WolfeNotes.com

(also see photos of prior posts for Cape Flattery, Hoh rainforest, Salish Sea, Olympic Smokeout, and Port Townsend)

After another wonderful summer on the Olympic Peninsula – weather was spectacular and we only got smoke last weekend – we’re back on the road for the long trek back to the desert for winter.

• Urge For Going

Not sure yet if we go coastal route south, or through the mountains, which I prefer. But, we hear there’s a lot of wildfire and smoke, particularly in Idaho and northern California, so we’re leaning towards the coast.

Here’s some photo highlights:

Lake Crescent

La Push 

Ruby Beach

OMG! Dog off leash in a National Park!!!!!!

Warehouse Guidance “doomed”

Just “another toothless wish list of wonderful things for towns to do”

Truth About The State Plan: “Furthering the public good was not enough.”

[Update below]

In a very rare moment of truth-telling, last week, NJ Spotlight reported an extended confessional quote by Jim Gilbert, an author of the 1986 State Planning Act and longtime State Plan Commissioner.

Gilbert not only told the truth about the toothless State Plan and the recently released toothless Warehouse Guidance document, he fingered former Gov. Tom Kean for gutting the State Planning Act, thereby killing the State Plan in its crib (or more accurately, in the womb).

Because it was so rare, let me repeat that truth here (NJ Spotlight, emphases mine):

As an author of the 1986 State Planning Act, Gilbert said he and other drafters were told by the administration at the time to remove language that would dilute home-rule power while building up regional or statewide authority over the planning process.

“The reason given to us for this weakening of the proposed act was that the individual towns, represented by among others the League of Municipalities, would never give up the immense monopoly power they had over growth in the state,” he said. “The governor and legislative leaders knew that to convince the collective towns and cities to give up this power, they would have to offer something in return. Furthering the public good was not enough.”

The latest attempt to establish statewide or regional planning policy is doomed to fail for the same reason, Gilbert argued.

“Hope springs eternal among planners,” he said. “But we don’t seem to be willing to learn from our mistakes. So here we have again another toothless wish list of wonderful things for towns to do.”

One would think such a stunning rare and honest quote that revealed such massive policy failure and political betrayal would set off a firestorm of demands that the Legislature and Gov. Murphy immediately act to put teeth in the State Plan and set right Gov. Kean’s historical wrong.

(I’ve been trying to the expose that truth for many years, most recently see:

• Warehouse Development Threat To Rural NJ Exposes Failures In State And Regional Planning and Regulation

So, what did the corporate oriented and Foundation funded land use (e.g. NJ Future) and “green” groups who still do tangential land use work related to the State Plan do in response to Mr. Gilbert’s explosive revelations?

Did they hold a protest or march on Trenton?

A Statehouse press conference?

At least write a scathing Op-Ed?

Nope. They did none of that. They did just the opposite.

They brought in NJ Future to divert attention from Gilbert’s truth telling and quickly circle the wagons and join ranks to shut down any criticism or further truth telling about the State Plan.

Specifically, I just got an email from the Lower Delaware Wild & Scenic River Management Council.

They put the Warehouse Guidance that Jim Gilbert just called a “doomed” “toothless wish list” on their September 29, 2022 meeting agenda. I can assure you, it was not put on the agenda to expose the Guidance and the State Plan as frauds, as Mr. Gilbert had just done.

The Lower Delaware Wild & Scenic River Management Council works with many NJ conservation and land use groups and their major campaigns, like Wm. Penn Foundation’s Delaware Watershed Initiative.

These groups have shared Board members (AKA inter-locking boards). They are funded by the same Foundations and corporate donors. They have revolving and sometimes shared staff. They have personal relationships. And they work on the same issues and feed from the same government troughs.

In other words, they are in bred, self serving, selfish elitists. I’ve called them NJ’s “Green Mafia”.

So, exactly what did the Lower Delaware Wild & Scenic River Management Council do that gives the game away and sparked my hostile criticism?

Did they bring in Jim Gilbert himself or some other expert critic to discuss the Warehouse Guidance?

Did they even solicit critical viewports, in light of Gilbert’s explosive revelations and criticisms?

Nope.

Here’s what they did: they provided a platform for the Office of State Planning Advocacy “(i.e  home of the Business Action Center) to spin the Warehouse Guidance to well meaning but poorly informed citizens.

Worse, they quoted, linked to, and repeated the position of the corporate planning group NJ Future, NOT THE REVEALING NJ SPOTLIGHT ARTICLE!

NJ Future has long misled the public about exactly the fatal flaws Mr. Gilbert just exposed!

Here is the Lower Delaware W&S Management Council’s meeting announcement:

They take care of their own. They don’t bite the hands that feed them or jeopardize any future funding.

Truth be damned.

I sent their new Director this email:

Hi Cindy – please see below. Please distribute it to your members, who deserve competing viewpoints.

Folks – I thought you might be interested in a very different view than from NJ Future – from Jim Gilbert, one of the authors of the the State Planning Act and a former longtime State Planning Commissioner member about the warehouse Guidance, as reported by NJ Spotlight news on September 12, 2022:

I doubt I’ll get a reply.

It’s virtually impossible to penetrate the Foundation funded “Green Mafia” bubble, even when the truth emerges from the most credible sources.

[End Note: In the interests of fairness and accuracy, its not just foundation and corporate money that corrupts here on the State Plan.

Because to adopt and advocate Mr. Gilbert’s critique of the State Plan as toothless and doomed to failure would completely destroy their entire ideology and approach to policy, across the spectrum. That approach relies on voluntary local initiative, not State leadership and regulatory mandates.

Additionally, it would also greatly besmirch the legacy of their leaders and the credibility of their organizations, including an entire crowd of longtime State Plan supporters, powerful people like Candy Ashmum, Sally Dudley, Mike Catania, Dave Moore, Chris Daggett, Michele Byers, Ted Stiles, Jim Shissias, and Joe Maraziti and an inter-locking set of organizations like ANJEC, NJCF, NJ Future, NJ LCV, PPA, Sustainable NJ, all the local watershed groups and Land Trusts, and elite Foundations (Dodge, Duke, et al). – all of whom have misled the public about the State Plan for decades.

For example, recently, these groups used their friends Gov’s. Kean and Whitman in a video on the Pinelands. Both of them deceived the people of NJ about the State Plan.

Gov. Florio appears in that same video, but Florio attacked “home rule”, he openly acknowledged the voluntary flaw in the State Plan, and he issued an Executive Order to out DEP regulatory teeth in the Plan.

The Green Mafia’s use of Kean and Whitman (she was horrible on Pinelands) as conservation leaders on Pinelands and land use issues is a big fat lie, and ignoring Florio and equating their records compounds that lie.

The deception continues and Jim Gilbert’s confession will quickly go down the Memory Hole.

[Update: 9/18/22 – Two longtime State Plan experts sent me email comments I thought worth posting (names withheld):

First, on the history of the Plan, with additional fingerprints to Gov. Kean:

Excellent Good article- one issue on the state plan history- Kean killed the 1973 state plan because the courts were enforcing it – there were a series of cases were the courts used the state plan to stop development or builder remedy lawsuits – Countryside vs Ringwood where the court rule Ringwood was exempt from regional share of Mt Laurel Housing because it was a conservation area in the 73 plan – Newark Dev Corp vs West Milford were Newark challenged West Milford 5 acre zoning -The corrupt Newark watershed corp wanted to build thousands of luxury townhouses and golf course on watershed land  – Court sided with West Milford because of state plan – WM zoned private land 5 acre too including land owned buy Kean Family-there were 3 others one in Morris Co I don’t remember the others.

So Kean killed the 73 plan on behalf of the builders and the  public outrage lead to the toothless state planing act – also Kean the green mafia foundation board members own a lot of land  especially in highlands and Morris / Somerset county.

And this on the lack of protections in the Plan and local zoning:

It’s amazing that this debate has gone down hill from where I left it … on the 10th anniversary of the state plan, which was not effective in controlling development then, and surely is not now.  Unless some miracle has happened that I am unaware of, there is still not protective zoning in Plng Areas 4 and 5, much less the contested area 3, so unless the target protection area lies in an area of state special jurisdiction, it’s the local’s desires for growth, not a state plan vision which carries the day.  And the broader national mood on land-use hasn’t changed since the 1990’s: anti-federal, anti-regulatory…despite all the evidence that nature itself is going downhill. And the “fraud” … is this: that the values of the plan are in the rhetorical realm not actuality on the ground, and the 10th anniv. “celebration” was the time to announce that the voluntary experiment was over, the municipal “confederation” government had failed according to the formal values, always being doctored as in Merrill Lynch-Hopewell to bend it towards what the corporate powers want, and it was time to enforce protective standards and clearing up the ambiguity in Plng area 3.

You are right, its a self-fulfilling game for the groups you named who  continue the false advertising that it is working…

 

Fossil Fuels And Nukes Get Huge Subsidies

The Costs Of Climate Chaos Are Ignored

NJ Climate Activists Are Lame And Corrupted

NJ Spotlight – with an assist from terrible “expert” sources – wrote another hit piece on so called “high costs” of the “subsidies” to renewable energy.

Today’s story is another in a years long campaign – which just so happens to align with the economic interests of their corporate and elite Foundation “major donors” like PSEG – of attacking renewable energy and exaggerating so called “subsides”, while ignoring fossil subsidies and the costs of the climate emergency, known as the “Social Costs Of Carbon”.

I’ll just post a few graphs and links to research Reports and DEP data to illustrate the flaws in Spotlight’s upside down thinking:

1. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimates that fossil fuels receive $5.9 TRILLION /yr in subsidies. Have you ever read that?

Globally, fossil fuel subsidies are were $5.9 trillion or 6.8 percent of GDP in 2020 and are expected to increase to 7.4 percent of GDP in 2025 as the share of fuel consumption in emerging markets (where price gaps are generally larger) continues to climb. Just 8 percent of the 2020 subsidy reflects undercharging for supply costs (explicit subsidies) and 92 percent for undercharging for environmental costs and foregone consumption taxes (implicit subsidies).

2. A recent study estimate that the “Social Cost of Carbon” (SCC) is $185 per ton. Have you read about that?

• Social Cost of Carbon More Than Triple the Current Federal Estimate, New Study Finds

3. In comparison to the SCC, the price of an “allowance” to emit one ton of carbon under the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) is just $13 per ton. Have you read about that?

(the Y axis on this graph would need to be significantly increased to show SSC $185/ton, and that would illustrate how small the RGGI price is, instead of how this graph makes it appear to be rising sharply)

4. According to the most recent DEP emission inventory, NJ polluters emit about 100 million tons of carbon equivalents per year.

5. DEP mandates air pollution emissions fees. The current DEP air pollutant emission fee is  about $125/ton, but the fee does not apply emissions of greenhouse gases. Have you read about that?

6. If the Social Cost of Carbon is used ($185/ton) and compared to the RGGI allowance price ($13/ton), greenhouse gas polluters receive huge subsidies, about $17 billion per year. Ever read that?

7. If the DEP air emissions fee is used ($125/ton) and compared to the RGGI allowance price ($13/ton), then greenhouse gas polluters receive huge subsidies, about $11 billion per year.

8. Studies have examined how to reduce these fossil subsidies and shift them to conservation and renewables. Such as shift can be achieved by changes in public policy and regulation (see above chart:

• Why fossil fuel subsidies are so hard to kill

9. Back in the 1980’s, in order to promote garbage incineration, NJ provided similar huge subsidies, over $200 million/year to “resource recovery”. Ever read about that?

When Gov. Florio changed DEP policy to discourage incinerations and promote waste reduction and recycling, those incineration subsidies were shifted to local and country recycling programs. Did the news ever report that? Or that it could be repeated today on energy?

10. The Murphy BPU and the DEP could implement a similar shift in subsidies from fossil to conservation and renewables by using their current statutory authority to regulate public utilities and the environment.

BPU could eliminate fossil subsides and impose a Social Cost of Carbon based ($185/ton) carbon surcharge on fossil energy generation, transmission, distribution, and use (NJ does not produce fossil energy, its all imported).

DEP could eliminate fossil subsidies by imposing the SCC or DEP air permit fees on greenhouse gas emissions and regulate GHG emissions to meet the reduction goals of the global warming response act (but pursuant to NJ Air Pollution Control Act, not the toothless GWRA).

This is not pie in the sky. Nor is it “radical”. Just the opposite: the subsidies to fossil are radical in the face of the climate emergency.

Why is virtually none of this information  and analysis being provided to the people of NJ by media and climate activists?

[End Note: Ironically, the only entity to successfully advocate for the social cost of carbon was corporate PSEG.

The SCC is the basis for their “zero emission credits” and $300 million annual subsidy.

The Legislature was willing to use the science and economics of the SCC in support of a $300 million corporate subsidy, but not to impose the true cost of carbon on greenhouse gas polluters, who get a near free ride, with tiny exception of RGGI, which only applies to less than 20% of total GHG emissions.

And the climate activists not only didn’t complain about that, they supported the nuke subsidies (or kept quiet).

To be clear, I do not support market based policy tools like the SCC and RGGI and DEP emission fees.

I prefer regulatory mandates, which are far more effective.

But imposing the SCC of carbon on GHG polluters would be better than nothing, and if groups in NJ support market based tools (like Mr. Gilbert and NJCF and Environment NJ), as least they could do so competently and aggressively based on the best available science and economics..

Report Makes Broad Conclusion That Land Use Drives Chemical Risks, Not Wastewater

Conclusions Are Misleading, Not Supported By Science, And Conflict With Prior Research

Flawed Conclusions Echo Agenda Of Foundation Funder, Big Pharma, And Chemical Industry

The second presentation was given by Chief Scientist John Bunnell from the Pinelands Commission. The purpose of this presentation was to gain access to borough property to conduct a scientific survey-study of fish, amphibians and water chemistry in streams above and below two different municipal wastewater treatment plants.

Hanold said he was fearful that the study might result in cost-prohibitive regulations that would impact the residents of Medford Lakes unfairly.

Bunnell said that the Pinelands Commission was conducting this project for scientific findings only, not regulatory pursuits….

Bunnell said that the total cost of their project is $684,800; of which $450,000 was granted by the Academy of Natural Sciences, $125,000 given from the Pinelands Commission, and $109,800 kicked-in by the U.S. Geological Survey. [Note: no mention of Wm. Penn Foundation funding. That’s how money laundering works.] ~~~ Pine Barrens Tribune

[Updates below]

This is Part 2 of my critique of the Pinelands endocrine disruptor story (read Part 1 here).

Part 1 focused on the funder of the study, the WM. Penn Foundation, and the economic interests, links to the chemical industry, and policy agenda of that Foundation.

In Part 2 today, we critique flaws in the study and show how they are related to and reflect the interests of the Wm. Penn Foundation.

Let me begin with a hypothetical analogy that can illustrate the basic flaws with the study:

Suppose the Donut Manufacturers Association (DMA) funded a study of the impacts of donuts on obesity.  Several prior studies had found a causal link between donut consumption and obesity. Based on these studies, the public was outraged and the Government was considering laws and regulations to reduce donut consumption and to require that donut manufacturers compensate the public and individual people for the harms of obesity.

The DMA masked their funding of the study by laundering their funds through a local DMA funded pseudo-academic outfit.

The study sampled 21 locations 4 times over 4 years: 20 locations were samples of people riding in professional bicycle events and just one was a sample of people visiting a very small donut shop in a very small rural town.

The DMA funded study found that there was little “obesity”  – a health condition they described by the term corpulentia, a technical word no one ever heard of and “donuts” were described as “complex carbohydrate mixtures” – related to donut consumption, and that corpulentia (obesity) was driven primarily by how many miles per week a person rode their bike.

The study found that, yes, some people who visit donut shops exhibit corpulentia, but not all people and at relatively low rates. The study concluded that the corpulentia (obesity) in these 4 people from the donut shop location also could be related not only to donut consumption, but to the miles of bicycling they rode per week.

The findings of this study conflicted with prior research. The study was conducted at a small donut shop, which the research report noted as a “limitation” in a small passage at the very end of the paper. The Title of the Study was “Potential Corpulentia Effects Of Complex Carbohydrate Mixtures and Bicycle Riding”.

Obviously, this study would be denounced as biased and junk science promoted by an industry association with an agenda. The DMA would be criticized. And the scientists who conducted the study would suffer harm to their reputations, professional careers, and credibility.

Well, something very similar to this absurd hypothetical happened in the Wm. Penn funded Pinelands endocrine disruptor study. Virtually every absurd flaw I mentioned in the above hypothetical (and more!) was seen in the Pinelands study. Let me summarize those flaws:

I) Sweeping conclusion that land use is driver, not wastewater, is not supported by data and conflicts with prior research

The study broadly concludes that land use – not municipal wastewater discharge – is the driver. (and it even has “potential health effects” in the title, downplaying risks and impacts from the get go!):

With respect to the term “wastewater”, it is limited to municipal sewage treatment plants. Industrial chemical discharge, directly to surface or ground water, or indirectly to a municipal sewage treatment plant, is not even considered or mentioned.

Based on that finding, the study emphasizes the following in the abstract and prominently right up front: (note particularly that scope of the conclusion geographically is described by the vague term “elsewhere”, which means beyond the boundaries of the Pinelands – emphases mine);

“Limited differences in contaminant concentrations were observed in reference and degraded wetlands but for streams/lakes, results indicated that landscape alteration, (upland agricultural and developed land) was the primary driver of contaminant concentrations rather than municipal wastewater. ….. These findings are critical to support the conservation, protection, and management of a wide range of aquatic species in the Pinelands and elsewhere as habitat loss, alteration, and fragmentation increase with increasing development.

I support aspects of the conclusion that “a wide range of aquatic species in the Pinelands and elsewhere as habitat loss, alteration, and fragmentation increase with increasing development.”

But I have strong objections to the findings on “landscape alteration” as the “primary driver” as well as the express expansion of the findings and conclusions beyond the boundaries of the Pinelands, i.e. use of the word “elsewhere”.

My objections are based on the following:

a) The sampling method and data (selection of stream, number of sites, location of sites, number of outfalls and the volume and chemical characteristics of wastewater flow of upstream outfalls, etc) are highly biased, not representative, not statistically valid, and can not support the major and unequivocal finding that land use – not wastewater – is the driver.

• Of the 21 sites sampled, ONLY 2 were below wastewater outfalls
• Of those 2 sites, only one is located on a stream that receives municipal wastewater discharge
• of the 84 samples, only 4 are from the location on a stream below a municipal wastewater outfall
• the upstream municipal wastewater outfall is very small, slightly more than 2 MGD serving a little over 25,000 people (I assume that there are no industrial pre-treatment permits issued to users of the POTW, a key regulatory fact not included in the study)

Here the text:

“The stream site below the WWTP outfall received an average continuous sanitary wastewater discharge of 2.013 million gallons per day (mgd, 2017–2020) from a municipal WWTP that served an estimated population of 25,584″

This is flawed design that can not support reliable sweeping findings:

• The stream sample location is reported to be impacted by just this one small municipal discharge “outfall”, with no other municipal or industrial point sources influencing water chemsitry
• the very limited data on this sample location shows significantly higher concentrations of both organic and inorganic chemicals detected below the single outfall

(Looking for the impacts from endocrine disruptors in the Pinelands is like sampling for obesity among a population of professional cyclists! – One sample downstream of a tiny municipal sewage treatment plant is like one sample at a donut shop!)

b) the study’s objectives and the 2 hypotheses tested did not include apportionment of chemicals sampled between non-point and point sources. Read them closely, from text:

• “Exposures to multiple organic and inorganic contaminants will occur and the concentrations/detections of certain contaminants (e.g., personal care products and industrial chemicals) will differ among point and non-point sources (Hypothesis 1)”

• “A greater incidence of endocrine disruption and parasites will occur in fish and frogs collected from sites impacted by both point and nonpoint sources compared to reference locations (Hypothesis 2).”

Those two hypotheses say nothing about apportioning chemical exposures between point and not point sources or determining which source is the “driver”.

c) The literature cited by the study does not support the finding that non-point sources & land use are drivers: (just the opposite: prior USGS research found chemicals impacting water quality and biota was from pharmaceutical plants and wastewater discharges!)

“Point and nonpoint sources have been identified as primary drivers of contaminant exposures to aquatic organisms in both urban and agricultural landscapes. Surface-water discharge of industrial and municipal wastewater is one of the major point sources of contaminant mixtures to aquatic systems. Conversely, nonpoint sources tend to be more difficult to identify and include on-site septic systems, stormwater basins, large-scale animal feeding operations and the application of pesticides, fertilizers, manure, and biosolids in urban and agricultural settings” […]

“Numerous studies have linked exposure to contaminants from both point and nonpoint sources to measures of endocrine disruption in male fish and frogs”

Yet despite the facts that:

1) the hypotheses of the study do not seek to apportion point v. non-point pollution;

2) the study’s design and sampling methods do not permit apportionment of point v. non-point;

3) the literature cited makes no apportionment;

4) there is just 1 point source influence municipal discharge site sampled (of 21) relied on;

4) there was no “industrial” sources included in the study; and

5) the discussion consistently aggregates point and non-point pollution;

The study makes sweeping findings that land use and non-point pollution – not wastewater – is the driver.

The conclusion that the results apply “elsewhere ” is not supported by the literature cited or the data collected and is based on data that is totally unrepresentative of both NJ and “elsewhere”.

The results are limited to the ecosystems of the Pinelands (and not even Pinelands water quality).

The study is grossly not representative, in terms of location i.e. the relatively pristine Pinelands ecosystem; the tiny presence and abundance of point source influenced surface and ground waters; the non existent presence and density of chemical industry manufacturing and wastewater discharge; or the failure to select a representative surface water body influenced by point sources (industrial and municipal).

In reality, the majority of NJ streams and rivers are impacted by hundreds of wastewater outfalls from industrial and municipal dischargers that discharge hundreds of millions of gallons per day.

It is rare for just one discharger outfall to be present and impacting water quality.

Additionally, most of the municipal wastewater plants involve pre-treatment permits for industrial users.

I suspect that the limited data relied on regarding impacts of wastewater are not even representative of Pinelands surface waters.

Additionally, the findings of the study, conducted by USGS and Pinelands Commission scientists, closely match the agenda of not only the Wm. Penn Foundation funder, but those of the Pinelands Commission.

The study’s findings emphasized that land use and non-point pollution – not point sources or municipal and industrial discharges – as the drivers of impacts. The express and implied management strategies mention conservation and land use, not regulation of chemicals or point sources.

Even for the point source impacts findings, the study interpreted data to make misleading claims that non-point sources played a contributing role, thereby diminishing already diluted findings about the point source role..

The study’s  findings and recommendations fit the agenda of the Pinelands Commission, a land use agency that regulates land use and manages non-point source pollution and conservation programs, not point source regulatory or chemical industry oriented programs.

At a minimum, that creates a public appearance problem: the Commission has a hammer and it found a nail.

Only at the conclusion (final paragraph) of the study, after sweeping findings in the abstract and findings and analysis, are severe limitations in the study mentioned, and those limitations are tied to biased findings:

Aside from personal care products which were higher below the WWTP outfalls, contaminant mixtures were more closely related to nonpoint sources from upland agriculture and development than to small municipal wastewater point sources.

The followup study recommendations also are biased and limited in scope as well, to “parasite prevalence”, there is no recommendation about followup study of ED impacts like dual sexed fish et al:

This was a small study with limited sites and species, so future work could expand the scope both temporally and spatially to determine the potential effects of contaminant mixtures more broadly on parasite prevalence and diversity in both native and non-native species across a gradient of anthropogenic alteration

Finally, the study uses technical jargon to mask the public’s recognition of both endocrine disruptors (described as “complex chemical mixtures”) and adverse effects like “dual sexed fish” (described as “oocytes”).

I call this pattern of bias borderline junk science, given flaws in the study’s design and biased and unrepresentative sampling methodology, its conflict with prior research regarding point source chemical discharge impacts on biota (dual sexed fish!), its broad sweeping conclusions that lack support in the biased data collected, and its minimization of limitations of the study which are buried, and it use of obfuscatory jargon.

II) Questionable Findings Perfectly Align With The Wm. Penn Foundation Funder’s Agenda

Part 1 described the Wm. Penn Foundation, it’s relationship to the chemical industry, and its Foundation funding objectives and watershed program that are: limited in focus to non-point sources of pollution – including agriculture – and non-chemical industry water pollutants like nutrients and to water resource management objectives involving voluntary land use and conservation tactics. 

Remarkably, the Pinelands endocrine disruptor study the Wm. Penn Foundation funded echoes the Penn Foundation’s narrow emphasis on non-point source pollution (described as “the driver”), land use (another “driver”), and conservation oriented management strategies, while ignoring the role of the chemical industry, point source discharges and point source chemical regulatory programs and management strategies.

As a result, adverse impacts to human health and the environment from and efforts to regulate the chemical industry, the point source discharge of chemical pollutants, and the remediation of chemical contamination of water quality, sediments, biota and public health are all ignored.

Which is exactly what Rohm and Haas, Dupont, Big Pharma, and The Chemistry Council ordered.

(From a scientific integrity, conflict of interest, and bias standpoint, the Wm. Penn Foundation funding this study is the relational equivalent of the Donut Manufacturers Assc.. Their funding was laundered through a pseudo-academic organization. The study’s findings are in total alignment with the funders’.)

[End Note: I sent the following email request to the USGS prime scientist, and have yet to receive a reply:

———- Original Message ———-

From: Bill WOLFE <>

To: “sbreitmeyer@usgs.gov” <sbreitmeyer@usgs.gov>

Date: 09/11/2022 5:25 PM

Subject: Bunnell – USGS ED Study

Hi Sara – I meant to copy you on my note below to John Bunnell, but I didn’t have your email. Appreciate your thoughts.

One immediate question: Is this an official USGS peer reviewed and formally approved research product? Has it been posted on the USGS website?

[Update 9/14/22 – I received a reply this morning from USGS as follows: (they did not reply to the above substantive criticism, which I sent to USGS and Pinelands scientists via email:

Yes, the product was peer reviewed and approved by the USGS.

Not yet. As it was just released by the journal, it has not yet been added to the USGS Publications Warehouse.

[Update 1: the initiation of the study was announced by USGS]

[Update 2: the USGS updated the original announcement, and including this:

The biological findings will be evaluated in the context of chemical concentrations in water samples. These findings will be compared with findings in other regions of the country.

However, unless I missed it, the study did not do this comparison: “These findings will be compared with findings in other regions of the country.”

I think there was just one sentence about and a link to otters research other findings on wastewater treatment.

[Update 3: Even though NJ DEP was not involved in the research, they made sure to post an outline of the study on the DEP website.

No doubt that chemical industry and sewage treatment plants will use this study to delay and avoid DEP regulation.

[Update 4 – A different USGS Office (WVa) made a presentation to the Pinelands (sorry, not dated). They conflict with the study, see:

• Evidence for Estrogenic Endocrine Disruption in Bass Throughout the Northeast

 [Update 5 – the study is being picked up by other websites. Check out this conflict of interest statement, which address conflicts that I have not alleged. I am not concerned about individual financial interests or personal relationships. I am concerned about the influence of the funder on the research design and conclusions and the fact that Pines Commission researcher was involved and found the hammer and nail:

Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

[Update 6: Just found a NJ Future Report by Dan Van Abs study (Rutgers, former DEP) 2014 Report on land use and water quality in the Pinelands. Dan has similar limited focus and mentions endocrine disruptors just once, from septic system sources.

[Update 7: Local governments in the Pinelands were aware of the study and its financial implications. They “invited”, i.e. called the Commission staff on the carpet before the study was even complete. USGS knew of the implications of this research and they were getting political pushback.  Check this out: 

Mayor Cranston invited the representative to explain the request.

John F. Bunnell (Chief Scientist) for the Pinelands Commission stated that they had received a four-million dollar Federal Grant to study potential effects of endocrine disrupting chemicals on fish and frogs in the Pinelands. The testing area would be above and below our Wastewater Treatment Plant and above and below the Treatment Plant in Evesham Twsp.

Council and Mr. Bunnell discussed; the length of the study, the fact that the Borough already meets or exceeds NJDEP standards for discharge and the potential financial burdens that the study results may place on the Borough.

Mayor Cranston thanked Mr. Bunnell for his attendance and presentation.

[Update 8 – The Pinelands Commission also was getting pressure from fracking and pipeline opponents regarding endocrine disruptors (of course, pipelines were not considered as a source of ED’s in the study)

The oil and gas industry isn’t required to disclose the chemicals they use in the process, but many are known endocrine disruptors.

Gov. Kean Directed State Planners To Kill Regulatory Power & Preserve “Home Rule”

Revelation A Serious Blow To Kean’s Legacy

The Worship of Mammon

I had to stop work on part 2 of my endocrine disruptor story for this one!

We’ve railed against the toothless NJ State Development And Redevelopment Plan (State Plan) for decades now, a plan my friend and former colleague Bill Neil (then head of Conservation at a very different from current NJ Audubon) called “the greatest fraud ever perpetrated on the people of NJ”.

NY Times:

In rural Hopewell, the referendum was spurred by a debate over a proposed nine-mile sewer link with Trenton that would serve a planned 2,000-unit housing development and 3.5-million-square-foot office park where soybean fields and forested wetlands now lie, said Bill Wolfe, the policy director for the Sierra Club of New Jersey.

”The people in the community are gravely concerned that the impacts will overwhelm their community with rapid and uncontrolled development,” he said. ”The schools are already at capacity.”

But those critiques  – what The NY Times once dubbed a “mom’s issue“ – and the prominent land use debates – like the State Plan itself – have long fallen off the media radar, the agenda of so called planning advocates, the environmental group’s campaigns, and the Trenton policy agenda.

A brief history is in order.

The State Planning Act was signed into law by Gov. Kean in 1986.

Gov. Florio issued an Executive Order to put DEP regulatory teeth in the State Plan.

That Florio policy was reversed when Gov. Whitman transformed the State Plan into an economic development tool (but at least retained the land use orientation).

Believe it or not, in contrast to today’s news blackout, once upon a time, there was substantive accountability on Whitman’s environmental policy record, and the State Plan played a role, i.e. see this NY Times article;

• As Mrs. Whitman Begins Her New Job, There Is Debate Over Her Commitment to the Environment in the Past

Gov. Christie retained the State Plan’s land use focus, but went beyond Whitman’s economic growth focus to use the State Plan as a vehicle to promote his deregulatory polices,  see: Gov. Christie introduces ‘State Strategic Plan’ to generate economic growth.

But, ignored by today’s lapdog media, current Gov. Murphy has completely abandoned the land use focus and turbo charged the State Plan as an economic development tool and State corporate subsidy program (i.e. Murphy views planning as a “Business Action Center”)

But the recent warehouse war has put the State Plan back on the radar screen.

So today, aside from being appalled by NJ Spotlight reporter Jon Hurdle’s false claim that the NJ Constitution includes a home rule provision (see End Note below for the demand for correction I sent him), I almost fell off the chair upon reading an incredible extensive and confessional quote by Jim Gilbert about the origin of the State Plan.

I had recently harshly criticized Mr. Gilbert for his failure to honestly acknowledge and take responsibility for the flaws in the State Plan, see:

• The Cowardice Of The Planners

But Mr. Gilbert told the truth today, and he blamed Gov. Tom Kean for gutting the State Planning Act, killing it in its crib! Check this out: (NJ Spotlight)

As an author of the 1986 State Planning Act, Gilbert said he and other drafters were told by the administration at the time to remove language that would dilute home-rule power while building up regional or statewide authority over the planning process.

“The reason given to us for this weakening of the proposed act was that the individual towns, represented by among others the League of Municipalities, would never give up the immense monopoly power they had over growth in the state,” he said. “The governor and legislative leaders knew that to convince the collective towns and cities to give up this power, they would have to offer something in return. Furthering the public good was not enough.”

The latest attempt to establish statewide or regional planning policy is doomed to fail for the same reason, Gilbert argued.

“Hope springs eternal among planners,” he said. “But we don’t seem to be willing to learn from our mistakes. So here we have again another toothless wish list of wonderful things for towns to do.”

But that’s not the whole truth – the State Plan could have ben regulatory (at least on the coast): (State Planning Act):

So, next time you pay your huge property tax bill; get stuck in traffic; get wiped out by a flood; yearn for open space, a small patch of nature or forest, or lost rural character; or wonder why the racially segregated and sprawled out NJ landscape looks the way it does, blame Gov. Kean!

[Full Disclosure: I studied regional planning for 2 years at Cornell Graduate School’s program in City And Regional Planning (satisfied the coursework for the Masters Degree), I passed the NJ Civil Service test for “environmental planner”, and served in that professional job title at DEP for over a decade, but I never practiced any land use or environmental planning!

[End Note: NJ Spotlight falsely reported that the NJ Constitution has a “home rule” provision. Here’s my note to reporter Jon Hurdle and his editor demanding a correction of that huge error:

Jon – you reported as fact that home rule is in the NJ Constitution. Who told you that? Senator Turner? You wrote:

“Sen. Shirley Turner (D-Mercer), who represents West Windsor, said she would like to introduce a bill that gives legal backing to the commission’s guidelines, and is seeking advice from the Office of Legislative Services on whether any such measure would conflict with home-rule provisions in the state Constitution.”

That is false. There is no “home rule” provision in the NJ Constitution. That an excuse for failure to act.

Read the Constitution:

https://www.njleg.state.nj.us/constitution

Read the below law review article which makes that clear:

“This article theorizes that the near universal, but erroneous, view of New Jersey as a home rule state contributes significantly to a mischaracterization ….

The Clash of Home Rule and Affordable Housing

https://cpilj.law.uconn.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/2515/2018/10/12.3-The-Clash-of-Home-Rule-and-Affordable-Housing-The-Mount-Laurel-Story-Continues-by-Robert-C.-Holmes.pdf

Please correct a major fact and legal error in your story.

Wolfe