Overnight Energy & Environment

Overnight Energy: Harris, Ocasio-Cortez unveil first step of Green New Deal | Inslee proposes environmental justice office | Democrat pushes FDA to act after ‘forever chemicals’ found in bottled water

by Miranda Green 07/29/19 06:11 PM ET

ALL THE ENVIRONMENT POLICIES:

Getting started on the Green New Deal: Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) on Monday unveiled legislation that would be the first step toward implementing the Green New Deal.

The draft bill is designed to address what the lawmakers describe as the third pillar of the Green New Deal — ensuring no community gets left behind.{mosads}

Dubbed the Climate Equity Act, the legislation lays out steps for Congress and the White House to “guarantee that the policies comprising a future Green New Deal protect the health and economic wellbeing of all Americans for generations to come.”

“Climate change is an existential threat — it’s critical we act now to achieve a cleaner, safer, and healthier future. But it is not enough to simply cut emissions and end our reliance on fossil fuels. We must ensure that communities already contending with unsafe drinking water, toxic air, and lack of economic opportunity are not left behind,” Harris, a 2020 presidential candidate, said in a statement.

The Green New Deal, championed by Ocasio-Cortez, would push for a massive shift in the economy away from fossil fuels and toward more environmentally friendly sources of energy, something she said will spur economic development along the way.

The legislation introduced Monday would require the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office to evaluate how new environmental bills would impact low-income communities. Projects pushed by the executive branch would face a similar review under the measure.

The legislation could help make Harris more competitive in a 2020 Democratic field full of candidates eagerly sharing their plans for tackling climate change.

Harris has yet to release a sweeping proposal of her own, and other candidates have put forth plans that target what’s known as environmental justice, which focuses on how environmental issues affect poor communities and communities of color.

The draft bill from Harris and Ocasio-Cortez would create an Office of Climate and Environmental Justice Accountability to help represent the views of “frontline communities.”

And another proposal for a new agency: Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, a 2020 Democratic contender, is proposing to open an office of environmental justice if he is elected president.

Under the policy offered by Inslee on Monday, the new agency would be committed to solving climate-related injustice typically seen in disenfranchised and low-income communities.

It’s the latest in a series of climate policies offered by Inslee, who has sought to lead the Democratic field on the issue. The latest proposal comes the day before Democrats will begin two days of debates in Detroit.

Inslee would turn the White House Council on Environmental Quality into the Council on Environmental Justice. The new council would then lay out what communities are the most at risk to exposure to toxic chemicals and pollution.

Inslee’s plan includes investment in front-line communities, or neighborhoods located close to power plants and manufacturers that often witness the negative effects of emissions first-hand.

His plan includes a guarantee that $1.2 trillion of his climate policy’s overall clean energy investments would go straight to low-income communities. It would also create an energy fund to help low-income families pay their energy bills. Low-income people are the most likely to experience pricing spikes if the U.S. switches to more renewable energy or a carbon tax.

Inslee’s plan mirrors a thematic message seen from the progressive left on issues of climate change — that economics, racial injustice and climate action are all linked. Like the Green New Deal touted by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt), another presidential candidate, Inslee’s plan aims to limit pollution and carbon emissions by helping the poor.

“The facts are clear: climate change and pollution disproportionately harm low-income communities and communities of color, and are major contributors to ongoing economic and racial inequality,” Inslee’s plan states. “For decades, corporate polluters have used lower-income communities as dumping grounds, and these communities now face an enormous and unequal burden from the costs of pollution and climate change.”

Inslee has been developing his plan, the last leg in a five-part series of climate action proposals, for months.

His campaign said it has worked closely with environmental justice groups to develop the proposal, including a listening session with leaders of several groups at the Netroots Nation national political action conference in Philadelphia earlier this year. Inslee was a keynote speaker at the event.

Read more on Inslee’s plan here.

HAPPY MONDAY! And welcome to Overnight Energy, The Hill’s roundup of the latest energy and environment news.

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BOTTLED UP: A Democratic senator is pushing the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to limit contaminants in drinking water after so-called forever chemicals surfaced in bottled water.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) urged the agency in a Monday letter to set a drinking water standard for a class of chemicals abbreviated as PFAS whether they are found in bottled or tap water.

PFAS, known as forever chemicals due to their persistence in the environment, have leached into the water supply after years of use in a wide range of products like teflon pans, raincoats and firefighting foam. The substance has been linked with numerous health issues, including some types of cancer.

Lawmakers have been pushing various agencies to deal with PFAS contamination, but those calls have largely been focused on contamination at military bases and on pressuring the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to set a limit on how much of the substance can be present in drinking water.

Blumenthal’s letter to the FDA calls for help from an agency often on the sidelines of contamination issues despite its purview over food and bottled water.

“Given the widespread persistence of PFAS in our environment and drinking water, many people have turned to bottled water to avoid adding toxins to their bodies. In light of this, it is especially concerning that bottled water may contain PFAS in unsafe concentrations. My constituents, as well as many other Americans, continue to be exposed to these toxic substances. I urge the FDA act expeditiously to tackle this national crisis in consultation with other federal agencies,” Blumenthal wrote.

His letter was spurred by reports earlier this month that PFAS was found in bottled water from the Spring Hill Farm Dairy in Massachusetts, leading the state to issue a health advisory for pregnant women, nursing mothers and infants.

A spokesman for the FDA said the agency would respond directly to Blumenthal.

The EPA currently recommends drinking water not have more than 70 parts per trillion (ppt) of PFAS, but it is not a requirement. Blumenthal is asking the FDA to require the products it oversees not have more than 70 ppt of PFAS and to limit two specific forms of PFAS to under 15 ppt.