Safeguarding Public Health and the Environment

Feb 8, 2016

Top 400 Taxpayers See Tax Rates Rise, But There’s More to the Story

As Americans were gathering party supplies to greet the New Year, the Internal Revenue Service released their annual report of cumulative tax data reported on the 400 tax r...

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Feb 4, 2016

Chlorine Bleach Plants Needlessly Endanger 63 Million Americans

Chlorine bleach plants across the U.S. put millions of Americans in danger of a chlorine gas release, a substance so toxic it has been used as a chemical weapon. Greenpeace’s new repo...

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Jan 25, 2016

U.S. Industrial Facilities Reported Fewer Toxic Releases in 2014

The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) data for 2014 is now available. The good news: total toxic releases by reporting facilities decreased by nearly six percent from 2013 levels. Howe...

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Jan 22, 2016

Methane Causes Climate Change. Here's How the President Plans to Cut Emissions by 40-45 Percent.

UPDATE (Jan. 22, 2016): Today, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released its proposed rule to reduce methane emissions...

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Report Finds Extensive Noncompliance with Clean Water Act Rules

A new report has found thousands of facilities are out of compliance with the requirements of the Clean Water Act. The report blames declining support for environmental enforcement during the Bush administration as a major cause of the regulatory violations. The U.S. Public Interest Research Group (U.S. PIRG), a nonprofit organization working on environmental policy and public outreach, published the report titled Troubled Waters: An Analysis of 2005 Clean Water Act Compliance.

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Funding Shortfalls Plague Superfund

Oct 22, 2007 by Matthew Madia

A subcommittee of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee held a hearing last week on the current state of Superfund, the federal government's toxic waste clean-up program.

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NOAA Efforts to Protect Marine Species Thwarted by White House

Oct 17, 2007 by Matthew Madia

For months, the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs has been blocking the finalization of a rule that would enhance protections for the North Atlantic right whale. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is pursuing the rulemaking because the right whale is one of the most critically endangered marine species in the world. Under Executive Order 12866, Regulatory Planning and Review, agencies are required to submit significant rules to the White House in order to give OIRA an opportunity to review and edit the rule.

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EPA's Lax Enforcement Fouls Water Too

Oct 11, 2007 by Matthew Madia

As Reg•Watch blogged this morning, the Environmental Protection Agency is all talk when it comes to enforcement of environmental regulations. A new report from U.S. PIRG titled Troubled Waters highlights the deficiencies in EPA's enforcement of Clean Water Act regulations. Facilities that want to discharge pollutants into navigable waterways must first receive a permit from EPA. EPA uses the permit system to limit discharges and to monitor the polluting activity of the facilities.

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Administration Contradicts Itself on Environmental Enforcement

Oct 11, 2007 by Matthew Madia

The Bush administration has caught some flack recently for its poor record of enforcing environmental regulations and for the timidity with which it pursues prosecution of the nation's worst polluters. A Sept. 30 Washington Post article reported, "The number of environmental prosecutions plummeted from 919 in 2001 to 584 last year."

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Latest Watcher

Oct 11, 2007 by Matthew Madia

Be sure to check out the latest issue of our biweekly newsletter, The Watcher. Regulatory policy articles this time: Bush Administration Delays Import Safety Changes While Congress Debates Solutions States Sue Bush Administration over New Children's Health Insurance Requirements

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EPA Cut Corners in TRI Rule

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) came under tough scrutiny at an Oct. 4 hearing of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Environment and Hazardous Materials for reducing the reporting standards of the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) in December 2006.

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House Energy and Commerce Committee Proposes Climate Change Legislation Framework

The House Committee on Energy and Commerce and its Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality issued the first in a series of white papers that will outline designs for complicated climate change legislation and regulation. The first white paper, released Oct. 3, outlines a design for a cap-and-trade program covering major greenhouse gases (GHG) that would form the cornerstone of comprehensive federal climate change legislation.

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EPA Official Defends Drop in Environmental Prosecutions

Oct 1, 2007 by Matthew Madia

As Reg•Watch blogged earlier, environmental prosecutions have dropped dramatically during the Bush administration. A recent Washington Post article indicates EPA has not made prosecution a priority.

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Prosecutions of Polluters Dropping under Bush

Oct 1, 2007 by Matthew Madia

Reg•Watch usually discusses federal policy and its implications. But even the best policies are useless if they are not properly enforced. In the case of environmental regulation, polluters may often have a financial incentive to avoid complying with federal regulations. The Environmental Protection Agency and the Justice Department both play a role in finding and penalizing those who do not comply. However, according to The Washington Post, prosecutions of environmental ne'er-do-wells during the Bush administration are way down:

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