Blog Archives – Page 14 of 22 – Environmental Data and Governance Initiative

May 13, 2020March 25, 2021Blog, New

EDGI Urges EPA to Withdraw its Ill-Conceived ‘Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science’ Proposed Rule

The Environmental Data and Governance Initiative (EDGI) has submitted a public comment on the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Supplemental Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (SNPRM) regarding its proposed Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science rule (STRS), Docket number EPA-HQ-OA-2019-0259-9322. We welcome you to read and draw material from the comment we submitted and urge you to submit a comment as well. The deadline for comments is May 18, 2020.

The EPA’s original 2018 proposal for the STRS rule represented a sweeping proposition to upend the use of science in the EPA’s regulatory developments and decisions. The STRS would require that data and models underlying scientific studies that are pivotal to regulatory action be available to the public, and “dose response data and models” used in regulatory decision-making available for independent validation. The proposed rule states that that would ensure that EPA relied on “best available science” that “enhance the public’s ability to understand and meaningfully participate in the regulatory process.” EDGI’s 2018 public comment on the proposed rule details its problematic ambiguity and misappropriation of transparency to stymie science-based regulations intended to protect human and environmental health…

May 4, 2020August 28, 2024Blog, New

An Embattled Landscape, Part 2b: The Declining Capacity of Federal Environmental Science

Over the past three and a half years, the Trump administration has engaged in a historically unprecedented campaign to shrink our government’s capacity for reliable, professionally vetted environmental knowledge. The most draconian statements of its vision have come in its annual proposals for budget cuts. Though these cuts have been repeatedly rejected by Congress, Trump political appointees have succeeded in significantly shrinking resources and personnel devoted to environmental sciences within the executive branch. This downsizing, done by means outside of Congressional control and underneath judicial and media radars, has left deep and debilitating scars on the scope and capabilities of federal environmental science, which will likely take years to repair. Our diminished capacity to understand the environments that surround us has corroded our government’s ability to protect our nation’s ecology and public health, leaving both more vulnerable.