cosmetics and other personal care products are primarily regulated by either the Toxic Substrates Control Act (TSCA) or the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C Act). While TSCA broadly applies to any “chemical substance,” certain chemicals or uses of chemicals are exempt from TSCA if they are regulated by other federal statutes. Such products include “cosmetics” regulated by the FD&C Act, which are defined as “articles intended to be rubbed, poured, sprinkled, or sprayed on, introduced into, or otherwise applied to the human body...for cleansing, beautifying, promoting attractiveness, or altering the appearance.” While the distinction between a cosmetic and personal care product may not always be apparent to the consumer, the difference is crucial with respect to federal oversight of the chemicals contained in the product.

Non-cosmetic, personal care products are regulated under TSCA, as amended by the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety Act of the 21st Century, which requires the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to identify “high-priority chemicals” used in existing commerce and determine whether any current uses of the chemicals “present an unreasonable risk of injury to health or the environment.” Where an unreasonable risk is identified, the EPA has discretion to impose conditions on or outright ban the chemical use. Prior to introducing a new chemical or new use of an existing chemical into commerce, manufacturers are required to provide notice to the EPA so that the agency may assess whether the proposed chemical or use will pose an unreasonable risk. In contrast, chemicals used in cosmetic products are regulated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) pursuant to the FD&C Act and generally do not require registration or preapproval by the agency before being introduced into commerce. Moreover, the FDA does not have authority to require a recall where it identifies a potential health hazard in a cosmetic product. However, the FDA does have authority to regulate the labeling of cosmetic products and to outright ban specific ingredients from being used in cosmetics generally.

3. State Regulation of Chemicals in Cosmetics and Other Personal Care Products—Newly Enacted Laws and Anticipated Future Legislation

While the regulation of chemicals in cosmetic and personal care products has historically been left to the purview of the EPA and the FDA, in recent years a growing number of states have expressed interest in directly regulating chemicals in cosmetic and personal care products sold within their jurisdictions. In 2019 and 2020, state regulation of these chemicals took a significant step forward as New York and California signed into law two bills regulating chemicals used in cosmetic and/or personal care products. A brief description of both state laws is provided below.

• New York: On December 9, 2019, Governor Cuomo signed into law New York Senate Bill 4389-B/A.6295-A, making New York the first and only state to set a maximum contaminant limit of 1,4-dioxane in consumer products. While there are no direct consumer uses of 1,4-dioxane, the compound may be present in cosmetics and personal care products as a byproduct of the manufacturing process (according to one 2007 Study, approximately 22% of cosmetic and other personal care products may contain 1,4-dioxane). New York’s legislation, which takes effect on December 31, 2022, prohibits the sale of personal care products containing more than 2 ppm of 1,4-dioxane and the sale of cosmetic products containing more than 10 ppm of 1,4-dioxane.
• California: On September 30, 2020, Governor Newsom signed into law the Toxic-Free Cosmetics Act, California Assembly Bill 2762, banning 24 chemicals, including mercury, formaldehyde, and certain types of PFAS, from being used in cosmetic, beauty, and personal care products sold in California. California’s legislation is set to take effect in 2025 and will mark the first state-level prohibition on the various chemicals in cosmetic products.

In addition to New York and California’s recently enacted legislation, there are at least five bills currently being considered by various states that would further regulate chemicals in cosmetic and/or personal care products sold within the respective jurisdictions. A brief summary of these state bills is provided below:

• Connecticut: SB 404—Prohibiting the sale or distribution of consumer products that contain PFAS (currently before the Joint Committee on Public Health).
• Maryland: HB 0643—Prohibiting the sale or distribution of cosmetic products that contain PFAS, mercury, and other chemicals in certain instances (currently passed in both chambers and before the Governor).
• New Jersey: A 189 / S 1843—Prohibiting the sale and distribution of nail salon products that contain dibutyl phthalates, toluene, or formaldehyde (currently before the Assembly Consumer Affairs Committee); A 1720—Prohibiting the sale of hand sanitizers and body cleaning products containing triclosan (currently before the Assembly Consumer Affairs Committee).
• New York: A 143 / S 3331—Creating a list of “chemicals of concerns” known to exist in personal care products, requiring manufacturers of such products to disclose any chemicals of concerns contained in their products and prohibiting the sale of personal care products containing chemicals of concerns after three years (currently referred to Environmental Conservation Committee).

4. Federal Preemption of State Laws

As more states continue to adopt new legislation to regulate chemicals in cosmetic and personal care products, manufacturers and/or trade organizations will likely bring preemption challenges to these state regulations. In the context of cosmetic products, the FD&C Act prohibits state or local governments from enacting “any requirement for labeling or packaging of cosmetics that is different from or in addition to, or that is otherwise not identical with” the federal rules. Thus, state laws that do not directly regulate the labeling or packing of cosmetics products but instead regulate the contents of these products will likely not run afoul of the FD&C Act’s preemption clause.

In contrast, state legislation governing chemicals in personal care products may be at a higher risk of being preempted by TSCA. TSCA broadly prohibits the enforcement of any state chemical regulation of a particular substance once the EPA completes a risk evaluation for the substance and either: (1) determines that the chemical will not present an unreasonable risk; or (2) concludes that the chemical presents an unreasonable risk under the circumstances of use, and promulgates a rule that restricts manufacturing or use of the chemical to mitigate the identified risks. Notably, the scope of TSCA’s preemption extends only to chemical uses examined in the EPA’s risk evaluation—meaning that the EPA’s failure to examine the use of a chemical in personal care products would make state regulation fair game. In addition, even where a risk evaluation of a particular chemical has been completed, TSCA will not preempt state laws that (1) only impose reporting, monitoring, or information obligations; or (2) environmental laws that regulate air quality, water quality, or hazardous waste treatment or disposal.

Early insight into the full scope of TSCA’s preemption provisions will likely be provided by anticipated challenges to individual state’s regulation of 1,4-dioxane. As explained above, New York has already taken steps to regulate 1,4-dioxane in personal care products and other states may soon look to follow suit. However, on January 8, 2021, the EPA released its final risk evaluation for 1,4-dioxane under TSCA. See 86 Fed. Reg. 1495. The EPA’s initial risk evaluation identified a number of “use conditions” in which 1,4-dioxane posed an unreasonable risk to occupational workers, but did not consider “use conditions” involving 1,4-dioxane’s presence in consumer products. In response to protests from industry, EPA’s final risk evaluation included a supplemental analysis of eight use conditions for 1,4-dioxane as a byproduct in consumer goods, including use in hobby materials; automotive care products; cleaning and furniture care products; laundry and dishwashing products; paints and coatings; and spray polyurethane foam. No unreasonable risks for these consumer uses were identified. Because the EPA’s supplemental risk evaluation examined but did not find any unreasonable risks from 1,4-dioxane in consumer products, an argument could be made that states are preempted from enacting their own 1,4-dioxane limits in consumer products. However, because the EPA’s risk evaluation did not specifically exclude cosmetic or personal care products, individual states may be able to argue that the preemption scope is limited only to the specific uses of 1,4-dioxane that were specifically examined during EPA’s risk evaluation. The resolution of any challenges to New York and other states’ regulation of 1,4-dioxane in consumer products will likely provide key insights into the scope of TSCA’s preemption powers.

By Matthew G. Lawson

On Friday, April 30, 2021, the Biden Administration’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced significant steps the agency intends to take under the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) Program to implement expanded reporting requirements for companies that store and utilize hazardous chemicals, including new obligations to report the storage, use and any releases of ethylene oxide, a commonly used industrial chemical and sterilant for medical equipment and supplies.  The TRI Program, which was established under Section 313 of the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA), serves as a resource for the public to learn about annual chemical releases, waste management, and pollution prevention activities reported by nearly 22,000 industrial and federal facilities.  Under the TRI Program, U.S. facilities operating in various industry sectors must report annually the quantity of certain chemicals they release to the environment and/or manage through recycling, energy recovery and treatment.  A “release” of a chemical in the context of the TRI Program means that the chemical is emitted to the air or water, or placed in some type of land disposal.

A major component of EPA’s announcement is the agency’s intent to regulate ethylene oxide. The use and release of ethylene oxide by medical device sterilization companies have prompted a number of recent high-profile lawsuits alleging that releases of the chemical into the environment have caused increased cancer rates in communities adjacent to the facilities.  EPA’s announcement notes that many existing sterilization facilities “are located near areas with Environmental Justice concerns,” and that individuals living adjacent to these facilities may be at a heightened risk from exposure to ethylene oxide.  “Every person in the United States has a right to know about what chemicals are released into their communities,” EPA Administrator Michael S. Regan stated.  “By requiring new and more data on chemical releases from facilities, EPA and its partners will be better equipped to protect the health of every individual, including people of color and low-income communities that are often located near these facilities but have been left out of the conversation for too long.”  In the coming months, EPA will provide further details regarding the specific actions the agency intends to take to require sterilization facilities that use ethylene oxide to report under the TRI Program.

In addition to implementing new reporting requirements for companies utilizing ethylene oxide, EPA announced several other steps the agency plans to take that will increase reporting and public access to information under the TRI Program, including:

• Finalizing a longstanding proposed rule that will add natural gas processing facilities to the industry sectors covered under the TRI Program thereby increasing the publicly available information on chemical releases and other waste management activities of TRI-listed chemicals from this sector;
• Continuing to add new per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (“PFAS”) to the list of chemicals that require reporting under the TRI Program, including the addition of perfluorobutane sulfonic acid (PFBS) following EPA’s toxicity assessment of the substance;
• Proposing a new rule to add high-priority substances under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) and chemicals included in the TSCA workplan to the list of chemicals that require reporting under the TRI Program; and
• Increasing public access to TRI data through improved search functionality and improved website interface.

EPA’s announcement marks the most recent step by the agency to implement the Biden Administration’s focus on environmental justice as a top priority of its environmental agenda.  On the same day that EPA announced the agency’s updated TRI policy, EPA circulated a memorandum to all EPA-staff, indicating the additional actions the agency intends to take to fulfill its environmental justice commitment.  These actions include: (1) increasing inspections of facilities that pose the most serious threats to overburdened communities; (2) focusing on implementing remedies that benefit communities, including through the incorporation of supplemental environmental projects; (3) increasing communications with overburdened communities to develop improved cleanup and non-compliance solutions; and (4) identifying locations where state regulators are not adequately protecting local communities and taking increased enforcement actions to “pick up the slack” if state regulators have not taken appropriate or timely actions.

The Corporate Environmental Blog will continue to follow developments on this issue in the coming months as EPA provides additional details on the specific actions it intends to take to expand the TRI Program.

By Allison A. Torrence

As the Corporate Environmental Lawyer Blog celebrates Earth Day, we turn to the important topic of drinking water. Drinking water, like the air we breathe, is an environmental issue that everyone interacts with on a daily basis. But, much like air pollution, contamination of drinking water often has the largest impact on poor communities and communities of color.

In a 2019 report co-authored by environmental organizations Natural Resources Defense Council (“NRDC”), Coming Clean, and Environmental Justice Health Alliance (“EJHA”), the groups analyzed EPA data on community drinking water systems, concluding that there “is unequal access to safe drinking water, based most strongly on race.” The report made several important findings that lead to this conclusion, including:

• Drinking water systems that constantly violated the law for years were 40 percent more likely to occur in places with higher percentages of residents who were people of color.
• Nearly 130 million people in the U.S. got their drinking water from systems that violated federal law during the time period reviewed in the report.
• Small systems – those that serve less than 3,300 people – were responsible for more than 80% of all violations. The EPA has noted many small systems are “likely to serve low-income, vulnerable populations.”

While there are many contaminants that communities monitor for in drinking water, lead is one of the most public and concerning drinking water contaminants of concern. Lead in drinking water is caused by the very pipes and service lines bringing us our water, entering the water when a chemical reaction occurs in plumbing materials that contain lead. As we saw in the Flint, Michigan lead water crisis in 2016, this corrosion of metal from the pipes and fixtures is more severe when water has high acidity or low mineral content.

Lead in drinking water has been a target of environmental activists and agencies for years. Recently, EPA amended its Lead and Copper Drinking Water Rule, under the authority of the Safe Drinking Water Act, to add a new lead trigger level for drinking water monitoring and add more proactive measures to identify upgrades needed to reduce the effects of deteriorating infrastructure. However, this rule was finalized at the end of the Trump Administration and the Biden Administration extended the effective date through June 2021, likely to be pushed back further as Biden’s EPA evaluates whether it wants to make additional changes.

Taking a bolder step, President Biden’s latest proposed legislation under his “Build Back Better” agenda—the American Jobs Plan—includes significant funding and plans to address lead in drinking water. According to the American Jobs Plan Fact Sheet:

“President Biden’s plan will eliminate all lead pipes and service lines in our drinking water systems, improving the health of our country’s children and communities of color.”

The current proposal includes $45 billion to replace every lead water line across the nation. In addition to the lead-specific funding, the American Jobs Plan proposes funding for broader drinking water improvements, including $56 billion to upgrade and modernize drinking water supplies through grants and low-cost flexible loans to states, Tribes, territories, and disadvantaged communities; and $10 billion to provide funding to monitor PFAS substances in drinking water and invest in rural small water systems & household well & wastewater systems.

This drinking water funding is just one small part of the $2.65 trillion plan, but it will likely continue to play an important part of the President’s agenda. The Corporate Environmental Lawyer Blog will stay on top of all relevant developments as negotiations on the American Jobs Plan and other drinking water proposals advance.

By Steven M. Siros and Matthew G. Lawson

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) is continuing to investigate an unexplained source of per-fluorinated compounds (PFAS) contamination that may be associated with the deployment of a fire-fighting compound in response to a major gasoline release by the Colonial Pipeline system on August 14, 2020.  The Colonial Pipeline, which spans 5,500 miles from Houston, Texas, to Linden, New Jersey, runs through a number of southern and mid-Atlantic states, including North Carolina.  The active pipeline delivers an average of 100 million gallons of liquid petroleum products each day.  On August 14, 2020, a leak in the pipeline resulted in the release of approximately 1.2 million gallons of gasoline into the environment near the town of Huntersville, North Carolina.  The release was the largest onshore gasoline spill in the United States in over 20 years and in connection with Colonial Pipeline’s emergency response to that release, Colonial Pipeline sprayed a commonly used fire suppressant known as F-500 encapsulate on the contaminated land to minimize the risk that vapors from the release would ignite. 

However, following Colonial Pipeline’s initial emergency response, new questions have emerged regarding PFAS that was detected at the release site.  As part of the ongoing efforts to investigate the nature and extent of the gasoline release, DEQ directed Colonial Pipeline to collect samples from the F-500 encapsulate and test that encapsulate for various PFAS formations.  The resulting test data found elevated levels—as high as 22,600 parts per trillion (“ppt”)—of at least three different PFAS compounds.  Samples of a nearby surface water showed PFAS concentrations ranging from 1 ppt to 14.9 ppt.

The source of the PFAS is not readily apparent, however, because as verified by the Safety Data Sheet , F-500 is not known to contain PFAS compounds.  In fact, F-500 acts differently than aqueous film forming foam (AFFF) to fight fires.  AFFF is intended to separate oxygen from the fuel while F-500 works by removing the heat, neutralizing the fuel, and interrupting the free radical chain reaction.  As such, it does not rely on fluorine compounds for effectiveness.

It is possible that the source of the PFAS identified by Colonial Pipeline was a result of residual AFFF residing in the storage tank or in the fire-fighting equipment that was used to dispense the F-500 encapsulating agent.  The F-500 was transported to the site by the Pelham Alabama fire department and the fire-fighting equipment that sprayed the F-500 was supplied by the Hunterville Fire Department.  However, notwithstanding that the equipment was supplied by the municipal fire departments and that the F-500 is not known to contain PFAS compounds, DEQ has still requested that Colonial Pipeline provide data demonstrating that there have been no PFAS impacts to soil or groundwater as a result of the emergency response. 

This a cautionary tale for environmental health and safety professionals charged with maintaining emergency spill response materials, including fire suppressant products, for their respective organizations.  Such professionals are faced with a unique challenge of ensuring that products maintained for spill containment or remediation purposes are not only fit for these purposes, but also that these products do not contain chemicals that pose a potential threat to human health or the environment.  This challenge is particularly acute with PFAS, of which there are over 5,000 different formulations which can be found in a large variety of different consumer and industry products.  Even if a decision is made to swap out one product that may historically contained PFAS with a new product that is purportedly PFAS-free, care should be taken to ensure that product distribution equipment is PFAS-free.  Otherwise, one might find oneself in the unfortunate position of having to defend against claims relating to PFAS impacts in the environment.