EPA Region 8 entered into a proposed administrative settlement agreement concerning the Central City/Clear Creek Superfund site in Clear Creek County, Colorado.

United States v. HP Inc., No. 3:23-cv-1383 (D.P.R. July 26, 2023). Settling CERCLA defendants that released hazardous substances at Operable Unit 1 of the San German Groundwater site in San German, Puerto Rico, must design and implement the remedy selected by EPA for the unit and pay the United States’ future costs for overseeing the response work.

CEQ proposed the “Bipartisan Permitting Reform Implementation Rule” to revise its regulations for implementing the procedural provisions of NEPA, including to implement the Fiscal Responsibility Act’s amendments to NEPA.

BLM proposed to revise its oil and gas leasing regulations to reflect provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act pertaining to royalty rates, rentals, and minimum bids; update the bonding requirements for leasing, development, and production; improve its leasing process to ensure proper stewardship of public lands and resources; and modify operating requirements.

United States v. Boise Cascade Corp., No. 97-cv-1704 (TJM) (N.D.N.Y. July 12, 2023). A proposed second amendment to a consent decree includes an ability-to-pay-cash-out settlement with one of the settling CERCLA defendants in which it will pay $150,000 and be removed as a settling defendant responsible for future work and costs at the Sealand Superfund Restoration site in Lisbon, New York.

EPA announced a proposed administrative settlement agreement under CERCLA and RCRA concerning the Delphi 1 Anderson Site in Anderson, Indiana.

United States v. J.R. Simplot Co., No. 1:23-cv-322 (D. Wyo. July 11, 2023). A settling RCRA, CAA, CERCLA, and EPCRA defendant must pay a $1.5 million civil penalty; implement compliance projects at its phosphoric acid and fertilizer manufacturing plant located near Pocatello, Idaho, known as the Don Plant; comply with specified requirements for management of wastes or other materials at the facility and in the facility’s phosphogypsum stack system; comply with specified requirements for the eventual closure and long-term care of the facility and provide financial assurance to cover the estimated cost of such obligations; continue groundwater and surface monitoring and reporting as required by a prior CERCLA consent decree; comply with specified operational practices for air emissions controls and replace the existing cooling towers with cooling pond(s) to reduce fluoride emissions into the air from the Don Plant; and revise the annual Toxic Chemical Release Inventory Reporting Forms it submitted under EPCRA for years 2004-2012 to include estimates of compounds that previously were not included.

United States v. Massachusetts Electric Co., No. 1:23- cv-11524 (D. Mass. July 7, 2023). A settling CERCLA defendant must provide $5.38 million to federal and state natural resources trustees to undertake habitat restoration work in the coastal area in the vicinity of the former Gloucester Gas Light Company Manufactured Gas Plant in Gloucester, Massachusetts, for damages relating to the release of hazardous substances to soils, sediments, groundwater, and surface water from the plant.

USDA, on behalf of the Administration’s Greenhouse Gas Monitoring and Measurement Interagency Working Group (GHG IWG), seeks comment on the draft interagency report entitled, Federal Strategy to Advance Greenhouse Gas Measurement and Monitoring for the Agriculture and Forest Sectors (Strategy), to inform the GHG IWG, and agencies' planning and implementation of an agriculture and forestry monitoring, measurement, reporting, and verification framework and near-term activities.

The Natural Resources Conservation Service proposed and seeks comment on changes to certain conservation practice standards in the National Handbook of Conservation Practices.