Marine Pollution Control8631 West Jefferson Avenue
Detroit, MI 48209 USA
313.849.2333 - 24/hour
11324 E Lakewood Blvd., #12 & #13
Holland, MI 49424
800-521-8232 – 24/Hour
GSA Contract #: GS-10F-0268R
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House Bill Extends Payments for Clean Ups of Contaminated Industrial Sites
The Trump administration may not be a fan of the US Environmental Protection Agency but it is supporting a House bill to extend until 2022 the payments to help clean up so-called “brownfields” sites. Such sites are industrial properties that have been contaminated and that would otherwise not have any future commercial or recreational use unless they are able to get restored.
To that end, the House voted last week 409 to 8 to authorize the funding to pay for those projects, which advocates say would lead to jobs and economic development — as opposed to having permanent blights in communities across the country. However, critics say that the $200 million annual allocations are a pittance of what is needed to make a real mark.
“EPA is committed to working with communities to redevelop Brownfields sites which have plagued their neighborhoods. EPA’s Assessment and Cleanup grants target communities that are economically disadvantaged and include places where environmental cleanup and new jobs are most needed,” said EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt.
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Businesses Ask EPA to Curb Clean Power Plan at Hearing
At the US Environmental Protection Agency’s only hearing to discuss the Clean Power Plan, the business community turned out and either asked for outright repeal or strict curbs on the proposal’s reach.
It’s an extension of the Trump administration’s outreach to businesses that it has said have been hurt the would-be regulation. The hearing was held in an area of the country loyal to Trump: West Virginia.
President Trump ran for office on a platform that said carbon restrictions are killing the coal industry, which is providing reliable and inexpensive fuel to the rest of the country. As a result, EPA Administrator Scott Pruit said in October that the Trump administration would seek to undo the Clean Power Plan.
“While ERCC believes that absent specific guidance in legislation from the U.S. Congress, market principles are the most sound basis upon which to proceed, we nevertheless support the process advanced by EPA,” Scott Segal, director of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council said at the EPA hearing in Charleston, WV, where this reporter attended.
“Federal guidance of sufficient flexibility, and limited to actions within the fenceline, can provide regulatory certainty, diminish frivolous litigation, and can aide in planning,” he added.
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745 oil spills reported in North Dakota in just one year
May 8, 2017
North Dakota, a state that was the forefront of national protests for months over environmental concerns stemming from the construction of a major pipeline, reported 745 oil spills since last May, according to the state’s Department of Health.
The oil and gas industry reported the spills, and the damages varied in each case. While some spills were in the 20-gallon range there were others that were much larger. KCET calculated that, on average, a spill occurred every 11 hours and 45 minutes. One spill coming from a pipeline in early December, went undetected until it was discovered by a local landowner. Originally estimates suggested around 176,000 gallons of crude oil leaked into the Ash Coulee creek, only hours away from Standing Rock, the central location for the Dakota Access Pipeline protests. However recent reports show that the spill was severely underestimated and that the total amount of oil spilled was actually three times greater — 529,830 gallons — making one of the largest oil spills in North Dakota history.
Marine Pollution Control Celebrates 50th Anniversary
Detroit’s Marine Pollution Control (MPC), a prominent environmental services company, was started by accident—literally.
In August, 1967, long before oil spills had become much of a concern, the Ford Motor Company spilled about 20,000 gallons of waste oil into the Rouge River. Uncertain about what to do, Ford personnel met with Dave Usher who, at the time, was hauling waste oil from industrial sites. Could he clean it up? Usher did not hesitate: Sure, he could.
“I really had no idea about what to do,” said Usher. “But I bought some vacuum trucks and other equipment and did the job.”
And so, against the backdrop of the Detroit Uprising, Usher created MPC, the first oil spill cleanup company in the Great Lakes and one of the first in the nation. A Detroit native, Usher remains the company’s Chairman. Under his watch, MPC has assisted in cleanup of some of the largest oil spills in the world, including the Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska in 1989.
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Oil Companies Are Downplaying Spills in the Gulf of Mexico, Coast Guard Data Reveals
May 5th, 2017Seven years after the Deepwater Horizon disaster killed 11 people, spilled almost 5 million barrels of petroleum into the Gulf of Mexico, and demolished the reputation of an energy company and its CEO, the evidence suggests that oil companies operating in the region continue to downplay their impact on local ecosystems and communities.
Three Louisiana environmental organizations – DisasterMap.net, 350 Louisiana and the Louisiana Bucket Brigade – say there were 479 offshore oil accidents in the Gulf of Mexico last year. That amounts to about nine accidents a week. And 94 accidents were publicly reported during a particularly troublesome three-week period last fall.
The three groups worked together to cull publicly-available data from the U.S. Coast Guard. Those images were then evaluated by West Virginia-based SkyTruth, which estimated the volume of oil lost based on each spill’s sheen.
The results often revealed a huge discrepancy between what these companies reported and analysts’ assessment of the volume of oil lost to accidents and leakage.
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