“Novel climate-financing deals are promising to shut off dirty energy plants in developing countries and retrain their staff to work in the green economy,” Wired reports.
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As Canadian smoke darkens the New York sky, the future is clear
“Since 2000, growing wildfire pollution has reversed significant gains from the Clean Air Act, and over the coming decades, it is poised to become the country’s main source of particulate pollution,” David Wallace-Wells writes.
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Earth is ‘really quite sick now’ and in danger zone in nearly all ecological ways, study says
Reporting by The Associated Press: “Earth has pushed past seven out of eight scientifically established safety limits and into the danger zone, not just for an overheating planet that’s losing its natural areas, but for the well-being of people living on it, according to a new study.”
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U.S. Representative Kim Schrier lauds federal funding for improved water treatment in Sammamish and Issaquah
Watch Kim Schrier’s April 11th press conference in Issaquah celebrating the appropriation of funds for the Sammamish Plateau Water District, which plans to upgrade its water treatment facilities to protect Washingtonians in its jurisdiction from toxic PFAS chemicals.
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The dirty secret of America’s clean dishes
“The world’s largest chemical maker, BASF, produces ingredients for America’s most popular products, from soaps to surface cleaners to dishwasher detergent. Emissions from their U.S. plants elevate cancer risks for an estimated 1.5 million people,” ProPublica reports.
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A century of tragedy: How the car and gas industry knew about the health risks of leaded fuel but sold it for one hundred years anyway
For decades, most gas sold in the U.S. contained a lead additive. Historian Bill Kovarik sees this anniversary as a time to reflect on the role of public health advocates and environmental journalists in preventing profit-driven tragedy.
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Dr. Seuss warned us fifty years ago, but we didn’t listen to ‘The Lorax’
“He’s describing what we would now call a ‘trophic cascade,’ and for me, as a scientist, I just find that genius that he anticipated that concept by a decade or more,” anthropologist and evolutionary biologist Nathaniel Dominy told NPR.
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‘Something needs to be fixed here’: Three Houston-area chemical leaks in one month raise calls for faster federal action
So much for don’t mess with Texas: “A slate of proposed revisions to federal chemical safety rules could have prevented the leaks, but the changes have been stalled for years,” Dominic Anthony Walsh reports.
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25,000 barrels possibly laced with DDT are found off California coast
The New York Times reports that one researcher said the number of discarded drums far exceeded his expectations. “It was hard to wrap my head around the density of targets,” he said.
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Michael Moore’s partner Jeff Gibbs debuts new film Planet of the Humans — and it’s free to watch on YouTube
Planet of the Humans is “a documentary that dares to say what no one else will — that we are losing the battle to stop climate change on planet earth because we are following leaders who have taken us down the wrong road.”
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Science under attack: How Trump is sidelining researchers and their work
In three years, the administration has diminished the role of science in policymaking while disrupting research projects nationwide.
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Progress *is* possible: Major cruise line to abandon plastic water bottles
Norweigan Cruise Line is phasing out plastic water bottles and switching to lower impact containers made by Just Water.
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Trump regime renews its attack on climate science
There is a real Republican war on science going on and it’s hurting the United States’ efforts to combat climate damage. This war started during the Bush years and is now being escalated by Donald “It’s freezing out, give me some of that global warming” Trump.
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Trump’s executive order to open Arctic waters to oil drilling was unlawful, federal judge rules
A victory for clean water and climate justice, via The New York Times: “In a major legal blow to [Donald] Trump’s push to expand offshore oil and gas development, a federal judge ruled that an executive order by Mr. Trump that lifted an Obama-era ban on oil and gas drilling in the Arctic Ocean and parts of the North Atlantic coast was unlawful.”
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Bill Gates: Why I’m for Washington state’s pollution fee
Bill Gates has thrown his support behind Initiative 1631, spearheaded by a coalition that includes the Northwest Progressive Institute.
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Garbage from Washington State’s booming pot industry clogs gutters, sewers and landfills
“Concentrated nutrients and fertilizers left over from cannabis growing operations are being dumped in public sewers and making their way past wastewater treatment plants into Puget Sound,” reports Kristen Millares Young. “And millions of pounds of weed harvest waste that could be composted are instead getting trucked to landfills.”
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Audit finds seventy percent of B.C. fish-processing plants do not comply with environmental regulations
“An audit of British Columbia fish-processing plants sparked by gory video of a pipe spewing bloody water into the Salish Sea has found that more than seventy percent of plants audited are out of compliance with environmental regulations, and some operate under rules decades behind modern standards,” Lynda Mapes reports.
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Sorry, Hanford: Your radiation leaks aren’t as important as tax cuts
“The whole mess is like a metaphor for how the entire federal government is run today. There is talk about big needs, even as they cut taxes on corporations and the wealthy, making it harder to address those needs. We the people are distracted by our borrowed bonuses. The crippling disconnect from reality isn’t even acknowledged.”
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Texas Republicans lobbied against imposition of safety rules on chemical plant that exploded
“The French company that says its Houston-area chemical plant is spewing ‘noxious’ smoke — and may explode — successfully pressed federal regulators to delay new regulations designed to improve safety procedures at chemical plants, according to federal records reviewed by International Business Times.”
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Say no to Longview coal terminal
“The Department of Ecology should therefore take a firm stand on behalf of sound science and strike a resounding blow against unreason by denying the permit for this unpopular, poorly conceived project.”
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Don’t bolster education funding by selling out our environment
If the Legislature is not prepared to create a carbon tax that is scaled to meet the challenges we face, it will be up to
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