Overnight Energy: New Mexico to sue EPA for mine waste spill

NM VS. EPA: New Mexico’s environmental agency said it’s suing the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for the August mine waste spill in Colorado.

Officials have yet to tally the total damage from the spill of 3 million gallons of toxic sludge into the Animas River and downstream to New Mexico. But they say the EPA has repeatedly failed in its duties to protect the state and its residents.

“From the very beginning, the EPA failed to hold itself accountable in the same way that it would a private business,” Ryan Flynn, secretary of New Mexico’s Environment Department, said in a statement.

{mosads}”The EPA caused an unprecedented disaster that may affect our state for years to come,” he added.

The EPA has taken responsibility for the spill, which happened as a contractor was trying to open an abandoned mine near Silverton, Colo.

Read more here.

DOE LOOKS TO JUMP START GRID RESEARCH: The Department of Energy is looking to boost research spending on the electricity grid.

Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz announced Thursday a $220 million effort to fund national labs research into the grid, saying it would “further strengthen our ongoing efforts to improve our electrical infrastructure so that it is prepared to respond to the nation’s energy needs for decades to come.”

Improving the electrical grid — by stabilizing it in the face of climate change and cyber attacks, for example, or expanding storage capabilities — has been a big priority for the Obama administration. In the Energy Department’s first “Quadrennial Energy Review” last April, the administration said it would look to invest nearly $4 billion to modernize the grid.

“Modernizing the U.S. electrical grid is essential to reducing carbon emissions, creating safeguards against attacks on our infrastructure, and keeping the lights on,” Moniz said Thursday.

Read more here.

PARK RANGERS PACKED SOME HEAT: A supervisory ranger at the Mojave National Preserve in California bought automatic rifles and flash-bang devices for his rangers, a watchdog report released Thursday found.

The Interior Department’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) concluded that the supervisor, who was motivated by the problems with his rangers’ old guns, knowingly violated National Park Service policies with the purchases and with the instructions to carry the rifles around in their vehicles.

“During our investigation, the supervisory park ranger admitted to purchasing and distributing the automatic weapons despite knowing that they violated NPS policy; admitted telling rangers who received the automatic rifles not to display them to others; and admitted to, at a minimum, not making it clear to his supervisors that the automatic weapons needed to be converted to semiautomatics,” the report said.

Investigators also dinged the employee for making false statements to his superiors and employees and for making “inconsistent and implausible statements.”

CALIF. GOV MAKES NEW PUSH FOR WATER PROJECT: California Gov. Jerry Brown (D) renewed his call Thursday to complete the $15.5 billion tunnel project under the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.

The project would provide much-needed water south of the Delta. But financing is at risk, and a new ballot initiative seeks to stop progress on it.

“Although there are a small group of people that absolutely hate it,” Brown told reporters, according to the Sacramento Bee, “I know they’re not right, and we will keep going forward, and I think we’ll get it done.”

Opposition comes mainly from northern Californians who object to the potential environmental impact and harm to their water supplies.

GREENS PLOT METHANE LEAK PROTESTS: Environmental groups are planning a pair of protests over the ongoing methane leak at a California natural gas storage facility.

Food and Water Watch will host a protest outside the EPA’s headquarters on Friday to “demand that the agency intercede and permanently shut down operations at a blown-out gas storage facility in California,” the group said.

In California on Saturday, residents and activists will protest outside a Granada Hills hearing on the leak. They, too, will call on state regulators to shut down the leaking storage facility.

The leak is spewing methane into the air at a rate of up to 50,000 pounds a day, the group said Thursday. Brown has declared a state of emergency, and California’s senators are asking federal officials to step in and investigate the situation, but some activists say that isn’t enough.

“For months, Governor Brown and California authorities sat on their hands as this gas blowout crisis deepened and scores got sick, ” Food and Water Watch executive director Wenonah Hauter said in a statement.  

“Now it’s a matter of ‘too little, too late’ from the governor, and the people of Porter Ranch are desperate for federal intervention to end this catastrophe and ensure it never happens again.”

ON TAP FRIDAY: A U.S. Treasury official and a former deputy managing director of the IMF will speak at a Carnegie Endowment event on green finance.   

AROUND THE WEB:

Hurricane Alex is the first Atlantic Ocean hurricane to develop during January since 1938, and is the first named storm during January since 1955, AccuWeather reports.  

Montana is relocating dozens of sage grouse to Canada in the hopes of recovering the bird’s population on both sides of the border, the Associated Press reports.

Michigan’s state budget office is planning to ask the legislature to allow it to use the state’s $575 million surplus for the costs of dealing with the Flint water crisis, Reuters reports.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT:

Check out Thursday’s stories …

-Administration pushes $220M electric grid upgrade program
-State to sue EPA for mine waste spill
-First natural gas exports delayed
-Greens call for climate review of oil, gas drilling program
-Green group launches ad backing Clinton on climate

Please send tips and comments to Timothy Cama, tcama@digital-release.thehill.com; and Devin Henry, dhenry@digital-release.thehill.com. Follow us on Twitter: @Timothy_Cama, @dhenry, @thehill