Bush reversed regulatory effort on gas
additive
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Bush
administration quietly shelved a proposal to ban
a gasoline additive that contaminates drinking
water in many communities, helping an industry
that has donated more than $1 million to
Republicans.
The Environmental Protection Agency's decision
had its origin in the early days of President
Bush's tenure when his administration decided not
to move ahead with a Clinton-era regulatory
effort to ban the clean-air additive MTBE.
The proposed regulation said the environmental
harm of the additive leaching into ground water
overshadowed its beneficial effects to the air.
The Bush administration decided to leave the
issue to Congress, where it has bogged down over
a proposal to shield the industry from some
lawsuits. That initiative is being led by House
Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas.
The Associated Press obtained a draft of the
proposed regulation that former President
Clinton's EPA sent to the White House on its last
full day in office in January 2001.
It said: "The use of MTBE as an additive
in gasoline presents an unreasonable risk to the
environment."
The EPA document went on to say that "low
levels of MTBE can render drinking water supplies
unpotable due to its offensive taste and
odor," and the additive should be phased out
over four years.
"Unlike other components of gasoline,
MTBE dissolves and spreads readily in the ground
water ... resists biodegradation and is more
difficult and costly to remove."
People say MTBE-contaminated water tastes like
turpentine.
In Santa Monica, California, the oil industry
will pay hundreds of millions of dollars because
the additive contaminated the city's water
supply.
"We're the poster child for MTBE, and it
could take decades to clean this up," said
Joseph Lawrence, the assistant city attorney.
In 2000, the MTBE industry's lobbying group
told the Clinton administration that limiting
MTBE's use by regulation "would inflict
grave economic harm on member companies."
Three MTBE producers account for half the
additive's daily output.
The three contributed $338,000 to George W.
Bush's presidential campaign, the Republican
Party and Republican congressional candidates in
1999 and 2000, twice what they gave Democrats,
according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Since then, the three producers have given
just over $1 million to Republicans.
The producers are Texas-based Lyondell
Chemical and Valero Energy and the Huntsman
companies of Salt Lake City.
"This is a classic case of the Bush
administration helping its campaign contributor
friends at the expense of public health,"
said Frank O'Donnell, executive director of the
Clean Air Trust, a Washington-based environmental
group.
Huntsman spokesman Don Olsen, echoing comments
by other MTBE producers, said, "We were not
a huge campaign contributor and this has
absolutely nothing to do with campaign donations.
It has to do with good public policy."
The industry says it has become a victim in a
Washington power struggle.
"Because of MTBE there has been a marked
improvement in air quality and reduction in
toxics in the air," Olsen said.
"Because of leaking underground storage
tanks in some relatively few instances, MTBE
found its way into places it shouldn't be. But
that has nothing to do with the product, which
has done exactly what it was designed to
do."
Said Valero Energy spokeswoman Mary Rose
Brown: "It would have been impossible to
fulfill the requirements of the Clean Air Act
without MTBE."
A daily Washington newsletter disclosed the
existence of the draft rule shortly after Bush's
inauguration; outside the industry, few people
noticed.
At the direction of White House chief of staff
Andrew Card and Mitch Daniels, then the White
House's budget director, all government agencies
withdrew their pre-Inauguration Day draft
regulations.
The EPA withdrew agency rules, including the
MTBE one, in mid-February 2001, White House
budget office spokesman Chad Kolton said.
In subsequent months, agencies rewrote many
Clinton-era regulatory proposals and went public
with them. The proposed MTBE regulation, however,
never surfaced.
"As legislation looked more promising in
2002 and 2003, we focused our energies on
supporting language in the Senate's energy
bill," Jeffrey Holmstead, the EPA's
assistant administrator for air quality, said in
a statement Friday.
"We have not ruled out the possibility of
seeking a solution" by regulation, Holmstead
said.
The EPA favors a phaseout of MTBE through
legislation. But the legislation has stalled and
it no longer calls for a ban in four years.
Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, the
front-runner for the Democratic presidential
nomination, issued a statement Sunday calling the
MTBE matter a case of the Bush administration
"yet again putting special interests over
America's interest." He
pledged to "take on the big oil and gas
companies and fight for clean water and a clean
environment."
Rep. Henry Waxman, D-California, said,
"If the White House had not rejected this
regulation, MTBE would be virtually eliminated by
now and our groundwater would be protected."
Waxman is the ranking Democrat on the House
Government Reform Committee.
On their own, 17 states banned the additive
and dozens of communities are suing the oil
industry.
"Nobody's talking about the trial lawyers
campaign contributions to their supporters in
Congress and its the trial lawyers who are the
force behind these unjustified lawsuits,"
said Brown of Valero Energy.
To regulate MTBE, the EPA would have to use
the Toxic Substances Control Act, which the
agency considers cumbersome and unwieldy.
MTBE industry representative Scott Segal said,
"It took EPA a decade to develop enough data
to justify issuing a regulation for
asbestos" under the law. "Even then,
the courts still blocked it."
Bob Perciasepe, an EPA official during the
Clinton administration, said a regulatory
approach would have provided "a pressure
point" to pass legislation.
Georgetown University law professor Lisa
Heinzerling said regulating MTBE would be
difficult, but "if we can't use the Toxic
Substances Control Act to regulate MTBE, which
has contaminated water supplies all over the
country, then what can you use it for?"
http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/02/16/fuel.fight.ap/
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