***lust trust da1nc da

Funding for LUST is guaranteed till 2016 NDPMA 12 – ND Petroleum Marketers Association (June 2012, “CONGRESS AGREES TO 27-MONTH HIGHWAY BILL An Important Win for Marketers on Wetlines,” NDPMA News, http://www.ndpetroleum.org/Information/June%202012%20Petroleum%20News.pdf)

The 24.3 cents-per-gallon gasoline, the 18.3 cents-per-gallon diesel fuel and the .001 leaking underground storage tank taxes that are dedicated to the Highway Trust Fund were extended at their current rates through September 30, 2016. For now, Congress has maintained current tax rates, but

given the depleting highway trust fund, Congress will likely revisit these tax rates next Congress.

LUST is the go-to fund for transportation trade-offNACS 4/19 National Association of Convenience Stores, an international trade association for convenience and fuel retailing representing more than 2,100 retail and 1,600 supplier company members (19 April 2012, “Washington Report: NACS, PMAA and SIGMA Blast Congress for Raiding LUST Trust Fund,” NACS, http://www.nacsonline.com/NACS/News/Daily/Pages/ND0419122.aspx)

Since the program’s inception in 1986, the LUST Trust Fund has accumulated roughly $3.2 billion, collects approximately $194 million in fees and earns $127 million in interest. However, Congress only appropriates around $112 million per year. “Rather than spend the money on its intended purpose, Members of both parties have steadily used the funds to balance the books instead of protecting the health and water security of your constituents,” the groups wrote, adding: “As you battle over funding streams for the highway bill, you have decided to exchange one trust fund for another. Simply because you have continually failed to adequately fund a program you designated to prevent releases and to clean up vital land and water sites within your communities, is not reason enough to divert these monies to highway construction projects unrelated to environmental protection.

“Congress has once again missed an opportunity to demonstrate fiscal responsibility and help your communities and constituents by funding cleanup projects, bringing these unused land resources back into the economy and employing potentially thousands of workers in your state.

Further, by raiding the trust fund and reducing future resources generated by the fee, you threaten to weaken the very program designed to prevent future contamination.

1nc warming impactLUSTs cause massive methane emissionsDoyle, 01 – senior staff writer for the San Francisco Chronicle, (Jim, “Army Plan To Stop Gas Leak; Trench proposed for part of Marin dump”, The San Francisco Chronicle, March 31, 2001, Lexis)//JKahn

The Army sketched out a plan of attack yesterday for stopping explosive methane gas from

leaking out of an old military dump and spreading beneath a new Marin subdivision . The U.S. Army Corps

of Engineers sent its lengthy report to state regulators but refused to make it available to the media. Army officials said, however, that its consultant has recommended that a trench be dug around a section of the dump in hopes of preventing the methane and other toxic chemicals from escaping the landfill. Under the plan, the Army would continue to test for methane at the dump and in the Hamilton Meadows subdivision. It will also monitor the site for other toxic chemicals, such as benzene, that could escape with the explosive gas. This option, including monitoring, would cost about $130,000 per year for the next 30 years. The report includes six other mitigation plans. But critics say the proposal does not go far enough to protect nearby residents, streams and wildlife at the former Hamilton Air Force Base in Novato. The Army, which appears to be running short of money for base cleanup efforts nationwide, is scrambling to divert funds from other projects to address Hamilton Field's methane gas leak. "We're working as fast as we can to make the best use of the resources we do have and to get a solution as quickly as possible," Brad Call, an Army environmental engineer, said yesterday. The highly flammable gas has migrated across a 150-foot buffer zone between the dump and dozens of lots at Hamilton Meadows where new homes are being built. Gas probes recently found elevated levels of methane on three lots of the new subdivision. Shea Homes, the developer of Hamilton Meadows, halted construction of its next phase of new homes in late February because of the methane problem. Thom Gamble, executive vice president of Shea Homes, said the Army's new proposal is "not adequate." "It's a start in the right direction, but I think there needs to be a lot more than this small, cut-out trench," Gamble said. "I just wish they'd address the whole problem and not just bits and pieces. My honest to God concern is that they don't have any money." According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, more than 40 explosions and fires since 1967 have been linked to methane that has migrated from landfills and seeped into nearby homes, factories and other structures, resulting in several deaths and injuries. Last summer, an old landfill at Hunters Point Naval Shipyard caught fire. But Call said the dump at Hamilton Field is generating such small amounts of methane that it holds "very little possibility" of spontaneous combustion. "This landfill is on its way to becoming inert," he said. Jerry Vincent, an Army Corps of Engineers program supervisor, said that his district office in Sacramento has requested more than $1.5 million to solve the methane problem at Hamilton Field. Vincent said that some of the money would be used to test for methane in the new

homes and underground utility boxes, where methane could accumulate and present an explosive hazard. The California Regional Water Quality Control Board has voiced concern that methane gas could poison nearby groundwater and act as a transport for volatile organic compounds to escape the Army dump, which was capped in 1995 with clay and plastic. Groundwater beneath portions of the subdivision is already contaminated with the gasoline additive MTBE, which leaked from underground storage tanks at a Navy gas station. The water board has ordered property owners of two-thirds of the lots not to dig wells or plant fruit trees. The MTBE plume has migrated into the dump, known as Landfill 26, which was used for decades as an unlined pit for construction debris, fuel residues, solvents, pesticides, polychlorinated biphenyls and dioxin. The Army plan must win the approval of the water board and the State Department of Toxics Control Board. Methane is created from the natural breakdown of refuse including petroleum residues, especially when oxygen is not present. The proposed trench would allow oxygen to enter the dump's

subsurface in an attempt to deter production of methane gas. Army consultants say that pumping oxygen into the site should not be needed unless methane is found in the groundwater. Shea Homes' Gamble wants the Army to not only dig the trench but also to pierce the landfill cap and pipe the methane to another location to burn it off. Army consultants say that this option would reduce the methane, but not stop it from migrating toward the new homes. Elena Belsky, the Marin investigator for San Francisco BayKeeper, voiced skepticism about the Army plan. "They need to study the methane problem in the entire landfill before choosing a remediation," she said. "There's been a lack of testing and consistent monitoring of the northern areas of the landfill. How are we going to know what's going on with a lack of data?" Generally, state law requires developers to install venting pipes in crawl spaces and automatic gas sensors with 24-hour alarm systems where construction is within 1,000 feet of a landfill with high levels of methane gas.

Methane tank leaks cause warmingRevkin and Krauss, 09 – *senior staff writers for the New York Times, senior fellow at Pace University's Pace Academy for Applied Environmental Studies, biology degree from Brown and a Master's degree in journalism from Columbia, former professor at Columbia's Graduate School of Journalism and the Bard College Center for Environmental Policy, AND** former foreign correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, Edward R. Murrow fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, published articles in Foreign Affairs, GQ and Wilson Quarterly, (Andrew C., Clifford, “Curbing Emissions by Sealing Gas Leaks”, New York Times, October 14, 2009, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/15/business/energy-environment/15degrees.html)//JKahn

To the naked eye, there was nothing to be seen at a natural gas well in eastern Texas but beige pipes and tanks baking in the sun. But in the viewfinder of Terry Gosney’s infrared camera, three black plumes of gas gushed through leaks that were otherwise invisible. “Holy smoke, it’s blowing like mad,” said Mr. Gosney, an environmental field coordinator for EnCana, the Canadian gas producer that operates the year-old well near Franklin, Tex. “It does look nasty.” Within a few days

the leaks had been sealed by workers. Efforts like EnCana’s save energy and money. Yet they are also a cheap, effective way of blunting climate change that could potentially be replicated thousands of times over, from Wyoming to Siberia, energy experts say. Natural gas consists almost entirely of methane, a potent

heat-trapping gas that scientists say accounts for as much as a third of the human contribution to

global warming . “This for me is an absolute no-brainer, even more so than putting in those compact fluorescent bulbs in your house,” said Al Armendariz,

an engineer at Southern Methodist University who studies pollutants from oil and gas fields. Acting quickly to stanch the loss of methane could substantially cut warming in the short run, even as countries tackle the tougher challenge of cutting the dominant greenhouse emission, carbon dioxide, studies by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology suggest. Unlike carbon dioxide, which can remain in the atmosphere a century or more once released, methane persists in the air for about 10 years. So aggressively reining in emissions now would mean that far less of the gas would be warming the earth in a

decade or so. Methane is also a valuable target because while it is far rarer and more fleeting than carbon dioxide, ton for ton, it traps 25 times as much heat, researchers say. Yet while federal and international programs have encouraged companies to seek and curb methane emissions from gas and oil wells, pipelines and tanks, aggressive efforts like EnCana’s are still far

from the industry norm. As a result, some three trillion cubic feet of methane leak into the air every year, with Russia and the United States the leading sources, according to the Environmental Protection Agency’s official estimate. (This amount has the warming power of emissions from over half the coal plants in the United States.) And government scientists and industry officials caution that the real figure is almost certainly higher. Unless monitoring is greatly expanded, they say, such emissions could soar as global production of natural gas increases over the next few decades. The Energy Department projects that gas production could rise nearly 50 percent over the next 20 years as companies race to discover and tap new sources. In the United States, 4,000 miles of new pipeline was laid last year alone. But the industry has been largely resistant to an aggressive cleanup. The Bush administration, which opposed mandatory limits on greenhouse gas emissions, expanded an existing voluntary domestic program for capturing methane emissions and began a related international program — with both aimed at promoting profitable ways for businesses to cut methane emissions as a relatively easy first step to combat climate change. In April the Obama administration signaled that it could adopt rules requiring the biggest American companies to report all of their greenhouse gas emissions. Oil and gas industry groups countered that the cost and complexity of dealing with some 700,000 wells were too great. In September the E.P.A. announced that the obligatory reporting would begin in 2011 but that it excluded oil and gas operations, at least for the time being. (Agency officials say they plan to issue rules for oil and gas by late next year.) Some scientists reject the industry arguments. “Further delay on finding and stopping such releases would be irresponsible, given the financial and environmental benefits,” saidF. Sherwood Rowland, a Nobel laureate in chemistry at the University of California, Irvine. Internationally, the amount of methane escaping from gas and oil operations can be only crudely gauged. But in 2006 the E.P.A. estimated that Russia, the world’s largest gas producer, ranked highest, with 427 billion cubic feet of methane escaping annually, followed by the United States at 346 billion, Ukraine at 225 billion and Mexico at 191 billion. Reflecting the uncertainty in such estimates, Gazprom, Russia’s giant state gas monopoly, estimated its annual emissions at half that figure last year. An E.P.A. review of methane emissions from gas wells in the United States strongly implies that all of these figures may be too low. In its analysis, the E.P.A. concluded that the amount emitted by routine operations at gas wells — not including leaks like those seen near Franklin — is 12 times the agency’s longtime estimate of nine billion cubic feet. In heat-trapping potential, that new estimate equals the carbon dioxide emitted annually by eight million cars. In the routine operations, great yet invisible plumes of gas enter the atmosphere when new wells are activated, old wells are invigorated to boost gas flows and wells are purged of fluids by letting out cough-like bursts of gas. In many gas fields, said Roger Fernandez, a senior methane expert at the E.P.A., fluid-clogged wells are still purged the old-fashioned way, by opening valves or using outdated equipment in ways that release a misty burst of gas directly into the air. For the E.P.A. and environmental scientists, the challenge is convincing gas and oil producers here and abroad that efforts to avoid such releases often more than pay for themselves. The use of infrared cameras is expanding as word spreads of the payoff in saved gas, said Ben Shepperd, executive vice president of the Permian Basin Petroleum Association, which represents 1,200 companies in the oil and gas business around West Texas. “We would like to see more people doing it,” he said. “People are very surprised when they shoot their equipment with these cameras and they see that there are releases in places they wouldn’t have expected.” The

benefits are there not only for gas producers but also for companies handling oil. Thousands of oil storage tanks emit plumes of methane and other gases, said Larry S. Richards, the president of Hy-Bon Engineering in Midland, Tex., which is using infrared cameras to survey storage tanks in 29 countries and sells systems that capture the gas. A clearer view of the worst methane emissions could come next year, when Japan plans to start releasing data from Gosat, a satellite that began orbiting the Earth in January. It may be able to identify the top hot spots within a few miles. That may increase pressure on countries with particularly large leaks. As the biggest methane emitter, Russia has begun seeking high-tech solutions. In April, for example, Gazprom, the Russian Defense Ministry and an Israeli aerospace company began discussing the potential use of miniature remotely piloted helicopters to monitor pipelines for leaks. But gadgets alone will not halt the vast exhalation of methane from Russia, environmentalists say. There is some hope that a successor to the 1997 Kyoto climate change pact will include more incentives for money to flow to Russian methane-reduction projects. Western companies that have captured methane point out the money that is often to be made by doing so. Starting around 2000, BP began introducing methane-catching techniques at 2,300 well sites in New Mexico. At well after well, gas that would have otherwise escaped now flows through meters that field crews affectionately call the “cash register.” Among other actions, BP engineers have fine-tuned a system for purging fluids that can stop up wells. The process uses the pressure of gas in the well to periodically raise a plunger through the vertical well pipe. This removes the liquids but typically allows gas to escape. The new computerized process, which BP calls smart automation, tracks well pressure and other conditions to more precisely time the plunger cycles in ways that avoid gas emissions. From 2000 to 2004, emissions from BP wells in the region dropped 50 percent, the company says. By 2007, they had essentially ended. On average, installing the systems has cost about $11,000 per well, but they have returned three times that investment, said Reid Smith, an environmental adviser for BP working on the project. “We spend a lot of money to get gas to the surface,” Mr. Smith said. “It makes a huge amount of sense to get all of it through the sales meter.”

1nc economy impactLUSTs destroy the housing market – the mere perception of local LUSTs is enough to crust pricesSimons and Sementelli, 97 – associate professor of planning and development at Cleveland State University, degrees in planning and economics from the University of North Carolina, AND* doctoral student with dual emphasis in operations research and organization studies, join teaching and research position at Cleveland State University, MPA in organizational behavior from Gannon University, BA in history and policy at Carnegie-Mellon University, (Robert A., and Arthur, “Liquidity Loss and Delayed Transactions with Leaking Underground Storage Tanks”, The Appraisal Journal, July 1997, http://www.rasimons.com/documents/articles/liquidity-loss-and-delayed-transactions.pdf)//JKahn<Note – spelling errors are due to OCR>

When redeveloping previously used urban lands developers may encounter environmental contamination caused by leaking underground storage tanks (LUST). The discovery of a LUST hinders the sale and financing of a property . Empirical evidence from this study addresses the extent to which private

markets transact and finance LUST sites in various stages at remediation. Results show that properties with tanks were less than

half as likely to be sold than otherwise comparable uncontaminated commercial properties . Further,

properties with tanks remaining were less likely to obtain mortgages upon sale, while cleaned sites with tanks removed were financed at rates similar to other commercial properties. Urban developers often encounter brownfield-related costs, expense required to clean up environmental contamination from prior land uses.

Parties redeveloping brownfield sites also face uncertainty about the degree of remediation, the financial responsibility of polluters and owners, and potential lender uncertainty . This puts urban brownfield

developments at a disadvantage when compared with greenfield sites that have not been previously used. Discovery of potential contamination from leaky underground storage tanks is a common brownfield problem encountered in virtually all jurisdictions in the United States. In 1982, about 6% of the estimated 1.2 million known steel tanks were believed to be leaking. Another estimate from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) places the number of USTs containing petroleum in the millions, with the leak rates as high as 25%.2 While many releases of toxic liquids from USTS result in modest amounts of contaminated soil confined on site, a substantial portion of cases are more severe and involve groundwater contamination, both on site and off site. Underground storage tank sites are among the most common types of brownfield. They are more numerous than Superfund or toxic release inventory sites. For example, in Cuyahoga County, the core urban county in the Cleveland primary metropolitan statistical area (PMSA), there were under 30 potential Superfund sites, almost 300 toxic release inventory (TRI) sites, and over 1,300 leaking tank sites known in late 1994. Many USTs are located in obvious places, including operating or former gas stations, transportation service facilities, industrial plants, government-operated service yards, and along major traffic arteries. Hence, they often have otherwise favorable locations at

strategic intersections, making them attractive as fast-food sites or key comer parcels in a larger-site assembly. When leaking underground storage tanks are encountered by developers, the project may become delayed or abandoned because of the associated costs necessary for remediation. Depending on what is found, parcels may undergo several months or years of environmental remediation to remove contamination from the site. This potential for additional costs raises several questions about LUST sites under remediation. Can they be sold or financed? Does removing functionally obsolete tanks from a site help? Does the perception of possible leaks stigmatize registered nonleaking tanks (RUST)? This study augments the growing body of research on redevelopment in lieu of environmental regulation, and extends the recent work of Page and Rabinowitz on groundwater contamination and its effect on property values by examining the relationship between on-site soil and groundwater contamination, property transactions and financing for n0n—leaking (RUST) and leaking (LUST) sites. It also provides indirect empirical evidence related to Patchin’s notion of stigrna. This paper presents evidence from Cuyahoga County on the transaction rates of commercial property, including LUST sites. Once leaks are detected, property owners are expected to cooperate voluntarily with state regulators in mitigating environ mental contamination. In Ohio, the regulating agency is the Bureau of Underground Storage Tank Regulations (BUSTR). Its activities include maintaining lists of registered and leaking tank sites, assisting property owners with soil and water testing, engaging consultants, and removing the contaminated soil. The detecfion of environmental contamination should depress property value, and there is no assurance that these "sunk" remediation costs Would be recaptured upon sale. Known contamination may also have a spillover effect on nearby properties. This uncertainty may prevent the completion of a transaction until the environmental problems are addressed through mitigation, litigation, or both. In Cuyahoga County, most of the chinking water is provided by the City of Cleveland Water Department directly from Lake Erie. Over 98% of the LUST sites analyzed have municipal drinl<.ing water rather than wells, minimizing the potential health risks of LUST incidents in this research. The presence of tanks or documented leak incidents are expected to impede an owner's ability to finance or sell the property. Stigma associated with known contamination could mean that sales activity would not rebound quickly to the levels of uncontaminated properties.5 Results based on 77 sales of tank sites indicate that only 4.9% of properties with nonleaking tanks

completed transactions over a four-year period compared with 10.4% of comparable, otherwise uncontaminated commercial properties. Only 3.8% of

leaking UST sites were sold over the study period, a figure also significantly smaller than for uncontaminated commercial sites. Lower sales volume is considered an indicator of stigma because of the potential loss to the owner's liquidity

in the property. Financing rates and loan-to-value ratios differed for UST sites. While 32.6% of commercial properties without tanks obtained mortgage financing when sold, only 9.3% of sales with nonleaking tanks on site were mortgaged. However, 29.4% of those sites with reported leaks,

many of them with tanks removed, received mortgages . Further, loan-to-value ratios for sites with

nonleaking tanks were lower . Hence, the presence of tanks on site, with or without a leak, appears to stigmatize properties, impeding access to

mortgage capital. RELEVANT LITERATURE Others wishing to transact contaminated properties face several obstacles, including environmental regulation, real estate market pricing, and financing considerations. Combined, risk and uncertainty about contaminated sites add to sluggish real estate markets that make selling tainted sites difficult. Real estate transactions occur only when a buyer and a seller agree on a price. A buyer’s offer for a property should reflect the present value of the discounted net cash flow stream over time, including remediation, adjusted for risk. In addition to business risk, uncertainty about environmental matters may be

substantial enough to kill a transaction. The stigma that potential buyers attach to previously contaminated lands

may interfere with the pricing and the time frame of the sale. The risk may also include liability

concerns about impact on nearby properties . Lender liability in property financing may be another reason for reduced transaction

activity. Potential sellers may have incomplete information about new regulation and may face voluntary compliance for cleanup costs . If they do not fully realize the sunk costs of remediation, they may try to recover cleanup expense

by setting a sales price higher than the market can bear. For example, state-mandated environmental regulations on buried construction and demolition debris substantially affected market activity by imposing cleanup costs on the seller owner.6 Page and Rabinowitz support the notion that changing environmental rules

themselves can hinder dt-EVEIOPII'lEI'lt.7 They assert that potential liability may affect property value more than actual contamination and that parties are deterred by the threat of delays and potential cleanup costs that could arise while waiting for a relaxation of remediation criteria. Page and Rabinowitz cover two issues pertaining to environmentally contaminated sites in general and leaking USTs in particular. Because property owners could be held accountable for off-site effects resulting from contamination originating from their properties, it is important to consider these situations. Contamination of Nearby Properties Known contamination can affect the value of nearby properties. Fear of lawsuits may prevent new buyers from acquiring property with tanks. Proximity to toxic waste sites,“ landfills,9 and petrochemical refineries has been known to affect residential property values negatively, diminishing with distance from the subject Property. However, when Page and Rabinowitz used a case study design, they found no diminution of value for nearby residential sites attributable to groundwater contamination. Their small sample size (two contaminated homes and five uncontaminated), research design (not all other factors were controlled), and use of assessed value rather than sales price as the value indicator may explain the counter-intuitive result. Further, it’s possible that the local assessor did not recognize contamination when setting sales prices. In another study we conducted, we found that close proximity (in the same city block or within 300 feet) to a registered, leaking underground storage tank reduced residential property values by about 17% of value. Some but not all of these leaking sites had offsite groundwater contamination. Overall, evidence supports the notion that known contamination has a

negative effect on nearby properties. Even with known cleanup costs, contaminated properties are difficult to transact. The prices of the subject and nearby sites may be reduced. Uncertainty, Risk, and Stigma Even with known

cleanup costs, contaminated properties are difficult to transact. The prices of the subject and nearby sites may be reduced .

Further, the publicizing of contamination on Superfund sites has a negative effect on residential property in the viciI1ity.12 Austrian and EichIer's“l survey on brownfields found that of the 46 midwestern respondents, 61% indicated that contaminated sites would only sell at a discount equal to or greater than the cleanup costs. Presumably, part of the discount that is in excess of the cleanup costs would dissipate when a formal assessment of the cleanup costs is done. Lf not, then the property is likely to incur additional price reducing stigma. Although real estate markets have been reluctant to recognize the sale of contaminated properties, they are becoming more accustomed to them, with sales usually occurring slowly and with severe discounts. M Lenders may be reluctant to finance properties with USTS, leaking or not. While lenders have long been considered potentially responsible parties (PRPS) under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act of 1980 (CERCLA), lender safe harbor legislation from UST liabilities has recently been proposed by the EPA. This might make UST properties easier to finance.15 However, Ohio law did not hold lenders exempt from liability from environmental contamination during the study period. Given these issues, research investigating if and when contaminated UST properties sell, along with their ability to get financing, are clearly warranted. This study focuses on properties during and after the completion of government-sanctioned remedial proced ures. RUST AND LUST DATABASE The properties used in this research were drawn from registered lists for LUST and RUST incidents in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, dating back to 1988. Of the 1,362 total incidents reported through Ianuary 1, 1993, 1,000 incidents having useable street addresses with a unique permanent parcel number (property tax number) were examined. Approximately 12O incidents reported in 1993 or later were excluded. The resulting available information included in this paper was based on 889 LUST sites, 882 RUST sites, and a baseline of 23,700 comparable commercial properties. The ratio of this sample to the overall population of contaminated sites with useable addresses initiated in 1992 or earlier is just under 50%. TRANSACTIONS AND FINANCING The crux of the empirical portion of this research is, what effect does the presence of tanks and a known leak have on transaction activity? The statistical technique used to evaluate this relationship is to compare the sale probabilities of nontank (baseline) commercial properties with commercial properties with RUST properties and contaminated LUST sites. The decision to use a comparison of the sale probabilities instead of a hedonic pricing model was based, in part, on our other study concerning residential sales near contaminated UST sites. Ln that study, which employed a hedonic price model, a smaller than-expected number of sales were found, raising the issue that lower transaction rates could be present near contaminated sites. Thus, that study focuses on the transaction rates rather than the effect of contamination on sales price. It is acknowledged that certain site attributes may affect the sale price of commercial property. However, a brief evaluation of selected sites and locational characteristics supports the notion that property attributes do not play a main factor in transaction rate differences between the populations studied in this re— search. Baseline commercial and tank sites are scattered throughout the county, with tank sites often located along major traffic arteries_ With respect to key site attributes, the mean square footage of RUST and LUST properties was 3,964, compared with 4,203 for baseline commercial parcels without tanks. The results of a difference—of-means test were not significant at a significance level of 0.1. Differences between baseline and UST means for lot depth and legal frontage were likewise found not to be statistically significant. Thus, site attributes of the baseline and tank groups do not seem to be significantly different. In the Cuyahoga County study, the nump ber of transactions, quality of title transfer (number of weaker quitclaim deeds), and presence of mortgage financing were considered. L0an—t0-value ratios for those properties receiving financing were noted. The study identified the baseline population of all applicable commercial sales in C uyahnga County over the period 1989-1992, which had the county auditor's land use classification of similar commercial property This baseline group excludes those properties with known USTS or incidents, properties containing multifamily residences or condominiums, and hotel and office buildings. A total of 23,714 properties Was considered. The desired unit of analysis is the site rather than the parcel because some properties have multiple parcels. The "lead" or main parcel of each transaction was chosen, thus avoiding the possibility of double—counting sales. Over the four—year period, 2,472 transactions

occurred, a rate of 10.4%. Expected Outcomes Because contaminated properties under active mitigation are expected to have lower transaction levels, the percentage that sell should be lower than for the baseline. Fewer mortgage originations and lower loan~tovalue ratios are also anticipated. ‘Results A total of -'13 properties with registered ing tanks (4.9%) were sold (see Table 1). A total of 34 LUST sites (3.8%) were transacted during the four-year study period. As expected, these percentages are lower than for the baseline commercial population, and this difference is statistically significant at a confidence level of 0..05. Among baseline properties, 248 sales (100%) had quitclaim deeds. The number of quitclaim deeds for tank and leak incident transactions was very small: Only four tank properties sold had this weak form of deed upon transfer (4.7% for RUST sales and 5.9% for LUST). Both UST rates are lower than the baseline, suggesting that sellers and buyers recognize that quitclaim deeds do not provide adequate protection from potential liability for site cleanup expenses, especially for owner—operators. With respect to financing, 32.6% of the baseline properties sold had registered mortgages (secured by the property) that were originated on or around the sale date. However, only four RUST properties (9.3%), and '10 LUST sales (29.4%) obtained financing. This demonstrates a statistically significant difference in financing for RUST properties, but not for LUST. Thus, properties with registered tanks appear less likely to receive a mortgage than clean commercial sales or sites with known comtamination. The low rate of mortgage financing for RUST sites may be attributed to financial institutions for fear of potential liability after the sale. It is possible that sales with tanks obtain unsecured nancing instead of secured mortgage loans. But LUST sites with ongoing mitigafion may have had tanks removed. The small number of such sites appears to be obtaining financing at a similar rate as baseline properties. Recent case law on lender liability may substantially ease the financing problem.“' Private environmental liability insurance partially addresses the issue of uncertainty, reducing lender concerns and increasing the property's marketability. Some states, such as Michigan and lllinois, are also moving toward a lender liability exemption for brownfield properties. Average loan-to-value ratios (LTV) for all nontank commercial properties in Cuyahoga County have decreased from over 0.95 to 0.80 during the 1989-1992 period (average LTV is 0.96), consistent with national financial trends. With these high LTVS, it is plausible that some are seller financed. For the sites with tanks, the loan-to-value ratios were substantially less (0.51 for the four RUST sales). The loan-tovalue ratios for sites where incidents occurred were more consistent with current financial trends (0.84 for LUST sales). This reinforces the assertion that lenders are more concerned with uncertainty concerning potential liability than with known liability. This paper addressed the presence of both leaking and nonleaking underground storage tanks and their effect on property transactions. Properties with tanks, contaminated or not, are transacting in the marketplace. However, these properties transacted at significantly reduced rates (less than half as often) than did baseline commercial properties. Properties that still had tanks on site are also much less likely to obtain secured mortgage financing than properties with no tanks. Also, loan—to-value ratios were substantially lower for properties with nonieaking tanks. The cumulative reduction of financial liquidity for owners of sites where leak incidents have occurred is substantial. Multiplying the relative proportion of transactions (0.038/0.104) by the likelihood of obtaining secured financing (0.294/0.326) yields 0.33, REFERENCES implying that property owner assets in contaminated sites are less than one half as liquid than for clean commercial sites. (LTV ratios were not considered because the sample size for LUST and RUST sales was very small. There would have been further reduction in liquidity if LTVs had been included.) The figures are even lower for sites with tanks remaining on site, which were only 0.13 as liquid as comparable commercial properties without tanks. These reductions are evidence of the stigma associated with contaminated sites or those tank sites where there is potential for a future environmental event.” The reduction in sales activity can be a problem for appraisers seeking to identify comparable sales for environmentally tainted properties. Having only a few comparables available tends to invalidate traditional market approaches to determining value. This indicates that appraisers should stratify comparables by known versus unknown contamination to get a better idea about arm's length financing for otherwise desirable RUST or LUST sites. By stral-ifying comparables by known or Luiknown contamination, appraisers can better differentiate between and low-quality sites, limiting the possibility of poor appraisals and their consequences.“ Property owners who cannot avoid dealing with or owning a UST site should consider removing tanks not needed for business purposes and then obtain a covenant not to sue (CNTS), if possible. Ideally, this should remove some of the associated stigma, and enable properties to be financed more readily through conventional sources after tank removal. For development properties with tan.l<5 still on site, nonsecured financing may be the rule rather than the exception. Since there appears to be reluctance in capital markets to financing contaminated sites, a risk-reducing role for the public sector may be appropriate. If environmental insurance is available, it may be worth while to pursue it.

The Housing Market’s key to the economy – reverse causalFederal Reserve, 12 (Yeah, them, January 4, 2012, “The U.S. Housing Market: Current Conditions and Policy Considerations,” http://federalreserve.gov/publications/other-reports/files/housing-white-paper-20120104.pdf, Hensel)

The ongoing problems in the U.S. housing market continue to impede the economic recovery. House prices have fallen an average of about 33 percent from their 2006 peak, resulting in about $7 trillion in household wealth losses and an associated ratcheting down of aggregate consumption. At the same time, an

unprecedented number of households have lost, or are on the verge of losing, their homes. The extraordinary problems plaguing the housing market reflect in part the effect of weak demand due to high unemployment and heightened uncertainty. But the problems also reflect three key forces originating from within the housing market itself: a persistent excess supply of vacant homes on the market, many of which stem from foreclosures; a marked and potentially long-term downshift in the supply of mortgage credit; and the costs that an often unwieldy and inefficient foreclosure process imposes on homeowners, lenders, and communities. Looking forward, continued weakness in the housing market poses a significant barrier to a more vigorous economic recovery. Of course, some of the weakness is related to poor labor market conditions, which will take time to be resolved. At the same time, there is scope for policymakers to take action along three dimensions that could ease some of the pressures afflicting the housing market. In particular, policies could be considered that would help moderate the inflow of properties into the large inventory of unsold homes, remove some of the obstacles preventing creditworthy borrowers from accessing mortgage credit, and limit the number of homeowners who find themselves pushed into an inefficient and overburdened foreclosure pipeline. Some steps already being taken or proposed in these

areas will be discussed below. Taking these issues in turn, the large inventory of foreclosed or surrendered properties is contributing to excess supply in the for-sale market, placing downward pressure on house prices and exacerbating the loss in aggregate housing wealth. At the same time, rental markets are strengthening in some areas of the country, reflecting in part a decline in the homeownership rate. Reducing some of the barriers to converting foreclosed properties to rental units will help redeploy the existing stock of houses in a more efficient way. Such conversions might also increase lenders' eventual recoveries on foreclosed and surrendered properties. Obstacles limiting access to mortgage credit even among creditworthy borrowers contribute to weakness in housing demand, and barriers to refinancing blunt the

transmission of monetary policy to the household sector. Further attention to easing some of these obstacles could contribute to the gradual recovery in housing markets and thus help speed the overall economic recovery.

uniqueness wall

Compromise cut less money and grunted future fundingNACS 7/2 – National Association of Convenience Stores, an international trade association for convenience and fuel retailing representing more than 2,100 retail and 1,600 supplier company members (2 July 2012, “Washington Report: President Obama to Sign Transportation Bill,” NACS http://www.nacsonline.com/NACS/News/Daily/Pages/ND0702121.aspx)

It was down to the wire on Friday, as both the U.S. House and Senate passed a 2-year extension of federal highway and transit funding, which President Obama is likely going to sign into law this week. One of the major hurdles toward final passage, approval of the Keystone XL pipeline, was ultimately removed from the bill final during conference negotiations. During conference negotiations to hammer out the differences

between the House and Senate versions of the bill, conferees agreed to steal $2.4 billion from the Leaking Underground Storage Tank (LUST) Trust Fund as opposed to the proposed $3 billion. The conferees also decided not to divert one-third of future revenues collected for the LUST Trust Fund to offset the Highway Trust Fund, which was originally proposed in the Senate bill.

link wallCongress pushed for offsets from LUSTNACS 2/10 – National Association of Convenience Stores, an international trade association for convenience and fuel retailing representing more than 2,100 retail and 1,600 supplier company members (10 February 2012, “Transfers $3.7 Billion from LUST to Senate Transportation Bill,” NACS, http://www.nacsonline.com/NACS/News/Daily/Pages/ND0210121.aspx)

The 18.4 cents per gallon federal gasoline tax has historically provided monies for the Highway Trust Fund. But that amount isn’t enough to cover a gap created by the bill’s two-year spending plan. That’s when the Senate turned to the LUST fund. Baucus pointed out that it was “important to note” that LUST funds also come from the federal gasoline tax. “Where we cannot find more revenue from the Highway Trust Fund’s usual funding sources, we have focused on funding that bears a nexus to transportation,” he

said. “We have therefore explored funding from transportation and energy sources.”

Congress is turning its back on LUSTNACS 4/26 – National Association of Convenience Stores, an international trade association for convenience and fuel retailing representing more than 2,100 retail and 1,600 supplier company members (26 April 2012, “Washington Report: NACS Responds to U.S. House Raiding LUST Trust Fund,” NACS, http://www.nacsonline.com/NACS/News/Daily/Pages/ND0426121.aspx)

Washington Report: NACS Responds to U.S. House Raiding LUST Trust Fund Raiding $3 billion from the Leaking Underground Storage Tank Trust Fund sends a clear message that Congress is abandoning a critical program that protects the health and water security of their constituents. ALEXANDRIA, VA –The National Association of Convenience Stores (NACS) responded today to final language included in the U.S. House of Representatives’ version of highway reauthorization legislation that raids $3 billion from the federal Leaking Underground

Storage Tank (LUST) Trust Fund and diverts future revenues collected for that program to offset the Highway Trust Fund. “Congress is turning its back on the environment by raiding the LUST Trust Fund — a program that they created to protect and clean our water systems from underground storage tank contamination,” said NACS Director of Government Relations Carin Nersesian. “Stealing $3 billion away from LUST sends a

clear message that members of Congress are abandoning a critical and necessary program that protects the health and water security of their constituents.” The diversion of LUST tax revenues to non-tank related purposes denies communities access to funds that could be used to prevent tank releases and to remediate contaminated sites in which no responsible party can be identified. The highway bill also diverts one-third of new revenues from the LUST Trust Fund, further compromising the

integrity of the program. Congress has repeatedly failed to appropriate sufficient funds to the program. Since 1986, the LUST Trust Fund has accumulated roughly $3.2 billion, collects approximately $194 million in fees and earns $127 million in interest. However, Congress only appropriates around $112 million per year.

Funds surface transportation will come from the HTF – politicians won’t increase the budget deficitKirk et al 12 – Specialist in Transportation Policy @ CRS, (Robert, “Surface Transportation Program Reauthorization Issues for the 112 th Congress,” http://heritageaction.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Surface-Transportation-Program-Reauth_Jan12-2012.pdf)

The most difficult issue to be considered during reauthorization is how to finance federal surface transportation programs. The highway trust fund and the revenue sources that feed it have been a reliable mechanism for financing highway and transit programs for five decades, but this is no longer the case. Fuel taxes, which provide most of the

money for surface transportation , are unlikely to provide a solid long-term foundation for the programs, although a rate increase could help in the near-term. The choice for policymakers, therefore, is to find new sources of income for the current-size program or an expanded program, or alternately, to settle for a

smaller program that might look very different from the one currently in place. The growing consensus on the need to reduce the federal budget deficit will likely influence this debate.

2nc brink

LUST is nearly drained nowScribner 6/26 – Land-use and Transportation Policy Analyst, Competitive Enterprise Institute (Marc, 26 June 2012, “The Highway Bill’s Sleeper Funding Provision: Pension Smoothing,” Competitive Enterprise Institute, http://www.openmarket.org/2012/06/26/the-highway-bills-sleeper-funding-provision-pension-smoothing/)

Things appear to have turned around for the stalled surface transportation reauthorization talks. Conference committee members worked over the

weekend trying to come to a consensus agreement. While I remain pessimistic that an agreement will be reached before the June 30 deadline, it is possible that Senate Democrats will cave to House Republicans’ demands of environmental review streamlining and the coal ash provision. The problem with such a

compromise is that the Senate bill’s financing portion relies on a series of very rosy assumptions to make it work. As I have noted previously, this involves draining the Leaking Underground Storage Tank Trust Fund of nearly all of its $3.6 billion+ funds and transferring revenue raised from tariffs on imported automobiles into the collapsing Highway Trust Fund. But one major non-user-pays provision that has been under-covered by the media may be its riskiest.

Congress fails at appropriating- now is a crucial time NACS 5/4 – National Association of Convenience Stores, an international trade association for convenience and fuel retailing representing more than 2,100 retail and 1,600 supplier company members (4 May 2012, “Congress Moves Closer To Raiding LUST Trust Fund,” NACS, http://www.nacsonline.com/NACS/News/Daily/Pages/ND0504122.aspx)

Tank spills will take a back burner to road upkeep if Congress reallocates the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Leaking

Underground Storage Tanks (LUST) Trust Fund to pay for transportation projects, Inside EPA reports. This comes amid concern that higher grade ethanol might trigger more tank spills. Currently, a projected 88,000 sites await cleanup. Critics of the move think there is little they can do to stop a House-Senate conference committee working on merging the two highway bills from incorporating language that raids $3 billion from the LUST Trust Fund and diverts future revenues collected for that program to offset the Highway Trust Fund. The provision has generated strong disagreement from

state waste officials and fuel retailers, including NACS, who point out it will take money from the LUST fund’s intended purpose of cleanup: “Simply because you have continually failed to adequately fund a program you designated to prevent releases and to clean up vital land and water sites within your communities, is not reason enough to divert these monies to highway construction projects unrelated to environmental protection ,” wrote NACS, SIGMA and PMAA in a letter sent last month to Congress. NACS also responded to final language included in the U.S. House of Representatives’ version of

highway reauthorization legislation that mirrors the Senate version, noting that Congress has repeatedly failed to appropriate sufficient funds to the program. Since 1986, the LUST Trust Fund has accumulated roughly $3.2 billion, collects approximately $194 million in fees and earns $127 million in interest. However, Congress only appropriates around $112 million per year.

LUST TF is strained now NACS 7 – National Association of Convenience Stores, an international trade association for convenience and fuel retailing representing more than 2,100 retail and 1,600 supplier company members (14 February 2007, “President Seeks More Money From Lust,” NACS, http://www.nacsonline.com/NACS/News/Daily_News_Archives/February2007/Pages/nd0214071.aspx)

"It is imperative that Congress spend the money it collects to pay for these mandated enforcement programs, protect the environment and ensure all tank owners are held to the same standards of compliance," John Eichberger, NACS vice president of government relations, told the newspaper, noting that NACS members sell 75 percent of the nation's gasoline. The EPA said that approximately 62 percent of the 640,000 remaining underground tanks are in compliance with federal release-prevention and detection rules. Holding up to 12,000 gallons of fuel, tanks with even tiny leaks can contaminate groundwater. NACS has lobbied for a heftier federal expenditure on the grounds that more inspections, especially of municipal and non-convenience-store sites, would help store owners reduce liability for spills. Business groups and

environmental groups are allies in this, the newspaper reports. "It's incredible to think there are thousands [of tanks] to clean up, we have the money, but we are refusing to spend it," said Edward Hopkins, director of the environmental quality program for the Sierra

Club in Washington. Along with the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Sierra Club has been trying to get more of the fund's money released because many states have backlogs of tanks to inspect and approximately 8,000 new leaks are uncovered each year. However, Congress and the administration have been reluctant to dip into the fund, citing fiscal discipline and deficit reduction. Over the past eight years, the annual payout from LUST has been about $72 million. That number is less than comes in annually via the funding mechanism, a one-tenth-of-a-cent-per gallon tax on motor fuels. "This is a great start for 2008," Eichberger told the newspaper regarding the President's budget. "But a one-time shot of $22.3

million will not be enough. Now the challenge is, what are the Democratic priorities for the new Congress? We will need a significant increase again. If you are collecting money for this program, spend it on the program."

2nc lusts linkLUSTs are a massive epidemic – old tanks are going to leak in the next ten years – carelessness means most USTs will leakAU, 05 – part of the Agriculture and Natural Resources WATER QUALITY: Controlling Nonpoint Source (NPS) Pollution report on wate quality, Alabama A&M and Auburn Cooperative Extension System, “Underground Storage Tanks (USTs) And NPS Pollution”, Alabama A&M and Auburn Universities, http://www.aces.edu/pubs/docs/A/ANR-0790/WQ4.8.1.pdf)//JKahn

Underground storage tanks (USTs) may contain a large variety of liquid chemicals including gasoline, other petroleum products, and hazardous substances. Millions of gallons of these potentially dangerous chemicals are stored in USTs prior to their use or disposal. Because of the widespread potential contamination threat these substances pose to groundwater, USTs have been described as “ ticking time bombs .” USTs are a threat because no one knows exactly how many

exist . The total UST population in the U.S. may be as high as 15 million . Only 1.5 to 3 million of these tanks,

because of their size or other special features, fall under current federal regulations. The other 12 to 14 million tanks are small and unregulated. Many were abandoned decades ago and are hard to account for. USTs are a threat because old tanks will

leak . Of the 1.5 to 3 million USTs that fall under federal regulations, at least 25 percent are already leaking. Some surveys have estimated that 30 to 35 percent of

these tanks have failed tank tightness tests. USTs are also a threat because they can be found everywhere. Unlike most hazardous waste disposal sites, USTs are

common in both urban and rural areas because they are used for storing heating oil, diesel fuels, and gasoline. Thus, the concern for USTs, unlike most other hazardous wastes, is not primarily an industrial concern but a concern for

private citizens, service stations, local governments, schools, and almost everyone else storing significant quantities of fuel on their property. Sources Of Underground Storage Tanks Most original liquid chemical storage tanks were motor fuel tanks kept aboveground. Wholesalers, retailers, businesses, and governments started placing them below ground in the 1920s because aboveground

tanks were considered more susceptible to vehicular accidents, theft, and tampering. They also took up valuable real estate space. The idea was to bury these storage tanks, and thus, bury most of the problems and liabilities associated with them . There

was no way to predict how long they would last or what type of problems buried tanks would present. From the 1920s to the 1980s, millions of underground storage

tanks were installed at commercial, industrial, residential, and governmental sites. These systems were neither well designed nor

carefully installed and maintained . In most cases, once the tanks were installed, the owner or operator simply forgot about them. The end result was a significant number of leaks and spills of the stored material, particularly gasoline. By

the 1960s and 1970s, underground storage tanks were identified as our nation’s number one source of groundwater contamination. Eighty percent or more of the USTs installed prior to 1980 were made of unprotected steel . Steel tanks could leak after as little as 10 years in the ground, depending on soil and climatic conditions.

Cold war era tanks are rusting now – causes massive groundwater contamination nation-wide and endocrine diseasesAP, 08 – Associated Press, Google News, (“AP IMPACT: Cold War era fuel tanks could be leaking hazardous material into environment”, Associated Press, August 12, 2008, Lexis)//JKahn

WASHINGTON - The government owns hundreds of underground fuel tanks — many designed for emergencies back in the Cold War — that need to be inspected for leaks of hazardous substances that could be making local water undrinkable. The Federal Emergency Management Agency has known since at least the 1990s that tanks under its supervision around the country could be leaking fuel into soil and groundwater, according to Associated Press interviews and research. The agency knows of at least 150 underground tanks that need to be inspected for leaks, according to spokeswoman Debbie Wing. FEMA also is trying to determine by September whether an additional 124 tanks are underground or above ground and whether they are leaking. There has been no documentation of reported leaks or harm to communities from the FEMA tanks, Wing said, although former agency officials and congressional testimony suggest that the federal tanks have long been

seen as a problem. Many of these tanks were built to store 5,000 gallons of diesel fuel and placed around the country at the height of the Cold War back in the 1960s to fuel electric generators that could sustain emergency broadcasts by radio stations in case of a nuclear attack or other catastrophe.

Made of steel, the tanks inevitably rust over time and allow fuel to escape . Steel tanks left in the ground for decades

rot like Swiss cheese, said Pat Coyne, director of business development for Environmental Data Resources Inc. Coyne said a joke in the industry is: "What percentage of steel tanks leak? 100 percent!" In the late 1980s and early 1990s the government insisted on better-made tanks. The underground tanks of today must have safety measures including leak detection and an extra shell made with material resistant to gasoline, diesel and ethanol, Coyne said. The FEMA tanks are part of a larger problem. More than 500,000 leaking storage tanks — most of which are filled with fuel and oil — are buried across the country, according to Environmental Data Resources, based in Milford, Conn. That's about half of all the underground tanks in the country, the consulting company says. Those tanks are owned privately or by

local, state and federal agencies. Because they're underground, leaking tanks can go undetected for years. If diesel leaks into drinking water, affected people could be at a higher risk of cancer, kidney damage and nervous system disorders ,

said Rochelle Cardinale, one of the lead coordinators for underground tank cleanup in Iowa. A gallon of fuel can contaminate 1 million

gallons of water . FEMA says the hundreds of federal tanks have not always been its responsibility. The Federal Communications Commission also has

had oversight, although FCC spokesman Clyde Ensslin said the commission believed FEMA was responsible for monitoring and maintaining the tanks. FEMA said it spent $8 million in the 1990s removing and repairing some of them. FEMA now acknowledges that it is the agency responsible for all of the tanks in question. But Senate testimony from 1992 suggests FEMA has long tried to avoid having to deal with the tanks. "For years FEMA resisted acknowledging the problem or seeking funds for remediation," former FEMA union president Leo Bosner said in 1992 before a Senate Appropriations subcommittee. He said then there were more than 2,000 underground oil storage tanks that FEMA had paid for or acquired over the years. But FEMA came out with a legal opinion that year concluding that it wasn't responsible for the tanks. Congress eventually decided it didn't matter which agency owned the tanks — FEMA would fund tank inspection, removal and replacement, said Bill Cumming, who at the time ran FEMA's ethics program. FEMA did eventually receive reports about leaking tanks, said Jane Bullock, who was the agency's chief of staff in the Clinton administration. Many of FEMA's out-of-use fuel tanks today have yet to be inspected because officials only recently finished going through decades of paperwork from the different federal agencies that at one point participated in the emergency broadcasting program. "We are committed to upholding our obligations to remediate, remove or upgrade them as necessary," FEMA spokesman Dan Stoneking told the AP. "We believe in adhering to any relevant environmental rule or law and will do so." FEMA disclosed the problems to the EPA in August 2007, a step that could lead to reduced penalties against FEMA. In May, the EPA formally requested information about the status of the tanks. FEMA said it now oversees 1,129 defunct tanks — including the hundreds that

could be leaking — many of which were inherited from the FCC and the Civil Defense Preparedness Agency. Recently FEMA found the location of most of the defunct tanks by looking through old records. To determine the tanks' conditions requires a physical inspection, and agency contractors have been going to each location and searching with hand-held metal detectors and other tools. FEMA will determine what to do with the defunct tanks — such as remove them or fill them with sand — on a case-by-case basis, because of varying state laws. FEMA would not provide the exact location of the tanks, and it has not contacted all the states about the tanks in question. Florida officials, for instance, did not know about these out-of-use tanks in their state. A 2005 law required all federal agencies to submit an inventory to Congress and the EPA of all the tanks they owned or operated, and whether the tanks were in compliance with the law. The inventory was pushed by private gasoline retailers who long have argued that they were being targeted for violations by a government that wasn't following its own rules. In the 1960s the federal government gave fuel tanks and generators to radio stations across the country so that vital information could be broadcast during an emergency. The program was managed by the FCC in some parts of the country, and elsewhere by the former Civil Defense Preparedness Agency. Broadcast stations volunteered for the program, and by 1979 about 700 stations participated. When FEMA was created in 1979 it took over programs run by the civil defense agency. Broadcast stations began to drop out of the program and funding was slowly eliminated between 1987 and 1994. FEMA manages fewer tanks now because of new broadcast technology and a realignment of oversight responsibilities to states. Now FEMA oversees only 38 in-use underground tanks that are being maintained to comply with EPA rules. These tanks are used for broadcast stations and to fuel generators to keep emergency operations centers running during a disaster.

2nc turns case

2nc turns economyCuts threaten the program and the LUST Trust stimulates the economy NACS 4/19 – National Association of Convenience Stores, an international trade association for convenience and fuel retailing representing more than 2,100 retail and 1,600 supplier company members (19 April 2012, “Washington Report: NACS, PMAA and SIGMA Blast Congress for Raiding LUST Trust Fund,” NACS, http://www.nacsonline.com/NACS/News/Daily/Pages/ND0419122.aspx)

“Congress has once again missed an opportunity to demonstrate fiscal responsibility and help your communities and

constituents by funding cleanup projects, bringing these unused land resources back into the economy and employing potentially thousands of workers in your state. Further, by raiding the trust fund and reducing future resources generated by the fee, you threaten to weaken the very program designed to prevent future contamination. “Again, we urge you to reject any efforts that divert resources from the LUST Trust Fund for non-tank related purposes and to support funding of this program to clean up contaminated lands, put people back to work and help this economy grow.”

2nc housing marketLUSTs crush the housing marketHarvey, 02 (William C. Harvey II, Appraisal Institute, September 12, 2002, “The Erosion of Communities and Home Valuesby Leaking Underground Storage Tanks,” Testimony before the Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity, House Committee on Financial Services, http://www.appraisalinstitute.org/newsadvocacy/downloads/ltrs_tstmny/2Fnl_Harvey_Tstimny.pdf, Hensel)

I want to thank you for holding this hearing. As we have witnessed in communities in many parts of the country, leaking underground storage tanks can have a wide-ranging impact on the health and productivity of our citizens and the economic condition of our communities. The Appraisal Institute has had a great deal of experience and expertise with this issue. The Appraisal Institute has developed and continually teaches seminars relating to environmental issues impacting the value of real estate 1. The Appraisal Institute has also published numerous academic articles addressing this issue. In addition, the Appraisal Institute has published a book entitled, Environmental Site Assessments and Their Impact on Property Value: The Appraiser’s Role, which is viewed as the authoritative publication on the issue of valuation of contaminated properties. A vast network of federal, state and local laws and regulations define the natural and man-made conditions that constitute environmental liabilities affecting property

values. Natural areas to be protected include wetlands, aquifer replenishment areas, and habitats for endangered or threatened species. Man-made liabilities may be indicated by the presence of leaking underground storage tanks, asbestos, PCBs or other hazardous materials. While real estate appraisers are not expected to be experts in the detection or measurement of hazardous substances, like buyers and sellers in the open market, real estate appraisers must often rely on the advice of others. It is the responsibility of appraisers to analyze the impact of the hazardous materials on the value of the property being appraised. With this, the roles and responsibilities of real estate appraisers in detecting, measuring, and considering environmental substances affecting a property are set forth in Advisory Opinion 9 of the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice and Guide Note 9 of the Appraisal Institute’s Guide Notes to the Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice. These standards are commonly accepted and used by real estate appraisers throughout the United States. Specifically, I am here to address the issues of valuing pre-contaminated property and the effect of contamination from leaking underground storage tanks on a housing market. Appraising contaminated property in its pre-contaminated condition requires that the appraiser invoke a hypothetical condition that the property is free of contamination and clearly indicate such in any report. Three categories of effective appraisal dates—retrospective, current, or perspective—may then be used, according to the purpose and function of the appraisal assignment. A retrospective appraisal occurs when the effective appraisal date is prior to the date of the report. This type of appraisal is most commonly developed for purposes of estate administration, condemnation proceedings, and litigation to recover damages. Since a retrospective appraisal is complicated by the fact that the appraiser knows what has occurred in the market after the effective appraisal date, it is critical that the appraiser establish a logical cutoff date for the consideration of subsequent data that no longer reflects the relevant market. While this can be a difficult determination to make, studying the market conditions as of the effective appraisal date will aid the appraiser in judging where to make this cut-off. The effective appraisal date should be considered as the cut-off date for data considered by the appraiser, absent evidence that data subsequent to the effective appraisal date were consistent with the market expectations at that time. Once the context of the appraisal is established, a retrospective appraisal is developed like any other appraisal through the proper development of the applicable approaches to value that are typically used to value vacant land and improved property. The reliability of an appraisal relates to the extent to which the valuation process yields the same results on repeated trials. To that end, retrospective appraisals can be as reliable as any other appraisal so long as a complete appraisal process is utilized. In developing a complete appraisal, the appraiser will use all applicable valuation procedures and the value conclusion will reflect all known information relative to the subject property, market conditions, and available data. By contrast, in a limited appraisal, the appraiser and client agree before the commencement of the assignment that the appraiser will not use all applicable valuation procedures, or that the value conclusion will not reflect all known information about the subject property, market conditions, and available data. Thus, to ensure the highest level of reliability, the process should involve a complete appraisal. On the issue of impact on the affected housing market, my personal experience in appraising properties affected by environmental contamination varies from single residences with minor onsite releases to

communities comprised of hundred of homes sitting atop large plumes of hazardous materials. Notwithstanding the differences in the case studies, the effects on value generally followed what has become known as the Detrimental Condition (DC) Model. 2 This model, a copy of which is attached hereto, graphically illustrates the fundamental effects that environmental contamination can have on local housing markets. While the DC Model includes all possible stages, each detrimental condition must be analyzed on a case-by-case basis because of the potential for a variety of impacts on value during the property’s life cycle. The first step with any detrimental

condition analysis is to consider the unimpaired value of the property as if there is no detrimental condition. This is reflected as Point A on the model. Upon the occurrence or more likely, discovery of the detrimental condition, the value may fall to Point B, if the facts and market data support such a decline. The value during this period is often the lowest, and in some instances the property is unmarketable until the magnitude of the detrimental condition can be ascertained. Nevertheless, in a retrospective appraisal where all assessment, remediation, and ongoing issues are studied, a reliable determination of Point B can be made. Four stages of recovery generally occur along the time continuum. The assessment stage involves the empirical analysis of the detrimental condition, which usually results in a simple increase to Point C after greater awareness of the problem becomes known. If remediation is required, the value will generally increase upon its completion, as reflected by Point D. Point E reflects the value of the property during the ongoing stage when aftermath issues such as monitoring and continuing maintenance costs can be encountered. The last recovery stage recognizes that market resistance or risk may continue to impact the value of the property, which, like any value issue, can have a variety of impacts. Therefore, Point F is reflected with multiple arrows to illustrate the variety of stigma that may result. While the DC Model suggests an orderly

process, each detrimental condition must be analyzed on a case-by-case basis due to the variety of impacts on value. Although my experience has shown that no two cases are alike, the analysis of environmental contamination should begin with the DC Model. Thank you for this opportunity to testify. I am pleased to answer any questions you may have.

LUSTs crush the housing marketHarvey, 02 (William C. Harvey II, Appraisal Institute, September 12, 2002, “The Erosion of Communities and Home Valuesby Leaking Underground Storage Tanks,” Testimony before the Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity, House Committee on Financial Services, http://www.appraisalinstitute.org/newsadvocacy/downloads/ltrs_tstmny/2Fnl_Harvey_Tstimny.pdf, Hensel)

I want to thank you for holding this hearing. As we have witnessed in communities in many parts of the country, leaking underground storage tanks can have a wide-ranging impact on the health and productivity of our citizens and the economic condition of our communities. The Appraisal Institute has had a great deal of experience and expertise with this issue. The Appraisal Institute has developed and continually teaches seminars relating to environmental issues impacting the value of real estate 1. The Appraisal Institute has also published numerous academic articles addressing this issue. In addition, the Appraisal Institute has published a book entitled, Environmental Site Assessments and Their Impact on Property Value: The Appraiser’s Role, which is viewed as the authoritative publication on the issue of valuation of contaminated properties. A vast network of federal, state and local laws and regulations define the natural and man-made conditions that constitute environmental liabilities affecting property

values. Natural areas to be protected include wetlands, aquifer replenishment areas, and habitats for endangered or threatened species. Man-made liabilities may be indicated by the presence of leaking underground storage tanks, asbestos, PCBs or other hazardous materials. While real estate appraisers are not expected to be experts in the detection or measurement of hazardous substances, like buyers and sellers in the open market, real estate appraisers must often rely on the advice of others. It is the responsibility of appraisers to analyze the impact of the hazardous materials on the value of the property being appraised. With this, the roles and responsibilities of real estate appraisers in detecting, measuring, and considering environmental substances affecting a property are set forth in Advisory Opinion 9 of the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice and Guide Note 9 of the Appraisal Institute’s Guide Notes to the Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice. These standards are commonly accepted and used by real estate appraisers throughout the United States. Specifically, I am here to address the issues of valuing pre-contaminated property and the effect of contamination from leaking underground storage tanks on a housing market. Appraising contaminated property in its pre-contaminated condition requires that the appraiser invoke a hypothetical condition that the property is free of contamination and clearly indicate such in any report. Three categories of effective appraisal dates—retrospective, current, or perspective—may then be used, according to the purpose and function of the appraisal assignment. A retrospective appraisal occurs when the effective appraisal date is prior to the date of the report. This type of appraisal is most commonly developed for purposes of estate administration, condemnation proceedings, and litigation to recover damages. Since a retrospective appraisal is complicated by the fact that the appraiser knows what has occurred in the market after the effective appraisal date, it is critical that the appraiser establish a logical cutoff date for the consideration of subsequent data that no longer reflects the relevant market. While this can be a difficult determination to make, studying the market conditions as of the effective appraisal date will aid the appraiser in judging where to make this cut-off. The effective appraisal date should be considered as the cut-off date for data considered by the appraiser, absent evidence that data subsequent to the effective appraisal date were consistent with the market expectations at that time. Once the context of the appraisal is established, a retrospective appraisal is developed like any other appraisal through the proper development of the applicable approaches to value that are typically used to value vacant land and improved property. The reliability of an appraisal relates to the extent to which the valuation process yields the same results on repeated trials. To that end, retrospective appraisals can be as reliable as any other appraisal so long as a complete appraisal process is utilized. In developing a complete appraisal, the appraiser will use all applicable valuation procedures and the value conclusion will reflect all known information relative to the subject property, market conditions, and available data. By contrast, in a limited appraisal, the appraiser and client agree before the commencement of the assignment that the appraiser will not use all applicable valuation procedures, or that the value conclusion will not reflect all known information about the subject property, market conditions, and available data. Thus, to ensure the highest level of reliability, the process should involve a complete appraisal. On the issue of impact on the affected housing market, my personal experience in appraising properties affected by environmental contamination varies from single residences with minor onsite releases to

communities comprised of hundred of homes sitting atop large plumes of hazardous materials. Notwithstanding the differences in the case studies, the effects on value generally followed what has become known as the Detrimental Condition (DC) Model. 2 This model, a copy of which is attached hereto, graphically illustrates the fundamental effects that environmental contamination can have on local housing markets. While the DC Model includes all possible stages, each detrimental condition must be analyzed on a case-by-case basis because of the potential for a variety of impacts on value during the property’s life cycle. The first step with any detrimental

condition analysis is to consider the unimpaired value of the property as if there is no detrimental condition. This is reflected as Point A on the model. Upon the occurrence or more likely, discovery of the detrimental condition, the value may fall to Point B, if the facts and market data support such a decline. The value during this period is often the lowest, and in some instances the property is unmarketable until the magnitude of the detrimental condition can be ascertained. Nevertheless, in a retrospective appraisal where all assessment, remediation, and ongoing issues are studied, a reliable determination of Point B can be made. Four stages of recovery generally occur along the time continuum. The assessment stage involves the empirical analysis of the detrimental condition, which usually results in a simple increase to Point C after greater awareness of the problem becomes known. If remediation is required, the value will generally increase upon its completion, as reflected by Point D. Point E reflects the value of the property during the ongoing stage when aftermath issues such as monitoring and continuing maintenance costs can be encountered. The last recovery stage recognizes that market resistance or risk may continue to impact the value of the property, which, like any value issue, can have a variety of impacts. Therefore, Point F is reflected with multiple arrows to illustrate the variety of stigma that may result. While the DC Model suggests an orderly

process, each detrimental condition must be analyzed on a case-by-case basis due to the variety of impacts on value. Although my experience has shown that no two cases are alike, the analysis of environmental contamination should begin with the DC Model. Thank you for this opportunity to testify. I am pleased to answer any questions you may have.

The Housing Market’s key to the economy – reverse causalFederal Reserve, 12 (Yeah, them, January 4, 2012, “The U.S. Housing Market: Current Conditions and Policy Considerations,” http://federalreserve.gov/publications/other-reports/files/housing-white-paper-20120104.pdf, Hensel)

The ongoing problems in the U.S. housing market continue to impede the economic recovery. House prices have fallen an average of about 33 percent from their 2006 peak, resulting in about $7 trillion in household wealth losses and an associated ratcheting down of aggregate consumption. At the same time, an

unprecedented number of households have lost, or are on the verge of losing, their homes. The extraordinary problems plaguing the housing market reflect in part the effect of weak demand due to high unemployment and heightened uncertainty. But the problems also reflect three key forces originating from within the housing market itself: a persistent excess supply of vacant homes on the market, many of which stem from foreclosures; a marked and potentially long-term downshift in the supply of mortgage credit; and the costs that an often unwieldy and inefficient foreclosure process imposes on homeowners, lenders, and communities. Looking forward, continued weakness in the housing market poses a significant barrier to a more vigorous economic recovery. Of course, some of the weakness is related to poor labor market conditions, which will take time to be resolved. At the same time, there is scope for policymakers to take action along three dimensions that could ease some of the pressures afflicting the housing market. In particular, policies could be considered that would help moderate the inflow of properties into the large inventory of unsold homes, remove some of the obstacles preventing creditworthy borrowers from accessing mortgage credit, and limit the number of homeowners who find themselves pushed into an inefficient and overburdened foreclosure pipeline. Some steps already being taken or proposed in these

areas will be discussed below. Taking these issues in turn, the large inventory of foreclosed or surrendered properties is contributing to excess supply in the for-sale market, placing downward pressure on house prices and exacerbating the loss in aggregate housing wealth. At the same time, rental markets are strengthening in some areas of the country, reflecting in part a decline in the homeownership rate. Reducing some of the barriers to converting foreclosed properties to rental units will help redeploy the existing stock of houses in a more efficient way. Such conversions might also increase lenders' eventual recoveries on foreclosed and surrendered properties. Obstacles limiting access to mortgage credit even among creditworthy borrowers contribute to weakness in housing demand, and barriers to refinancing blunt the

transmission of monetary policy to the household sector. Further attention to easing some of these obstacles could contribute to the gradual recovery in housing markets and thus help speed the overall economic recovery.

It destroys real estate – municipalities won’t take responsibilityPage and Rabinowitz, 93 (G. William, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Planning, University of Buffalo, the State University of New York *AND Harvey, former professor, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Autumn 1993, “Groundwater contamination: Its effects on property values and cities,” American Planning Association, Journal of the American Planning Association Volume 59, Issue 4, ProQuest, Hensel)

The cases show that groundwater contamination significantly influenced the value of commercial and industrial property (see Table 1).(Table 1 omitted) Documentation of the phenomenon is difficult, however, because of the sensitivity of realtors and purchasers to the issue and to their legal liability (Rabinowitz and Page 1991). The liability issue caught financial institutions off guard. The resolution of United States v. Maryland Bank and Trust(1986) and other cases established that lending institutions could be held liable for the cleanup of contaminated property obtained through foreclosure. For example, in 1990 financial institutions stopped loaning money for real estate purchases in a twenty-eight square mile area in Tucson, Arizona, because they were concerned that they might be held liable for the cleanup of a contaminated Superfund site (Harrison 1991). After several months the secondary markets adjusted to the risk of liability and resumed making loans. Financial institutions now routinely use a due diligence process during underwriting to scrutinize commercial loan applications for contamination liability. New Jersey's Environmental Cleanup Responsibility Act (ECRA) links the sale or transfer of many commercial and industrial properties to testing for contaminants and compliance with environmental laws and can require remedial action to clean up soil and

groundwater contamination before a sale is completed. The industrial case study properties are abandoned industrial properties, known as temporarily obsolete abandoned derelict sites (TOADS), with serious toxic chemical contamination of

the groundwater . Cities and other local governments face a potential crisis in dealing with TOADS (Greenberg et al. 1990; 1992). Some local

governments that have taken tax delinquent property in lieu of taxes have had to pay twenty times the value of the property to clean up contamination on the site (Rabinowitz and Page 1991). Consequently, some cities, in fear of direct liability or involvement in a third-party lawsuit to pay for cleanup costs, have stopped taking tax delinquent contaminated properties, if not required to by the state. These properties are in a state of limbo. In 1992, the City of Milwaukee listed 175 sites that it refused to acquire in lieu of taxes owned (Schwab 1992). The list included some large industrial production sites, but primarily small parcels that formerly housed gas

stations and dry cleaners. Small sites may contain as much or more contamination as large properties . In almost

all cases previous owners could not afford cleanup costs . The city estimates a potential cleanup cost of 30 million to $40 million

dollars for these properties. The small sites, often in established neighborhoods, must be made secure, tested, and remediated.

Even when municipalities take ownership of the property, they may decide not to fence off contaminated properties to protect the public because that action may constitute " active management " of the site and thereby

make them liable for the cleanup costs even if they were not responsible for causing the pollution .

Municipalities face a profound dilemma. Children may be playing on abandoned, tax delinquent, and contaminated sites known to threaten their health, but the city refuses to take the property in lieu of taxes or fence it because of legal and financial considerations. The research revealed several cases of this serious problem, especially in older industrial cities. The EPA is developing guidelines that will clarify federal policy, but not exempt municipalities entirely from liability (Schneider 1991).

Groundwater contamination raises property tax rates – that destroys commercial developmentPage and Rabinowitz, 93 (G. William, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Planning, University of Buffalo, the State University of New York *AND Harvey, former professor, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Autumn 1993, “Groundwater contamination: Its effects on property values and cities,” American Planning Association, Journal of the American Planning Association Volume 59, Issue 4, ProQuest, Hensel)

Toxic chemical contamination of groundwater presents real costs to society. The case studies suggest that not all real estate markets reflect these costs. The commercial and industrial property markets are quickly adjusting to include the additional cost of groundwater contamination in

the value of property. Residential property markets, however, ignore groundwater contamination. When the real estate markets ignore the cost of groundwater contamination, society as a whole is left with the costs of contamination rather than assessing those costs to the property with the contamination. The fear of liability for expensive remediation of

toxic chemical contamination of groundwater may explain why the real estate market does not fully reflect the costs. The assignment of liability for

groundwater contamination under commercial and industrial properties is well established and well known. Thus, groundwater contamination has a direct impact on real estate values for commercial and industrial properties . Liability for groundwater contamination under residential properties when the owner did not cause the contamination is not well established in practice, although owners could be found liable in court. The lack of impact of groundwater contamination on the real estate values of residential properties suggests that the liability guidelines established by

CERCLA are affecting property values to a greater extent than actual groundwater contamination. This research has many implications for public policy. The largest municipalities have most of the country's industry and contamination. These municipalities must contend with the dilemma of limbo properties that pose a threat to public health and reduce

property tax revenues . Municipalities are bearing the costs of managing and testing a large number of potentially contaminated

properties, the costs of remediation of the sites that contain contamination, and the burden of reduced tax assessments on contaminated properties. This latter factor, which is just now surfacing in court cases (Bass vs. the Tax Commission of the City of New York,

1991), may result in higher property tax rates as a result of a lower tax base, which when combined with the stigma

of contamination, is not conducive to attracting additional development . Municipalities need relief from liability for contamination that

they did not cause. Policies and a legal system that prevent cities from protecting the health of children from known risks are perverse. Some cities have lost a large portion of their tax base because of groundwater contamination . For example, the Gilbert and Mosely

Superfund site in Wichita, Kansas, contaminated the groundwater of an eight square mile area of the central business district. The owners of properties with contaminated groundwater are legally considered "potentially responsible parties." The properties constitute 7 percent of Wichita's tax base . Wichita's tax assessor reduced the assessed value of these properties 40 percent because of the groundwater contamination (Efflandt 1991). While few cities have such a large

portion of their tax base affected by groundwater contamination, some loss is common. Wichita created a tax incremental financing district for the affected downtown property to finance the remedial cleanup of the contaminated groundwater. This innovative approach holds considerable promise as a means of financing expensive groundwater contamination cleanup. Jurisdictions need to generate initiatives to protect groundwater from contamination and to protect innocent buyers of residential property from liability for contamination. Real estate professionals are legally responsible for alerting potential buyers of problems such as groundwater

contamination, but few professionals are well informed about contamination or liability issues, jurisdictions need to introduce procedures to make real estate agents, property appraisers, and lenders more aware of contamination issues and their potential liability (Dornfest 1991). States need to pass legislation that requires all wells be tested for a range of toxic chemicals and the results made available to potential buyers before the property can

be sold. Better measures of the costs of groundwater contamination may induce policy changes that promote groundwater protection. The sole source aquifer protection program and the wellhead protection program, both designed to protect groundwater, are seriously underfunded. At present, national policy is

directed toward remedial action to cleanup contaminated groundwater. Protecting groundwater from contamination is a more effective and less costly course of action. Prevention is required in tandem with the cleanup of existing contamination.

2nc normal meansat – plan is general revenue/capital expenditure

Prefer link evidence over abstract definitions of investment – empirically, new transportation funding comes from the HTFNew spending won’t come from the general revenueCohen 10 – Executive Director of the Prevention Institute, (Larry, “AAA: Their Policies should be as Good as their Service. A conversation between Larry Cohen and Dick Jackson,” http://www.preventioninstitute.org/about-us/lp/495--aaa-their-policies-should-be-as-good-as-their-service-a-conversation-between-larry-cohen-and-dick-jackson.html)Larry Cohen: "This statement from Gagnon just seems to contradict the claims AAA makes on their website about their support for multi-modal transportation

opportunities. Even if he only speaks for the Mid-Atlantic region, AAA needs to clarify its stance. Diverting Highway Trust Fund money

away from alternative modes of transportation would be disastrous, and would place yet another burden on those who don't have access to a car, which are often the same people who don't have grocery stores, businesses, and jobs within walking distance of their homes. The reality is that alternative transportation

programs would experience deep cuts without the Highway Trust Fund. Transportation is the seventh largest federal expenditure and the largest chunk of money transferred directly to communities for community planning, design, and renovation. AAA M-A should know

that there is no way these programs would get the same funding from government general revenues . Don't you think Gagnon's comments are a little reckless?"

Even if the plan is general revenue, that still triggers the link – Congress raids the HTF to support the general revenueThe Newspaper 5 (“Billions in Highway Taxes Diverted to General Spending,” http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/14/1494.asp)

Billions of dollars collected from motorists from gasoline taxes, tolls, and registration fees are being diverted by state and local governments into uses that have nothing to do with roads and highways. According to the latest figures from the Federal Highway Administration, motorists gave state and local government $40.3 billion in 2005 for the ability to drive and own a vehicle. Gasoline taxes accounted for $20.5 billion in revenue while registration fees and miscellaneous taxes generated $13.5 billion. State and local toll roads also collected

$6.4 billion from motorists. After accounting for administration and overhead, $28.5 billion remained for all fifty

states to spend in 2005. Of this amount, only $13 billion was spent on state and local road construction and

maintenance. A total of $8.9 billion of motorists' money was diverted into unrelated uses . A total of $1.4 billion went to

mass transit and $7.5 billion was used for social spending . The remaining amount went to related uses such as

paying down transportation debt and funding highway law enforcement.

Comes from HTF

U.S. Federal News 6/29(“Congress Passes Highway, Transit Bill,” pg online @ http://www.governing.com/news/federal/gov-congress-releases-details-of-transportation-legislation.html //um-ef)

Congress has finally passed a bill authorizing federal spending on highways and transit for the next two years, just a day before the current legislation was set to expire. It's legislation that's more than two-and-a-half years in the making. SAFETEA-LU -- the previous version of the legislation -- expired in September 2009, and Congress has passed nine temporary extensions since then to keep the country's transportation programs afloat. On Friday afternoon, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the transportation authorization bill on a 373-52 vote. Shortly afterwards, the U.S. Senate passed the legislation 74-19. The bills were part of a package included with legislation that prevented student loan rate increases. The sentiment among most stakeholders is that while the legislation wasn't particularly ambitious -- it fails to substantively increase funding for transportation, and it relies on what many call accounting gimmicks to provide the funding that's there -- it's better than allowing the legislation to expire. As recently as last week, some legislators, stakeholders and advocates believed the legislation was at risk of dying, as it appeared negotiators on a conference committee might not reach agreement. "People did not think this was possible," Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) said on the floor of the Senate after the legislation passed. The previous longstanding uncertainty about transportation legislation had caused endless frustration for state and local leaders, who said the nine stopgap extensions made it difficult to conduct long-range planning for big infrastructure projects, since they didn't know how much federal funding to expect in the future. Relief is now in sight. Highlights of the legislation include provisions to streamline the federal approval process of transportation infrastructure projects and consolidate the number of highway programs by two-thirds in a move that's being praised as a way to reduce red tape and promote efficiency. The legislation also gives "categorical exclusions" to

some types of projects that exempt them from the full force of federal environmental regulations. That includes repairs to infrastructure damaged in emergencies, work being done in some existing rights-of-way, and projects that get a low percentage of federal funding. Environmentalists don't like those reforms, but state highway programs will likely enjoy less red tape and delays as they pursue projects. The bill does not include approval of the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, which House Republicans had hoped to include. “This agreement will help strengthen our nation’s construction industry and provide stability to highway, bridge and infrastructure projects across the country," said Rep. John Mica (R-Fla.), who chairs the U.S. House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, in a statement earlier this week when it became clear the legislation was poised to pass. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), who chairs the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said the agreement "provides stability and flexibility

for the nation's transportation planners, invests in America's crumbling roads and bridges, and puts people back to work." The legislation doesn't increase federal gas taxes, and legislators never seriously considered doing so, even though it's a step most experts believe is necessary to protect the long-term solvency of the Highway Trust Fund,

which helps fund the federal government's transportation spending.

Comes from HTFYglesias 2k11(“Will The Federal Gasoline Tax Be Grover Norquist’s Next Hostage?, Forslund again)

With the debt ceiling controversy all but resolved, and hostage-taking once again proven to be an effective strategy for achieving conservative policy goals, Washington is wondering what the next fight will be. Byron Tau and Ben Smith in Politico plausibly speculate that the scheduled September 30

sunset of the federal gasoline tax may be the culprit. The gas tax, in addition to serving important environmental goals, is the means by which the federal government finances investments in transportation infrastructure . Traditionally, reauthorizing the tax for that purpose has been uncontroversial (though the idea of raising it to finance needed infrastructure upgrades hasn’t been) but in this day and age everything could be on the table and Tau & Smith report that Grover Norquist seems to be at least considering the idea: “In general, ATR has always supported the idea of ending the federal tax on gas and having states pay for their own roads,” Norquist told POLITICO, but he declined to say whether he or his group plans to pressure congressional Republicans to let the excise tax expire. “ATR would love to help begin such a dialogue,” he said. “We’re monitoring the situation. I think that everyone on the Hill and most outside groups are pretty focused on the nation’s debt crisis,” said Barney Keller, spokesman for the conservative Club For Growth, who also wouldn’t say whether his group wants the tax to expire. There’s no denying that the gas tax is a tax, so in that sense it’s difficult to see why anti-tax groups wouldn’t argue against its reauthorization. More broadly, the traditional reason reauthorization has been uncontroversial is that neither Republicans nor Democrats wanted to see infrastructure spending fall to $0 so nobody was willing to use the gas tax as leverage for concessions. But by the same token, the traditional reason the debt ceiling hasn’t been used as leverage for concessions is that neither Republicans nor Democrats wanted to see the country default. This summer, however, the world has learned that Republican leaders can simultaneously agree that the debt ceiling needed to be raised while also demanding major policy concessions in exchange for agreeing to raise it. Transportation Committee Chairman John Mica (R-FL) is already pushing a transportation bill that will starve the country’s infrastructure and devastate job creation in both the short- and long-term. If the gas tax becomes a new hostage, the situation will only get worse.

at – other funds tradeoff

HTF is the principal source of funding Siggerud 6 – Director of Physical Infrastructure Issues, Government Accountability Office (Katherine, 4 April 2006, “Highway Trust Fund: Overview of Highway Trust Fund Estimates,” GAO, http://www.gao.gov/assets/120/113356.pdf)

The Highway Trust Fund is the principal mechanism for funding federal highway and transit programs through receipts from excise taxes charged to highway users, such as taxes on motor fuels. The Department of Treasury (Treasury) and the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) each prepare estimates of future receipts for the Highway Trust Fund semiannually. Treasury's receipt estimates are combined with the Department of Transportation's

(DOT) estimates of outlays to create an estimate of the Highway Trust Fund balance for the President's Budget; CBO also projects outlays to develop an estimate of the fund balance. The agencies’ most recent estimates show that the Highway Account within the Highway Trust Fund could have a negative balance as early as 2009, raising concerns about whether funding for federal highway programs—which were recently authorized by the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users—will continue to be met. Consequently, the Subcommittee asked us to review and compare recent estimates made by Treasury and CBO. This testimony provides information on how (1) estimates are used to provide key information about the Highway Trust Fund, (2) the most recent Highway Trust Fund estimates—based on receipt estimates made by Treasury and CBO—compare, and (3) Treasury’s and CBO’s estimates compare to actual receipts for recent years.

at – states solve

States and other agencies can’t pick up the slackNACS 2/3 – National Association of Convenience Stores, an international trade association for convenience and fuel retailing representing more than 2,100 retail and 1,600 supplier company members (3 February 2012, “Washington Report: NACS to Senate: Hands Off LUST Fund,” NACS, http://www.nacsonline.com/NACS/News/Daily/Pages/ND0203121.aspx)

Keep the federal Leaking Underground Storage Tank (LUST) program intact, NACS is asking the Senate Finance Committee. The association sent a letter to the committee yesterday, urging them to not transfer $3 billion from LUST to the highway trust fund. “In order for States to comply with the multitude of new requirements enacted in the EPAct, States must receive significant funding from the Federal program. If States do not receive such funding, they will be unable to comply and will lose funding from the Federal government, which would then return enforcement back to the Federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Unfortunately they also lack the appropriate funding and resources to effectively enforce the regulations,” the letter stated.

at – cuts now

LUST funding was preserved and guaranteed NDPMA 12 – ND Petroleum Marketers Association (June 2012, “CONGRESS AGREES TO 27-MONTH HIGHWAY BILL An Important Win for Marketers on Wetlines,” NDPMA News, http://www.ndpetroleum.org/Information/June%202012%20Petroleum%20News.pdf)On June 28, House and Senate negotiators signed off on a deal to extend highway programs for 27 months. The highway bill conference agreement could be merged with a student loan bill and flood insurance legislation which are currently pending on the Senate floor. All three combined bills are expected to pass tomorrow or into

the weekend. The highway bill agreement would maintain funding at current levels through the end of fiscal year 2014. PMAA successfully lobbied for a provision which will prevent the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) from arbitrarily adopting costly new "wetlines" retrofit rules for trucks and trailers owned by marketers. The important provision calls for a "wetlines" study and cost benefit analysis requiring

the Secretary of Transportation to coordinate with an independent non-partisan organization before the rule can be finalized. Fortunately, the final conference agreement doesn’t completely raid the leaking underground storage tank (LUST) trust fund as originally proposed. The final deal now takes $2.4 billion from the fund and doesn’t divert future LUST revenues by taking one-third of the .001 LUST tax to pay for the 27 month extension as many in Congress originally supported. Earlier this year, the Senate passed their highway bill which would have taken $3.1 billion from the LUST fund and diverted future LUST revenues to pay for the highway bill. PMAA argued that if states didn’t receive the LUST money, then state agencies would be forced to look for other ways to pay for state UST programs such as increasing UST fees on marketers. PMAA will continue to urge lawmakers to appropriate adequate LUST funding and use the fund for its intended purpose.

Previous cuts just eliminated surplus Bolton 6/26 – Staff writer for The Hill (Alexander, 26 June 2012, “Leaders Say Congress Close to Deal on Student Loans and Transportation Bills,” RYO Filling Station, http://ryofillingstation.com/pdfs/RYO%20FEDERAL%20News%20Clips%2006.27.12.pdf)

A transfer from the Leaking Underground Storage Tank Trust Fund: $3.685 billion. TCS approves of this use of funds, since they come from the gas tax and are underspent at a three-to-one ratio. This transfer just eliminates most of the backlogged surplus.

at – raising taxes solvesNo new taxes in this political environment Schulz and Berman 7/9 – Contributing Editor, Logistics Management Magazine; Group News Editor, Logistics Management Magazine (John; Jeff, 9 July 2012, “Obama officially signs MAP-21 into law, Logistics Management, http://www.logisticsmgmt.com/article/obama_officially_signs_map-21_into_law/)

The balance of the trust fund was expected to be $5.5 billion by Sept. 30, the end of fiscal year 2012 ,

compared with $14.3 billion in 2011, according to a March CBO estimate. The main funding mechanism is the federal tax on

motor fuels—18.4 cents on gasoline, 23.4 cents on diesel—which has been unchanged since 1993. There is no appetite on either side of the aisle to raise those taxes in an election year A report from Ken Orski, publisher of Innovation News Briefs, said that the $118 billion bill is funded through $105.2 billion bill in obligation authority for FY 2013-14 adding that the bill supplements the Highway Trust Fund (HTF) with an $18.8B transfer from the general fund and an additional $2.4B transfer from the LUST (Leaking Underground Storage Tank) Trust Fund.

at – not zero sum

HTF is zero-sum- new programs trade-off and open the fund up to spending cuts Heymsfield 11 Former Staff Director of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure (David, 22 February 2011, “Let the Games Begin,” National Journal, http://transportation.nationaljournal.com/2011/02/transforming-the-highway-trust.php)

Currently the Trust Fund covers most federal programs for highways, transit, motor carrier safety, and highway safety. The budget proposes adding a number of programs, most significantly Amtrak, high-speed rail, and an infrastructure fund. The proposal does not appear to contemplate anything approaching unlimited discretion for the Administration to allocate the fund’s revenues to different modes. Rather, the proposal appears to contemplate continuation of the current Trust Fund structure in which spending from the fund must be within the context of a specific program established by the fund such as the National Highway System program or the Urbanized Area Formula program for transit. Most of these programs are limited to one mode, and use formulas to determine how much of the funding goes to each State. Another feature of the current system is that the States are given some discretion to “flex” their formula funding from one program to another (including flexing some funds between highway and transit programs). In the existing structure there are

only few programs in which the Administration has discretion to decide which mode will be funded. The budget proposes adding one new program in which there will be discretion to choose between modes, but it is only a small portion of the overall trust fund programs. Specifically, the Administration budget proposal contemplates giving the Administration discretion to decide which modes will be funded in a new Infrastructure Fund program. This program would be authorized at about $5 Billion a year in an overall program of more than

$60 Billion. It is not clear whether the Administration will also propose that the States be given any discretion to “flex” rail funding to highways or transit, or to flex highway or transit funds to rail. Another major unknown is whether adding rail to the Trust Fund is likely to change the funding which rail, highway and transit would have received if the current

system had been continued. Under the current system, overall funding for highways and transit is set at a level that falls within the revenues the Trust Fund will receive from the user fees supporting the fund. A number of factors go into the allocation of funds between highways and transit, including giving transit a “fair share” of total revenues, and having highways and transit grow at the same rate (or in today’s context, being reduced at the same rate). Under the existing system, rail is funded as part of a general transportation appropriation bill, based on general budget policies and the funding available for all transportation programs in the bill. Funding for rail is not tied to any particular revenue stream, or by the general relationship to funding for highways and transit. If rail is moved to the Trust Fund, its funding will be determined by the available revenues and decisions on how they should be allocated between highways, transit and rail. The effects of this change seem unpredictable until we know

the level and composition of the fund’s revenues. Until recently the user fees supporting the fund have been adequate to cover growing highway and transit programs. This is no longer the case. The existing fees will not even cover existing programs, much less a new rail program. The Administration is opposed to increasing the current user fees. If the new revenues are not user fees and cannot be tied to any mode, we can expect major disputes on how the

new revenues should be divided. It will be a zero sum game in which a dollar going to one mode will not be available for the other two. It’s anybody’s guess what the end result will be, and how it will compare to what would have occurred if rail was not

moved to the Trust Fund. Finally, bringing new programs into the Trust Fund could leave the Fund more vulnerable to deficit reduction measures designed to cut Trust Fund spending below the revenues put into the fund. Since TEA-21 in 1998 the Trust Fund has been able to resist proposals to cut spending below revenues. Supporters of the fund have been able to argue convincingly that the fund’s revenues are contributed by users (mainly through the gasoline tax) and that the users are entitled to have the funds they contributed spent. Bringing rail into the fund will require new revenue sources for the fund, and as discussed these new funds are not likely to be user fees. If this occurs, the arguments for full spending of revenues will be weakened significantly.

at – alt cause

NopeAU, 05 – part of the Agriculture and Natural Resources WATER QUALITY: Controlling Nonpoint Source (NPS) Pollution report on wate quality, Alabama A&M and Auburn Cooperative Extension System, “Underground Storage Tanks (USTs) And NPS Pollution”, Alabama A&M and Auburn Universities, http://www.aces.edu/pubs/docs/A/ANR-0790/WQ4.8.1.pdf)//JKahn

Leaking USTs are one of our nation’s leading causes of groundwater contamination . They pose the greatest threat in rural America, where 95 percent of the population depends on well water for drinking. As a result, local governments, businesses, and private citizens face substantial costs to comply with regulations covering both the tanks and potential cleanup, in case there is a problem. In 1990 the average cost for cleaning up a spill or leak was more than $50,000. By 1993, the average investigation and cleanup of contaminated soil and/or groundwater averaged over $100,000 per site in Alabama, a cost similar to that incurred and reported in other states. In some cases cleanup costs can run up to several million dollars. The National Association of Towns and Townships in Washington, DC has developed valuable resource materials for local officials of towns and cities in dealing with underground storage tank issues (1522 K Street, N.W., Suite 600, 20005-1202, 202 737-5200). This organization has also compiled a list of available technical and non-technical resource materials on USTs.

at – alt cause to housing market collapseNo alt causes – only water contamination – prefer empirical studiesPage and Rabinowitz, 93 (G. William, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Planning, University of Buffalo, the State University of New York *AND Harvey, former professor, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Autumn 1993, “Groundwater contamination: Its effects on property values and cities,” American Planning Association, Journal of the American Planning Association Volume 59, Issue 4, ProQuest, Hensel)

The effects of air pollution on property values are less clear. Some studies report a significant inverse relationship between air

pollution and property value (Anderson and Crocker 1971; Bendarz 1975). Other studies report no statistically significant

relationship (Smith and Deyak 1975). The effects of solid waste landfills on property values are also unclear.

Several studies show an inverse relationship between property values and landfills with regard to both distance from a landfill and degrees away from the direction of

the prevailing wind (Hockman et al. 1976). Other studies found no effect (Schmalensee et al. 1975: Petit and Johnson 1987; Zeiss and Atwater 1989;

Cartee 1989). Earthquake hazard has little impact on real estate values . Empirical studies show that the

mandated disclosure of earthquake hazard zones produced little effect on home buyer behavior

(Palm 1981). The disclosure of special earthquake hazard zones seems to produce no impact on lending decisions

(Palm et al. 1983). Surface water pollution, however, seems to decrease the value of adjacent property . A study

in Pennsylvania compared residential property along polluted and clean streams and found that the presence of pollution significantly decreased the value of property (Epp and Al-Ani 1979). Along Barnegat Bay in New Jersey, beach closings because of pollution depreciated property value on average by 22.7 percent (Polhemus et al. 1985).

at – insolvency nowOnly the Highway and Mass Transit Account will be insolvent NAPA 7/3 – National Asphalt Pavement Association (3 July 2012, “H.R. 4348, The Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act,” NAPA, https://www.asphaltpavement.org/big_files/Awards/Government/NAPASummaryFinal.pdf)

Funding Sources. In addition to extending federal fuel excise taxes through September 30, 2016, the bill utilizes a number of new funding sources, including pension reforms and a transfer of the portion of the gasoline tax that currently goes into the Leaking Underground Storage Tank Trust Fund into the Highway Trust Fund (HTF). The bill does not include any long ‐ term fixes for the solvency of the Highway Trust

Fund. The Congressional Budget Office predicts that under the conference report, the HTF will be insolvent in both the Highway Account and the Mass Transit Account by FY 2015.

at – gas tax solvesRaising the gas tax is empirically unpopularRooks 7/8 – writer for Sun Journal, former daily and weekly newspaper editor who has covered the State House for 25 years (Doug, 8 July 2012, “Roads, bridges crumble while politicians refuse to raise gas tax,” Sun Journal, http://www.sunjournal.com/news/columns-analysis/2012/07/08/roads-bridges-crumble-while-politicians-refuse-rai/1219656)Europeans like to tweak America as a juvenile society, even though – at 236 years and counting, the United States is the world’s oldest democratic government. Sometimes this can be annoying, but occasionally they have a point. Europeans maintain a pragmatic relation to taxation – sometimes taxes go up, sometimes down – a far cry from America’s often hysterical reactions to the price we pay for government services. The Revolution’s battle cry was “No taxation without representation,”

but even with representation, the colonists wouldn’t have been happy. A contemporary example of our aversion to taxes is the gasoline tax. In theory, this is as direct a relationship as you can find between costs and benefits. We pay taxes into the highway trust fund (federal and state) and the money builds roads and bridges. People do seem to understand this, and overall, support the taxation needed to do the job. The income tax is much more unpopular. The right objects to funding what they see as bloated social welfare programs. The left dislikes what they term equally bloated budgets to fight wars and build redundant weapons. But surely cars and roads are still as

American as apple pie. So why is the gas tax a political football? At the federal level, we’re dealing with endemic distrust of Washington. And – it must be admitted – presidents have often muddied the waters. Rather than see the gas tax as transportation funding, pure and simple, they have often stuck gas tax revenues into complicated budget-balancing plans. Ronald Reagan, who later had his veto of a 5 cent gas tax increase by Congress, earlier supported a temporary 5 cent hike in 1983 in a revenue package after his 1981 income tax cuts had put a mammoth hole in the budget. George Bush the elder also tried to shoehorn a gas tax hike into a budget bill, but Congress took it out. Bill Clinton pursued a carbon tax to combat global warming, but ended up with just a 4.3 cent gas tax increase in 1993 – an increase Republican Senate Leader Bob Dole predicted would be twice as large. As it happens, that 4.3 cent hike nearly 20 years ago was the

last adjustment to the federal tax. Due to inflation, $1 in gas tax revenue at 1993 levels is only about 63 cents today. So it’s not surprising that congressional attempts to reauthorize transportation funding resemble a magic act. The money’s just not there. Little known fact: The federal treasury is currently “loaning” the highway trust fund $50 billion annually. As a reason for increasing the federal deficit, this has no justification

whatsoever. Since transportation politics is fairly bipartisan, you might think there would be hope for change, but there isn’t. Republicans are as absolutely opposed to gas tax increases, even to make up for inflation, as to any other kind of tax. And the Obama administration isn’t about to call for a tax increase and expend scarce political capital. So we’re stuck. Until last year, things were a little better in Maine. The gas tax here has been raised periodically, and in 2002, at the end of the King administration, legislation indexed the rate to inflation. Most years the increase was less than a penny per gallon, but at least it

prevented highway funding from steadily eroding. It wasn’t easy to get there. The legislation was unpopular among both Democrats and Republicans, and then-House Speaker Mike Saxl used all his parliamentary skills to get it through. During the eight years it was in effect, Maine was able to make a small dent in its huge amount of backlogged road and bridge needs. Then Gov. Paul LePage and a Republican legislature arrived and they spent about 15 minutes getting rid of a common-sense measure that took years to get through. There wasn’t even a separate vote on repeal; it was tucked into the biennial budget bill without public discussion. So get used to more rusting bridges, crumbling highways and future closures. As Dana Connors, a former transportation commissioner who’s now president of the Maine State Chamber Commerce recently put it, “We simply can’t do more with less. It just can’t be done.” We’re now more reliant on revenue from the Maine Turnpike. Simply because it has the power to raise tolls independently – it’s current proposing a 25 percent increase that’s more than 12 times higher than the annual gas tax indexing increments – the turnpike authority is acting while the Legislature buries its head in the sand. But turnpike tolls can’t fund roads statewide. Unless our elected leaders acquire an unexpected dose of pragmatism, post-election, this dubious story will continue.

at – housing collapse doesn’t cause recessionHousing downturns correlate with recessions- they spill over Makin 7 – visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute (John, 8 September 2007, “Recession 2008?” The Wall Street Journal, http://finance.baylor.edu/weblogs/docs/ofod/recession2008.pdf)

Over the past half century, every U.S. housing downturn as sharp as the current one has translated into a U.S. recession. U.S. house prices are falling at an annual rate of nearly 4% -- an event not seen since the Great Depression -- and the downward trend is accelerating. The credit crunch that has emerged since late July is a clear signal of a move closer to recession. Tighter credit conditions mean that the drag on the U.S. economy will soon spread beyond the housing

sector to affect consumption and investment decisions. Indeed, this week's disappointing employment numbers strengthen the case for recession sooner rather than later, thereby sharply increasing pressure on the Fed to ease and ease now. Our credit problems are deeply entrenched because they spring from a securitization trend

in the mortgage market -- the construction and sale of securities whose intrinsic value is tied to the assumption that U.S. house prices will never fall. Now that they are falling, and are expected to continue falling at a faster pace, the value of such derivative securities has collapsed. The holders of derivative securities are widely dispersed and their identity is not well known; nor is the actual value of the derivative securities they hold easy to establish as house prices accelerate

downward and the economy slows. The sharp rise in uncertainty tied to an extraordinary and unanticipated unwinding of the securitization of claims on mortgage issuers and other debts has caused segments of the credit sector, like asset backed commercial paper (ABCP), to virtually cease functioning. As credit markets are tightly linked by credit arbitrageurs, the impairment of the ABCP market and subprime mortgage market has reduced the flow of credit to all borrowers while increasing the cost of borrowing for credit-worthy borrowers. Less credit-worthy borrowers can't borrow at any cost.

Every housing downturn led to a recession Cornerstone Consulting no date – SAP Software and Sage Software Certified Business Partner offering Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems (“Recession - U.S. Economic Downturn,” http://www.cornerstone1.com/index.cfm?meter=879)***Published immediately before the 2008 recession While they are unusual and hard to predict, a 2008 economic recession seems to be imminent. If so, it will be the second recession that has happened in more than fifteen years. A recession is defined as two or more consecutive quarters of negative growth in the GDP. The last official recession in the United States occurred in

2001. Over the past 50 years, every U.S. housing downturn has translated into a recession. Currently, U.S. house prices are

falling at an annual rate of nearly 4%. Such a dramatic decline has not been experienced since the Great Depression. Unfortunately, the housing market’s downward trend is accelerating. In addition to the decline of the housing market, there is a credit crisis. Many banks approved

mortgages for houses people could not afford to purchase. When people could not make mortgage payments, the banks foreclosed on those homes. This situation instigated tighter credit conditions. The strict credit conditions strains the U.S. economy and has a detrimental effect on consumption and investment decisions. While it's true that many more recessions have

been predicted than have occurred, the economic damage caused by continued falling residential investment and from credit-constrained consumers will, most likely, produce negative growth early in 2008. By lowering interest rates, the Fed hopes to prevent further U.S. economic decline and avoid detrimental effects of a recession. Unfortunately, there isn't much it can or should do to prevent the permanent downward spiral of securities tied to undocumented-income, negative-amortization, and securitized mortgages rated AAA by irresponsible rating agencies and sold to unwary investors.

***impacts2nc lust key to groundwater

Leaks massively contaminates groundwaterEDF, 11 – Environmental Defense Fund nonprofit and nonpartisan group that creates market based environmental problems intended to solve ecological problems and climate change, principle lobbying group that helped in passage of the Clean Air Act, (“Federal Requirements Will Decrease Nation's LUST”, Environmental Defense Fund, http://www.edf.org/news/federal-requirements-will-decrease-nations-lust)//JKahn

The nation's groundwater will be better protected as of December 22 when federal requirements go into effect to upgrade leaking underground storage tank (LUST) systems. The Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) today called the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) requirements the minimum actions that tank owners and operators should take to prevent leaks,

and said that the majority of regulated tanks have already upgraded to meet EPA's standards. "LUST is a serious problem, but it's getting better as a result of EPA's regulations," said Lois Epstein, EDF senior engineer. " Hundreds of

thousands of underground tanks and their piping have confirmed leaks that contaminate

groundwater . Approximately 40 percent of the water the US uses in its cities and to irrigate

farms comes from groundwater ." The number of leaking tank systems does not include home heating oil tanks and other tanks not federally

regulated. Click here to view a map showing the percent of the population by state that drinks groundwater (1990 data).

LUSTs destroy groundwater and infuse toxic chemicalsODEQ, 7/10/12 – Oregon Department of Environmental Quality, State of Oregon, (“DEQ Removes Leaking Underground Storage Tanks to Prevent Groundwater Contamination”, Oregon Department of Environmental Equality, http://www.deq.state.or.us/about/history/tanks.htm)//JKahn

Ever since combustion engines became popular, most gasoline and diesel tanks at vehicle service

stations have been buried underground . Gas stations proliferated in the 1950s and 1960s, but

without any regulation . Early tanks—made of steel—were installed without protection from corrosion, spills or overfills. Many of these tanks would eventually leak gasoline and oil containing toxic chemicals such as benzene, toluene and lead which can leach into groundwater, posing a threat to the environment and human health. Nearly 2 million Oregonians get their drinking water from groundwater

sources. Underground tank leaks are one of the top threats to safe drinking water. Federal laws governing safe tank storage began regulating the industry in the 1980s when the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency required the registration of underground storage tanks. In Oregon 31,000 regulated tanks were registered. Of this number, 25,000 tanks were removed or decommissioned with DEQ oversight through the Underground Storage Tank Program. During the decommissioning process, 7,000 petroleum-contaminated sites were discovered from leaks and spills. To date, DEQ staff have overseen the

successful cleanup of approximately 90 percent of these sites, with others in the cleanup process. The latest EPA regulations require underground storage tanks to be inspected every three years and to have double-walled construction with corrosion protection, overfill/spill containment equipment and leak detection monitoring equipment. DEQ underground storage tank staff conduct onsite inspections of some 6,000 tanks throughout the state, confirming their safe operation and overseeing the cleanup of any leaks. The good news for Oregon residents is that the number of leaks and cleanups has dropped dramatically in the past decade. New regulations and monitoring are ensuring greater protections than ever for our environment and drinking water.

firesLUSTs contaminate groundwater – petroleum products spread rapidly and cause firesEPA, 11 – U.S. EPA (“Leaking Underground Storage Tanks (LUSTs)”, United States Environmental Protection Agency, Region 10, http://yosemite.epa.gov/R10/WATER.NSF/UST/LUST/)//JKahn

EPA's federal underground storage tank (UST) regulations require that leaking underground storage tank (LUST) sites must be cleaned up to restore and protect groundwater resources and create a safe environment for those who live or work around these sites . It can be an area contaminated not just from

leaking underground storage tanks, but also from spills and overfills that occurred when USTs were in use. USTs leak for a variety of reasons. Some tanks are made of steel, which is likely to corrode over time, causing tank contents to leak into nearby soils and groundwater. Faulty installation or inadequate operation and maintenance of UST systems also can cause a leak or a spill. USTs contain not only petroleum products like diesel fuel and gasoline, but also other contaminants

of concern like lead, MTBEand other oxygenated compounds added to petroleum fuel. Some USTs are used to store hazardous substances. The greatest potential hazard from a leaking UST is that these contaminants can seep into the soil and contaminate groundwater , the source of drinking water for nearly half of all Americans , making water unsafe or unpleasant to drink. Leaking underground storage tanks can present other health and environmental risks, including the potential for fire and explosion . In Region 10, about 17,400 LUST sites have

been reported. Steady cleanup work has progressed for over a decade and over 13,550 contaminated sites have been cleaned up. While much good work has been done, there are about 4,150 UST sites remaining to be cleaned up. To see a breakdown of this data by state and Indian Lands and to see how we compare to other regions, you can go to the corrective action measures page, which is maintained by EPA’s Office of Underground Storage Tanks (OUST) in Washington, DC.

Fires hurt biodiversity, threaten economic assets, deplete water, and erode soil WWF, 06 – World Wildlife Fund, part of the World Wildlife Foundation, the largest international non-profit conservational organization in the world, (World Wildlife Fund, 9/12/06, http://www.panda.org/about_wwf/what_we_do/forests/problems/forest_fires/index.cfm)//JKahn

The immediate impact of forest fires can be devastating to human communities and forest ecosystems alike. Fires can alter the structure and composition of forests, opening up areas to invasion by fast-colonizing alien species and threaten biological diversity . Buildings, crops and plantations are

destroyed and lives can be lost. For companies, fire can mean the destruction of assets ; for communities,

besides loss of an important resource base, fire can also lead to environmental degradation

through impacts on water cycles, soil fertility and biodiversity ; and for farmers, fire may mean the

loss of crops or even livelihoods.

groundwater contamination impacts

laundryLitany of impacts – housing market, agriculture, ecosystems, disease, and the overall economy are affected by groundwater contaminationPage and Rabinowitz, 93 (G. William, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Planning, University of Buffalo, the State University of New York *AND Harvey, former professor, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Autumn 1993, “Groundwater contamination: Its effects on property values and cities,” American Planning Association, Journal of the American Planning Association Volume 59, Issue 4, ProQuest, Hensel)

Toxic chemical contamination of groundwater is a national problem. Groundwater contamination is the most serious problem at the majority of sites in the federal government's $15.2 billion Superfund program (U.S. Government Accounting Office 1991b). The program, which deals with the worst cases of contamination, as identified by the national

priorities list, has insufficient funds to clean up all contamination; thus, the 1,200 Superfund sites are only a small portion of the contaminated sites in the United States. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which operates the Superfund, sets the standards for levels of contamination. At the local level,

where remediation is conducted, groundwater contamination is having significant impacts on property markets

and on local government. Groundwater contamination and other forms of pollution impose many costs on society. Extensive research has measured the negative externalities of various types of pollution, but little has been done to determine the costs resulting from the contamination of groundwater with toxic chemicals.

Groundwater supplies about 40 percent of the U.S. population with drinking water , is used

extensively by agriculture and industry , and is critical to sensitive surface water ecosystems .

Contaminated groundwater is extremely expensive and difficult to clean up. Toxic chemical contamination in groundwater is an increasingly serious problem for local government, which is responsible for protecting the public health , the environment , and the tax base , which pays for government services, and for stimulating

local economic development . Local governments often have to take remedial action to clean up groundwater because the polluter cannot be

identified or found legally liable. The health risks, high costs of remedial action to clean up groundwater contamination, and the legal liability issues create serious

financial problems and moral dilemmas for municipalities. Policy planners at all levels of government must be aware of the full social and environmental costs of groundwater contamination to be able to create policies that efficiently allocate resources for

remediation incentives and to be able to devise adequate penalties to deter sufficiently potential polluters. Property owners must also be aware of the full costs of groundwater contamination as well as of their own liability for such contamination. Under EPA policy, current owners of property may be liable even if they did not cause the pollution. Mortgagees, lessees, and managers of property are also often drawn into the net of potentially responsible parties (PRPs) who could be found liable for contamination. The nature of groundwater flows

complicates the contamination issue. Toxic chemicals in groundwater are not static; they move in a plume of contamination. Contaminants degrade

much less efficiently in groundwater than in surface waters . Neither the direction nor the rate of movement of plumes of toxic chemicals in groundwater is predictable without a thorough and costly hydrogeological

investigation; and even the most thorough investigations may produce inaccurate predictions about contamination

movement because of the complexity of and the difficulties in monitoring groundwater systems. The plume of

contaminated groundwater will continue to flow and may pollute municipal water supply wells or private wells in the same or nearby communities,

or it may discharge into wetlands, rivers, lakes, or coastal waters . Owners of property near sites containing contamination also should know if real or perceived concerns about contamination will affect the value of their property .

biodiversityGroundwater contamination destroys biodiversityBergkamp, 06 – head of the Water Programme at UCN, fellow at IUCN’s Global Water Programme on groundwater and river basin management (Ger, “Groundwater and Ecosystem Services: towards their sustainable use”, International Symposium on Groundwater Sustainability, March 10, 2006, http://aguas.igme.es/igme/ISGWAS/Ponencias ISGWAS/13-Bergkamp.pdf)//JKahnGroundwater is an important component to providing ecosystem services. For example, aquifers are connected to a greater ecological and hydrological landscape that

includes adjacent riparian areas, upland terrestrial ecosystems, and surrounding river basins (NRC, 2004). Ecosystems that depend on groundwater include terrestrial vegetation , river base flow systems, aquifer and cave ecosystems,

wetlands, terrestrial fauna , and estuarine and near-shore ecosystems (Sinclair Knight Merz, 2001). Groundwater

associated ecosystem services provide support to a wide range of production and consumption processes, which have high economic value (Emerton and Bos, 2004). In this section, we discuss the ways in which groundwater provides ecosystems in the form of provisioning, regulating, supporting and cultural services. For example, discharge to streams and rivers may provide essential nutrients to aquatic life and support downstream users of water for drinking or irrigation (NRC, 1997). These ecosystems depend on several groundwater characteristics, which include the quality of water, discharge flux from an aquifer, and the level of pressure of groundwater

(Sinclair Knight Merz, 2001). Small changes can potentially cause extensive damage to dependent ecosystems .

In addition we examine how ecosystem services, such as climate regulation and land-use are critical to maintaining groundwater systems. The challenge is to use groundwater and interrelated ecosystem services in a sustainable manner to provide for the present without compromising the needs of future generations . The MEA classifies fresh water (including groundwater) as a provisioning service, which is defined as “products

obtained from ecosystems” (MEA, 2005, p.40). Most freshwater is not in lakes and rivers, but in aquifers. In fact, groundwater is the earth’s largest accessible store of fresh water (excluding ice sheets and glaciers) and constitutes about 94%

of all fresh water (Ward and Robinson, 1990). Groundwater is also an integral component of regulating, supporting and cultural ecosystem services. One

of the critical functions of groundwater as a provisioning service is its storage and retention for domestic, industrial and agricultural uses. As many as two billion people depend directly upon aquifers for drinking water, and 40% of the world’s food is

produced by irrigated agriculture that relies heavily on groundwater (Morris et al., 2003).

ExtinctionYoung, 10 – Ph.D. in costsal marine evology, member of the Academy of Natural Sciences, (Ruth, “Biodiversity: what it is and why it’s important”, February 9, 2010, TalkingNature, http://www.talkingnature.com/2010/02/biodiversity/biodiversity-what-and-why/)//JKahn

Different species within ecosystems fill particular roles, they all have a function, they all have a niche. They interact with each other and the physical environment to provide ecosystem services that are vital for our survival . For example plant species convert carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere and energy from the

sun into useful things such as food, medicines and timber . Pollination carried out by insects such as bees

enables the production of ⅓ of our food crops . Diverse mangrove and coral reef ecosystems provide a wide variety of habitats that are essential for many fishery species. To make it simpler for economists to comprehend the magnitude of services offered by biodiversity, a team of researchers estimated their value – it amounted to $US33 trillion per year. “By protecting biodiversity we

maintain ecosystem services” Certain species play a “ keystone ” role in maintaining ecosystem services. Similar to the removal of a

keystone from an arch, the removal of these species can result in the collapse of an ecosystem and the subsequent

removal of ecosystem services. The most well known example of this occurred during the 19th century when sea otters were almost hunted to extinction by fur traders along the west coast of the USA. This led to a population explosion in the sea otters’ main source of prey, sea urchins. Because the urchins graze on kelp their booming population decimated the underwater kelp forests. This loss of habitat led to declines in local fish populations. Sea otters are a keystone species once hunted for their fur (Image: Mike Baird) Eventually a treaty protecting sea otters allowed the numbers of otters to increase which inturn controlled the urchin population, leading to the recovery of the kelp forests and fish stocks. In other cases, ecosystem services are maintained by entire functional groups, such as apex predators (See Jeremy Hance’s post at Mongabay). During the last 35 years, over fishing of large shark species along the US Atlantic coast has led to a population explosion of skates and rays. These skates and rays eat bay scallops and their out of control population has led to the closure of a century long scallop fishery. These are just two examples demonstrating how biodiversity can maintain the services that ecosystems provide for us, such as fisheries. One could argue that

to maintain ecosystem services we don’t need to protect biodiversity but rather, we only need to protect the species and functional groups that fill the keystone roles.

However, there are a couple of problems with this idea. First of all, for most ecosystems we don’t know which species are the

keystones ! Ecosystems are so complex that we are still discovering which species play vital roles in maintaining them. In some cases its groups of species not

just one species that are vital for the ecosystem. Second, even if we did complete the enormous task of identifying and protecting all keystone species, what back-up plan would we have if an unforseen event (e.g. pollution or disease) led to the demise of these ‘keystone’ species? Would there be another species to save the day and take over this role? Classifying some species as ‘keystone’ implies that the others are not important. This may lead to the non-keystone species being considered ecologically worthless and subsequently over-exploited. Sometimes we may not even know which species are likely to fill the keystone roles. An example of this was discovered on Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. This research examined what would happen to a coral reef if it were over-fished. The “over-fishing” was simulated by fencing off coral bommies thereby excluding and removing fish from them for three years. By the end of the experiment, the reefs had changed from a coral to an algae dominated ecosystem – the coral became overgrown with algae. When the time came to remove the fences the researchers expected herbivorous species of fish like the parrot fish (Scarus spp.) to eat the algae and enable the reef to switch back to a coral dominated ecosystem. But, surprisingly, the shift back to coral was driven by a supposed ‘unimportant’ species – the bat fish (Platax pinnatus). The bat fish was previously thought to feed on invertebrates – small crabs and shrimp, but when offered a big patch of algae it turned into a hungry herbivore – a cow of the sea – grazing the algae in no time. So a fish previously thought to be ‘unimportant’ is actually a keystone species in the recovery of coral reefs overgrown by algae! Who knows how many other species are out there with unknown ecosystem roles! In some cases it’s easy to see who the keystone species are but in many ecosystems seemingly

unimportant or redundant species are also capable of changing niches and maintaining ecosystems. The more biodiverse an ecosystem is , the

more likely these species will be present and the more resilient an ecosystem is to future impacts. Presently we’re only scratching the surface of

understanding the full importance of biodiversity and how it helps maintain ecosystem function. The scope of this task is immense. In the meantime, a wise insurance policy for maintaining ecosystem services would be to conserve biodiversity . In doing so, we increase the chance of

maintaining our ecosystem services in the event of future impacts such as disease, invasive species and of course, climate change. This is the international year

of biodiversity – a time to recognize that biodiversity makes our survival on this planet possible and that our protection of

biodiversity maintains this service.

agricultureKey to agricultural competitiveness – independently destroys biodiversity and ocean lifeFAO, 96 – Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, (“Chapter 1: Introduction to agricultural water pollution”, Natural Resources Management and Environment Department of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, http://www.fao.org/docrep/W2598E/w2598e04.htm)//JKahn

Second only to availability of drinking water, access to food supply is the greatest priority. Hence, agriculture is a dominant component of the global economy. While mechanization of farming in many countries has resulted in a dramatic fall in the proportion of population working in

agriculture, the pressure to produce enough food has had a worldwide impact on agricultural practices. In

many countries, this pressure has resulted in expansion into marginal lands and is usually associated with subsistence farming. In other countries, food requirements have required expansion of irrigation and steadily increasing use of fertilizers and pesticides to achieve and sustain higher yields. FAO (1990a), in its Strategy on Water for Sustainable Agricultural Development, and the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Agenda 21, Chapters 10, 14 and 18 (UNCED, 1992) have highlighted the challenge of

securing food supply into the 21st century. Sustainable agriculture is one of the greatest challenges. Sustainability implies that agriculture not only secure a sustained food supply, but that its environmental, socio-economic and human health impacts are recognized and accounted for within national development plans. FAO's definition of Sustainable agricultural development appears in Box 1. It is well known that agriculture is the single largest user of freshwater resources, using a global average of

70% of all surface water supplies. Except for water lost through evapotranspiration, agricultural water is recycled back to surface water and/or groundwater. However, agriculture is both cause and victim of water pollution. It is a cause through its discharge of pollutants and sediment to surface and/or groundwater, through net loss of soil by poor agricultural practices, and through salinization and waterlogging of irrigated land. It is a victim through use of wastewater and polluted surface and groundwater which

contaminate crops and transmit disease to consumers and farm workers. Agriculture exists within a symbiosis of land and water and, as FAO (1990a) makes quite clear, "... appropriate steps must be taken to ensure that agricultural activities do not adversely affect water quality so that subsequent uses of water for different purposes are not impaired." Sagardoy (FAO, 1993a) summarized the action items for agriculture in the field of water quality as:

· establishment and operation of cost-effective water quality monitoring systems for agricultural water uses. · prevention of adverse effects of agricultural activities on water quality for other social and economic activities and on wetlands, inter alia through optimal use of on-farm inputs and the minimization of the use of external inputs in agricultural activities. · establishment of biological, physical and chemical water quality criteria for agricultural water users and for marine and riverine ecosystems. · prevention of soil runoff and sedimentation. · proper disposal of sewage from human settlements and of manure produced by intensive livestock breeding. · minimization of adverse effects from agricultural chemicals by use of integrated pest management. · education of communities about the pollution impacts of the use of fertilizers and chemicals on water quality and food safety. This publication deals specifically with the role of agriculture in the field of freshwater quality. Categories of non-point source impacts - specifically sediment, pesticides, nutrients, and pathogens - are identified together with their ecological, public health and, as appropriate, legal consequences. Recommendations are made on evaluation techniques and control measures. Much of the scientific literature on agricultural impacts on surface and groundwater quality is from developed countries, reflecting broad scientific concern and, in some cases, regulatory attention since the 1970s. The scientific findings and management principles are, however, generally applicable worldwide. This publication does not deal with water quality impacts caused by food processing industries insofar as these are considered to be point sources and are usually subject to control through effluent regulation and enforcement. Water quality

as a global issue Agriculture, as the single largest user of freshwater on a global basis and as a major cause of degradation of surface and groundwater resources through erosion and chemical runoff, has cause to be concerned about the global implications of water quality. The associated agrofood-processing industry is also a significant source of organic pollution in most countries. Aquaculture is now recognised as a major problem in freshwater, estuarine and coastal environments, leading to eutrophication and ecosystem damage. The principal environmental and public health dimensions of the global freshwater quality problem

are highlighted below: · Five million people die annually from water-borne diseases. · Ecosystem dysfunction and loss of biodiversity .

· Contamination of marine ecosystems from land-based activities . · Contamination of groundwater resources. · Global

contamination by persistent organic pollutants. Experts predict that, because pollution can no longer be remedied by dilution (i.e. the flow regime is fully utilized) in many countries, freshwater quality will become the principal limitation for sustainable development in these countries early in the next century. This "crisis" is

predicted to have the following global dimensions: · Decline in sustainable food resources (e.g. freshwater and coastal fisheries) due to pollution. · Cumulative effect of poor water resource management decisions because of inadequate water quality data in many countries. · Many countries can no longer manage pollution by dilution, leading to higher levels of aquatic pollution. · Escalating cost of remediation and potential loss of "creditworthiness". The real and potential loss of development opportunity because of diversion of funds for remediation of water pollution has been noted by many countries. At the 1994 Expert Meeting on Water Quantity and Quality Management convened by the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific

(ESCAP), Asian representatives approved a declaration which called for national and international action to assess loss of economic opportunity due to water pollution and to determine the potential economic impacts of the "looming water crisis". Interestingly, the concern of the delegates to the ESCAP meeting was to demonstrate the economic rather than simply the environmental impacts of water pollution on sustainable development. Creditworthiness (Matthews, 1993) is of concern insofar as lending institutions now look at the cost of remediation relative to the economic gains. There is concern that if the cost of remediation exceeds economic benefits, development projects may no longer be creditworthy. Sustainable agriculture will, inevitably, be required to factor into its water resource planning the larger issues of sustainable economic development across economic sectors. This comprehensive approach to management of water resources has been highlighted in the World Bank's (1993) policy on water resource development. Older chlorinated agricultural pesticides have been implicated in a variety of human health issues and as causing significant and widespread ecosystem dysfunction through their toxic effects on organisms. Generally banned in the developed countries, there is now a concerted international effort to ban these worldwide as part of a protocol for Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs). One example of such an effort was the Intergovernmental Conference on the Protection of the Marine Environment from Land-based Activities, convened in Washington DC in 1995 jointly with UNEP (more information is included in Chapter 5).

The collapse of U.S. agriculture turns every impact and makes extinction inevitableLugar, 4 – U.S. Senator – Indiana, Beta Theta Pi from Denison University, Rhodes Scholar at Pembroke College - Bachelor and Master's degrees, U.S. Navy Lieutenantn (Richard, “Plant Power” Our Planet v. 14 n. 3, http://www.unep.org/OurPlanet/imgversn/143/lugar.html)

In a world confronted by global terrorism, turmoil in the Middle East, burgeoning nuclear threats and other crises, it is easy to lose sight of the long-range challenges. But we do so at our peril. One of the most daunting of them is meeting the world’s need for food and energy in this century. At

stake is not only preventing starvation and saving the environment, but also world peace and

security . History tells us that states may go to war over access to resources, and that poverty and famine have often bred fanaticism and terrorism. Working to feed the world will minimize factors that contribute to global instability and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction . With the world

population expected to grow from 6 billion people today to 9 billion by mid-century, the demand for affordable food will increase well beyond current international production levels. People in rapidly developing nations will have the means greatly to improve their standard of living and caloric intake. Inevitably, that means eating more meat. This will raise demand for feed grain at the same time that the growing world population will need vastly more basic food to eat. Complicating a solution to this problem is a dynamic that must be better understood in the West: developing countries often use limited arable land to expand cities to house their growing populations. As good land disappears, people destroy timber resources and even rainforests as they try to create more arable land to feed themselves. The long-term environmental consequences could be disastrous for the entire globe. Productivity revolution To meet the expected demand for food over the next 50 years, we in the United States will have to grow roughly three times more food on the land we have. That’s a tall order. My farm in Marion County, Indiana, for example, yields on average 8.3 to 8.6 tonnes of corn per hectare – typical for a farm in central Indiana. To triple our production by 2050, we will have to produce an annual average of 25 tonnes per hectare. Can we possibly boost output that much? Well, it’s been done before. Advances in the use of fertilizer and water, improved machinery and better tilling techniques combined to generate a threefold increase in yields since 1935 – on our farm back then, my dad produced 2.8 to 3 tonnes per hectare. Much US

agriculture has seen similar increases. But of course there is no guarantee that we can achieve those results again. Given the urgency of expanding food production to meet world demand, we must invest much more in scientific research and target that money toward projects that promise to have significant national and global impact .

For the United States, that will mean a major shift in the way we conduct and fund agricultural science. Fundamental research will generate the innovations that will be necessary to feed the world. The United States can take a leading position in a productivity revolution. And our success at increasing food production may play a decisive humanitarian role in the survival of billions of people and the health of our planet .

environmentImpacts groundwater, the environment, and natural resourcesMDE, 03 – Oil Control Program, Land Management Administration, Maryland Department of the Environment, (“Maryland Environmental Assessment Technology For Leaking Underground Storage Tanks”, State of Maryland, 2003, http://www.mde.state.md.us/programs/Land/RecyclingandOperationsprogram/Publications/Documents/www.mde.state.md.us/assets/document/MEAT_Guidance.pdf)//JKahn

The Seven Risk Factors considered for each site by OCP are: (1) Liquid Phase Hydrocarbons. LPH refers to a regulated substance that is present as a nonaqueous phase liquid. When LPH is found on site, the liquid

product must be removed to the maximum extent possible. OCP has determined this to be a sheen. (2) Current and Future Use of Impacted Groundwater. If the groundwater impacted by the release is used for direct consumption within a half mile of the site or the site is located within an approved wellhead protection zone, a site assessment and corrective action plan must be designed. Other uses of groundwater that would warrant remediation include industrial, agricultural, and surface water augmentation . If known, future use of the groundwater must be taken into

consideration. If site-specific future use is unsure, regional trends must be considered. Generally, if future use is not clear a more conservative approach to cleanup is applied. (3) Migration of Contamination. The ability of contamination to migrate off site or to migrate to a receptor is a critical measure. If it can be demonstrated that the contamination is stationary and site conditions restrict the potential for migration, the need for cleanup may be reduced. (4) Human Exposure. Any exposure to the public warrants site corrective action. There are several exposure pathways that must be considered. These pathways include but are not limited to inhalation,

ingestion, and dermal contact. (5) Environmental Ecological Exposure. The need to protect the natural resources of the State is mandated by Maryland law. If there is exposure to animal or plant life from the petroleum release or the degradation of a natural resource, corrective action is warranted. (6) Impact to Utilities and Other Buried Services. The responsible party must correct adverse affects to utilities. Utility materials have been known to degrade from contact with petroleum products. Utilities may also act as conduits that lead to the migration of contamination. Migration along utilities may cause vapor impacts or other issues at nearby structures. (7) Other Sensitive Receptors. Sensitive receptors such as surface water, historic structures, and subways are an indication that a site may warrant further corrective action.

Destroys the environmentStates News Service 3/27/12 – Washington-based newsgroup that relays news to CNN and MSNBC, (“Ecology Works To Improve Safety Of Underground Storage Tanks”, States News Service, March 27, 2012, Lexis)//JKahnThe following information was released by the Washington State Department of Ecology: The Washington Department of Ecology (Ecology) currently is seeking

public comments on proposed changes to the state's rule for preventing leaks from underground storage tanks. The Legislature has

directed Ecology to revise the current rule to include some recent changes in state and federal laws, and to improve compliance with the rule. Leaks from underground storage tanks (UST) can contaminate groundwater, the source of drinking water for 60 percent of Washington's residents. Ecology will accept comments through May 4, 2012. Comments also will be accepted during public

hearings in April. The state's compliance program addresses the serious threat posed to human health

and the environment by leaking underground storage tank systems containing petroleum and other hazardous substances. Ecology currently regulates more than 9,500 systems at more than 3,600 facilities throughout the state. A majority of UST systems are located at gas stations. Others are owned and operated by other businesses and by local, state and federal governments. Each year, about 50 new releases are confirmed at regulated UST facilities. The rule changes will help to reduce the number and severity of such releases.

Environmental destruction causes global warsHomer-Dixon, 98 – associate fellow of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, World Security, assistant professor of political science and director of the Peace and Conflict Studies Programme at the University of Toronto, (“Challenges for a New Century”, Third Edition, edited by Michael Klare and Yogesh Chandrani, pg. 342-3, 1998)//JKahn

Experts have proposed numerous possible links between environmental change and conflict. Some have suggested that environmental change may shift the balance of power between states either regionally or globally, causing instabilities that

could lead to war . Another possibility is that global environmental damage might increase the gap between rich and poor societies, with the poor then violently confronting the rich for a fairer share of the world’s wealth. Severe conflict may also arise from frustration with countries that do not go along with agreements to protect the global environment, or that “free-ride”

by letting other countries absorb the costs of environmental protection. Warmer temperatures could lead to contention over more easily harvested resources in the Antarctic. Bulging populations and land stress may produce

waves of environmental refugees , spilling across borders and disrupting relations among ethnic groups.

Countries might fight among themselves because of dwindling supplies of water and the effects of upstream pollution. A sharp decline in food crop production and grazing land could lead to conflict between nomadic tribes and sedentary farmers.

Environmental change could in time cause a slow deepening of poverty in poor countries, which might open bitter divisions between classes and ethnic groups, corrode democratic institutions, and spawn

revolutions and insurgencies. In general, many experts have the sense that environmental problems will “ ratchet up” the

level of stress within states and the international community, increasing the likelihood of many

different kinds of conflict —from war and rebellion to trade disputes—and undermining possibilities for cooperation.

diseaseAbsent LUST, gas tanks will cause cancer, diseases, and endocrine disruptionRyan, 11 – professor of at the Department of Civil, Environmental, and Architectural Engineering at the University of Colorado, Bouler, Ph.D. in environmental engineering from MIT, masters in environmental engineering from MIT, bachelors in civil engineering and geological engineering, Princeton University, (Joe, “Leaking Underground Storage Tanks”, Boulder Area Sustainability Information Network, Lexis)//JKahn

Because most LUST sites are contaminated by gasoline, the following constituents of gasoline are the typical contaminants of concern of LUST sites. Benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylenes together are referred to as the BTEX compounds. They are the most common hazardous components of gasoline leaks. benzene is the most hazardous of these compounds -- its EPA Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL) is 5 parts per billion (ppb). Long-term exposures to benzene in drinking water at levels above the MCL increase the risk of cancer . toluene and ethylbenzene are not considered

carcinogenic (cancer-causing). Their MCLs are 1.0 and 0.7 parts per million (ppm). Over the long term, toluene and ethylbenzene

damage the liver, kidneys, and central nervous system . xylenes are a mixture of compounds (ortho-, meta-, and para-xylene) with two methyl (-CH3) groups attached to a benzene ring. Xylenes also affect the liver, kidneys, and nervous system , but they are not considered nearly as hazardous as the first three --

the MCL for total xylenes is 10 ppm. Methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE) is an additive used to increase the oxygen content of gasoline to improve air quality. In the language of the 1990 Clean Air Act, oxygenated gasoline is referred to as "reformulated gasoline" or "oxyfuel." At concentrations as low as 20 parts per billion (ppb), MTBE makes drinking water unfit for human consumption because of taste and odor (American Water Works Association, LUST Program). Currently, MTBE is classified as a potential human carcinogen, but as yet there is no Maximum Contaminant Level for drinking water. As many as 9,000 community water wells in 31 states may be affected by MTBE contamination. The U.S. Geological Survey reports that about 20% of groundwater in areas where reformulated gasoline is sold is contaminated by MTBE. More details about air quality, health, and water quality concerns over MTBE are provided in this report by the Congressional Research Service. MTBE is highly soluble in groundwater -- about 43,000 ppm. The high solubility of MTBE allows it to be readily dissolved into groundwater from leaked gasoline and transported over great distances. In some cases, MTBE transport has exceeded the transport distances of BTEX compounds by 10 times. Compared to MTBE, the BTEX compounds are less soluble and more readily sorbed to aquifer sediments. A study of benzene contamination of groundwater by LUSTs in Texas reports that most benzene plumes extend less than 80 meters from their source.

LUSTs cause disease and destroy home valuesEarthTalk, 09 – member of the National AZA Science Initiative, part of the EarthTalk foundation, (“Living near a gas and service station can post health risks”, Record Seachlight, April 3, 2009, Lexis)//JKahnDear EarthTalk: I am looking at possibly buying a house that is very close to a gasoline station. Is it safe to live so close to a gas station? What concerns should I have? I have toddler and infant babies. - Ranjeeta, Houston Despite all the modern health and safety guidelines they must follow, gas stations can still pose significant hazards to neighbors, especially children. Some of the perils include ground-level ozone caused in part by gasoline fumes, groundwater hazards from petroleum products leaking into the ground, and exposure hazards from other chemicals that might be used at the station if it's also a repair shop. Ozone pollution is caused by a mixture of volatile organic compounds, some of which are found in gasoline vapors, and others, like carbon monoxide, that come from car exhaust. Most gas pumps today must have government-regulated vapor-recovery boots on their nozzles, which limit the release of gas vapors while you're refueling your car. A similar system

is used by the station when a tanker arrives to refill the underground tanks. But if those boots aren't working properly, the nearly odorless hydrocarbon fumes, which contain harmful chemicals like benzene, can be released into the air. Higher ozone levels can lead to respiratory problems and asthma, while benzene is a known cancer-causing chemical, according to the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The quest to reduce ozone levels has led the state of California to implement a more stringent vapor-recovery law, which became effective April 1 and requires that all gasoline pumps have a new, more effective vapor-recovery nozzle. Underground gasoline storage tanks can also be a problem. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates that there are some 660,000

of them from coast-to-coast. Many a lawsuit has been filed against oil firms in communities across the country by people whose soil and groundwater were fouled by a gas station's leaking underground storage tank. In the past, most tanks were made of uncoated steel, which will rust over time. Also, pipes leading to the tanks can be accidentally ruptured. When thousands of gallons of gasoline enter the soil, chemicals travel to groundwater, which the EPA says is the source of drinking water for nearly half the U.S. If buying a home, consider its potential loss in value if a nearby underground storage

tank were to leak. Gasoline additives such as methyl tertiary-butyl ether (MTBE), which has been outlawed in some states, make the water undrinkable - and that is only one of 150 chemicals in gasoline. Repeated high exposure to gasoline, whether in liquid or vapor form, can cause lung, brain and kidney damage, according to the NIH's National Library of Medicine. Spilled or vaporized gasoline is not the only chemical hazard if the station is also a repair shop. Mechanics use solvents, antifreeze and lead products, and may work on vehicles that have asbestos in brakes or clutches. Auto refinishers and paint shops use even more potentially harmful chemicals. In today's car-centric world, we can't escape exposure completely, because these chemicals are in our air just about everywhere. But by choosing where we live, keeping an eye out for spills, and pressuring the oil companies to do the right thing for the communities they occupy, we can minimize our exposures.

Extinction Togawa 99 – Institute of Biomaterials and Bioengineering, University of Tokyo, (Tatsuo, Technology in Society, August, Lexis)//JKahn

Advanced technology provides a comfortable life for many people, but it also produces strong destructive forces that can cause extinction of the human race if used accidentally or intentionally. As stated in the Russell-Einstein Manifesto of 1955, hydrogen bombs might possibly put an end to the human race.1 Nuclear weapons are not the only risks that arise from modem technologies. In 1962, Rachel Carson wrote in her book, Silent Spring [2], that the amount of the pesticide parathion used on California farms alone at that time could provide a lethal dose for five

to ten times the whole world's population. Destruction of the ozone layer, the greenhouse effect, and chemical pollution by endocrine

destructive chemicals began to appear as the result of advanced technology, and they are now considered to be potential causes

of extinction of the human race unless they are effectively controlled.

ExtinctionDaswani, 96 — staff writer for the South China Morning Post (Kavita, “Leading the Way to a Cure for AIDS”, 1/4/1996, South China Morning Post, p. Lexis)Two decades of intensive study and research in the field of virology have convinced him of one thing: in place of natural and man-made disasters or nuclear warfare,

humanity could face extinction because of a single virus, deadlier than HIV. "An airborne virus is a lively, complex and dangerous organism," he said. "It can come from a rare animal or from anywhere and can mutate constantly. If there is no cure, it affects one person and then there is a chain reaction and it is unstoppable. It is a tragedy waiting to happen." That may sound like a far-fetched plot for a Hollywood film, but Dr Ben -Abraham said history has already proven his theory. Fifteen years ago, few could have predicted the impact of AIDS on the world. Ebola has had sporadic outbreaks over the past 20 years and the only way the deadly virus - which turns internal organs into liquid - could be contained was because it was killed before it had a chance to spread. Imagine, he says, if it was closer to home: an outbreak of that scale in London, New York or Hong Kong. It could happen anytime in the next 20 years - theoretically, it could happen tomorrow. The shock of the AIDS epidemic has prompted virus experts to admit "that something new is indeed happening and that the threat of a deadly viral outbreak is imminent", said Joshua Lederberg of the Rockefeller University in New York, at a recent conference. He added that the problem was "very serious and is getting worse". Dr Ben-Abraham said: "Nature isn't benign. The survival of the human species is not a preordained evolutionary programme. Abundant sources of

genetic variation exist for viruses to learn how to mutate and evade the immune system ." He cites the 1968 Hong Kong flu outbreak

as an example of how viruses have outsmarted human intelligence. And as new "mega-cities" are being developed in the Third World and rainforests are destroyed, disease-carrying animals and insects are forced into areas of human habitation.

"This raises the very real possibility that lethal, mysterious viruses would, for the first time, infect humanity at a large scale and imperil the survival of the human race ," he said.

ExtinctionNissani, 92 (Moti, writer who has examined the reception new scientific discoveries have received in history, 1992, “Lives in the Balance: the Cold War and American Politics, 1945-1991”, http://www.is.wayne.edu/mnissani/PAGEPUB/CH2.html)//JKahnSome 15 percent of the bomb's energy is taken up by ionizing radiation. From the psychological point of view, and from the point of view of humankind's long-term

future, radiation is perhaps the most frightening direct effect of nuclear explosions. We can sense blast, heat, and fire, but we can't detect ionizing radiation (except at very high intensities when it produces a tingling sensation4) without the aid of special instruments; we can be irradiated to death without knowing it. Unlike fire and blast, ionizing radiation not only damages our health, but, through its potential impact on fetuses and on reproductive cells, it may damage the health of our descendants. Though the heat and the blast wreak incredible havoc, their direct effects are gone within seconds, or,

in the case of the fires they cause, within hours or days. In contrast, poisonous radioactivity may linger for years. X-rays are the most familiar type of ionizing radiation. Owing to their ability to penetrate the human body, they are widely used as a diagnostic tool. But even when used in minuscule doses (as in dental examinations), X-rays can cause slight problems by damaging, or ionizing, the chemical constituents of our bodies. Two overlapping schemes are used to classify the ionizing radiations produced by nuclear bombs. The first, which will not be taken up here, is based on their ability to penetrate matter. The second scheme is based on their order of appearance. Initial radiation is released within the first minute of an explosion. It accounts for about 5 percent of the bomb's energy. The

initial radiation of a 12.5 kt explosion will knock unconscious people standing in the open at a distance of less than half a mile from ground zero.

These people will die from radiation sickness within two days (even if they somehow managed to escape the heat and blast). People standing in the open three-quarters of a mile away will die within one month.6b Given these three powerful effects-blast, heat, initial radiation-the chances of survival are slim for anyone within a one mile radius of a small nuclear explosion. With larger explosions, or with multiple detonations in one area, the lethal range is greater. Those who manage to survive all three must still deal with radioactive fallout (also called residual radiation). Fallout takes some 10 percent of the bomb's energy. Fallout is emitted by fission products such as radioactive iodine, weapon residues such as plutonium and radioactive hydrogen, and substances in the vicinity of the explosion which became radioactive as a result of exposure to the bomb's initial radiation. Radioactive fallout is usually classified into two components, early and delayed. Early fallout reaches the ground within 24 hours of the explosion. Delayed fallout reaches the ground after 24 hours. Early fallout is also called local fallout because it tends to remain in the vicinity of the explosion site. Delayed fallout is also called global fallout because it can take months or years to come down to earth, during which time it can be carried to all corners of the globe.

housing marketGroundwater contamination destroys the housing market – perception is keyPage and Rabinowitz, 93 (G. William, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Planning, University of Buffalo, the State University of New York *AND Harvey, former professor, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Autumn 1993, “Groundwater contamination: Its effects on property values and cities,” American Planning Association, Journal of the American Planning Association Volume 59, Issue 4, ProQuest, Hensel)

Most experts assert that groundwater contamination with toxic chemicals negatively affects property

values . Groundwater contamination moves without respect for property boundaries, and

contamination episodes often affect multiple properties. Even the perception of the risk of groundwater contamination can

affect real estate values. Purchasers acquire through real estate transactions a package of rights and entitlements related to that property, including the right to sell, develop, occupy, rent, or use the property as collateral or in other economically productive ways.

Groundwater contamination with toxic chemicals can negatively affect all the rights to and entitlements of

the real estate and thereby diminish its value . The value can be reduced solely to the right to occupy the

real estate or to its value in use rather than its market value. Contaminated properties are difficult

to sell and almost impossible to use as collateral for a loan . In a case of default, the mortgagee or lending institution would likely defer taking the property through foreclosure because of the liability risks. Value in real estate rests in the perceptions of prospective buyers and sellers. "Because there

are always substitute properties that will perform a like function, there is no incentive to purchase property with any form of pollution" (Lunz 1989). One major disincentive to purchasing land with contamination is that private owners of land may be held liable for groundwater contamination even if they did not cause the contamination and did not know it existed. Following the lead of CERCLA (the federal legislation that established the Superfund program), many states

have enacted laws that require parties to clean up the contamination under conditions of "joint and several liability" or

allow the state to conduct the cleanup and attempt to recover the costs from the responsible parties. The current landowner, who may not have caused

the pollution, may be the only solvent party and may be held liable for cleanup costs (Kovalic and Carter 1989).

Groundwater contamination with toxic chemicals affects the " highest and best use " of real estate . Property ideally located and suited for intensive development may not be developed because of contamination problems. By undermining the potential for development of property, groundwater contamination with toxic chemicals directly affects its value.

soil erosionLUSTs destroy soil quality – lack of LUST funds mean soil removal is necessary which leads to erosionMDE, 03 – Oil Control Program, Land Management Administration, Maryland Department of the Environment, (“Maryland Environmental Assessment Technology For Leaking Underground Storage Tanks”, State of Maryland, 2003, http://www.mde.state.md.us/programs/Land/RecyclingandOperationsprogram/Publications/Documents/www.mde.state.md.us/assets/document/MEAT_Guidance.pdf)//JKahn

The impact to soil from a release of petroleum product presents its own series of issues . The goal established

by OCP is to ensure that the product or contaminants in the soil cannot migrate to water resources of the State. Further clean-up goals are established for soil if it is determined that the soil may release vapors or otherwise cause impacts to human health or the environment. Pathways of exposure include dermal contact, ingestion, and inhalation. It may not be mandatory to remove

soil simply based on an across-the-board action level. The decision to remove and treat soil is site specific. However, OCP recognizes that soil removal is generally the most reliable procedure to prevent future contamination migration and reduce risk. MDE has determined that soil contamination at a release site with Total Petroleum Hydrocarbons (TPH) levels below 230 parts per million (ppm),

as determine by EPA method 8015B DRO/GRO, does not pose a risk or a threat of adverse effects if left in place. However, soil that is treated at an “oil-contaminated soil facility” must be treated to the regulatory level of 10 ppm TPH or treated as established by the facility’s permit. Soil treated on site must be treated to the point that the “three objective approach” is accomplished. Soil showing a contaminant level over 10 ppm, removed from a site or otherwise handled, is considered “oil-contaminated.” This level is established by default due to the fact that this level is required for “post-treatment soil” from a permitted oil treatment facility as mentioned above. This regulation can be found in COMAR 26.10.13.11. If oil-contaminated soil is to be treated on site, the activity must be conducted under an OCP approved corrective action plan for the site.

ExtinctionRobbins, 97 – author of Pulitzer Prize-nominated book, Master's Degree from Antioch College, received the Rachel Carson Award, the Albert Schweitzer Humanitarian Award, and the Peace Abbey’s Courage of Conscience Award, (John, author of the Pulitzer Prize-nominated Diet for a New America, “The Ground Beneath Our Feet,” pg., http://www.animalsvoice.com/PAGES/invest/robbins1.html)//JKahn

There is not a single aspect of the ecological crisis that would not be immediately and profoundly improved by such a transformation. From dust we came and to dust we return. Archaeologists tell us that soil erosion has played a determining role in the decline and demise of many great civilizations , including those of the ancient

Egyptians, Greeks and the Mayans. Wherever soil erosion has destroyed the fertility base on which civilizations have been built, these civilizations have perished . Two hundred years ago, most of America’s croplands had at least 21 inches of

topsoil. Today, most of it is down to around six inches, and the rate of topsoil loss is accelerating. We have already lost 75 percent of what may well be our most precious natural resource. The U.S. Soil Conservation Service reports that more than four million acres of cropland are being lost to erosion in this country every year. That’s an area the size of Connecticut. Of this staggering loss, 85 percent is directly associated with livestock raising. Without a diet-style change, we are well on our way to losing what many scientists feel has always been the basis of our strength as a nation.

2nr ditties

to fund LUST is a mustso the LUSTs can adjustto the rust and the dustmake the LUST trust robust.

another one bites the LUST

~ Hensel

For 2NR analysis:dustbustmustcrustthrustcussedfussedgustjustdistrustadjustrobustincrust