Environmental Protection Agency
sb admin | July 23, 2007By Myra L. Karstadt, Ph.D
On June 13, a team of which I was part received EPAâs highest award: The Administratorâs Gold Medal for Exceptional Service. According to the citation, the award was given to us âFor successful conclusion of the largest administrative penalty action in history which will significantly improve reporting of TSCA toxic chemical risk information.â
The DuPont case, which I worked on from mid-2003 (the beginning of the investigation that resulted in the litigation) until I left EPA at the end of May 2005, was based in greatest part on the companyâs violation of…
sb admin | July 9, 2007A couple of weeks ago, EPA proposed a new National Ambient Air Quality Standard for ozone (0.07 â 0.075 ppb) that was lower than the current limit (0.08 ppb) but not as protective as the limit many experts suggested (0.06). The agency also announced that it would be taking comments on alternative standards from 0.06 â 0.08 ppb. (Read this post on the announcement for more.) On Wednesday at 10am, this proposed revision will be the subject of a hearing held by the Senate Environment & Public Works Committeeâs Clean Air & Nuclear Safety Subcommittee.
While weâre waiting to hear EPA…
sb admin | July 9, 2007Remember back in May, when public health advocates sounded the alarm about the fact that EPAâs short list of nominees for its Science Advisory Board asbestos panel included scientists associated with product defense firms? As David Michaels explained, these firms are hired by corporations and trade associations to minimize government regulation, and scientists associated with them have a fundamental conflict of interest that should preclude their participation in EPAâs science advisory panels.
Now a similar problem is arising with another SAB panel: the particulate matter review panel of…
sb admin | June 5, 2007By Liz BorkowskiÂ
In a commentary in the latest issue of JAMA, Sheldon Krimsky (a member of the planning committee for the Project on Scientific Knowledge and Public Policy, and a contributor to this blog) and Tania Simoncelli examine the EPAâs guidelines for testing pesticides on humans and find that the agency is making âa fundamental shift in moral thinking â and a striking departure from the moral codes that have provided the guidance for human experiments.â
The rule in question is âProtections for Subjects of Human Research,â and the authors begin by summarizing their concerns about it…
sb admin | May 22, 2007The public (that's you) have until May 24 to comments on EPA's list of nominees for its Science Advisory Board panel on asbestos. David Michaels has weighed in on this issue  and is submitting his comments today to EPA. Another organization providing input is the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). Writing on behalf of NRDC, senior scientist Jennifer Sass writes: Â
On the whole, industry-employed scientists and scientists working for industry-supported research institutions tend to downplay the effects of toxic chemicals. ...Here, many, if not most of the industry nominees…
sb admin | December 16, 2006by Revere, cross-posted at Effect Measure
The Bush Administration hates science. Science is reality-based and some truths are politically inconvenient. But there are things that can be done. Like this:
The Bush administration is clamping down on scientists at the U.S. Geological Survey, the latest agency subjected to controls on research that might go against official policy.
New rules require screening of all facts and interpretations by agency scientists who study everything from caribou mating to global warming. The rules apply to all scientific papers and other public documents, even…
sb admin | November 30, 2006By David Michaels
In a move that recognizes the post-election climate change in Washington, the EPA has told two Democratic Senators that it is revising plans to roll-back the reporting requirements of the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI). In a post yesterday, I wrote about TRI as an important (and cost-effective) example of "Regulation by Shaming" or "Democracy by Disclosure."
Juliet Eilperin of the Washington Post obtained the letter EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson sent to New Jersey Democratic senators Frank Lautenberg and Robert Menendez in which he announced his plans. According to…