Environmental Right to Know

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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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Chemical Plant Security Act Approved in Senate Committee

On July 25 the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee unanimously approved S. 1602, a substitute version of the bill originally offered by Sen. Jon Corzine (D-NJ) in October 2001, that would require each chemical plant to address its vulnerability to a terrorist attack. Under the bill, plants must submit plans to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) showing how they will address their vulnerabilities. As this article points out, chemical plants have many hazards that could be removed to make them safer in the case of an accident or a terrorist attack.

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Testimony of Paul Orum

Paul Orum of Working Group on Community Right-to-Know testified today before the Subcommittee on Superfund, Toxics, Risk, and Waste Management of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. Testimony of Paul Orum Working Group on Community Right-to-Know Before the Subcommittee on Superfund, Toxics, Risk, and Waste Management of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee November 14, 2001  

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"A People Armed?" Agency E-FOIA Implementation

On October 2, 1996, President Clinton signed the Electronic Freedom of Information Act (E-FOIA) Amendments into law. These new provisions of the thirty-year-old Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) are the first to guarantee public access to federal government information electronically. The intent was that by agencies making records, record indexes, and a FOIA guide available online to fulfill these amendments members of the public could easily find and obtain access to records regarding federal government projects and policies. Can they?

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Hearings All Around, But Is Anyone Really Listening

Hearings continue in both the House and Senate on the Administration’s Homeland Security proposal. Since introducing the President’s proposal to create a cabinet-level Department of Homeland Security, Tom Ridge, Director of Homeland Security, has testified almost nonstop before numerous congressional committees. Yet even with these many hearings on the biggest bureaucratic reshuffling in decades the President’s bill seems to have avoided serious criticism from Congress.

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Confidential Interim Report on Chemical Plant Safety Stirs Little Reaction in Congress

In 1999, President Clinton signed the Chemical Safety Information, Site Security and Fuels Regulatory Relief Act (P.L. 106-40), and also directed the Justice Department (DOJ) to conduct a study of site security at chemical plants. An interim report on the study was due August 5, 2000, and the final report was to be completed by August of 2002. DOJ missed the first deadline, offering a lack of funding as the excuse for not getting the interim report out on time.

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Battle of the Bills

The Senate is currently considering two chemical security bills that seem just about as diametrically opposed to each other as two bills could be. Sen. Jon Corzine’s (D-NJ) Chemical Security Act (S. 1602) is scheduled for mark-up this week. Corzine’s bill would require that facilities that pose hazards to their neighbors look for safer processes and adopt them where feasible. Under the act:
  • The EPA and the Department of Justice would identify the highest-priority facilities;

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EPA Likely to Require "Terror Checks" at Chemical Plants

According to Associated Press reports last week, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) may finally begin to require chemical plants to assess their vulnerabilities to a terrorist attack, and then take measures to reduce those risks. While chemical plants have always posed significant risks to communities from “routine” accidents, the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 prompted a reassessment of these threats and greater sense of urgency in addressing these risks, and as OMB Watch previously reported here, chemical plants have failed to effectively address the threats on their own.

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EPA Turns Over Documents on Information Removal, Yet Questions Remain

Soon after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, EPA began combing its web site for any information that could potentially be used to stage another attack, according to internal agency documents and emails obtained by OMB Watch through a Freedom of Information Act request -- and almost immediately, information began coming down on a scale much larger than previously reported, as this inventory shows.

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OMB Watch Freedom of Information Act Request to EPA

On December 20, 2001, OMB Watch submitted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) -- as well as several other federal agencies -- for information removed from its web site post September 11th, and any guidance or criteria used for the removal. The following is a copy of the letter sent to EPA. December 20, 2001 Betty A. Lopez Associate Director, FOIA Operations EPA 1200 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20460 Dear Ms. Lopez: Re: Freedom of Information Request

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Results of OMB Watch FOIA Request on Information Withheld

OMB Watch submitted Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to a number of federal agencies asking for a list of any information removed from agency web sites in response to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and any criteria used in making decisions to remove such information. The following inventory is based on responses we have received thus far, giving particular attention to EPA; it will be updated as we receive more information from those agencies that have not yet responded.

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Resources & Research

Living in the Shadow of Danger: Poverty, Race, and Unequal Chemical Facility Hazards

People of color and people living in poverty, especially poor children of color, are significantly more likely...

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A Tale of Two Retirements: One for CEOs and One for the Rest of Us

The 100 largest CEO retirement funds are worth a combined $4.9 billion, equal to the entire retirement account savings of 41 percent of American fam...

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Blowing Smoke: Chemical Companies Say “Trust Us,” But Environmental and Workplace Safety Violations Belie Their Rhetoric

Large chemical companies a...

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Gasping for Support: Implementation of Tougher Air Quality Standards Will Require New Funds for State Agencies

New scientific research shows that the current levels of...

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