Recent Projects

Yesterday, the Obama Administration announced the plans from thirty agencies to conduct retrospective review of regulations—a step towards following up on a presidential executive order issued in January.

Today, the EPA and DOT announced new fuel-efficiency labels for cars. The new stickers will give shoppers detail on the environmental elements of vehicles—miles per gallon, greenhouse gas ratings and smog emissions.

This morning, Policy Integrity petitioned the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation, and Enforcement (BOEMRE) to reconsider its leasing policies, which may encourage over-drilling. The topic is the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act’s (OCSLA) requirement of the Secretary of the Interior to develop five-year schedules that specify the timing for offshore leasing activity.

Mayor Bloomberg recently announced that the city will phase out the use of unrefined oil sludge and the most-polluting grades of heating oil, to be completed by 2030. The new rules target the airborne fine particulate matter from two grades of heating oil that when burned by buildings create more than 85% of the city’s heating oil soot emissions. It’s expected that 10,000 buildings will be affected, as the black smoke billowing from smokestacks that the city says is responsible for killing 3,000 residents each year is eliminated.

Today, Policy Integrity submitted comments to the Department of Justice (“DOJ”)on its notice of proposed national standards to detect, prevent, and reduce the incidence of sexual abuse in the nation’s prisons. The proposal implements the Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003 (“PREA”), which created the National Prison Rape Elimination Commission to study of the impacts of sexual assault in the United States; standards ultimately suggested by the Commission inform much of the DOJ’s proposed rule.

Today, Policy Integrity sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on Obama’s plan for voluntary incentive auctions of noncommercial broadcast television spectrum. This plan would permit the FCC to conduct incentive-based auctions of unused broadband spectrum, making more airwaves available for wireless broadband services to prevent network congestion amid shooting demand for services such as mobile web surfing.

Policy Integrity, along with a group of environmental organizations, sent a letter to government officials urging the Administration to fulfill its commitment to updating the Social Cost of Carbon (SCC) value to reflect improving science and economic understanding of climate change and its effects on society. Doing so can communicate to the public important information about the benefits of greenhouse gas reductions and show how the Administration frames the climate change issue and the values it brings to decision-making.

The EPA released the third report in its series of cost-benefit analyses of the Clean Air Act today. Titled the Second Prospective Study, this report focuses on the effects of programs implemented after the 1990 amendments to the act.

Today, the city is conducting hearings on a regulation that the Bloomberg administration released last month to address the soot pollution from residual oil.

Today, the Obama administration rescinded the 2008 Bush-era physician conscience rule, which extended protections to health care providers who refused to provide certain services due to moral or religious objections.