SIGN UP! If you’d like to continue receiving Washington Examiner’s Daily onEnergy newsletter, SUBSCRIBE HERE: http://newsletters.washingtonexaminer.com/newsletter/daily-on-energy/

PRUITT SAYS EPA HAS ‘NO AUTHORITY’ TO RELEASE CONTROVERSIAL CHEMICAL STUDY: Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt Monday night downplayed his agency’s role in burying a federal study that found a class of chemicals that have contaminated water supplies are harmful to human health at lower levels than the EPA previously deemed safe.

“EPA does not have the authority to release this study,” Pruitt said in a letter obtained by the Washington Examiner, sent to Rep. Dan Kildee, D-Mich., who requested the EPA release the study. Some Republican lawmakers including Rep. Mike Turner of Ohio and Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania also have demanded answers about why the study has not been released.

Pruitt said the Department of Health and Human Services, which prepared the study, has the authority to release it.

He told a Senate Appropriations subcommittee last week that he “was not aware that there had been some holding back of the report.”

• ‘Public relations nightmare’: The EPA and the White House sought to block publication of the study of a toxic chemical class known as known as Per-Poly fluorinated chemicals (PFAs), that has been linked with thyroid defects, problems in pregnancy and certain cancers, Politico reported earlier this month.

The White House reached out to the EPA fearing a “public relations nightmare” if the study was released.

• States at risk: An analysis published Tuesday by the Environmental Working Group found that up to 110 million U.S. residents may be exposed to drinking water contaminated with PFAS.

Michigan is planning to spend $1.7 million to test water supplies across the state, including in 1,380 public water systems and 461 schools. Communities in New York, West Virginia, North Carolina and other states also have found the chemicals in their drinking water.

PRUITT DECLARES CONTAINING PFA CHEMICALS A ‘NATIONAL PRIORITY’ AT SUMMIT: As Pruitt sought to deflect responsibility for releasing the study, he is hosting a summit Tuesday and Wednesday with state and local officials to discuss how to combat PFA contamination.

“It’s clear this issue is a national priority we need to focus on as a country,” Pruitt said at the opening of the meeting Tuesday morning, which also included tribal, industry and nonprofit officials.

He said the chemicals have “helped save lives” but acknowledged “concerns” about them tainting the environment in an “adverse way.”

• Promised action: Pruitt promised that EPA is working to declare PFAS a “hazardous substance.” He said the agency is developing an updated determination on the maximum level of PFAs in groundwater that is considered safe and is drafting a National PFAS Management Plan, slated for release this fall.

Agency officials will travel to states and communities affected by contamination beginning next month, he said.

• Closed meeting: Reporters were asked to leave the the day-and-half long summit meeting after an hour on Tuesday, and public access was blocked, sparking criticism from environmental groups. Victims of PFA exposure from affected communities were also not invited to the summit.

Welcome to Daily on Energy, compiled by Washington Examiner Energy and Environment Writers John Siciliano (@JohnDSiciliano) and Josh Siegel (@SiegelScribe). Email [email protected] for tips, suggestions, calendar items and anything else. If a friend sent this to you and you’d like to sign up, click here. If signing up doesn’t work, shoot us an email and we’ll add you to our list.

TRUMP’S LAWYER WORKED TO GET QATAR TO FINANCE NUCLEAR PLANT, REPORTS SAY: The last 24 hours have unleashed a whirlwind of controversy surrounding Trump donors, lawyers and confidantes involved in trying to win lucrative deals with Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

One of the stories tells of Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, helping a donor lobby the country of Qatar to invest in a nuclear power plant in Alabama, according to the Wall Street Journal and other media outlets that broke the news Monday night.

Donor Franklin Haney was looking to complete two unfinished reactors at the Bellefonte nuclear power plant in Alabama.

Cohen and Haney had a meeting in April with the chairman of the Qatar Investment Authority, Sheikh Ahmed bin Jassim bin Mohamed al-Thani, to seek funding for the project. It is not clear if Qatar is considering investing in the plant.

If the plant did gain adequate foreign investment, it could raise legal questions for the plant’s licensing by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which has legal restrictions in granting operating and construction licenses for plants owned by foreign entities, according to Market Watch.

TRUMP BLAMED FOR HIGH PRICES AT THE PUMP: “Americans can blame Trump when they get sticker shock at the pump this holiday weekend,” said Robert Weissman, president of Public Citizen, the consumer advocacy group founded by Ralph Nader.

• Prices jumping: The group started a Memorial Day campaign to blame Trump for the 59 cent increase in the average price of gasoline since the president’s inauguration.

• Policies to blame: Weissman says that can be blamed on Trump’s policy decisions.

• Costing voters: “President Trump’s policies are directly responsible for costing the very people he pledged to protect when he was campaigning as Candidate Trump,” Weissman said. The spike in gasoline prices is attributable “in part” to three Trump policies. First, rolling back clean car standards. Second, exporting U.S. oil.  And finally, cancelling the Iran nuclear deal.

• Car standards: It should be no surprise that Public Citizen is suing the administration over its proposal to roll back Obama-era fuel-efficiency standards. While the rollback hasn’t happened yet, some automakers are already intensifying production of sport utility vehicles and are reducing their manufacturing of more fuel-efficient models.

• More oil exports: Nader’s group also doesn’t like that the U.S. is exporting more oil now than in the past 70 years. That deal was garnered under President Barack Obama, but Trump has made oil exports central to his pro-growth agenda.

• Opposed under Obama: Public Citizen opposed the lifting of the 40-year ban on oil exports in 2016, saying it would take more supply out of the domestic market and raise fuel costs.

• Iran sanctions equal supply cuts: Trump’s re-upping sanctions on Iran will also reduce overall global supply and raise prices.

TRUMP’S FORMER CLIMATE ADVISER LEADS INDUSTRY’S CLIMATE PUSHBACK: George David Banks, who advised Trump on international environment policy, is taking the helm of a new multi-million dollar industry coalition to push back against the practice of proxy voting on the issue of climate change.

• New coalition: The Main Street Investors Coalition, made up of leading manufacturing, financial and retirement associations, is focused on reforming the shareholder system that denies “an adequate voice” to the 100-million-strong retail investors.

• Hidden agendas: The coalition is meant fight the use of shareholder meetings to bring forth non-binding resolutions on such issues as climate change, which most investors are not aware of and have no voice in countering, it says.

• ‘Drown out’ the majority: Banks said “the size and influence” of fund managers, institutional investors and proxy advisory firms have grown, which has acted to “drown out the voices and interests of Main Street investors who, despite controlling the single largest pool of equity capital in the world, have no ability to influence the decisions these funds make on their behalf, with their money.”

The coalition is meant to educate investors and policymakers on the issue.

• Members: The National Association of Manufacturing is one of the founding members, which has launched efforts in the past year to raise awareness and pushback against climate lawsuits by state and local governments against the energy industry.

TOWNS SEE GOLD IN STORING NUCLEAR WASTE: If there ever was a place meant to store the nation’s commercial nuclear waste, at least temporarily, it’s southeastern New Mexico, some local residents say.

The Eddy-Lea Energy Alliance, a coalition of volunteers, owns land in Lea County that it intends to sell to a company proposing to build an underground storage site to temporarily house waste from the nation’s 99 nuclear reactors.

• Interim plan: The alliance’s embrace of the concept is a stark contrast to sentiment in Nevada, where opposition to being a “dumping ground” for the nation’s commercial nuclear waste has stalled a 30-year effort to develop Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, as the nation’s permanent repository for nuclear waste.

Interim storage is not authorized under federal law. But a bill passed by a wide bipartisan margin in the House this month would direct the Energy Department to create a temporary storage program until Yucca Mountain is approved by regulators and funded by Congress, if it ever is.

• Sign me up: Finding communities willing to take the radioactive waste has always been a difficult task for the U.S. government, and only two sites have been proposed for interim storage.

Holtec International, a New Jersey-based equipment supplier, is seeking a 40-year license for a storage site in Lea County, with a plan to house 120,000 tons of nuclear waste.

Waste Control Specialists, meanwhile, wants to build a temporary nuclear storage site in Andrews County in West Texas, a project that also enjoys support from local and state officials, including Republican Rep. Mike Conaway, whose district houses the proposed location.

• Economic view: Supporters of the proposed projects say their experience with nuclear power, coupled with the job opportunities provided by hosting a site, outweigh their concerns of potential risks.

Read more about local acceptance of nuclear waste storage in this week’s magazine here.

SENATE COMMITTEE PASSES CARBON CAPTURE BILL: The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Tuesday morning passed legislation promoting carbon capture, utilization, and sequestration technologies.

The “Utilizing Significant Emissions with Innovative Technologies (USE IT) Act”, sponsored by a bipartisan group of senators, directs the EPA to support research for carbon capture and utilization and direct air capture.

It also declares that carbon capture projects and pipelines transporting the collected carbon dioxide are eligible for expedited permitting reviews.

• ‘Major global player’: The committee’s passage of the bill comes after Congress in February approved a tax credit to help the energy industry build coal and natural gas plants with carbon capture technology, which takes carbon dioxide out of the smokestack and places it underground.

“In passing this bill, EPW has taken another step toward establishing the U.S. as a major global player in commercializing carbon capture technologies,” said Rich Powell, executive director of ClearPath Foundation, a group that promotes clean energy.

EPW COMMITTEE ALSO PASSES WATER INFRASTRUCTURE LEGISLATION: The Environment and Public Works Committee also Tuesday morning unanimously passed the “America’s Water Infrastructure Act,” which gives local communities more control over water infrastructure projects that get federal funding.

It also “cuts red tape,” supporters say, by directing the Army Corps of Engineers to complete studies for new projects within two years, and providing investment to maintenance and construction of water and wastewater infrastructure.

PERRY’S NO. 2 JETS OFF TO DENMARK TO ENSURE NUCLEAR INCLUDED IN CLEAN ENERGY TALKS: The deputy energy secretary is jetting off to Denmark to ensure nuclear power is included in international clean energy talks, while starting a new global effort with Japan and Canada to do just that.

“If the world is serious about reducing emissions and growing economies, then the ministerial must consider all options when it comes to carbon-free power, including clean, reliable nuclear energy,” Dan Brouillette said Monday in a blog.

U.S. TOP OIL AND GAS PRODUCER: The U.S. continued to be the world’s top producer of oil and natural gas in 2017, attaining a “record high,” the Energy Information Administration reported Monday.

• A decade of growth: “The United States has been the world’s top producer of natural gas since 2009, when U.S. natural gas production surpassed that of Russia, and the world’s top producer of petroleum hydrocarbons since 2013, when U.S. production exceeded Saudi Arabia’s,” the government agency said.

• 60 percent increase: Over the last decade, U.S. oil and natural gas production increased by almost 60 percent.

ELECTRIC VEHICLES HAVE HAD SLOW GROWTH OVER PAST 5 YEARS: Sales of electric vehicles have remained stagnant over the past five years compared to conventional vehicles, the EIA said Tuesday.

Electric vehicles accounted for between 2.5 percent and 4 percent of total light duty sales over the past five years, even as the number of models available increased from 58 to 95.

The EIA says the growth of EVs has been hindered by high purchase costs, low gasoline prices, improved fuel efficiency of conventional vehicles, and limited charging infrastructure.

ETHANOL SUMMIT FOLLOWS WHITE HOUSE DEAL WITH CHINA: A summit to figure out the U.S. ethanol industry’s role in the Asia Pacific is underway in Minneapolis this week.

• Weekend breakthrough: The summit comes after an agreement between China and the U.S. on Saturday to increase energy and agriculture exports to China. Ethanol fits both categories.

• The big 17: The gathering is impressive, with industry and government officials from 17 countries in Asia. They are meeting with members of the U.S. ethanol industry and U.S. officials, according to the Renewable Fuels Association, the ethanol industry lead trade group.

• The future: The Ethanol Summit of the Asia Pacific is “focused on current and future prospects for the U.S. Grains Council, Growth Energy and the Renewable Fuels Association hosted the high-level officials from agriculture, environmental and energy ministries in the 17 countries.

• The countries included: Australia, Bangladesh, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Myanmar, New Zealand, Pakistan, Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam and the United States.

MAKING NUCLEAR RELEVANT AGAIN: The Nuclear Energy Assembly kicked off this week in Atlanta, with an emerging theme being making nuclear energy relevant, as opposed to “cool.”

• Less about being ‘cool’: Kory Raftery with Arizona Public Service, the largest utility in Arizona, was cited by the Nuclear Energy Institute on Monday as being “less focused on making nuclear cool, and more on making nuclear relevant.”

• Picking conversations: Raftery “wants us to meet folks where they are and make sure nuclear is part of their everyday conversations,” NEI tweeted.

The assembly is the premier nuclear power event for the industry. The panel where Raftery was speaking was called “Making Nuclear Cool Again.”

HAWAII 2018: PARADISE BECOMES HELL ON EARTH: Reports from Hawaii’s big island read like a scene from Tolkein’s “Lord of the Rings,” conjuring up images of Mordor and Mount Doom as a toxic white cloud of acid and fine shards of glass could be seen boiling into the sky Monday.

• Two weeks of calamity: The lava from the Kilauea volcano is flowing into the ocean, creating the deadly lava smog amid the volcano’s two-week-plus eruption.

• Largest emitter of deadly sulfur gas: An EPA spokesman put Hawaii’s situation in stark contrast to the rest of the country.

“The volcano puts the Big Island highest in the nation for SO2 (sulfur dioxide) values,” said EPA spokesman Dean Higuchi.

• Things are getting worse: But the high SO2 levels existed before the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory issued a new air quality warning on Sunday because of the erupting volcano.

The new air quality threat is from the deadly “lava haze” that is full of glass and acid, which occurred when the lava began pouring into the Pacific Ocean.

GEOTHERMAL PLANT ABOUT TO GO DOWN AFTER LATEST ERUPTION: A new eruption on the island Monday is making a real case for the release of even more deadly gases, according to civil defense authorities.

• Lava flowing into plant site: Lava from a fissure has breached the property of the Puna Geothermal Venture power plant, where county, state and federal partners have been working with the owners of the power plant to maintain the safety of the nearby communities.

• New gas threat: The plant provides electricity for almost 25 percent of the island. Authorities warn that the lava could flow into one of the plant’s geothermal wells, causing the release of dangerous hydrogen sulfide gas.

INTERIOR PROPOSES HUNTING IN WILDLIFE REFUGES: Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke on Monday proposed a new rule allowing or expanding hunting on 30 national wildlife refuges.

The Interior Department’s Fish and Wildlife Service also is aiming to increase sport fishing at four national wildlife refuges.

• Money maker: Together, the Trump administration is proposing to open or expand an additional 248,000 acres to hunting and sport fishing, which it says will yield about $711,000 in recreation-related spending.

• Exception to law: Under federal law, national wildlife refuges in all states are protected from recreational use to protect and conserve threatened fish and wildlife.

But the Interior secretary can open refuges to hunting or sports fishing if he determines the use is compatible with protecting wildlife there.

• National preserves targeted: Also Monday, the Interior Department proposed reversing National Park Service hunting restrictions in Alaska’s national preserves that were imposed by the Obama administration in 2015.

RUNDOWN

Wall Street Journal Major oil companies embrace Latin America

Bloomberg Tesla Model 3 rebuffed by consumer reports on slow breaking

Reuters Pollution turns India’s white marble Taj Mahal yellow and green

Bloomberg BP invests in tech to charge cars as quickly as filling a gas tank