New York State residents have long enjoyed high quality, affordable potable water; the result of the State’s protected source waters and reservoirs, and robust testing and filtration programs. In fact, most New Yorkers have taken the quality of their potable water for granted. But in recent weeks two upstate New York towns – Hoosick Falls and Petersburg – have detected elevated levels of perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) in their drinking water supplies, leading state and federal authorities to warn residents against using tap water for human consumption.
Continue Reading Groundwater in New York: A Threatened Resource?
Supreme Court Stays Clean Power Plan
We previously reported on the Obama administration’s release of the final version of the Clean Power Plan (“Plan”), a set of Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations designed to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions from electric power generating plants. Under the Plan, states are responsible for developing individualized compliance policies by September 2016, with the ultimate goal of a 32% decrease from 2005 levels in carbon emissions from existing power plants by 2030.
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New York Expresses Strong Support for Obama’s Clean Power Plan
Earlier this month, the Obama administration released its final Clean Power Plan (“Plan”), a comprehensive set of rules and standards geared toward decreasing carbon emissions from coal- and gas-fired power plants and combatting global warming. The Clean Power Plan focuses on the nation’s largest carbon emitter, the electricity sector, which in 2013 accounted for an estimated 31% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has expressed strong support for the Plan, stating, “The President’s Clean Power Plan is a visionary step forward for our nation, and it provides a robust and equitable approach to reducing America’s carbon pollution. Here in New York, we have embraced the challenge of climate change with a commitment to cut harmful carbon pollution by 40 percent by 2030, and I look forward to working alongside our partners in the federal government to bring about a cleaner, safer future for all.” New York must submit a strategy to implement the Clean Power Plan to EPA by September 16, 2016.
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SDNY Decision Penalizes Parties Who Voluntarily Clean Up Sites under New York’s Brownfield Clean Up Program
The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA), commonly known as Superfund, was enacted by Congress to promote the expeditious cleanup of sites contaminated with hazardous substances. Through CERCLA, Congress attempted to achieve this goal by, among other things, providing funding to federal agencies, primarily EPA, to clean up certain contaminated sites and authorizing the agency to sue responsible parties for reimbursement after the site is cleaned up. Private parties may clean up a site and seek reimbursement from other responsible parties under CERCLA as well.
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Clean Up a Property? The SOL for your CERCLA contribution action may begin to run a lot earlier than you thought.
The statute of limitations (“SOL”) for seeking contribution under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) is three years from the date of “entry of the judicially approved settlement.” But what happens if that judicially approved settlement was not based on CERCLA, and did not resolve CERCLA claims? According to a recent federal court decision, so long as the settlement resolved environmental liability for costs related to a cleanup action – even if that cleanup action was taken pursuant to a state superfund law or another federal statute like the Clean Water Act – CERCLA’s three year statute of limitations for contribution will apply.
Continue Reading Clean Up a Property? The SOL for your CERCLA contribution action may begin to run a lot earlier than you thought.
OSHA Considers Changes to Work Place Exposure Limits
For once, business and labor seem to agree: The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (“OSHA”) standards for workplace exposure to chemical hazards are badly outdated and in need of revision. In response to these concerns, last week OSHA issued a Request for Information seeking stakeholder input into how these standards, known as permissible exposure levels or PELs, may be best updated, and on other strategies to evaluate and address workplace exposure. In correspondence to OSHA, public health agencies and the Chamber of Commerce all agree that OSHA’s updating of its PELs is long overdue and necessary.
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NYS Brownfield Cleanup Tax Credit Program To Be Extended
By Donald T. Ross
At the conclusion of its annual 2013-14 session, the New York State Legislature passed an extender (S. 7878) to the New York State Brownfields Cleanup Program (BCP) tax credits.
The BCP tax credits, which were first enacted into law in 2003, incentivize remediation and redevelopment of contaminated sites by providing credits against New York State personal or corporate income tax credits for expenditures related to cleanup and site preparation, new construction, job creation, and real property taxes paid on remediated sites.
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Fracking Alert: Home Rule Prevails In New York’s Highest Court
On Monday, New York’s Court of Appeals, its highest court, upheld the power of municipalities to prohibit hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) within their boundaries.
The case, previously discussed here, concerned efforts by two towns to ban fracking within their boundaries after several town residents signed oil and gas leases allowing for exploration and extraction on their land.
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What does the Supreme Court’s UARG decision mean for you?
In a highly anticipated decision last week, the Supreme Court struck down a portion of EPA’s so-called Tailoring Rule for greenhouse gas emissions. By its Tailoring Rule, EPA had attempted to regulate certain stationary sources under the Clean Air Act’s Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) and Title V permitting programs, based solely on those sources potential to emit greenhouse gases (GHGs). But because the numerical threshold required to trigger PSD and Title V regulation as set forth in the CAA were so low – 250 tons per year – thousands of small sources like apartment complexes, schools and churches would likely come within EPA’s regulatory purview. Calling this result “absurd,” EPA attempted to “tailor” its regulations to subject only those sources that had the potential to emit 100,000 tons per year of GHGs to PSD and Title V obligations.
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EPA To Consider Mandatory Disclosure Of Chemicals Used In Fracking Fluids
In what is considered a first step towards requiring natural gas drillers to disclose the chemical constituents of hydraulic fracturing fluids, EPA recently released an Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking seeking public comment on the topic.
High volume hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking” is a method of natural gas extraction by which materials, typically water, sand and chemical additives, are injected at high pressure to fracture deep layers of shale, which allows for the release of natural gas. The natural gas is then captured and surged to the surface, along with residual flow back fluids.
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