The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is expanding its Risk Management Program (RMP) to include specific chemicals. While the rule is expected to go into effect on Friday, Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond on Tuesday provided testimony to a U.S. House subcommittee that the EPA’s new rule will harm private businesses.
“Unfortunately, EPA consistently promotes policies and issues rules that are bad for businesses, harmful to consumers, and outright hostile to America’s oil and gas industry,” he said. “The rule under review today is no exception.”
Drummond was on a panel for the House Subcommittee on Environment, Manufacturing, and Critical Materials. The subcommittee held a hearing on the RMP rule.
“Adding to the regulatory burden of any private enterprise without providing sufficient corresponding benefit is a recipe for economic drag. The final RMP rule is a new burden that potentially applies to a wide range of businesses and facilities in my state and across the country,” Drummond testified.
“The obvious and most concerning entities are petroleum refineries and chemical manufacturers, but the list does not end there. Also subject to the new rule would be chemical and petroleum wholesalers and terminals; midstream gas plants; agricultural chemical distributors; food manufacturers and packing plants; and a wide range of other businesses that use substances covered by the new rule.”
You can watch Drummond’s testimony on the subcommittee panel in the video below. Drummond’s opening statement is near the 29:55 mark.
