Underground Construction - February 2020 - 20

Washington Regulatory Outlook
reasonable to assume the EPA will publish
a final rule in 2020. The EPA's initiative has
been highly controversial, with several industry groups from various sectors weighing in, in favor. Environmental groups have
hotly opposed the EPA, sometimes in fiery
language. Different states have been for it,
others against. As evidence of the controversial nature of the EPA proposal, House

Democrats in their pipeline authorization
bill added a provision forbidding the EPA
to move forward. On the other hand,
Republicans in the Senate are supporting
legislation that gives the agency legal
grounding to proceed.
The Interstate Natural Gas Association
of America (INGAA) and individual pipelines have been making the case that state

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FEBRUARY 2020 | UConOnline.com

departments of environmental regulation
keep stopping and then restarting -
allegedly to get additional information
- what is supposed to be a one-year time
limit during which states are allowed to
rule on a 401-certification application.
Sometimes what appear to be extraneous
considerations, primarily greenhouse
gas emissions, come into play in state
deliberations.
In its comments to the EPA, INGAA
stated, "The language of Section 401, however, is ambiguous and variable about the
scope of the certifying authority's review,
determination, and condition-setting.
The proposed rule offers the first holistic,
coherent reconciliation of the statute,
taking into consideration the context and
structure of Section 401 and the focus and
purposes of the CWA."
The Natural Resources Defense Council
takes the opposing view. It stated in its
comments: "EPA makes a mockery of
its claimed respect for tribal rights and
cooperative federalism, proposes a rule
that violates the Clean Water Act in several
respects, ignores important aspects of the
issue, utterly fails to identify a problem
that the proposal is designed to address,
and promotes an unworkable and illogical
scheme that leaves waters more vulnerable
to pollution and other harms."
It is pipeline safety, not construction,
that Congress will deal with in 2020, as
the House and Senate attempt to merge
two very different reauthorization bills.
These big bills, passed every four years,
make changes in the laws enforced by
the Pipeline Hazardous Materials and
Safety Administration. The House bill,
with only Democratic support, has some
industry-opposed provisions on methane
leaks. At the same time, it includes none of
the industry-supported provisions in the
bipartisan Senate bill allowing pipelines to
use innovative safety technologies in a limited fashion, which has been a key industry
legislative objective.
The bottom line for underground
construction in 2020 is no new, significant
funds, but potential, consequential regulatory initiatives from the EPA which would
probably lead to an upswing in the sound
of jackhammers breaking ground. *

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Underground Construction - February 2020

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Underground Construction - February 2020