Clean Water Action joined the Environmental Intergrity Project, and 15 other local, regional, and national organizations to petition the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to require the oil and gas extraction industry—including companies engaged in fracking—to report to the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI).  The oil and gas extraction industry has long used and released large amounts of TRI-listed toxic chemicals, and this has dramatically increased in the last decade with the rapid spread of horizontal hydraulic fracturing (or “fracking”).

Lynn Thorp, Clean Water Action's National Campains Director says, “Inclusion of oil and gas sector pollution data in the Toxics Release Inventory is long overdue, and will provide people the information they need to protect their health, their drinking water, and their communities.”

Today’s petition would finally make this information available for the first time to citizens, communities, and lawmakers.  The full text of the petition is available here.

127,000 Tons of Undisclosed Hazardous Emissions: Oil and Gas Would Join Other Industries, Including Coal, That Already Report to the Toxics Release Inventory; Federal Disclosure for O&G Not Yet Required Despite Surge in Fracking Chemical Pollution.

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Despite Progress, Congressional Attacks on Clean Water Act Just Won’t Stop

"The biggest threat to our water today is from politics."

(Washington, D.C.) Today, October 18th, marks the 40th Anniversary of the Clean Water Act’s passage into law. In observance of the occasion, Clean Water Action President and CEO, Robert Wendelgass issued the following statement:

Spurred by public outrage over massive fish kills, sandy beaches marred by huge oil spills, and rivers so full of toxic pollutants that they actually caught on fire, a unified Congress overrode President Nixon’s veto and passed the Clean Water Act on October 18, 1972. In the forty years since, we’ve seen amazing progress. But we’re not done – to ensure a clean water future we need to update and strengthen this landmark law.

We still face many water quality challenges, especially from diffuse sources of pollutants in runoff from cities, farms, and other intensive land uses.  

\When Congress overwhelmingly passed the landmark Clean Water Act in 1972, we set an incredibly ambitious goal: eliminate all water pollution. Before the Act, rivers like the Cuyahoga caught fire, Lake Erie was declared “dead”, untreated waste was routinely dumped in rivers and streams and wetlands were thought to be useless swamps that needed to be drained for development or agriculture. The Clean Water Act changed all of that. Over the past forty years we have seen amazing progress for our water.

Brown Not Supporting Key Chemical Reform Legislation

 

kick coal ash

The Senate has tried time and time again to make it harder to protect our communities from coal ash. So far, we've been able to stop them. These various bills have failed to provide meaningful protections to the thousands of communities living near dangerous coal ash dumps.  The latest bill (S. 3512 - which is "dead" would have permanently barred the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from ever establishing enforceable standards to protect human health and the environment from harmful coal ash pollution. We expect to a similar bill introduced in the new Congress.

Tell your Senators to oppose any giveaway to polluters!

Washington, D.C. – The following statement is from Clean Water Action, Earthjustice, Environmental Integrity Project, Natural Resources Defense Council and Sierra Club regarding the introduction today of the Coal Ash Recycling and Oversight Act of 2012, legislation in the U.S. Senate dealing with the disposal of toxic coal ash:
 

We Must Re-Elect President Barack Obama

This is the most important environmental election in years.  On November 6th, we’re either going to re-elect a President who has enacted an ambitious new fuel standard of 54.5 mpg , a standard that will reduce our dependence on foreign oil, save consumers money, create jobs and fight climate change--or we’ll elect a candidate who laughed at climate change in his acceptance speech. The race is incredibly close, but the choice is clear – re-elect President Barack Obama!

The U.S. House of Representatives will vote Thursday on a measure to urge the Transportation Conference Committee to strip the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of the ability to designate toxic coal ash as a hazardous waste. This spring, the House approved H.R. 4348, the Surface and Transportation Extension Act of 2012.  In this bill the House included an amendment by West Virginia Republican Representative David McKinley, that would prohibit the EPA from ever setting federally enforceable safeguards for the disposal of toxic coal ash. Now McKinley and the coal lobby are fighting to keep his amendment from being stripped out during House-Senate conference committee negotiations.