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EPA Proposes Limits To Science Used In Rulemaking (reuters.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency proposed a rule on Tuesday that would limit the kinds of scientific research it can use in crafting regulations, an apparent concession to big business that has long requested such restrictions. Under the new proposals, the EPA will no longer be able to rely on scientific research that is underpinned by confidential medical and industry data. The measure was billed by EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt as a way to boost transparency for the benefit of the industries his agency regulates. But scientists and former EPA officials worry it will hamstring the agency's ability to protect public health by putting key data off limits.
The EPA has for decades relied on scientific research that is rooted in confidential medical and industry data as a basis for its air, water and chemicals rules. While it publishes enormous amounts of research and data to the public, the confidential material is held back. Business interests have argued the practice is tantamount to writing laws behind closed doors and unfairly prevents them from vetting the research underpinning the EPA's often costly regulatory requirements. They argue that if the data cannot be published, the rules should not be adopted. But ex-EPA officials say the practice is vital.
The EPA has for decades relied on scientific research that is rooted in confidential medical and industry data as a basis for its air, water and chemicals rules. While it publishes enormous amounts of research and data to the public, the confidential material is held back. Business interests have argued the practice is tantamount to writing laws behind closed doors and unfairly prevents them from vetting the research underpinning the EPA's often costly regulatory requirements. They argue that if the data cannot be published, the rules should not be adopted. But ex-EPA officials say the practice is vital.
Because this is how you end up watering your crops with Brawndo.
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
Medical research.
The participants in a medical study generally are protected from having their medical histories exposed to the world.
I suppose one could argue that knowing someone is 37, a non-smoker, takes over-the-counter asprin, and has high-blood pressure might not be enough to expose who they are. But in more detailed tests knowing someone had cancer in a timeframe or making their DNA public definitely could be invasive.
But what sort of research would be private and have an impact ?
Here's some of what the Union for Concerned Scientists had to say about attempted GOP legislation that tried to do the same thing:
Agencies such as the EPA don’t make all this information publicly available for a number of very good reasons. Protecting individuals’ privacy is prime among them. For example, we’re all aware of the laws that protect the privacy of our medical records. The Secret Science bill appears to require the EPA to release such confidential personal health information about the participants in scientific studies if it wants to use health studies to make regulatory decisions—a direct violation of health privacy law. The bill also fails to protect intellectual property rights, another reason data often cannot be publicly released.
Further, the bill would not compel companies and others to make their relevant data publicly available to the agency.
The upshot is, if this bill became law, the EPA would not be able to use public health data protected by confidentiality agreements to enact science-based regulations. The result? The EPA would not be able to carry out its mission of protecting public health and the environment.
What’s Wrong with Expecting the EPA to Make All of Its Data Available—Isn’t Complete Transparency a Good Thing?
Excerpt from a letter signed by 1000 scientists urging Pruitt not to do this:
Proponents for these radical restrictions purport to raise two sets of concerns: reproducibility and
transparency. In reality, these are phony issues that weaponize ‘transparency’ to facilitate political
interference in science-based decisionmaking, rather than genuinely address either. The result will be
policies and practices that will ignore significant risks to the health of every American.
First, many public health studies cannot be replicated, as doing so would require intentionally and
unethically exposing people and the environment to harmful contaminants or recreating one-time events
(such as the Deepwater Horizon oil spill).
Second, there are multiple valid reasons why requiring the release of all data does not improve scientific
integrity and could actually compromise research, including intellectual property, proprietary, and
privacy concerns. Further, EPA has historically been transparent in demonstrating the scientific basis of
its decisions, so the public can hold the agency accountable to establish evidence-based safeguards; any
changes should be made with the full consultation with and support of the scientific community.
Is this end-to-unattributed data going to have a fat, juicy exception written for fracking compounds? Asking for my grandkids.
in his administration. No joke, he didn't invite the press...
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The intent may be to hobble the use of public health data, but it will may also force pesticide companies to publish trade secrets in order to have their products registered for legal use. At present this data is treated as confidential by the EPA.
This will not only affect new pesticides, it could also affect already registered pesticides, even if you grandfathered in the original registration. That's because a new registration number needs to be issued whenever the manufacturer changes any of the inert ingredients in the formulation, or even makes changes to the the production processes.
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Not disclosing public health data does not make a result non-reproducible. It just makes it less convenient to reproduce.
In your conception of "reproducible", gravity wave detection is not science, because you can't reproduce the detection of any specific event.
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I am skeptical of any Trump associate (or even any guy Trump likes) proclaiming they are trying to make a government agency more transparent. Remember this is the guy who insisted on a bug sweep of his government office and also installed an expensive privacy phone booth, and insists on a security detail greater than that of most 3rd world dictators. He gets favors like cheap rent from industry lobbyists and then tries to lie about it.
And, for good measure, freely uses taxpayer money for luxury travel so lavish that even Trump has to notice.
So spare me protestations that this member of the Trump clown show is going to make anything better at the EPA for anyone except his industry executive friends and that any criticism is just anti-Trump bias. For someone to have faith in him doing the right thing they would have to be delusional, ignorant, partisan or any combination.
Without data and methods, the study can't be reproduced, so the conclusions can't be challenged.
That's not science.
Anonymize the data. That's what everyone else does. Or compel data from the entities in question. Compelling data is only a rule change away.
"Solid research" means meeting the normal standards for research in that field.
I've actually worked with public health data, and the standard for exchanging data is to aggregate that data in such a way that personally identifiable information is not recoverable. For example when you report an HIV case, you know the person lives at 123 Maple Street, but you instead report it as occurring within a geographic area that contains enough people that it's not feasible to work out who that person is, even if you combine it with other data.
That's the usual standard. If you ask for surveillance data, you get sanitized data, never raw data. It may limit the kinds of conclusions you draw, but it doesn't undermine the validity of the conclusion you *do* draw.
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But instead of relying on science, our political system lets companies write the laws and regulations that govern them. As a result, we get abominations like polluted water in Flint MI, West Virginia, and North Carolina.
Before releasing something into the water supply, samples should be tested for contaminants. And if those samples don't make the grade, those responsible need to be held accountable. Making discharge safe typically involves diluting it to approved contaminant levels before releasing it into the water supply. Simple, really. There are labs that can and do test discharge samples for a plethora of contaminants, acidity, color, dissolved oxygen, turbidity, etc. But they don't test for everything that might be dangerous - prescription drugs for example. These sort of things need to be put right before they are put in our water. But it won't happen if science doesn't make the rules and regulators don't enforce those rules.
Because science and technology can verifiably be used to clean up the environment, whereas politics demonstratively won't, I propose replacing Scott Pruitt with AI. If AI is good enough for the CIA, it's gotta be better for the environment than a corrupt political lackey.
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http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/videos/what-lies-upstream/
Proponents for these radical restrictions purport to raise two sets of concerns: reproducibility and
transparency. In reality, these are phony issues that weaponize ‘transparency’ to facilitate political
interference in science-based decisionmaking, rather than genuinely address either.
It is the same as pretty much everything else with them.
1. Establish the desired outcome. Eliminate abortions, get more republicans elected, more tax cuts for high earners, etc.
2. Determine what paths get that outcome ignoring ethics entirely or to a great degree.
3. If necessary come up with "reasons" why you had to take those actions.
4. Take those actions.
With abortions, you have such things as requiring a 6 foot wide hallway. There have been no rational basis for why that is required beyond they wanted to shutdown more abortion clinics, but the stated reason was for the health of the people involved. In other words, they lied.
In voting, you have protecting against fake voting as the stated reason. In practice their voting role purges, voter id requirements, etc, etc raise barriers to voting that tend to favour their side. In short, they lied again.
With this you have the stated reason of protecting us from non verified info and such, but the outcome of gutting more of the EPA and making the planet dirtier. In short, they lied again.
They elected someone known for lying and have established a pattern of lying continuously to get their way. None of this is new..
Hell Trump just called the leader of North Korea "Very Honourable."
Truth means nothing to these people. Only outcomes matter. It is all a means to the end.