AP story on OFA Lawsuit in NY

FYI - info on the recent lawsuit filed by the Oxygenated Fuels Association in
NY against the state's law banning MTBE. I will forward information by fax
that includes more details and talking points from OFA.

Industry group challenges state's MTBE ban

by JOEL STASHENKO
Associated Press Writer

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) - Charging the governor and state Legislature with
political pandering, an industry group said Wednesday it is challenging New
York's ban on the gasoline additive MTBE.

The Oxygenated Fuels Association said it filed a federal court suit Tuesday
in Albany calling for the first-in-the-nation state law phasing out the use
of MTBE by 2004 be declared invalid.

The association, an Arlington, Va.-based coalition of MTBE manufacturers,
said New York and every other state is prohibited from unilaterally imposing
regulations on the use of additives which are more stringent than those set
by Congress and the president in the Clean Air Act.

The state's MTBE ban is such a law, the suit argues.

Methyl tertiary-butyl ether increases oxygen in gasoline so it burns
''cleaner'' in combustion engines and reduces air pollution, but it has
increasingly been found in ground and surface water statewide. It is a
particular concern on Long Island because residents there depend on aquifers
for drinking water.

The additive must be in gasoline sold in high-smog parts of the state, which
encompasses most of the downstate New York region.
The Oxygenated Fuels Association also argued that since the reported
problems with MTBE are from leaking gasoline storage tanks, the solution is
to better enforce tank regulations in New York and not to ban the substance
from gas.

A spokeswoman for the state Department of Environmental Conservation,
Jennifer Post, said department lawyers hadn't reviewed the suit as of
Wednesday.

''We are confident of the legislation, which is necessary to protect public
health and safeguard water resources, and we will continue to fight for
federal action to ban MTBE and identify an acceptable alternative,'' Post
said.

Discussions of banning MTBE in New York elsewhere have ''been driven more by
politics and emotion than by sound science and we are counting on the courts
to put the issue back in perspective,'' said Thomas Adams, executive
director of the Oxygenated Fuels Association.

David Liddle, a spokesman for the association, said the intent of the Clean
Air Act was to allow a range of oxygenates - enabling cleaner-burning gas -
to be used and for the ''marketplace to decide'' which was superior.
If MTBE is banned, Liddle said, that would mean ethanol would be the only
real option left. He argued that ethanol is both more expensive than MTBE
and gas does not burn as cleanly using it.

''New York has unilaterally skewed the playing field and the result is
higher prices and dirtier air,'' he argued.

State environmental officials have said they are aware of about 1,700 MTBE
spills around New York state, although not all the spills have contaminated
water supplies.

MTBE was introduced starting in the late 1970s when the use of leaded
gasoline was banned, again because of health-related concerns.

In March, the Clinton administration moved to ban MTBE. That prohibition,
expected to take up to three years to implement, was a ''backstop measure''
in case Congress can't agree on a way to phase out MTBE, said Carol Browner,
administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.

MTBE is believed by some scientists to be a cancer-causing agent in animals,
but its effect on humans is being debated. A University of California study
last year concluded that more research is needed on its health effects, but
it added that MTBE has the ''potential to cause cancer in humans.'' Some
researchers have suggested that the inhalation or intake of MTBE can also
trigger headaches, asthma or neurological damage