House Energy and Commerce Committee Announces Investigation into Bayer CropScience Explosion

Representative Henry Waxman announced that his Energy and Commerce Committee would hold a hearing on April 23 to investigate the August explosion at Bayer CropScience that killed two workers. See the committee announcement here.

Read commentary by Ken Ward of Sustained Outrage a blog at the Charleston (WV) Gazette:

"Waxman has a reputation for his vigorous oversight of government agencies, and it will be interesting to see if he looks into the recent controversy over whether findings of a federal Chemical Safety Board probe of the accident should be hidden from the public. As Harman and Maya Nye of People Concerned About MIC pointed out to me, the congressional hearing is set for the same day as the Chemical Safety Board public meeting announced Friday.

Maybe Waxman will also ask the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration why a chemical plant accident that killed two workers draws only $143,000 in fines from OSHA inspectors, despite the plant’s long history of safety problems. Or maybe Waxman will look into what is — or maybe isn’t — going on with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s promise to investigate whether Bayer violating federal chemical leak reporting laws when it stalled releasing information to local emergency responders. Perhaps Waxman’s committee will even push to know why EPA doesn’t appear to be examining if Bayer is complying with federal chemical process safety requirements."

For the full story from Ken Ward see here.