Marsh Fork permit example -- Why does Bo Webb say that the DEP abandoned the people of West Virginia?

DEP is a state level counterpart of the EPA.

You should know:

-- The laws EPA enforces, and what it does (enforcement, cleanup, research)

-- The other federal players -- Interior, Agriculture, NOAA, NRC, Corps of Engineers, Energy

-- The role of states

-- Regional approaches

-- International efforts (Stockholm, Basel, Montreal, Rio, Kyoto, Copenhagen, etc)>

EG: Two major United Nations initiatives concerning toxic waste have been under development as part of broader initiatives to control environmental pollutants:

• The Basel Convention on the Control of Trans-boundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and Their Disposal; and the

• Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants which targets for restriction and phasing out some of the world’s most dangerous chemicals -- pesticides like DDT and chlordane, industrial chemicals such as PCBs, and byproduct chemicals such as dioxins.

This past summer I did an internship at the Government Accountability Office. (http://www.gao.gov ) Part of my work included examining recent final rule publications by the EPA and analyzing their rulemaking process in depth. It is nothing new that the EPA, run by a political appointee, has the tendency to cater to political pressure as well as often provide slack regulations for states to follow. The rulemaking process itself is extremely slow and lacks transparency, therefore what really goes on behind the EPA offices is not well known to the general public. It can take up to 10 years (and recently has) for a rule to be passed to regulate industries or some sort of pollutive emissions. However because of our system a lot of these procedures are necessary and the “red-tape” becomes value-laden territory. Many of the check points in the rulemaking process involve public comment periods, as well as cross-checks between agencies and departments that may or may not be impacted or involved in the regulatory process. However to omit some of these check points might conflict with our democratic system. We have to ask ourselves where is it appropriate to bypass certain aspects of the process to ensure a timely rulemaking, and questioning what is necessary in the process then becomes an issue of values and opinions.

With the level of slackening at the federal level it is no surprise that often states will implement the same loose regulatory tactics. Its nice to see when states such as California go above and beyond the federal standards, and in a dream world all would do so. However there definitely is a need for some federal standards to make sure that at least states are doing the bare minimum (like in the case with WV and Massey Energy in this chapter).

Penalties for breaking Federal law, such as in the case in this chapter, should be much more painful to the industry and the state and local governments in violation, to assure that these things don’t happen again and provide disincentives for the common “race to the bottom” commonly found through states implementing federal regulations.

-Jackie Pontious