Environmental Right to Know

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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2001 TRI Data Finally Arrives

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is releasing the 2001 Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) today, June 30th, just one day shy of the July 1st reporting deadline for 2002 data. As part of the unveiling, EPA will also release their analysis of the latest TRI data and conduct various briefings for the press, congressional offices, environmental community and industry representatives. In addition to being the latest public release of TRI data the 2001 TRI also marks the first year that releases of lead will be reported and potentially the last year that mining companies report their toxic releases.

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Stealthy Officials Raid Libraries of Emergency Plans

It's now a lot harder for people in Ohio to know whether their communities are prepared for chemical emergencies, thanks to local officials who unilaterally removed documents from libraries without the librarians' prior knowledge or public comment.

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GAO Authority Undermined

The recent decision by the General Accounting Office (GAO) to drop its lawsuit against Vice President Dick Cheney likely further weakens the agency’s ability to get information from an already overly secretive administration. The GAO lawsuit set an important precedent as the first time in GAO’s 81 years that the agency sued the Executive Branch in order to obtain information. This raised the struggle for transparency and accountability in government to a new level.

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EPA Releases Enforcement Data Online

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will be accepting public comments for the next 60 days on its newly released pilot website -- Enforcement and Compliance History Online (ECHO) -- that allows the retrieval of enforcement and compliance information for over 800,000 regulated facilities, as announced in the Federal Register on Nov. 20th.

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Report Refutes Industry Right-to-Know 'Reforms'

The Georgetown Environmental Law & Policy Institute (GELPI) recently released a paper that responds to criticisms of environmental right-to-know programs and explains how industry’s proposed “procedural” reforms threaten to undermine them.

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Judge Orders White House to Turn Over Energy Task Force Documents, Again

In one of several lawsuits brought against the Bush administration for its failure to disclose key documents relating to its energy task force, a federal judge ordered the Bush administration to turn over the documents for the second time; the same ruling was previously made in August, according to the Washington Post.

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Troubling Information Polls Tell of a Troubled Public

Two recent polls present a mixed picture about public access to government information in the post-9/11 environment. When asked about whether specific information should be removed from the web, most people say no. But their views change dramatically if the government argues that the information could help terrorists. On One Hand

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Different Opinion on Chemical Security

OMB Watch responded to a recent Washington Times Op-ed, entitled "Toxic road map for terrorists" with this letter to the editor. Angela Logomasini ("Toxic road map for terrorists," Op-Ed, 9/4/2002) advocates eliminating public access to risk management plans (RMPs) because it is possible the information could be misused. Perhaps she would agree with some in industry that propose government no longer collect RMPs since the information may fall into the wrong hands.

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EPA's Next Step in Data Quality

As part of its efforts to develop and implement Data Quality Guidelines, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently announced plans to develop “Assessment Factors” to assist the agency in evaluating the quality of information and data that it receives from external sources.

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Chemical Security Heats Up

Sen. Jon Corzine’s (D-NJ) Signers of the letter included industry groups such as the American Chemistry Council, the American Petroleum Institute, the National Association of Manufacturers , the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and Edison Electric Institute.

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