All Knowledge & Insights By Date

By Lynn L. Bergeson On December 10, 2018, the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) submitted a letter urging Congress to investigate the reason for which DOE has not spent all of its 2018 fiscal year funding for clean energy research, development, and demonstration (RD&D). In the letter to Congress, NRDC expresses concerns that certain DOE Administration officials may be purposefully hindering clean energy RD&D funding from innovative businesses focused on clean energy. The analysis...

By Lynn L. Bergeson On December 5, 2018, the United Kingdom (UK) published a policy paper titled “Growing the Bioeconomy, Improving Lives and Strengthening Our Economy: A National Bioeconomy Strategy to 2030.” As the UK strives to double its bioeconomy value by 2030, four main goals are outlined as part of the strategic plan: Capitalize the research, development, and innovation base; Maximize productivity and potential from existing bioeconomy assets; Deliver real, measurable...

By Lynn L. Bergeson On December 5, 2018, the Government of British Columbia, Canada, released CleanBC, a climate plan outlining the province’s path to a cleaner, more sustainable future. The plan includes implementation activities on how to make energy use more efficiently and prevent waste through cleaner technologies. Highlighting increases in funds for renovations and energy retrofits, the plan also states that by 2032, every new building constructed in the province will be...

Energy Reporters, “Norway to Ban Palm Oil from Biofuels” Euractiv, “Biofuels and Electromobility Are Key in Portugal’s Transport Decarbonisation” BiofuelsDigest, “Biofuel Opportunities Could Abound with Maersk’s Net Zero CO2 Target” GovDelivery.com, “Winners of the Fourth Wood Stove Design Challenge Announced” Biofuels International, “Finnair to Launch Biofuel Offsetting Service in 2019” Des Moines Register, “Tax...

Download transcript. Recently, we published a 3 part article with Bloomberg News entitled: New Chemicals Under New TSCA—Stalled Commercialization. This week, I sat down with Charles Auer, a Senior Regulatory and Policy advisor here at the firm, and Dr. Richard Engler, our Director of Chemistry, two of my co-authors on this article to talk about it. Our thesis is simple: EPA’s interpretation of our brand new industrial chemical law, the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the...

On November 21, 2018, in Court of Justice of the European Union (EU), the Fourth Chamber of the General Court (General Court/Fourth Chamber) issued a judgment in the appeal case T-545/11 RENV that denied all three pleas on appeal and prevented applicants Stichting Greenpeace Nederland and Pesticide Action Network Europe (Applicants) from receiving certain documents containing confidential information relating to the first authorization of the placing of glyphosate on the market as an...

On December 7, 2018, the Occupational Cancer Research Center (OCRC) held a seminar on “Perspectives on Mitigating Exposures to Engineered Nanomaterials in the Workplace.”  The seminar was part of the Occupational and Environmental Health seminar series supported by the Dalla Lana School of Public Health, Public Health Ontario, OCRC, and the Center for Research Expertise in Occupational Disease.  Pat Rasmussen, Health Canada/University of Ottawa, gave the presentation, addressing:...

On December 6, 2018, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced it was proposing a rule (83 Fed. Reg. 62760) to harmonize the EPA-specific regulations regarding research involving human subjects conducted or sponsored by EPA or submitted to EPA for regulatory purposes with the revised regulations of the Federal Policy for the Protection of Human Subjects (Common Rule) issued on January 19, 2017 (82 Fed. Reg. 7149).  Specifically, EPA is proposing to amend subparts C,...

On December 11, 2018, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler announced EPA’s and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ (Corps) release of their highly anticipated proposed replacement definition of “Waters of the U.S.” (WOTUS) that defines the scope of waters and wetlands that fall under federal Clean Water Act (CWA) jurisdiction. The 2018 WOTUS rule proposal is currently available in pre-publication format on EPA’s...

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) published a Federal Register notice on December 7, 2018, withdrawing significant new use rules (SNUR) promulgated under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) for 28 chemical substances, including single-walled carbon nanotubes, that were the subject of premanufacture notices (PMN).  As reported in our October 10, 2018, blog item, EPA issued the SNURs through a direct final rule on October 10, 2018.  EPA states that it...