Announcing
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Free Enrollment in ACS Short Courses for
Unemployed Members The ACS is pleased to provide this expanded career services program for unemployed members to help them upgrade their knowledge and improve their networking opportunities.
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£4 To obtain a calendar of upcoming courses, write or call the Department of Continuing Education, American Chemical Society, 1155 Sixteenth Street, N.W., Washington, DC 20036. Phone: (800)227-5558 or 202-872-4508.
MACT averaging allowed for petroleum refineries Petroleum refineries are expected to benefit from emissions averaging, which enables them to overpollute from some points as long as they control the overall level of hazardous air pollutants (HAPs) at a single site. The scheme is part of the final maximum achievable control technology (MACT) standards EPA issued Aug. 18 for petroleum refineries and may become a normal part of all MACT standard setting in the future [Federal Register, 1995, 60, 43244-97). EPA claims the final rule will reduce annual emissions of 11 air toxics by 53,000 tons and will eliminate another 277,000 tons of VOCs annually, a reduction of about 60% for the industry. It will affect 192 refineries and is the second MACT rule to cover a major industry. The first time EPA used emissions averaging was in a final rule published in April 1994 for controlling emissions from the chemical industry, according to Jim Durham with EPA's Air Office. Emissions averaging under MACT allows refineries the flexibility to decide which emissions they can control by averaging across refineries, marine terminal loading operations, and gasoline distribution facilities located at the same site. Despite the flexible emissionsaveraging provision, the rule has been met with resistance. The American Petroleum Institute opposes the rule, claiming that the benefits do not outweigh the costs, in spite of EPA's calculations to the contrary. And the National Petroleum Refiner's Association sent a letter to President Clinton saying that cancer risks from refineries' emissions are too low to justify the regulation's controls and that the data on which the regulation is based are flawed. The rule also is threatened by a rider in EPA's appropriations bill passed by the House of Representatives, which would cut off funds for its implementation.
Local brownfields pilot projects funded Contaminated industrial and commercial sites in 15 localities have been chosen as sites for federally funded pilot brownfields projects, announced Administrator Carol Browner in July. Each project will receive $200,000 over the next two years to assess, clean up, or rede-
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velop the abandoned sites. The grants coincide with the Clinton administration's agenda to revitalize cities, and Browner said they are "the cornerstone of the Clinton administration's efforts to help our nation's cities in ways that make economic and environmental sense." Nine grants go to cities that will combine the funds with federal empowerment zone/enterprise community grants. The grant to Laredo, TX, supports North American Free Trade Agreement objectives by cleaning up areas of the Rio Grande watershed. In Cape Charles, VA, monies will be used to develop a 55-acre eco-industrial park chosen by the President's Council on Sustainable Development as a demonstration project. Some of the funds for New Orleans, LA, will be targeted to environmental justice issues. Other brownfields grantees include Birmingham, AL; Sacramento, CA; a group of 36 Chicago, IL, suburbs; Indianapolis, IN; Louisville, KY; Baltimore, MD; Detroit, MI; St. Louis, MO; Trenton, NJ; Rochester, NY; a seven-city group called the Oregon Mill Sites; and Knoxville, TN. Another 25 projects are expected to be funded by the end of this year, according to the agency.
Environmental justice moves to enforcement The Office of Environmental Justice (OEJ) soon will reside within the Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance (OECA), a move that advocates hail as an enhancement of the agency's environmental justice program. OEJ Director Clarice Gaylord said the office will not refocus its efforts strictly to enforcement because of the move. The current OEJ home in the Office of Administration and Resource Management does not provide the multidisciplinary interaction that environmental justice requires, according to Gaylord. Steve Herman, assistant administrator for enforcement and compliance assurance, said OEJ would fit right into his office's purview. "The mission of the work they do is consistent with the work we do," he said. During his tenure at EPA, Herman has emphasized targeted enforcement of industries near minority or low-income communities. For advocacy groups, the move meets a major concern. "Environmental justice is too important and
