On February 28, 2017, the EPA received a petition from the “RMP Coalition” for reconsideration and a request for a stay from the amendments to the RMP rule. The RMP Coalition consists of several affected industry trade groups, manufacturing groups, and the Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America. The petition asserts that:

• the Local Emergency Planning Committee (“LEPC”) disclosure requirements are open ended, will result in a significant security risk, and that EPA failed to give notice that it may alter the final rule being open-ended;
• the EPA changed the third-party audit criteria to include an arbitrary trigger that is subject to the whims and imagination of an agency, and EPA did not properly notice or address this change;
• the EPA did not include information on its cost-benefit findings as required by Michigan v. EPA, 135 S.Ct. 2699 (2015);
• the scope of the three year audit was expanded to include all covered process without providing notice of the change or the rational;
• the EPA failed to explain claimed statutory authority to expand the rule;
• numerous supporting documents were not available during the comment period; and
• the EPA should reconsider the amendment “in light of the revelations that the West, Texas, incident was an intentional act.”

On March 13, 2017, Scott Pruitt, Administrator of the EPA, convened a proceeding for reconsideration of the RMP rule amendments and signed a letter that administratively delayed the effective date of the rule for 90 days.