NPRA ’08: US chemicals face legislative threats

31 March 2008 01:24  [Source: ICIS news]

SAN ANTONIO, Texas (ICIS news)--The US chemicals industry must do a better job of reaching out to policymakers, legislators and consumers as it battles a range of regulatory threats this year and beyond, top NPRA officials said on Sunday.

 

Norman Phillips, president of the fuels division of LyondellBasell and board chairman at the National Petrochemical & Refiners Association (NPRA), told a press conference that “this is going to be a very busy advocacy year”.

 

Phillips said the association will focus in particular on building public awareness about the consequences of pending federal legislation that could have sharply negative impact on the chemicals industry and the broad consumer population as well.

 

Speaking at the opening press conference of the 33rd annual International Petrochemicals Conference (IPC), Phillips was particularly critical of a bill being advanced in the US House of Representatives that would toughen an existing law mandating federal oversight for antiterrorism security at high-risk US chemical plants.

 

“Among other things, this legislation would undermine the existing law by exposing sensitive information about chemical sites’ vulnerabilities,” Phillips said.  The pending legislation seeks to make information about high-risk chemical facilities and their vulnerability to terrorist attack more available to local communities.

 

The bill, passed earlier this year by the House Homeland Security Committee and now awaiting consideration by the full House, also would give federal officials authority to impose inherently safer technology (IST) measures on specific plant sites as a means of improving security by making facilities less attractive as targets.

 

Phillips said the introduction of IST measures under the guise of security “would set a highly unreasonable standard”.

 

NPRA president Charlie Drevna said the IST effort in Congress is being championed by environmental interests.  “This is an attempt to get environmental controls that they could not otherwise secure through the normal legislative process,” he said.

 

Phillips charged that the House effort to rewrite site security legislation while the year-old existing statute is just now being implemented is “moving the goal posts in the middle of the game”.

 

He also criticized legislation pending in the US Senate that would establish a cap and trade emissions control mandate on US industry.

 

“This bill poses a risk to both our industry and the economy at large through the impact that cap and trade would have on our natural gas supply,” Phillips said.

 

A cap and trade programme would force manufacturers and electric utilities to immediately limit their emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG) and gradually reduce them to well below 2005 levels.  Emissions permits would be auctioned to manufacturers and utilities and could be bought and sold among them to offset GHG emissions in excess of allowed levels.

 

“This legislation would force fuel-switching among electric power producers from coal to natural gas,” Phillips said, warning that resulting increased pricing pressure on natgas would undermine both the chemicals industry and the broader US economy.

 

“This bill has very significant costs to our economy and very uncertain benefits,” he said.

 

Phillips and Drevna said NPRA will launch within a few months a new grassroots campaign that will enlist the help of chemical sector workers in telling the industry’s story.

 

“It is my personal goal to make citizens of this country as familiar with the petrochemicals industry as they are with the refining industry,” Drevna said.

 

Sponsored by NPRA, the petrochemicals conference runs through Tuesday.

By: Joe Kamalick
+1 713 525 2653

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