Study: PM Pollution is an “Environmental Neurotoxin” to Brain

PM Map of USIt was just two months ago we featured the results of a study out of Boston that linked exposure to Particulate Matter, or PM pollution to brain aging and increased risk of dementia. Before that, we highlighted studies linking PM to autism and Parkinson-like symptoms. Now comes one more long-term, peer-reviewed report that connects ambient levels of the pollution to accelerated brain aging.

This one is from the University of Southern California and looked at over 1,400 women without dementia who were initially enrolled in a large health study from 1996 to 1998. Researchers measured their brain volume with M.R.I. scans in 2005 and 2006, when the women were 71 to 89 years old.

Using residential histories and air pollution monitoring data, they estimated their exposure to PM air pollution from 1999 to 2006. For each increase of 3.49 micrograms per cubic centimeter (μg/m3) cumulative exposure to PM, there was an associated 6.23 cubic centimeter reduction in the subject's brain white matter, the equivalent of one to two years of brain aging. The current EPA standard for 24 PM exposure is 35 μg/m3, while the annual average standard is 12 μg/m3, although many leading scientists now believe there's no "safe" level of exposure to PM pollution. That is, any amount of exposure is capable of doing some damage.

The association between pollution exposure and brain aging in the USC study remained after adjusting for many variables, including age, smoking, physical activity, blood pressure, body mass index, education and income.

“This tells us that the damage air pollution can impart goes beyond the circulatory system,” said the lead author, Dr. Jiu-Chiuan Chen, an associate professor of preventive medicine at the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California. “Particles in the ambient air are an environmental neurotoxin to the aging brain.”

It's important to note that all of these women were subject to ambient levels of PM pollution, that is, levels that we're all being exposed to on a daily basis living in the modern world. Everyday kinds of exposure to this substance is making our brains age prematurely.

What makes PM pollution dangerous to human health is the fact that its soot particles are so tiny that they can actually cross from the lungs into the blood stream and travel anywhere in the body, including the brain. Soot is a toxic substance on its own, but when its carrying the residues of whatever was burned to produce it – benzene in a combustion engine, mercury from the coal in a power plant, dioxins from "hard to recycle plastic waste" in a cement kiln – it becomes even more dangerous.

While PM pollution remains an important factor in respiratory diseases, heart attacks and strokes, the more insidious effects to the brain it causes are raising its profile among policymakers and activists. They have implications for zoning highways near schools, parks, and residences, as well as pollution control measures at industrial facilities.

PM is one of the best examples of "the closer we look, the more trouble we find" phenomena in environmental health science. Advances in technology and medicine show that subtle changes in exposure to chemicals that went unnoticed before can have profound consequences to our species.  

The State’s “Do-Nothing” DFW Air Plan is Falling Apart. Here’s Our Chance to Have a Real One.

House of cards 1For the second time in five years, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality thought it had gamed the system. It believed it could get away with another DFW "clean air plan" that didn't actually do anything. It looks like it was wrong.

A series of events playing out since December of last year has seemingly laid waste to the state's intent to get approval from EPA for its "State Implementation Plan" (SIP) for DFW smog that didn't touch the major sources of air pollution in North Texas. As a result, citizens have an opportunity for the first time since 2011 to get a real clean air plan – but only if we organize and focus on demanding EPA do its job.

Stick with us here. It's kind of a long trip, full of regulatory jargon and jousting, but the destination is worth it.

Because of what seems like an intractable disagreement between the state and EPA over the content of the state's proposed 2015 air plan for DFW, citizens have a chance to press for the real thing – a federal plan, drafted and implemented by EPA – that could finally bring deep cuts to major sources of pollution like the Midlothian cement kilns, East Texas Coal Plants, and the oil and gas industry.

If that sounds like an attractive option to you, there are two things you can do right now to make it more likely:

1) Sign the petition for a Federal Plan at Change.org

2) Send a letter to both the Regional EPA Director Ron Curry and the National EPA administrator Gina McCarthy through our Click N' Send automatic e-mail system. There's prepared language already there and you can add your own if you want.

 

In the last six months the fate of the state's plan has been radically altered. Among the most dramatic changes:

1) Only days before Christmas, a federal court ruling pushed back the deadline for DFW to meet the current 75 parts per billion ozone/smog standard from 2018 to 2017. Despite knowing about the court decision, until very recently the state kept aiming its plan at 2018. It hadn't made changes to its computer modeling to adjust to a 2017 goal. Now there's a real question as to whether it can submit all the data EPA requires by a July 20th deadline to turn it in for review. If the state doesn't get all the information in, EPA must rule that the plan is "incomplete." As of right now, a month before it's due, that's the conclusion EPA would have to reach.

2) Official EPA comments on the state's plan are highly critical of it, echoing many of the same assessments raised by citizens in the January Arlington City Hall hearing, and written comments submitted by Downwinders and the Sierra Club. For example,

 – The inadequacy of the state's plan and need for more pollution reductions: "…it is difficult to see how the area would reach attainment in 2018….The fact that the attainment year will likely be 2017 makes the chance of attainment smaller…The recent court decision…makes it less clear that the area will attain the standard by 2017 without additional reductions…we believe it is likely that additional reductions will need to be included to demonstrate attainment.”

– The quality of the state's computer modeling, which drives the entire plan: "The monitor data does not show the large drops in local ozone levels and therefore raises a fundamental question whether the photochemical modeling is working as an accurate tool for assessing attainment in 2018 for DFW”….the episode overall is not fully representative of the most difficult ozone scenarios. In addition, while current ozone trends and the model predictions support that ozone levels will continue to improve, it is not clear to EPA that these trends are sufficient for the area to attain by 2018.”

– More cuts are needed from the Midlothian cement kilns: "…the TCEQ estimates that reducing the source cap for the kilns in Ellis County would not provide significant emission reductions for the DFW area. However, a reduction in the source cap…does appear significant...TCEQ’s rules need to be reevaluated to insure…the emission limits reflect a Reasonably Available Control Technology (RACT) level of control as required by the Clean Air Act….We can no longer conclude the emission limit that is in place reflects a RACT level of control…Failure to conduct a thorough RACT analysis for cement kilns which would include appropriate emission limits would prevent us from approving the RACT portion of the attainment plan submittal.”

 – More cuts are needed from the East Texas coal plants: “The TCEQ provided an evaluation of emissions from all of the utility electric generators in east and central Texas. However, the discussion in Appendix D on the formation, background levels, and transport of ozone strongly supports the implementation of controls on NOx sources located to the east and southeast of the DFW nonattainment area."

What is that discussion in TCEQ's Appendix D? It's this incriminating admission: "…efforts focused solely on controlling local emissions may be insufficient to bring the DFW area into ozone attainment …."

– Link between oil and gas sources and higher ozone levels:  "These monitors (Eagle Mtn. Lake, Denton, and Parker County) are in areas more impacted by the growth in NOx sources for Oil and Gas Development that seem to be countering the normal reduction in NOx levels seen at other monitors…."

"We have some concern that as well pressure diminishes that natural gas fired engines driving natural gas compressors may be utilized more than the current usage per production amount. This may result in the projected NOx emissions not dropping as much as projected. The same volume of gas being produced with less well head pressure flow could need more overall actual compression to get to market. This situation could result in more NOx emissions than estimated based on the current emissions/production level relationship."

3) EPA requests for information from TCEQ leave no doubt that EPA wants more pollution cuts in the plan and that without those cuts, the plan is in deep trouble. Examples:

– “Please provide the estimated amount of emission reductions (in tons per day) that would reduce ozone values at the monitors by 1 ppb…please include the estimated emissions reductions associated with each of the (control) measures."

 – “An evaluation…for cement kilns in Ellis County is needed that reflects the level of control that can reasonably be achieved and new limits to reflect the reasonable level of control.”

– “How would a reduction in emissions from utility electric generators in just the counties closest to the eastern and southern boundaries of the DFW area impact the DFW area?”

– “The updated modeling results provided in early January by TCEQ indicate one monitor at 76 ppb in 2018 using the new DRAFT guidance and existing guidance methods indicate 77 ppb at Denton and 76 ppb at Eagle Mtn. Lake and Grapevine. We note that these numbers will most likely go up some with an attainment demonstration based on 2017. We request that TCEQ supplement their analysis as needed to show that the area will attain by 2017.”

All of those EPA comments and requests were made way back in early February. The state only got around to responding to them on June 3rd. With the July 20th deadline for final submission of a DFW air plan to EPA rapidly approaching, this is TCEQ's June 3rd answer:

"It was not possible to complete all work necessary for this DFW Attainment Demonstration SIP revision to demonstrate attainment in 2017. The DFW AD SIP revision also commits to develop a new Attainment Demonstration  SIP revision for the DFW 2008 eight-hour ozone non-attainment area as long as 2017 remains the attainment year. The new DFW Attainment Demonstration SIP revision would include the following analyses to reflect the 2017 attainment year: a modeled Attainment Demonstration, a reasonably available control measures (RACM) analysis….."

Rhetorically, TCEQ seems to be committing to submitting a new plan or parts of a new plan to EPA by July 20th, but it's very unclear how much, if any a "new" TCEQ DFW air plan will differ from the current one. The modeling for 2018 took Austin over a year to finish and there are serious doubts about whether the state can condense that process into less than two months to churn out entirely new results for 2017.

Moreover, the state knows what it will find if it does accomplish that feat: higher ozone levels.

At its most basic, the TCEQ plan for 2018 attainment with the 75 parts per billion standard relied exclusively on federal changes in the chemical make-up of gasoline that will reduce its sulfur content, due to hit the marketplace in January 2017. Before the December court ruling, that meant a whole two summers for that fuel change to reduce the pollution from cars without the state lifting a finger to cut pollution from industrial sources like the cement kilns, coal plants, or gas industry.

Now, however, with the attainment date moved up by a year, it means only one year of impact from that fuel change. It means that instead of averaging the 4th highest ozone readings from 2016, 2017, and 2018 for the required rolling three- year average that determines success or failure, it will be this year, 2016 and 2017. Two out those three years will not see the benefit of that federal fuel change on the marketplace, resulting in a higher number than the state was counting on before. Will the state want to put that new number on paper? Because when/if it does, it's Exhibit A for the need for new pollution cuts the state will have to impose. And it really doesn't want to do that.

TCEQ could ignore the July 20th deadline while it works on updating its modeling for the 2017 deadline. Officially, EPA has up to six months (until January 20th, 2016) to decide the state's plan is "incomplete." It could be that EPA accepts a tardy TCEQ 2017 computer model while the state scrambles to come up with its next ridiculous theory to propose in lieu of real cuts from major polluters.

But just pushing back the computer modeling to 2017 wouldn't solve all of the state's problems. For one thing, the gap between projected ozone levels and the goal of 75 ppb will be wider because we're looking at 2017, not 2018. They'll be more ozone that needs reducing. How do you do that?  EPA could also find a new state approach inadequate in the same ways it's shooting down the current "do-nothing plan" if it doesn't analyze the impacts of cuts from major polluters. EPA seems to be boxing-in the TCEQ to either admit the need for more real reductions from major sources, or face being "incomplete."

Secondly, and based on TCEQ's June 3rd response to EPA, seemingly even more awkward, is the EPA's request for the state to perform a new review of control measures and their impacts on DFW smog levels. You can't get any more explicit in EPAese than "Failure to conduct a thorough Reasonably Available Control Technology analysis for cement kilns which would include appropriate emission limits would prevent us from approving the RACT portion of the attainment plan submittal.”

As some of us have been saying from the start, TCEQ ignored the fact that there are off-the-shelf controls to get 90% smog pollution reductions from cement kilns and coal plants, controls being used or implemented on kilns and coal plants right now, as well as a long history of electrification of gas compressors in areas of the US with air quality problems.

In its comments and information requests EPA is very specifically requesting drastic, fundamental revisions in the state's analysis, not just in regard to the cement kilns, but also the East Texas coal plants and any other control measure that can get you a 1 part per billion or better improvement in DFW smog levels.

This is something the state is loathe to do. It hasn't done this kind of "sensitivity" analysis in almost a decade. In it's June 3rd comments, it's very clear that the TCEQ is still not finding any reason to revise its opinion that no new control measures on any major sources are needed, and so no such analysis is warranted. "The TCEQ disagrees that the existing cement kiln rules no longer satisfy RACT….and …"the TCEQ has determined that imposing additional controls on these attainment county EGUs (coal plants) is not justified.”

So even though the state says it will work on submitting a new plan aimed at 2017, it's digging in its heels and also saying it's not going to revisit these potential control measures as ways to reach attainment as EPA is requesting. As a result, it's unlikely the state will provide answers to the EPA's many questions about what impacts different controls have on future DFW smog levels.

(If only there was some way to provide those answers to EPA using the TCEQ's own modeling. If only someone had made a copy of the TCEQ model and then run all those "what if" scenarios that the state won't perform.)

On one side is EPA saying the state needs to dramatically revamp its air plan for DFW. On the other is TCEQ saying that it won't do everything the EPA is asking. 

What happens if the state won't give in? TCEQ outlines the possibilities in its June 3rd response:

“TCEQ: What are the consequences if this SIP revision does not go forward? Are there alternatives to this SIP revision? The commission could choose to not comply with requirements to develop and submit this DFW Attainment Demonstration SIP revision to the EPA. If the DFW SIP revision is not submitted by July 20, 2015, the EPA could impose sanctions on the state and promulgate a federal implementation plan (FIP). Sanctions could include transportation funding restrictions, grant withholdings, and 200% emissions offsets requirements for new construction and major modifications of stationary sources in the DFW non-attainment area. The EPA could impose such sanctions and implement a FIP until the state submitted and the EPA approved a replacement DFW 2008 eight-hour ozone AD SIP revision for the area.”

And that folks, is what citizens need – a serious FEDERAL Implementation Plan that puts the responsibility for getting cleaner air in the hands of the adults for a change. That's what we all should be asking the EPA to implement.

Waiting for the state of Texas to draft and implement a sincere clean air plan for DFW is the political equivalent of waiting for Godot. Remember the last time the state drafted a DFW air plan in 2011, also exempting major polluters from cuts, it actually raised ozone levels in DFW. After five attempts over 20 years, the state has never met a federal smog clean-up deadline.

Whether you're concerned about pollution from the cement plants, the coal plants, or gas compressors, or just don't want to see the air you're breathing anymore, this is a strategy that can get you real reductions and cleaner air. This is a campaign that can unite a lot of different local groups and causes under one banner.

It's a two step process. First we have to convince the EPA to find the state's plan "incomplete." As you can tell from the EPA's own language, that might not be that hard. But this judgment needs to happen as quickly as it can after July 20th in order to move on to the second decision EPA must make  – to formally reject the TCEQ plan, that is, "disapprove" it. On paper, EPA has up to a year to make that decision. Our job is to convince them to do it asap so we can really get down to business.

A formal disapproval will result in the EPA beginning to write a Federal Implementation Plan of its own. Once this process begins the EPA has more of an upper hand. Even if the state panics and submits a new plan of its own, it will have to follow the outlines of what EPA is already proposing. The state has two choices – do it under their own name, or let the EPA carry it out.

Having suffered almost a decade under unprecedented state neglect, DFW air quality is the best example in the US of the need of a federal takeover.

What Texas is doing to subvert the letter and spirit of the Clean Air Act is no different than what southern states did to subvert civil rights legislation in the 1960's. The response from the federal government should be the same now as it was then. If the state won't enforce the law of the land, citizens need the feds to do it for them.

There are two things you can do right now to help this effort, both from the comfort of your own computer screen:

1) Sign the petition for a Federal Plan at Change.org

2) Send a letter to both the Regional EPA Director Ron Curry and the National EPA administrator Gina McCarthy through our Click N' Send automatic e-mail system. There's prepared language already there and you can add your own if you want.

We need lots of people to begin doing this. Not dozens. Not hundreds. But thousands.

Think about everyone who uses an inhaler in DFW, who knows a family member or friend who suffers respiratory problems. Send this appeal out far and wide. 

This is our chance to finally get some progress. We need your help. Thanks.

Study: Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals Tied To Male Birth Defect

Little BoyWhen the phenomenon of toxic exposures first hit the popular culture, it was all about cancer risks. This or that chemical or product increased your cancer risks. Cancer risks still define the way the EPA regulates chemicals with a theoretical safe threshold of one cancer case in a million. Cancer is the headliner of environmental health impacts. It's the bluntest short cut to labeling a substance as toxic.

But the last twenty years of research have been all about examining the less well-known, but perhaps more insidious non-cancer impacts on the human body of toxic chemical exposures. Damage to immune systems that then lead to more serious illness, links to debilitating diseases like Parkinson's and Alzheimer's, more abrupt consequences like strokes and heart attacks. And birth defects.

Birth defects are one of the most underrated impacts of toxic exposure, but they're capable of slowly but surely changing the characteristics of humanity itself. 

There is now a whole new school of study, "Epigenetics," that didn't even exist a decade ago. It examines how damage of a person's DNA, or the factors influencing how that DNA works, are passed down to subsequent generations. Such damage can skip a generation, or two, so that your grandfather's or great grandfather's exposure to really bad stuff at his workplace affects your DNA and physiology today.

By allowing so many untested chemicals into the marketplace and making citizens swim through them as they go about their lives, industry and government are conducting a planet-size laboratory experiment that we are always trying to understand after the fact. 

Another example of new knowledge is the discovery and labeling of certain chemicals as "Endocrine-Disruptors." Before the mid-1990's, we didn't even have such a phrase.

Our endocrine system is the network of glands and hormones that regulates many of the body's functions, including growth, development and maturation, as well as the way various organs operate. The endocrine glands — including the pituitary, thyroid, adrenal, thymus, pancreas, ovaries, and testes –– release carefully-measured amounts of hormones into the bloodstream that act as natural chemical messengers, traveling to different parts of the body in order to control and adjust many life functions.

Endocrine disruptors are chemicals that interfere with that signaling and regulation of body functions, and produce adverse developmental, reproductive, neurological, and immune effects in both humans and wildlife. They include Dioxins, Phthalates, DDT, PCBs, and Bisphenol A (BPA), and pose the greatest risk during prenatal and early postnatal development when organ and neural systems are forming.

Past studies of the effects of endocrine disrupting chemicals have often focused on the vulnerablity of reproductive systems to exposure to endocrein disruptors, producing the now familiar stories of male fish with female characteristics or via versa. In uterus, a fetus' chemical wiring can be crossed or short-circuited.

A new study from France involving over 600 boys looks to add to this trend, concluding that a expectant mother's exposure to Endocrine-disrupting chemicals raises the risk to a specific male birth defect, Hypospadias, by almost 70%.

Hypospadias is a condition where the opening of the urethra is on the underside of the penis rather than at the tip. The defect, which can be minor or quite severe depending on how far the opening is from the tip, can lead to problems with urination and, later in life, sexual difficulty.

The risk for those boys whose mothers were exposed to Endocrine disrupting chemicals was 68 percent higher than the unexposed boys. The researchers ruled out baby boys with known genetic risks for such defects. Working with hormone disrupting chemicals and living in homes near heavy polluters were both linked to more baby boys having the defect. Mothers were most likely to have boys with hypospadias if they worked as a cleaner, hairdresser or beautician. However, the researchers did say a limit of the study was attempting to estimate fetal exposure to such chemicals.

In a previous study, mothers in southeast England who were heavily exposed to endocrine disrupting phthalates on the job were about three times more likely to have a baby boy with hypospadias. Phthalates are used in some cosmetics, fragrances, food packaging and PVC plastics.

Hypospadias is one of the most common genital defects in baby boys, and most cases require surgery, often done before they reach two years old. In the United States, an estimated five out of 1,000 boys are born annually with hypospadias, while Europe’s rate is slightly less than two out of 1,000. “Nobody dies from hypospadias," said one of the researchers. "Most are cured with surgery, but if we can come up with some kind of prevention protocol, it could prevent a lot of surgeries and anxiety for families.”

Congratulations! We Have DFW’s First Official Smog Violation of the Season

Merry Ozone Season copySummer's here and the time is right for…putting on those gas masks.

This last Saturday saw DFW's first official violation of the federal ozone, or smog, standard of 75 ppb in 2015.

That doesn't mean it was the first instance of an "exceedence" of the 75 ppb standard at an area air monitor. Oh no. That happened at three different monitors (Parker County, Eagle Mountain Lake, and Denton) way back on May 1st.

As some veterans of the Air Wars know, it takes four, (count 'em, four) "exceedences" of the standard at the same monitor before you can count it as a "violation" of the Clean Air Act. As noted, Denton already had one from the first day of May. Last week's run of bad air days on Thursday, Friday and Saturday (rare) gave it the three more it needed to add up to a real violation. Lucky Denton. Fracking returns, and it hosts the region's worst concentration of smog, all in the same week. Coincidence? We report, you decide.

Denton's fourth exceedence in 2015 means there's no chance of DFW air being declared safe and legal this year. That site also had official violations the last two years as well, and since the "attainment" of the standard is determined by a rolling three-year average of the fourth highest exceedence (got that? ) – we're still stuck in "non-attainment" status. But that's probably not going to be a surprise to most of you.

Right now the three-year average is 79.6, but it's still early in the season. If there are more "exceedences" at the Denton site above the 77 ppb one recorded Saturday, the 77 reading will drop out and the higher ones will have to be averaged instead. It's the fourth-highest reading at a monitor from the entire ozone season that then gets averaged with the previous two year's fourth-highest readings from that same monitor to determine "attainment" (simple!). Denton recorded a reading of 92 ppb on Friday (so far it's worst reading), so that rolling three year average of 79 based on Saturday's fourth-highest 77 ppb result is likely to rise, along with summer temps.

The monitor in Pilot Point has three exceedences and only needs one more to make it the site of the second official DFW smog violation of the season. After that, there's Keller, Grapevine, and Eagle Mountain Lake that have two exceedences each. Today (Tuesday the 9th) is an Ozone Alert Day, so we could see another round of high numbers. If you want to keep track of what the highest four readings are at every DFW ozone monitor, you can check them out all summer long at this Texas Commission on Environmental Quality website.

Remember folks, the State of Texas predicted four years ago that we'd be seeing historically low levels of smog in 2015 because so many people would be buying new cars. That would be the same State of Texas that's now predicting we'll reach attainment by 2018 just by waiting for the feds to change the national gasoline standards. No other control measures are necessary to clean the air according to Austin. No new controls on the Midlothian cement kilns, the East Texas coal plants, or gas sources in DFW.

But by now you know there's a large gap between the state's predictions of DFW air quality and the real thing. Despite five or so different past air plans for DFW since 1991, none has achieved its goal on time. Be safe out there. Don't inhale too deeply today.

The State of Texas is Letting Polluters Write their Own Permits to Avoid Public Hearings and Federal Law

Rubberstamping polluttion

It's not news to anyone that the current Texas state government is "polluter-friendly." For proof, just look at the list of new legislation passed in Austin during the last five months.

But there's "friendly," and then there's pandering. And right now, we have a state government that's pandering to polluters to the point of letting them write their own permits in order to subvert federal law and the requirement of public hearings.

Maybe some of you saw the articles last week concerning the discovery of emails between coal plant operators and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, and the ensuing petition from environmental groups, including Downwinders at Risk, to prompt EPA action.

Thanks to the Project for Environmental Integrity, we have a whole library of correspondence that proves industry and state regulators were meeting behind closed doors with the goal of colluding on language that could avoid federal oversight of huge new releases of pollution at 19 coal-fired power plants across Texas, including all of those that directly impact air quality in Dallas-Fort Worth.

At the heart of the controversy is a term DFW residents might already be familiar with – a State Implementation Plan, or SIP.  These are Austin-created plans designed to address air pollution problems identified by EPA under the Clean Air Act. Since 1991, DFW has required one SIP after another for its smog, or ozone air pollution problems.

This time, the EPA required a SIP from Texas to address a type of pollution called Particulate Matter (PM) – really tiny soot particles that have been linked to a wide variety of health problems.

This state plan for Particulate Matter was supposed to include strict limits on the amount of soot emitted from industrial sources – like coal plants – so that the state could meet standards under federal law. Instead, between 2011 and 2013 the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality gave 19 coal plants revised air permits that allowed them to exceed that limit during their startup, shutdown, and maintenance activities for up to or six weeks per year. That's important because emissions are often higher during those periods because plant efficiency is reduced and pollution controls are less effective.

The TCEQ changes meant the release of thousands of tons of additional soot than federal standards allow. In one case, a permit change in 2013 authorized two NRG coal-burning plants in Limestone County, directly south and upwind of Dallas, to emit 7,616 pounds of particulates per hour during maintenance, startup and shutdown. Before the change the plants' maximum was 256 pounds per hour. That's a nearly 3,000% increase.

Each additional ton of particulates results in about $1.2 million in public health costs, according to an EPA estimate for the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

The 19 power plants in question are already responsible for 30 percent of all of the particulate pollution produced by large industrial sources in the state, as well as 31 percent of the nitrogen oxides (which contribute to smog) and 78 percent of the sulfur dioxide (which causes acid rain).  They're owned by American Electric Power, Luminant, NRG Energy, San Antonio Public Service Board, San Miguel Electric Cooperative, and Texas Municipal Power Agency.

In February, the Integrity Project requested emails, correspondence and permit documents from the TCEQ under the Texas Public Information Act. The request sought records about permits governing power plant emissions during plant maintenance, startups and shutdowns for 2010-12, specifically focusing on communications between the state agency and the utility operators of the plants.

That correspondence indicates that TCEQ used new permit language specifically supplied by the electric companies to avoid new oversight by the EPA and the public. 

On October 25, 2010, and other dates, the Association of Electric Companies of Texas sent TCEQ proposed language for the revised permits that created exemptions from the federal limits during the startup, shutdown and maintenance of power plants. TCEQ then incorporated the industry’s language – verbatim – into the final text of the permits.   In the copied text, the state allows utilities to design their own emission limits, define “startup,”  “shutdown,” and “maintenance” virtually any way they want, and switch monitoring options in a way that makes it impossible to determine compliance. The combined effect of these changes was to make the state’s new so-called “limits” for the power plants meaningless.

That part of the collusion between the state and industry stinks, but is perfectly legal. What wasn't legal was their plan to create a loophole to exempt the new tons of soot emitted by the coal plants from Clean Air Act pollution limits that would trigger EPA approval and public review.

The extent of that plan is made repeatedly clear. An email from Sean O’Brien, a technical specialist in the Air Permits Division at TCEQ, to other employees at the TCEQ shows the state was aware that EPA’s approval would normally be necessary in such a situation:

“It is not sufficient to say that the emissions are not new to avoid a federal new source review (NSR). You may treat the authorization of maintenance, start-up, and shutdown (MSS) at your site as a project and determine federal NSR applicability as follows.”

And then the helpful O'Brien outlines how the TCEQ and companies would pre-empt EPA oversight.

If TCEQ had sought EPA approval to relax the state’s implementation plan and demonstrated it could still meet federal particulate matter standards, then the EPA might have granted Texas a variance. In that case, the state would be free from potential federal enforcement, though citizen groups could still sue.

But TCEQ never submitted its proposed changes to the EPA. Nor did the state provide adequate public review of the new, looser regulations.

The petitioners have "a good case" for their complaint, said Thomas McGarity, a University of Texas administrative and environmental law professor who reporters contacted for an independent legal opinion.

"What Texas has done requires the approval of EPA, or else the [coal plants] may be subject to enforcement action by the EPA," said Craig Oren, a law professor at Rutgers University-Camden who has worked on Clean Air Act issues since 1979.

Joining the Environmental Integrity Project in petitioning the EPA for action were Air Alliance Houston, Downwinders at Risk, Environment Texas, Neighbors for Neighbors, Public Citizen, the Sustainable Energy and Economic Development Coalition and Texas Campaign for the Environment. The groups are asking EPA to re-open the revised permits and require Texas to eliminate the exemptions from federal pollution limits, allowing public input during the process.  If Texas fails to comply within two years, the coalition is urging EPA to impose a federal air pollution control plan for the state.

EPA's initial reaction was entirely too conciliatory.

"While EPA believes states are best suited to run federally approved environmental programs, we have an obligation to fellow Texans to act in the rare case that the state regulatory agency cannot because of new state laws,” said David Gray, a spokesman for the EPA regional office in Dallas. “It takes a lot of work and time for states to receive EPA approval and no business benefits when delegation is threatened.”

The State of Texas is letting polluters write their own permits to avoid public hearings and federal law.

When federal civil rights laws were being subverted, US Marshals showed up to enforce them. Where is the federal government when Texas is flagrantly violating environmental laws?

Since former Regional Director, and the polluters' nemesis, Al Armendariz' untimely departure in 2011, the Region 6 EPA office has been under orders to keep a low profile and "get along to go along" with Texas state government.

They've succeeded in this goal all too well, remaining silent as the state of Texas has attempted to undermine and sabotage one federal initiative after another. 

Instead of Alabama Segregationist Governor George Wallace standing in the school house door keeping black children out, you have Gregg Abbott laughing at the courthouse door as he files yet another frivolous lawsuit to challenge EPA's authority, or ignores another federal mandate.  As the state's attorney general, Abbott sued the EPA 19 times from 2010-14. And when it's not suing the EPA, Texas government bureaucracies are working overtime to frustrate its goals. This episode involving the coal plants is only the latest and one of the more blatant examples of the way Austin works now.

It's time for EPA to stop taking the abuse from the state of Texas, and, if they must, withdraw the responsibilities for carrying out environmental laws like the Clean Air Act that have been awarded to the state when it was believed the state was acting in good faith. It is not. The feds didn't leave enforcement of civil rights laws in the hands of Alabama officials, and they shouldn't leave enforcement of the Clean Air Act up to Texas.

Civil Disobedience Begins in the Gas Patch. How Will It End?

DisObeyOn Monday, three local Dentonites blocked the driveway of the Vantage gas drilling site on the edge of town. They were arrested and charged with a Class B misdemeanor. On Tuesday, three more local residents were busted on the same driveway and charged with the same crime. And so the first organized acts of civil disobedience in the Texas gas patch have taken place.

Meanwhile, after a lengthy meeting, the Denton city council has postponed any action on repealing the municipal fracking ban that the protesters were defending.

Throughout the election that led up to the ban last November, the Denton anti-fracking community prided itself on keeping the issue local. It was the industry that was nationalizing the fight, not them. They didn't put out a call to come to help draw a line in Denton. They didn't recruit "outsiders."  That strategy paid off in the almost 60% majority the ban attracted at the polls.

But of course, the results of that vote didn't stop the industry from continuing to make Denton a symbol of statewide and national importance. In fact, it only added to its flagship status. And in the wake of the victory, even anti-fracking activists were using the Denton vote as a signal of a sea change. If it could happen in Denton, they said, it could happen anywhere. Exactly our point, the industry told its supporters in office.

Timing is everything and it so happened that this in-your-face rejection of fracking took place on the eve of the biennial state legislature. Unlike recent sessions, this one had no one-third rule protecting consensus in the Senate and reflected a wave of new Tea Party members in both the House and Senate. Retaliation was swift and uncompromising. Despite the Republican Party's age-old rhetorical dedication to "local control," HB 40 is now law and denies any city the right to ban fracking within its jurisdiction. It also has the additional intended effect of freezing any new municipal attempts at regulating fracking at all for fear of a costly and lengthy lawsuit from industry. 

But the passage of this legislation didn't come without a cost of its own. Its shameless hypocrisy was the subject for countless editorials and cartoons. The industry gained protection, but the Republican Party took a hit to its brand. HB 40 has become a symbol. Of blatant political prostitution. Of bullying. Of electoral robbery and anti-democratic thievery. Of bad law.

Civil disobedience is absolutely an appropriate and archetypal response to bad law. Think Boston Tea Party. Think Thoreau and the Mexican War Tax. Think Freedom Riders. Bad law deserves disobedience. And the circumstances surrounding HB 40 make it every bit as emblematic in the early 21st Century as any of those examples were in their own times.

Which is why the response from Denton activists needs to rise to the occasion. Instead of continuing to see the fight through the eyes of local residents, Denton fracking opponents should embrace their newfound statewide symbolism. Lots of Texans want to express their shared outrage over HB 40, but they have no satisfying means to do so.

Instead of, apparently, making the civil disobedience at the Vantage site an exclusive and secreted affair, locals should open it up, set a date, and ask everyone who feels the same way to come and join in. Less Mark Rudd, more Gandhi. Six arrests is nothing to sneeze at, but imagine 60. Or 600.  In addition to activists, what about some of the local city council members whose authority to zone their own city was stripped by the law? Nothing would help demonstrate the moral bankruptcy of HB 40 better.

Another form of dangerous energy development prompted the largest single acts of organized civil disobedience in Texas in the late 1970's.

In June 1979, 48 people climbed the fence at the Comanche Peak nuclear power plant, just an hour south of Dallas – Ft. Worth. In November, 100 people did the same. Organizers spent months organizing the events and negotiating with local law enforcement. Posters and flyers were distributed. Recruitment was widely publicized, with half-day training sessions happening almost weekly that included logistical and legal briefings.

When the day came to show-up, it was a well-greased celebration of resistance that was widely covered, making front-page news throughout the state. Local institution Harold Taft (the authoritative weatherman Troy Duncan aspired to be) did a couple of minutes on the 10 pm news (with maps!) on how predominantly southeastern winds would carry radioactivity from Comanche Peak into the heart of Fort Worth. That kind of coverage happened only because of the audaciousness of those willing to get arrested for a cause.

Nor did it end there. After the first action, lawyers for the protesters convinced the local Somervell County judge to allow them to argue a "necessity defense." Such a defense says that breaking a minor law like a trespassing statute is justifiable if the accused are attempting to prevent a larger harm from occurring. If you have to jump a fence to rescue a drowning man, no one is going to hold that against you. As a result, nationally-known scientists were flown in to testify about the routine and exceptional dangers of nuclear power plants in front of the six-person Glen Rose jury. It was the first and only time nuclear power went on trial in Texas. The jury was hung 4-2 in favor of acquittal.

And that was BEFORE Comanche Peak was ever emitting a single radionuclide. We already have a long history with fracking harms in Texas. Think about the potential army of dissenters available for recruitment to civil disobedience surrounding HB 40. It could make the anti-nuclear movement numbers look small by comparison. Think about the testimony in front of a jury available now from scientists about the dangers of fracking. About the testimony of local residents who have already seen their health affected, and property values decline from living in close proximity to a fracking site. Think about the testimony from local Denton city council members about why they voted to hold an election on a ban and still support it. Here's a chance to put HB 40 on trial – in a courtroom and in the court of public opinion.

Along with more public and accessible civil disobedience, Dentonites might also consider revisiting the works of Gene Sharp, the author of a Encyclopedia Britannica of non-violent resistance tactics. Cataloging everything from boycotts to creative taxation, Sharp's books have been the basic texts of new pro-democracy movements around the world. What better reference material now that Texas is turning into a Banana Republic?

The point is to open up the movement to everyone who wants to participate by giving them ownership in tactics that are both effective and satisfying, whether they live in Denton or not. Not just letters to the editor, not just donating bail money, but actually physically participating in a popular resistance to HB 40. Invite everyone who wants to lend you a hand be able to do so at whatever level of commitment they feel comfortable with – whether it's linking arms at a pad site and getting arrested, or rallying around those that do. Everyone else is treating the law and Denton as a symbol. It's time for local opponents to do the same.

Thanks to six brave souls, civil disobedience has been introduced as a tool against HB 40 in the gas patch. Now the question is whether that effort will end with a whimper, or a bang.