House passes interior bill with anti-environmental riders

The fiscal year 2004 Interior Department spending bill, passed by the US House of Representatives on Oct. 30, was saddled with several anti-environmental riders that could prove very harmful to a variety of wild lands. The riders “are shameless handouts to special interests,” said Randy Moorman of Earthjustice. “The House has compromised protections for lands belonging to all Americans in order to benefit a powerful few.”

Damaging riders added by the Senate would limit public participation and interfere with courts regarding logging projects in certain national forests in Alaska and Montana. Another amendment provides a boon to the cattle industry, which pays token amounts to graze cattle and other livestock on publicly-owned lands. The measure seeks to mandate renewal of grazing permits that expire over the next five years without required environmental reviews and public input.

In a final blow to public lands protections, the House failed to retain a measure aimed at protecting national parks and monuments, wildlife refuges, and wilderness areas from a Bush administration rule that could turn cow paths and jeep tracks into thousands of miles of bulldozed highways. (US Newswire)

FDA labels meat, milk from cloned animals safe

Milk and meat products from cloned cattle, pigs, and goats are safe for consumers to eat, according to a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) document released Thursday. The findings bring the FDA one step closer to determining whether to allow the commercialization of food from cloned animals. A final policy is expected next year.

Cloned animals are attractive to the food industry because ranchers are able to keep their favorite livestock, theoretically providing better tasting meat and more milk and eggs. The nascent food cloning industry is eagerly awaiting the FDA’s decision on commercialization.

While the report states that “Edible products from normal, healthy clones or their progeny do not appear to pose increased food consumption risk,” the report also raises some concerns about cloned animals immediately after birth. Many of the young animals are susceptible to under-developed respiratory and cardiovascular systems. But as a food safety issue, the agency said the risk was small. (Reuters)

Green groups protest Kraft

The Genetically Engineered Food Alert coalition, composed of US environmental groups and consumer advocates, lead around 1,000 activists in over 250 US cities last week in a protest targeting grocery stores and Kraft Foods facilities for the company’s use of genetically engineered (GE) crops in its products.

“We are choosing Kraft because it is the largest food company,” said a spokesperson for the activist group. “They have removed GE ingredients entirely from their European products and we are asking them to so the same in the US.”

This is the fourth week of demonstrations against Kraft in the last two years. (Reuters)

EPA official backed air act changes despite warnings

The top Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) official charged with protecting air quality was warned repeatedly by staff that proposed changes to the Clean Air Act could undermine efforts to force certain power plants to add anti-pollution equipment, according to a report by the General Accounting Office (GAO).

Nonetheless, Jeffery Holmstead, the assistant EPA administrator for air and radiation, told two congressional committees in July 2002 that the revisions the administration was considering would not hurt those efforts.

But the GAO said in its report that EPA staff had told Holmstead otherwise in 2001 and 2002. The staff cautioned that some of the proposed changes could induce defendants to delay cases and judges to decide that the utilities did not need to install anti-pollution devices.

Environmental groups and congressional Democrats say the new policy will undermine seven ongoing lawsuits that accuse owners of 35 coal-fired power plants of illegally emitting millions of tons of pollution.

In its report, the GAO concluded the Bush administration’s new policy may deter judges from forcing power companies that violated the old rule to install pollution controls, and it “also likely will discourage utilities from settling at least some of the remaining cases. (Los Angeles Times)

EPA to ease sewage treatment rules

The Bush administration is shifting policy so cities and towns can skip a required treatment procedure for sewage they pump into rivers, lakes, and coastal waters during high rains.

The change aims to settle years of disputes over how municipal sewage plants handle the increased flow of waste—mainly storm runoff—that comes during wet weather. At issue is whether local governments should have to spend billions of tax dollars upgrading those plants so peak flows of sewage can get all the sanitary treatment that federal law demands in normal conditions.

The administration’s plan would let hundreds of communities big and small escape that expense by partially treating sewage surges in big storms. Environmental groups and some federal regulators say those flows should be treated completely to keep disease-carrying microbes out of recreational waters.

The Environmental Protection Agency plans to propose the policy change this week, and there will be 60 days for public comment before it can be finalized. (USA Today)