WolfeNotes.com

An Open Letter

Dear Senator Smith and Assemblyman McKeon:

I am writing to you as prime sponsors of the Highlands Water Protection and Planning Act (Act).

On May 2, 2016, the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) proposed amendments to the current septic system density standards in the Highlands Water Protection and Planning Act Rules (Highlands Rules) at N.J.A.C. 7:38-3.4(b). see this.

The proposed amendments would roll back and weaken protections of groundwater quality in the Preservation Area of the Highlands by increasing the allowable density of septic systems and thereby allow significant increases in development in the Preservation Area.

The DEP proposal itself estimates this increased allowable development:

The parcel analysis indicates that the proposed amendments to the septic system density standards could result in up to 1,145 additional septic systems, or about 12 percent more individual septic systems than under the existing rule. (@ page 19)

The proposal would violate the express legislative policy and standards of the Highlands Act and is inconsistent with legislative intent, as summarized below.

Contrary to the policy, standards, and legislative intent of the Act, the DEP proposal would

• allow additional degradation of water quality, not prevent degradation
• weaken regulatory protections, not strengthen them
• promote development in the Preservation Area, not restrict it
• ignore “deep aquifer recharge”, not consider and set septic standards based on it

Therefore, we urge you to exercise your Constitutional oversight and power to review and veto this DEP proposal as inconsistent with legislative intent.

I) Relevant Legislative Intent of the Act:

The following legislative findings express and form the relevant basis for understanding the current septic density standards and how the proposal would weaken them and conflict with legislative intent.

1. Prevent degradation of water quality from sprawl development

The Legislature expressed a clear and strong intent to preserve, among other things, the water quality of the Highlands region, for multiple reasons and the multiple benefits provided by clean water:

The Legislature further finds and declares that the New Jersey Highlands is an essential source of drinking water, providing clean and plentiful drinking water for one-half of the State’s population, including communities beyond the New Jersey Highlands, from only 13 percent of the State’s land area; that the New Jersey Highlands contains other exceptional natural resources such as clean air, contiguous forest lands, wetlands, pristine watersheds, and habitat for fauna and flora, includes many sites of historic significance, and provides abundant recreational opportunities for the citizens of the State.

The Legislature found that the primary threat to the resources of the region was land development, that must be strictly limited by stringent regulation:

The Legislature further finds and declares that, since 1984, 65,000 acres, or over 100 square miles, of the New Jersey Highlands have been lost to development; that sprawl and the pace of development in the region has dramatically increased, with the rate of loss of forested lands and wetlands more than doubling since 1995; that the New Jersey Highlands, because of its proximity to rapidly expanding suburban areas, is at serious risk of being fragmented and consumed by unplanned development; and that the existing land use and environmental regulation system cannot protect the water and natural resources of the New Jersey Highlands against the environmental impacts of sprawl development.

2. Finding that existing DEP regulatory scheme was not adequate to protect water quality

The Legislature based the Act upon a finding that then existing DEP regulations – including the existing regulation of septic systems and groundwater – were not sufficiently protective:

“… The Legislature finds and declares that   …  the existing land use and environmental regulation system cannot protect the water and natural resources of the New Jersey Highlands against the environmental impacts of sprawl development.”

3. Need to establish A New Strict DEP regulatory regime

Based upon the important water and natural resources of the region and the fact that current land use and DEP regulations cannot protect those resources, the legislature found:

that the State should take action to delineate within the New Jersey Highlands a preservation area of exceptional natural resource value that includes watershed protection and other environmentally sensitive lands where stringent protection policies should be implemented; that a regional approach to land use planning in the preservation area should be established to replace the existing uncoordinated system; that such a new regional approach to land use planning should be complemented by increased standards more protective of the environment established by the Department of Environmental Protection for development in the preservation area of the New Jersey Highlands

The Act set forth a:

“comprehensive approach to the protection of the water and other natural resources of the New Jersey Highlands, that this comprehensive approach should consist of the identification of a preservation area of the New Jersey Highlands that would be subjected to stringent water and natural resource protection standards, policies, planning, and regulation” …  that this comprehensive approach should also include the adoption by the Department of Environmental Protection of stringent standards governing major development in the Highlands preservation area.

The current DEP septic density rules are a core feature of the DEP’s comprehensive regulatory scheme authorized by the Act that was designed to implement these findings and provisions of the Act.

To understand the Legislature’s findings and intent regarding deficiencies in DEP’s regulatory framework with respect to the septic density standards, you need to understand the DEP’s nitrate dilution approach PRIOR to passage of the Act – which the Act sought to strengthen.

The DEP’s nitrate/septic regulatory framework that existed prior to the Act which the legislature found “cannot” protect the Preservation Area’s resources from development and sought to strengthen included the following significant limitations:

a) the antidegradation policy in the GWQS, which allowed degradation of 50% of the difference between local background and the 10 mg/L GWQS, typically resulting in a nitrate target value of 5.5 mg/L. and lot sizes of 4-6 acres;

b) the nitrate dilution and recharge parameters of NJ GSR 32, which were deemed inappropriate because they did NOT accurately reflect the geology and recharge characteristics of the Highlands region:

c) The GSR 32 method was also rejected by the Legislature because it failed to consider cumulative impacts, allowed too much water quality degradation, did not include a nitrate target based on natural background conditions, and generally produced lot sizes in the range of 6 – 10 acres, which were deemed to be inadequate to protect the water resources and large blocks of forests in the region.

Here is the DEP Guidance for how that model was implemented in the DEP permit program for 50 or more septic units: (note nitrate targets of 5.2 mg/L – to 8 mg/L):

Please keep in mind the key legislative, policy, and technical differences between the prior septic rules, the current septic rules that replaced them, and the proposed new septic rules that would weaken the current rules..

II) Legislative Standards for DEP Septic Density

The Highlands Act requires the Department to establish a septic density standard. The septic density standards are authorized by the following provision of the Highlands Act( C.13:20-32 Rules, regulations, standards.; P.L. 2004, c.120):

“a septic system density standard established at a level at a level to prevent the degradation of water quality, or to require the restoration of water quality, and to protect ecological uses from individual, secondary, and cumulative impacts in consideration of deep aquifer recharge available for dilution” See N.J.S.A. 13:20-32e.

The Legislative policy and standard for DEP’s regulatory septic density standard is to “prevent the degradation of water quality“.

Importantly, the regulatory septic density standard set by the Department must be done explicitly  “in consideration of deep aquifer recharge available for dilution”.

The current DEP septic density standards were derived based upon this preventive policy and standard.

DEP derived the current septic density standards based on “pristine” background groundwater quality conditions that did not reflect anthropogenic sources of groundwater pollution.

See DEP’s Basis & Background of the Septic Density Standard which correctly noted the legislative policy context (see: Nitrate Target Concentration, p.17)

The context for method selection must be guided by the intent of the legislation, which is to protect and restore ground water and surface water quality. […]

In light of the direction in the HWPPA to select a septic density that would not degrade water quality, the Department considered two land use scenarios, recognizing that the underlying ground water would have different ambient qualities depending on the presence/absence of anthropogenic inputs. The Department performed numerous exercises with available data and referred to numerous sources to assess ambient nitrate concentration specific to two land cover designations: forested and mixed land use. […]

To assess nitrate levels under conditions that best represent pristine in contemporary terms, the monitored wells were then selected based on the 500-meter buffer containing equal to or greater than 90% forest + wetlands + water, e.g., less than 10% urban, agricultural, or barren land use.

Accordingly, to reflect the clear Legislative intent and strict legislative preventative standard, the current DEP septic density regulatory standards are conservative and were based upon the following nitrate target concentrations

Two ambient nitrate concentration standards were selected, 0.21 mg/L for forest land use and 0.76 mg/L for mixed land use. (page 1)

III) Proposal Conflicts with Legislative Policy and Septic Density Standard

The DEP’s proposed new septic density standards conflict with both legislative intent and the legislative standards established by the Act.

The DEP proposal does not “prevent the degradation of water quality” as mandated by the Act. In fact, it explicitly allows degradation of water quality because the “target concentration” for pollution in groundwater is NOT based on “pristine” background conditions.

In the proposed new rules, the DEP simply moved the goalposts from a density standard based on natural background conditions (e.g. “pristine”) to a standard based on groundwater that has already been polluted by septic systems and agricultural chemicals and animals.

Here is a side by side comparison of the current septic density standards and the proposed new standards.

Here is the NJ DEP Regulatory Basis for the current standards:

The context for method selection must be guided by the intent of the legislation, which is to protect and restore ground water and surface water quality.  […]

Two ambient nitrate concentration standards were selected, 0.21 mg/L for forest land use and 0.76 mg/L for mixed land use. 

Here is the basis from the USGS Study (August 2015):

The estimated median nitrate concentration for the entire Highlands Region is about1.25 mg/L as N, and estimated median concentrations range from about 1.05 to 1.78 mg/L as N among 11 smaller administratively defined areas within the Highlands Region that vary in percentages of urban land use, agricultural land use, and septic-system density.

The change from the original DEP “nitrate target concentration” of  0.21 mg/L – and 0.76 mg/L based on “pristine” or natural background concentrations to the USGS median regional anthropogenic impacted values decreases lot sizes tremendously.

Th current lot sizes under the current septic density standards are 88 acres in forested areas and 25 acres on farmlands.

The proposed new lot sizes under the proposed new rule are 23 acres in forested areas and just 11 and 12 in farmlands.

By DEP’s estimate, the proposed new standards would increase development significantly:

The parcel analysis indicates that the proposed amendments to the septic system density standards could result in up to 1,145 additional septic systems, or about 12 percent more individual septic systems than under the existing rule. (proposal at page 19).

By definition and by the best available science, we know that increasing septic density and allowing at least 1,145 additional septic systems that discharge to Highlands Preservation Area groundwater – at least a 12% increase – will cause a decrease in water quality.

In addition to the direct discharge of pollutants from septic systems to groundwater, the development that uses these new septic systems will convert natural lands to impervious surface, which decreases recharge and increase runoff and non-point source pollution, which degrades and impairs surface water quality.

The DEP’s own projected results of the additional new development and ground and surface water degradation violate the letter and intent of the Act.

Additionally, the DEP’s proposed new septic density standards were not derived “in consideration of deep aquifer recharge available for dilution” as expressly mandated by the Act.

The DEP based the new standards on a USGS study. The USGS study relied almost exclusively (96% of data) on data from the NJ Private Well Testing Act. According to USGS own study, the source of the PWTA data was shallow residential wells and the data did not include well depth or aquifer, which are essential data attributes required to determine if “deep aquifer recharge” is considered. See the PEER complaint below for further discussion of this fatal flaw.

IV)  Inconsistencies with Legislative Intent

The DEP estimates that the proposed new rule would allow at least an additional 1,145 septic systems and significant new development in the Preservation Area.

That is contrary to the express intent of the legislature to prevent degradation of water quality, more strictly regulate development, and protect natural resources, as outlined above.

V) Flaws in USGS study that forms exclusive basis for proposal

The DEP proposal is based exclusively on a 2015 Report by the USGS.

The August 2015 study by scientists at the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) is entitled “Median Nitrate Concentrations in Groundwater in the New Jersey Highlands Region Estimated Using Regression Models and Land-Surface Characteristics.” In an April 21, 2016 news release, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) touted the study as “comprehensive new scientific information” which supported what the agency termed “common sense revisions to Highlands septic density standards.”

Rather than being based on either new or comprehensive scientific information, the USGS study is actually based on old state data of extremely poor quality and reliability. The PEER complaint points out that 96% of the study’s data is drawn from the state’s Private Well Testing program which even the DEP concedes is highly questionable for a number of reasons, including that the data is –

• Unverified with no quality controls to confirm validity;
• Skewed and not necessarily representative of the Highlands deep aquifer; and
• Drawn from wells outside the Highlands Preservation Area.

In order to correct and remedy those flaws, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) filed a federal Data Quality Act complaint with the USGS, requesting that the flawed study be withdraw.

The PEER complaint goes into detail and provides an additional demonstration of how the proposed DEP rule is inconsistent with Legislative intent.

You may read the PEER petition here.

We urge you to defend the legacy of the Highlands Act, veto this DEP proposal as inconsistent with Legislative intent, and look forward to your pompt and favorable consideration.

Bill Wolfe,

Bordentown, NJ

NJ DEP Private Well Testing Act Data Lack QA/QC

Location bias and lack of basic geological features violate USGS science standards 

The federal Data Quality Act was passed by Congress in 2000 as part of an attack on regulatory agencies. According to a Congressional Research Service Report, some say the Act was designed to be used as:

a tool by which regulated parties could slow or even stop new health, safety, and environmental standards

The academic group Defending Science shares that view of the intent of the Act:

The law was in large part the brainchild of the Center for Regulatory Effectiveness (CRE), an industry-sponsored ‘regulatory watch-dog’ group. …

For proponents of the IQA such as the US Chamber of Commerce and CRE, IQA was a mechanism for “regulating the regulators.” Critics of the law – including public interest groups such as the Center for Progressive Regulation, OMB Watch and Public Citizen – were concerned that a high volume of petitions would sap resources.

The law has been called “the nemesis of regulation”.

So it’s a sweet irony that I just deployed this tool to attack a regulatory rollback by the Christie DEP.

The fact that I drafted the legislative provision of the Highlands Act (i.e. the phrase “deep aquifer recharge“) and staffed Governor McGreevey’s Highlands Task Force and worked on the issue while with DEP only makes that irony sweeter.

The revolving door sometimes turns in the public interest! And the Arc of the Universe sometimes bends towards justice.

NJ Spotlight does a good job in reporting the story today, see:

• CITING FLAWED DATA, ‘GREEN’ GROUP FILES TO BLOCK HIGHLANDS’ SEPTIC TANK RULE

Just a few points to expand upon that story and provide the underlying documents.

The challenge was filed by PEER, see:

• HIGHLANDS SEPTIC STUDY FACES RETRACTION DEMAND – Study Used to Justify Septic Standards Relaxation Based on Bad Data

In particular, the wonks out there might want to read the complaint which seeks:

Accordingly, PEER respectfully requests the USGS take the following steps to comply with the Information Quality Act:

1. Retract the “Median Nitrate Concentrations in Groundwater in the New Jersey Highlands Region Estimated Using Regression Models and Land-Surface Characteristics” study.

2. Issue a public statement explaining the reasons for this retraction.

3. Send a letter to the NJ DEP Commissioner requesting that that agency refrain from relying on this retracted report for any regulatory or public health purpose.

The USGS study in question admits that it is spatially biased, a point we highlight in the complaint.

USGS also admits that the data does not provide essential geological information, such as well location, depth, or aquifer – critical attributes that are included in USGS’s own well data.

In addition, as the USGS study admits, shallow residential wells are influenced by nearby septic systems and other anthroprogenic sources of nitrate, and therefore can never characterize “deep aquifer” conditions or background groundwater quality, as required by the Highlands Act.

But, what may be the killer argument, is the fact that the underlying data for the USGS study did not undergo quality assurance/quality control (QA/QC) review. That failure alone conflicts with USGS’s own standards for scientific reports.

The source of this data (96% of it) is the NJ Private Well Testing Act.

The NJ DEP itself noted critical limitations in this data, including the fact that it did not undergo QA/QC review.

The DEP’s Private Well Testing Act Report warns about lack of QA/QC and other limitations and flaws in the PWTA data (see page 5, “Limitations of the Data”)

Several factors may affect the measurement and quality of the data collected as part of the PWTA and utilized in this report. These factors include sample collection and transport, laboratory analysis, accuracy of related well location information, and data entry and reporting. Any of these factors, if handled improperly, could result in an unwarranted test failure or approval. Since no state agency has the ability to verify that all real estate transactions (sales and leases) subject to testing under the PWTA have been reported to NJDEP, the absence of results, along with errors or mistakes in the reported data, could have a significant impact on the evaluation and interpretation of the data presented. The following identifies some key issues concerning PWTA data: […]

Analysis and Data Reporting – The PWTA Program testing data are submitted electronically and are automatically entered into the database without any quality control or quality assurance reviews. It is assumed that the certified laboratory properly met all required protocols and the data are accurate. The PWTA Program relies on the reporting laboratory to catch and correct any data entry errors.

The USGS Report also used a bizarrely high “Method Detection Limit” (MDL) to classify 23% of the PWTA data as “Non-Detect” (ND), as high as 10 mg/L nitrate. That is an MDL that is orders of magnitude higher than what DEP certified laboratory and various EPA regulations require.

While not a science or data flaw, the statistical metric chosen, i.e. median value, by definition considers degradation of background water quality because a median value is “the number separating the higher half of a data sample, a population, or a probability distribution, from the lower half.” (Wiki)

The median statistic contradicts the legislative standard in the Highlands Act to prevent degradation of groundwater

Finally, the USGS knew – or should have known – about the DEP’s methodology and basis for the current Highlands septic density standard (which relied on USGS well data, not flawed NJ PWTA data) and how that methodology reflected the Highlands Act non-degratation policy and derived “deep aquifer” protections based on background nitrate levels.

The USGS knew – or should have known – that this DEP standard was subject to a lawsuit filed by the NJ Farm Bureau and was a core protection of the Highlands.

As such, their work on this study undermined the public trust and confidence in USGS, as a science based organization independent from politics.

BL England plant – fossil dinosaur – Gateway to Cape May

Corporate Polluters Hijack Cape May County’s Good Name

[Update below]

Did Cape May County get naming rights?

That’s the least they could ask for as corporate polluters seek to appropriate the County’s good name in a scheme to rename the notoriously ugly industrial pollution scar on Great Egg Bay – The Gateway to lovely Cape May County –  “The Cape May Energy Center”.

Cape May – a special place known for charming gingerbread Victorian B&B’s along narrow gas lamp lit streets, and world renown migratory and shorebird habitat, and intimate lovers’ walks on the beach.

Is a climate destroying fossil fuel plant compatible with that? Be sure to put that landmark on the brochure for “Eco-tourism”!

That ugly industrial scar would remain for another 40 years or so – if it’s not underwater by then – if DEP approves a new air pollution permit for the proposed re-powering of the old coal & oil plant to a natural gas fueled plant, cynically to be renamed “The Cape May Energy Center”.

Over a hundred people came out last night – including a small group of dedicated activists – to urge DEP to think about what’s at stake – captured in the above photos.

Enjoy it now folks, because it’s soon all gone as climate driven sea level rise and storm surge erode and ultimately inundate the whole Cape May Peninsula – Game Over for Piping Plover!

Ignoring all this beauty and meaning, I tried to speak the language of the DEP bureaucracy last night – complex technocratic regulatory-speak, designed to obscure reality and mask the operation of economic and political power and  frustrate democracy and evade responsibility.

I advised DEP that the whole world is in non-attainment for greenhouse gases – a riff on “The Whole World Is Watching!” – as CO2 levels exceed 400 ppm and record heat and extreme weather are experienced throughout the world at a terrifying and accelerating rate.

[Update 5/23/16 – this is what I mean by a terrifying and accelerating rate.]

The DEP hearing officer and stenographer duly noted my testimony.

But did they listen? Do they get it?

Climate Change crisis demands zero carbon renewable energy future

Insane fracking, pipeline, and power plant scheme must be killed

DEP Holding Public Hearing Tuesday Night on New Air Pollution Permit

Investor alert: There will be protracted legal battles, growing public opposition, and civil disobedience to block these pipeline and power plant projects.

[Updates below]

The Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) will hold a public hearing on Tuesday (5/17/16) night at 7 pm at the Upper Township Municipal Building located at 2100 Tuckahoe Road Petersburg, NJ 08270 on  a new air pollution control permit for the BL England plant (BLE). There will be a protest at 6:30 before the hearing – bring your friends and a sign.

It is important that people attend the hearing and speak out against this fossil fuel plant. Those who can’t attend to speak can submit written comments until May 23 (see public notice for where to send written comments).

NJ Spotlight wrote a good set up story CLOUD OF CONTROVERSY HANGS OVER AIR PERMIT FOR NEW B.L. ENGLAND POWER PLANT and Jeff Tittel has an Op-Ed which provide some helpful information.

We go a little deeper in the weeds and provide the permit documents and some context and history.

• Here is the DEP’s  Statement of Basis
• Here is the draft air pollution permit

Climate crisis – “Leave it in the ground”

In 2007, the Legislature passed and Governor Corzine signed the Global Warming Response Act (GWRA) P.L.  2007, c. 112;  (N.J.S.A 26:2C-37), at the time, one of the strongest greenhouse gas laws in the country:

The Legislature therefore finds and declares that it is in the public interest to establish a greenhouse gas emissions reduction program to limit the level of Statewide greenhouse gas emissions, and greenhouse gas emissions from electricity generated outside the State but consumed in the State, to the 1990 level or below, of those emissions by the year 2020, and to reduce those emissions to 80% below the 2006 level by the year 2050.

Since then, the science of climate change has become far more dire and demonstrated that we must make far deeper cuts in emissions much earlier than previously thought to avoid irreversible climate change and catastrophic warming.

Simply put, NJ can not meet the aggressive GWRA emission reduction goals with continued investments in and construction of major fossil fuel infrastructure.

The most recent science suggests that we need to leave at least 80% of known fossil fuel reserves (coal, oil, & gas) in the ground if we are to limit warming to 2 degrees Celsius, and even more to avoid the 1.5 degree goal recently embraced in the Paris climate accords.

Methane is a far more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, especially in the short run. Several credible recent studies document that the lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions from natural gas, i.e. from fracking wells, fugitive pipeline and compressor station emissions, through power plant emissions are at least as bad – or even worse – than coal, thus gas is not a “bridge fuel” to a stable climate future.

Failure to regulate greenhouse gas emissions

Greenhouse gases are defined and regulated as “air contaminants (pollutants) under NJ’s State Air Pollution Control Act. The draft air permit would allow emissions – from the BL plant alone – of 1.6 million tons of greenhouse gases, as CO2 equivalents.

The NJ Air Pollution Control Act mandates that air permits reflect “State of the Art” (SOTA) pollution control requirements. No GHG emissions controls at BLE clearly can’t be SOTA.

The DEP permit fails to require any pollution controls for greenhouse gas emissions and fails to even consider lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions from upstream gas sources that power the project. Failure to conduct lifecycle cumulative impact analysis and compare emissions for compliance with the GWRA reduction goals can not be SOTA.

The Christie DEP has no plan for how to meet the federal EPA’s proposed Clean Power Plan regulations. It is irresponsible and reckless for DEP to issue approvals of major new GHG emission sources in the absence of a State plan that meets federal requirements.

It is not clear whether the BLE plan and the DEP draft air permit will comply with EPA’s proposed new power plant emission regulations (Clean Power Plan), so this permit should not be issued before those regulations are adopted in final form. BLE emissions would impact the entire State’s power sector, first by impacting the State’s GHG  emissions rates under EPA CPP rules and secondly by undermining investments in renewable energy via subsidized and artificially low energy price that fail to consider the social costs of carbon

The Long Strange Trip of BLE – Well Past Time to Pull The Plug

Back in December, I flagged the issue and anticipated the need to revise the air permits after significant changes were made to the original BLE re-powering plan, which was part of the South Jersey Gas Pinelands pipeline approval, see

• BL England Re-Powering Plan Quietly Gets Dirtier (and Less Profitable)

This last minute change in the BLE re-powering plan and how it was kept from the public and the Pinelands Commission is just another example of how absurd this whole review process is and how dirty the regulatory process has become.

Over a decade ago, US EPA and NJ DEP found that the BL England plant’s pollution violated the Clean Air Act and took enforcement action. That resulted in a Jan. 4, 2006 Administrative Consent Order (ACO) that required that the plant either be upgraded to meet the standards of the Clean Air Act or shut down.

The costs of upgrading the plant were determined to be an uneconomic investment, so the decision was made by the owner Atlantic City Electric, to shut down the plant.

But later in 2006 ACE sold the plant to financial speculators named “RC Cape May” who decided to repower the plant and convinced the Corzine DEP to extend the compliance deadlines. Ten years later, the plant is still polluting.

Then the pro-gas Christie Administration came along in 2010 – lobbied by the infamous law firm of Wolf & Samson – and green lighted DEP permits, BPU approvals, and extended the original 2006 ACO compliance deadline 3 times. No regulatory uncertainty under Bob Martin’s leadership!

The Christie crew also rammed a dedicated private pipeline through the Pinelands to serve the plant and make ratepayers pick up 60% of the $100 million construction costs of the pipeline, while providing even more public subsidies by exempting the BL England plant from various greenhouse gas emissions fees and charges.

The BLE repowering is part of a $500 million boondoggle – $400 million for the BL repowering and another $100 million for their private SJG Pinelands “dedicated” pipeline.

It will be provided gas from a multi-billion dollar regional fossil energy Ponzi scheme that begins with fracking wells from the Marcellus shale in Pennsylvania, and the $1+ billion new PennEast pipeline, which will also serve the other Pinelands pipeline, known as the “Southern Reliability Link” (SRL) owned by the NJ Natural Gas Co.

Both those Pinlands pipelines are facing litigation – and DEP has not even issued all permits to the SRL, which are sure to have appeals – and the PennEast pipeline is certain to face litigation as well should FERC or DEP issue final approvals.

Investor alert: There will be protracted legal battles, growing public opposition, and civil disobedience to block these pipeline and power plant projects.

It’s time to pull the plug on the entire fossil enterprise and accelerate investments in renewable power.

[Update: 

I’ve previously disclosed the fact – unreported by NJ press – that Wolff & Samson ELEC reports show meetings with the Gov.’s Office to lobby for the BL England plant and the SJG pipeline (see this and this for examples of W&S lobbying of DEP)

Here are some of the benefits of that lobbying, worth hundreds of millions of dollars granted by Christie controlled state agencies:

1.In an April 29, 2013 Order, BPU quietly granted huge tax breaks and subsidies to the Rockland Capital BL England Plant:

2. This BPU Order also provided secrecy to cover up the amount of huge ratepayer subsidies to Rockland Capital.

An Open Letter to the Chair of the Assembly Regulatory Oversight Committee

Tolerance is not an absolute and Respect must be earned

Facts matter

Dear Assemblyman Gusciora:

I want to expand upon and explain my revulsion to your exercise of the power of the Chairman of the Assembly Regulatory Oversight Committee at the May 12, 2016 hearing.

There was only one bill on the agenda and one Resolution. As far as I know, there were no conflicting Legislative activity or competing commitments of the members of the Committee.

So no one should have been in any hurry, particularly on an issue as important as pipelines.

At the outset of the hearing, you noted “a plethora” of people signed up to testify and used that as a justification for a strict 2 minute time limit on testimony.

There were 10 people who testified. None of them were lobbyists for commercial for profit interests.

I’ve never experienced a 2 minute time limit on legislative testimony in my 31 year Trenton career – even DEP regulatory hearings allow a minimum of 3 minutes, and a person can provide a second round if they are unable to finish their testimony in the 3 minute period.

I would think that such a severe restriction would require extraordinary circumstances.

In my view, objectively, there were no extraordinary circumstances and there was not a “plethora” of people seeking to be heard.

I find the 2 minute limit you imposed arbitrary, contrary to democracy and the public interest,  and an abuse of the power of the Chair.

I am copying Speaker Prieto on this to request that he look into this matter and provide guidance about whether there is Assembly policy or rules of procedure that govern and constrain a Committee Chairman’s discretion in this regard.

Furthermore, I want to object to the inappropriate manner in which you introduced my testimony. Your voice clearly paused and your inflection and tone changed when you introduced me as “a citizen”.  I signed in to testify as “citizen” – with no quotes or no need for the way you handled it.

I am sure you are very familiar with how subtle behaviors – like inflection and tone of voice – can convey disrespect.

Finally, and most importantly, I must object to how you managed the testimony and questions posed by Assemblyman Auth.

Assemblyman Auth made repeated factually false and misleading statements on air pollution, climate change science, energy economics, and the Tennessee Gas Pipeline.

You can find detailed analysis, with verbatim quotes, in these three essays:

http://www.wolfenotes.com/2016/05/nj-legislator-deploys-a-death-panel-scare-tactic-in-climate-denying-attack-on-solar-and-wind-power/

http://www.wolfenotes.com/2016/05/the-renewable-energy-ventilator-death-legislator-lied-about-tennessee-gas-pipeline/

http://www.wolfenotes.com/2016/05/the-fine-art-of-pipeline-kabuki-on-display-today-in-trenton/

But you went way beyond a mere passive tolerance.

In the extended silent confusion following Auth’s “ventilator” comment, you even felt the need to explain Auth’s outrageous remark about turning off the hospital ventilators.

Perhaps worst of all, you abandoned a passive approach and silenced the only witness before the Committee with the capability and desire to rebut Auth’s ugly and false remarks.

In this pattern of conduct as Chairman, you effectively legitimized Auth’s remarks.

How would you have felt if the Assemblyman engaged in a series of lies, smears, and homophobic attacks?

Would you have sat back and let them go unchallenged?

Would you have explained them?

Would you have silenced testimony of a witness that would challenge them?

Would you have said “all views are respected” in their wake?

Assemblyman Auth acted like a jackal in targeting his inquisitions to weak members of the herd – note that he did not cross examine Assemblywoman Muoio, who had the capability to effectively rebut his false statements and defend her position.

You let all that go, which you may find a noble exercise of liberal tolerance, but that I find contemptible and cowardly.

Bill Wolfe, Bordentown

ps – I respected and reached out to you via email well before the hearing, but was not provided the respect or courtesy of a reply. In contrast, Assemblywoman Muoio’s Chief of Staff replied almost immediately.