Protecting Our Health From A Toxic Threat

Though smaller than regular plants, industrial power plants are the U.S.'s third largest source of mercury pollution. The dirtiest of these facilities released more than 160 million pounds of toxic air pollutants like mercury, lead, benzene and acid gases in 2010 alone. Earthjustice has worked for more than a decade to reduce health threats from pollution caused by industrial power plants - also known as industrial boilers.

In 2011, under a court-ordered deadline, the EPA issued revised Clean Air Act emission standards for these plants that will save thousands of lives each year and prevent widespread sickness and suffering. Industry groups, including the Koch brothers, SPI: The Plastics Trade Association, and others, have launched an attack on Capitol Hill in an attempt to permanently block these protections. If they succeed, the pollution and subsequent health damage will continue unabated.

The EPA has stated that there are approximately 1,750 industrial power plants nationwide that will need to meet emission limits for hazardous air pollutants under the new standards often referred to as the "boiler MACT". Research by Earthjustice identified that there are 1,753 industrial power plants located at 758 individual facilities in 44 states, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands that will need to meet emission limits.
The baseline emissions of these industrial power plants, according to data from the EPA, exceed:

• 10,000 pounds/year of mercury;
• 215,000 pounds/year of lead;
• 123,000 pounds/year of chromium;
• 100 million pounds/year of hydrochloric acid; and
• 100 million pounds/year of fine particulate matter.

 

These numbers illustrate the tremendous capacity of industrial power plants to pollute our air. The owners of these industrial power plants, along with their congressional allies, have sought time and again to kill these standards. Two bills were introduced in 2011—S. 1392 in the U.S. Senate and H.R. 2250 in the House of Representatives—that would permanently exempt industrial power plants from the Clean Air Act. These bills have also been attached repeatedly as "riders" to unrelated, must-pass budget and payroll tax bills, a disingenuous strategy to undercut badly needed public health protections by trading them off against legislation designed to provide economic relief.

This is a make or break presidential election for democracy and the middle class

A vote for Republicans is a vote for Slavery.....

growth!!!!

Arizona, California, Florida and Nevada -- the states that were most hurt in the real estate collapse over the past five years -- are now leading the U.S. labor market expansion.

Copper Imports

Imports of copper by China last month were the second- highest on record, the data showed, after the weeklong holiday slowed customs clearance in January. 

Net crude oil imports increased to a record to meet rising demand as farmers prepare for the planting season and the government adds to emergency stockpiles. The average price of February’s crude imports was $112.39 a barrel, up from $92.28 in the same month last year, according to Bloomberg calculations.

Wen, in his state-of-the-nation work report to lawmakers at the National People’s Congress this week, said the government will “carry out timely and appropriate anticipatory adjustments and fine-tuning” of fiscal and monetary policies.

‘Powerful Recovery’

“The powerful recovery in earnings thus far has allowed market averages to rise without pushing the P/E higher,” David Joy, the Boston-based chief market strategist at Ameriprise Financial Inc., said in a Feb. 21 e-mail. His firm oversees $600 billion. “Many investors are either not convinced that this price rally and earnings recovery are for real, or they simply do not care, having been burned too badly in the downturn.”
U.S. gross domestic product expanded an average 2.4 percent a quarter in the 2 1/2 years since the recession ended in 2009, data compiled by Bloomberg show. The world’s largest economy hasn’t had a smaller post-recession recovery rate since at least the 1940s, the data show. In the 2003 bull market, GDP rose 2.7 percent on average, before the S&P 500 surged 102 percent. For the 1982 rally, the rate was 5.7 percent. Equities more than tripled in that cycle.

Jobs Jobs Jobs

Employers added more than 200,000 workers to their payrolls for a third straight month in February, a sign the economy was strengthening and in less need of further monetary stimulus from the Federal Reserve.

Friday's Labor Department report, which showed nonfarm payrolls increased 227,000 last month, also bolstered President Barack Obama's chances for re-election.

The jobless rate held at a three-year low of 8.3 percent even as people flooded back into the labor force to hunt for work, and 61,000 more jobs were created in December and January than previously thought.

Time to get real America = let's prevent the next mishap

According to chemical facility reports to the EPA, there are 483 U.S. chemical facilities distributed among 43 states that each put 100,000 or more Americans at risk of a Bhopal magnitude disaster. According to the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory these hazards could easily result in thousands of fatalities in a matter of hours following a terrorist attack. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has identified 4,500 high risk chemical facilities in the U.S. The Homeland Security Council estimated that an attack on a 90 ton tank car of chlorine gas would result in: 17,500 fatalities, 10,000 severe injuries and 100,000 hospitalizations. Plant employees and communities living closest to the plants are at the greatest risk.

Hundreds of chemical facilities have eliminated the possibility of a chemical disaster by converting to inherently safer chemical processes. A famous example was the conversion of Washington, D.C.'s wastewater treatment plant from deadly chlorine gas to harmless liquid bleach within 90 days following the 9/11 attacks. This conversion eliminated a terrorist risk to more than one million people at a cost of less than $0.50 per water customer per year. More than 200 other plants have converted since 9/11 and 49 percent did it for less than $100,000. Unfortunately at this rate it will take decades to convert the 2,498 most dangerous plants and there is no requirement that the highest risk plants convert sooner even where cost-effective alternatives are readily available.

In 2002 the EPA proposed to more fully enforce the 1990 Clean Air Act to prevent chemical disasters through the use of safer chemical processes but the proposal was later killed by the White House. Until Congress acts responsibly, the only way to ensure that the DHS and EPA disaster prevention policies are implemented is to enforce the 1990 Clean Air Act's General Duty Clause (GDC). The GDC in the Clean Air Act obligates all chemical facilities to be designed and operated to prevent catastrophic chemical releases. By issuing new rules and guidance under the GDC any resulting hazard reduction would also reduce the work load on the DHS and Coast Guard as more high-risk plants become safer "de-listed" facilities subject to fewer regulations with far less liability. Such a program would also help close security gaps at water and port facilities because the Clean Air Act program already covers those facilities.

As we have seen with disasters, such as the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, once "fail safe" gadgets fail, it's too late to prevent a catastrophe.

The authority of the Clean Air Act should be used as soon as possible to reduce these catastrophic risks to millions of Americans so that they will no longer be targets of terrorism or Bhopal magnitude chemical accidents.

People working again = what a concept....

Employers in the U.S. boosted payrolls more than forecast in February, capping the best six month streak of job growth since 2006.

USA: The People Win Today!!! Congress fought for their constituents' interests.

Today, the U.S. Senate voted on a number of bills that will have tremendous impacts for America's wildlife. Thanks to advocates like you who have been keeping the pressure on Congress to fight for their constituents' interests instead of Big Oil’s, we are happy to be able to report some big wins for wildlife today:

* Keystone XL Pipeline: REJECTED!
This amendment would have overturned President Obama's decision to reject the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline--bypassing the environmental review process and giving Congress unprecedented authority to hand out a permit for this dangerous project. The pipeline would put endangered whooping cranes and critical resources at risk of toxic oil spills and drive a rapid expansion of habitat-destroying tar sands operations that could put the lives of thousands of wolves and other wildlife at risk. 

* RESTORE Act: PASSED!
The RESTORE Act ensures that Clean Water Act penalties collected from those responsible for the BP oil disaster be dedicated to Gulf Coast restoration--a big win for brown pelicans and other wildlife impacted by the spill. This historic amendment also includes significant authorization and funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund and the National Endowment for the Oceans, both essential programs to protect key wildlife habitat and natural resources. 

* Arctic Drilling: REJECTED!
This amendment would have opened new leases for oil and gas drilling in pristine Arctic wilderness--putting ringed seals at needless risk of potential oil disasters, while boosting Big Oil's billions of dollars in profits. It would have also drastically expanded offshore drilling into vast new areas of our coastline, including the Atlantic Ocean, the California Coast, eastern Gulf of Mexico and Bristol Bay in Alaska. 

Thanks to all of you that sent messages, made calls, and spread the word to your friends over the last month--your voices for wildlife were heard loud and clear!

Democracy cannot defend itself!!! We must defeat Citizens United v FEC

In the wake of Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, corporations are spending hundreds of millions of dollars to ensure that their interests are the ones our politicians are concerned about, at the expense of the interests of the American people.

People in towns and cities across the country are advancing resolutions through their city and town councils and state legislatures that declare public support for a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United, challenge corporate power and eliminate unlimited campaign spending.

This spring, a coalition of groups are planning to work with you to pass over 100 new local resolutions calling for a constitutional amendment, centered around Resolutions Week in June. Will you join us? No previous experience necessary, just a passion for democracy.

Oh President Assad you seem to be missing a few Generals.....

Four more high-ranking officers have defected from the Syrian armed forces and joined the year-old uprising against President Bashar al-Assad's rule, two rebel groups said on Thursday.

The men fled over the past three days to a camp for Syrian army deserters in southern Turkey, according to Lieutenant Khaled al-Hamoud, a spokesman for the Free Syrian Army (FSA). He told Reuters by telephone from Turkey the desertions bring to seven the number of brigadier generals who have defected.

The seven are the highest-ranking officers to abandon Assad, and the rank is the fifth highest in the Syrian armed forces. Mustafa Sheikh was the first brigadier general to announce his defection.

"We have six brigadier generals who are now in Turkey and another, who has stayed to lead some battalions inside Syria," Hamoud said. "We plan to form an advisory council to absorb these and any other high-ranking defections and this group will plan operations for the FSA."

A Paris-based spokesman for Sheikh's Supreme Syrian Military Council, Fahad al-Masri, said the four recent defectors were still under the observation of Turkish authorities and their names could not yet be released.

Guess What your kids are eating for lunch? Pink Slime (btw usually used for dog food)

Pink slime is a beef-like product created by grinding together connective tissue and beef scraps normally used in dog food, and treated with ammonia hydroxide to kill salmonella and E. coli.

It is "not meat" according to a 35-year veteran USDA microbiologist, and was recently rejected by the likes of McDonalds, Taco Bell and Burger King.²

So it's pretty disturbing that the USDA continues feeding this stuff to kids, and plans to buy seven million pounds of it for school lunches.

In an all too familiar story, despite concerns raised by USDA inspectors and minimal safety inspections, the USDA approval of Beef Products Incorporated's "Lean Beef Trimmings" was pushed through by USDA undersecretary JoAnne Smith, a George H. W. Bush appointee and former president of the National Cattleman's Association.

The USDA allows beef products like hamburgers to contain up to 15% of the ammonia-treated, meat-ish stuff, but inadequate labeling requirements prevent parents from knowing if it's included in the meat being served at their kids' school.

Aside from the lack of nutritional value, pink slime raises a number of health and safety concerns. The New York Times exposed in 2009 that despite being treated with ammonia, three E. coli contaminations and four dozen salmonella contaminations occurred between 2005 and 2009, during which time school lunch officials three times temporarily banned hamburger makers from using pink slime from one facility in Kansas.
Ammonium hydroxide is itself of course harmful to eat, and can potentially turn into ammonium nitrate, a common ingredient in homemade explosives.

Kids need nutritious food to be able to learn in school, and many of the tens of millions of kids who rely on school lunches come from low-income families where they are less likely to get a healthy diet. While pink slime is a nutritionally inferior and potentially risky product, the school lunch program saves only three cents more per pound of ground beef by continuing to put this filler in kids' hamburgers.
Over the past few months, numerous fast-food chains have rejected the product and say they no longer use it. School lunch officials should clearly follow suit.

Poison in every bite => GMO Corn = sweet corn that contains a toxic pesticide in every bite

Surveys over the past decade have consistently shown that Americans don’t want to eat genetically engineered (GE) food. Despite the overwhelming opposition to this risky new food technology, the biotech giant Monsanto continues to impose its unlabeled GE foods onto our dinner plates.

The latest: Monsanto’s new GE sweet corn. This experimental corn will not be labeled, so consumers cannot know when they may be eating sweet corn that contains a toxic pesticide in every bite. Monsanto’s corn is a new GE variety that has been genetically modified for three different traits, to resist two different insects and to withstand heavy spraying with Monsanto's toxic Roundup herbicide. Because there are already varieties of other insect-resistant and Roundup-Ready varieties on the market, federal regulators are not requiring ANY approval process—which means NO public comment on its introduction into our food supply.

CFS has teamed up with the Center for Environmental Health and Food and Water Watch to urge major food companies and grocers to reject Monsanto’s GE sweet corn, and we need your help to tell leading retailer Walmart to reject this new GMO corn. General Mills (Green Giant, Cascadian Farms), Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods have already indicated that they will not use Monsanto’s new GMO sweet corn in their products—so can Walmart!

USA Export LNG = key risks

The greatest risks to the USA in becoming an export LNG producer are: a) continued dependency on coal as a primary power producing feedstock, under-investment in natural gas fired power production, c) higher power prices, and d) under-investment in renewables.

"Due to higher prices, the electric power sector primarily shifts to coal-fired generation (major pollution and climate change offender), and secondarily to renewable sources, though there is some decrease in total generation due to the higher price of natural gas," EIA added. "There is also a small reduction in natural gas use in all sectors as a result of efficiency improvements and conservation."

Of course if you are a natural gas producer accessing the LNG market is enticing as it is oil linked and today commands about 6x premium over US spot market.

Reason Rally: You know its a Myth! You have a choice.

The Reason Rally, a nationwide celebration sponsored by the top secular organizations in the United States, will be held March 24, 2012, in Washington, DC.

With the intent to unify, energize, and embolden secular people nationwide, The Reason Rally is a FREE event that will combat negative stereotypes about nonreligious Americans. Slated to be the largest secular event in world history, the rally will be filled with music, comedy, and addresses by leaders of the secular movement.

This event will give secular Americans an opportunity to unite under a banner of reason and community at a level of impact that has never been seen before.

A growing list of diverse speakers includes:

• Richard Dawkins, ethologist, evolutionary biologist, and author, The God Delusion
• James Randi, magician, author, lecturer, and amateur archaeologist/astronomer
• PZ Myers, biologist, associate professor at the University of Minnesota, and blogger
• Ronald A. Lindsay, president and CEO, Center for Inquiry
• Todd Stiefel, secular humanist, atheist, activist; vice president, Secular Coalition for America
• Greta Christina, author and writer for AlterNet
• Fred Edwords, president, United Coalition of Reason
• Sean Faircloth, executive director, Secular Coalition for America
• David Silverman, president, American Atheists, Inc.
• Roy Speckhardt, executive director, American Humanist Association
• Jamila Bey, freelance journalist
• Hemant Mehta, author, I Sold My Soul on eBay

After Fukushima, Are We Safe with All the Aging Reactors in the United States?

Ask a Scientist - March 2012

K. Smith of Boothbay, ME, asks “Given what we learned from the Fukushima disaster, are we safe with all the aging reactors in the United States? Are there more safety precautions the owners of these reactors should be taking, and what should the rest of us do to protect ourselves?" and is answered by Global Security Senior Staff Scientist Edwin Lyman, Ph.D.

The devastating disaster in Fukushima, Japan nearly one year ago showed us that, while the likelihood of a nuclear power plant accident is low, its consequences can be grave. The truth is, an accident like the one at the Fukushima Daiiachi nuclear plant could happen here. An equipment malfunction, a fire, a natural disaster or terrorist attack, or even human error could, separately or in combination, lead to a nuclear crisis.

Some proponents of new, smaller reactor designs claim that these plants will be “inherently” safer. But we have learned the hard way that real safety comes only from careful planning, regulation, and enforcement. That’s why we at the Union of Concerned Scientists have offered a series of recommendations to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for changes we need to make nuclear reactors in the United States safer. 

First of all, the NRC does not currently require U.S. reactor owners to plan for or to be able to cope with a severe accident such as the one that occurred in Japan. For instance, we believe these reactor owners need to develop and thoroughly test emergency procedures for situations when no electrical power is available for an extended period. Fukushima demonstrated clearly the disaster than can ensue when a nuclear plant is deprived of power for an extended period of time, as happened after the tsunami there. We are urging significantly more stringent requirements that all U.S. reactors be designed to safely cope with prolonged loss of electrical power.

Similarly, the NRC should require reactor owners to develop emergency plans for a larger area than the current 10-mile radius around each U.S. reactor now required. The areas we propose would be based on a scientific assessment of the site, including issues like population density, prevailing weather patterns, and other site-specific factors. 

Finally, the Fukushima crisis illustrated the dangers of keeping spent fuel in storage pools when the plant loses the power needed to cool these pools. The safety and security risks associated with spent fuel can be significant reduced by transferring the fuel from pools to dry casks once it is cool enough (i.e. five years after removal from the reactor). This change will entail a significant capital investment, but the Fukushima disaster showed that the costs of inaction can be far greater.

As we document in our new report U.S. Nuclear Power Safety One Year After Fukushima,  none of these recommendations—or the recommendations from the six-member task force the NRC appointed to examine the Fukushima accident—have yet been implemented at U.S. reactors as the first anniversary of the tragedy nears. While we understand that it will take some time to develop the right approach, we don’t want to see a repeat of what happened after the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City. In that instance, it took nearly 10 years for the NRC to fully implement new regulations for reactor owners to cope with the aftermath of a terrorist aircraft attack—and even then, the final measures were insufficient.

It is the NRC’s job to make sure all Americans are adequately protected and we will continue to work to hold them to that standard. These common-sense changes, among others, would go far to making U.S. nuclear reactors safer. You can help by staying informed about this important issue and vocally supporting efforts to put safety first when it comes to nuclear power in the United States .

TransCanada Announces Plan to Circumvent Environmental Review to Build Rejected Tar Sands Pipeline in US

WASHINGTON, DC – TransCanada, the company behind the rejected Keystone XL tar sands pipeline sent a letter to the US State Department announcing its intention to circumvent US environmental review and build the southern portion of the proposed crude oil pipeline from Cushing, OK, to Port Arthur, TX. In the month since President Obama denied the permit the company has undertaken an unprecedented lobbying and public relations effort to gain approval for the pipeline.

In response, Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director, issued the following statement:
“TransCanada is hell bent on bringing tar sands, the world’s dirtiest oil, through America to reach foreign markets. They can’t wait for a fair, scientific environmental review they know their pipeline would fail. So we see dirty political tricks, dirty PR tricks, and, now, this dirty trick to build the pipeline piecemeal.

“With TransCanada it’s ‘safety last.’ The first US Keystone pipeline averaged a leak a month. But the company can’t wait to divert tar sands crude oil from the Midwest to the Gulf, raising American oil prices and, likely, also gasoline prices. This Oklahoma to Texas segment of the Keystone XL pipeline will mean more tar sands converted to diesel and available for export overseas.

 “With this announcement TransCanada is telling the Americans that it is above the law. The company did not expect public scrutiny on this project, but the American people are watching and we are unwilling to sacrifice American farmers and ranchers, and the drinking water for millions of Americans whose water supplies lie below or downstream of this dangerous pipeline.”

More Good News!!!

About one-third of U.S. local governments may have their credit rating raised by Standard & Poor’s (MHP) under a new methodology that the company is proposing to boost transparency and comparability.

The change would affect about 3,800 issuers, S&P said in a report today. About 65 percent of ratings may remain unchanged under the plan, while 3 percent could drop, typically by one level, S&P said.

170 Million Americans like it, want it and see the value in it!!! => PBS (Public Broadcasting System)

Once again, the American people have said that when it comes to trust, you can't beat public broadcasting.

For the ninth consecutive year, national research confirmed that PBS is the most trusted institution in the United States and is considered an "excellent" use of tax dollars --  Only military defense outranked PBS as the best value for the American tax dollar.

The research was conducted in January and February 2012 by the independent, non-partisan research companies Harris Interactive and ORC Online Caravan.

In the same poll, Americans enthusiastically endorsed public broadcasting as the best place for educational programming. PBS KIDS was named the most educational TV/media brand, the safest destination for children to watch television or visit online and the top provider of content that helps children build reading and math skills.

Despite all of this research, some national politicians continue to call for the elimination of federal funding for your local public radio and television stations. Annual funding for public broadcasting that amounts to less than $1.35 per citizen. That's a small investment for a big return.

What can you do? Invite your friends and family to join 170 Million Americans for Public Broadcasting. There is strength in numbers and we need to be as strong as possible to successfully protect public broadcasting for you and for future generations. Direct your friends, family and neighbors to our Facebook page, and ask them to "like" us.

Global Companies need to held accountable to the highest standard and not the standard they can get away with!!!!

Should corporations be held liable for acts of torture committed under their auspices? If that had been the only issue considered by the Supreme Court last week in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum, the logical answer would surely have to be yes.

If corporations are people for the purpose of constitutional rights like free speech -- as per the Citizens United decision -- they ought to be treated as people when it comes to responsibilities as well. If Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSA) aided the Nigerian government in raping and murdering people in the Ogoni region to keep the oil flowing, as the plaintiffs claim, it would seem monstrous to let the company get away with it just because it is a corporation.

Tolerance or Intolerance = remember the American Dream for all of us

And what did we learn today, class? At Sacred Heart Catholic School in Shawano, Wisconsin, a recent lesson plan revealed to students that saying “I love you” in one’s native tongue is something worthy of disciplinary action.

A seventh grade student at the private northeastern Wisconsin school learned that lesson the hard way recently after educators decided to boot 12 year old Miranda Washinawatok from the basketball team for saying a few phrases in the language used by the Menominee Tribe of Indians.

The Menominee are a nation of Native Americans that total around 8,700 in the state of Wisconsin. Never mind the fact that the Menominee have been in the area for over 1,000 years, though. In America, you speak English. Unless, apparently, you don’t want to play school sports.

After her teacher complained that Washinawatok had spoken a few phrases in her tribe’s language, the student says the educator became pretty agitated.

“She sort of threw her hands down on her desk and said, ‘Don’t be talking like that. How would you like it if I started talking Polish?’” Miranda Washinawatok tells a local NBC affiliate.

The student says the words she said aloud were the Menominee translations for “Hello,” “Thank you” and “I love you.”

From there the teacher, Julie Gurta, recommended disciplinary actions. When the school’s principal got wind that the student was a troublemaker of sorts, he benched her from the next basketball game. Principal Dan Minter has since apologized and says he wasn’t aware of the nature of the exact incident when he suggested taking Washinawatok off the team.

Gurta has apologized as well, offering a statement saying the actions were not meant to single out the student. Washinawatok’s mother, however, want more than just a “sorry.”

“It was unfair treatment I thought,”Tanaes Washinawatok tells the NBC affiliate. “It could have been handled differently.”

Tanaes adds that many of the school’s students are Native Americans and she fears they will be subjected to similar treatment in the future. Her solution, she says, is to fire the teacher.

“I’m not going to let anybody tell me they can’t speak that language,”adds the mom. She also calls the way Gurta handled the matter as"arrogant, narrow-minded way of teaching”and will be appealing for the diocese to relieve her from her position.

In a statement to the Menominee Nation, the Green Bay, Wisconsin diocese offered an apology saying that"It is our hope that with greater awareness, we can begin to repair any harm that has been caused, and be able to build new and improved relationships.”

Shell's plans for responding to a blowout and spill for offshore Alaska are laughably weak.

The oil giant Shell filed suit in federal court in Alaska last week against a dozen environmental groups, employing a rare — and rarely successful — legal gambit in an effort to pre-empt anticipated legal challenges to its plans to begin exploration in the Arctic Ocean this summer.

The unusual maneuver an act of desperation by a company fearful that it might be thwarted again in its efforts to begin drilling in the seabed off Alaska’s North Slope? 

The environmental groups who have spent years trying to block its drilling project say that the effects on native communities, air, water and wildlife are too great and that the company’s plans for responding to a blowout and spill are laughably weak. 

While the groups have not announced their intention to go to court to challenge the company’s 450-page oil spill response plan, which was tentatively approved by the Interior Department two weeks ago, the company has every reason to think that they will. 

“We just got the spill plan and are reviewing it,” said Whit Sheard, a lawyer for Oceana, one of the environmental groups named in the Shell lawsuit. “It’s based on technology that doesn’t exist and on faith that a spill won’t happen. What we’ve seen in the Gulf of Mexico and the North Sea, of course, is that spills do happen.” 

Mr. Sheard said that Oceana and the other groups reserved the right to challenge the plan in court and would use every weapon at their disposal to ensure that drilling, if it ever takes place, is conducted in the safest possible way. He called Shell’s novel legal maneuver “frivolous.” 

“It’s very unusual,” Mr. Sheard said. “I’d suggest it’s either desperate or abusive in terms of the American legal process. It’s not likely to prevail.” 

There are few precedents to guide the court in deciding Shell’s suit, technically known as a complaint for declaratory relief, which essentially asks a judge to declare a lawsuit without merit before it is even filed. 

How about this for a process?  Get the NGOs, Company and regulator in the room; create a document before its filed; the company can naturally object to all the parts they deem uneconomic and the regulator can then regulate....oh I forgot there is more money in it for the lawyers, lobbyists the way we're doing it....