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For Louisiana’s ‘Cancer Alley,’ Study Shows An Even Graver Risk From Toxic Gases
For months now, Sharon Lavigne, a former special education teacher turned environmentalist, has told just about everyone she meets of the dangers posed if a planned plastics plant is built near her home just outside New Orleans in Louisiana’s notorious “Cancer Alley.”. The founder of a local environmental...
The Chesapeake Bay Program Flunked Its 2025 Cleanup Goals. What Happens Next?
Agriculture and stormwater runoff from developed land—key reasons the Chesapeake Bay is not on target to meet 2025 cleanup goals—will continue to limit pollution reduction efforts until federal and state agencies come up with new approaches to tackle these longstanding problems. That’s according to a recently published paper...
Kids Are Particularly Vulnerable to Extreme Weather. What Are We Doing About It?
It’s not unusual for pediatricians to prescribe a healthy dose of sunshine and outdoor time to their growing patients. A wide body of research extolls the benefits of getting outside for kids—from improving motor skills to lowering obesity risk. However, as climate change accelerates, this recommendation comes with...
As a Longwall Coal Mine Grows Beneath an Alabama Town, Neighbors of an Explosion Victim Feel Undermined and Unheard
OAK GROVE, Ala.—Lily Spicer felt the energy of the explosion surge through her body. She was talking to her daughter on the phone when the boom came. Her family was accustomed to the occasional blasts that would sometimes shake their windows, she said. But this was different. “The only...
Low-Emission ‘Gas Certification’ Is Greenwashing, Climate Advocates Conclude in a Contested New Report
A growing effort by the fossil fuel industry to sell natural gas as a low-carbon fuel is little more than greenwashing, according to a new report by climate advocacy organizations. Gas producers looking to differentiate their products as clean fuel are increasingly seeking “gas certification” from third-party companies, which monitor...
Declaring an Epidemic of ‘Toxic Litter,’ Baltimore Targets Plastic Makers and Packaging in the Latest Example of Plastics Litigation
Tired of potato chip wrappers and other single-use plastic waste clogging streams, littering public spaces and creating air pollution when burned, the city of Baltimore has gone to court to ask for relief. City officials and their lawyers claim global beverage giants PepsiCo and Coca-Cola, along with six other companies,...
Mining the Sun: Some in the Wyoming Epicenter of the Coal Industry Hope to Sustain Its Economy With Renewables
Coal mines are not static. They move. A years-long time lapse of a strip mine would show a crater crawling across the Earth as miners gouge pits hundreds of feet deep to expose coal seams, and then haul dirt excavated from the front of the hole to fill in the back, where the mining’s finished. It’s an efficient way to begin the process of “reclamation,” which companies are required to implement to restore the disturbed land to some semblance of its pre-mining condition.
In West Virginia, the Senate Race Outcome May Shift Limits of US Climate Ambitions
For decades, West Virginia has elected senators who have played an oversized role in United States energy policy, backing fossil fuels and resisting robust action on climate change. Sen. Joe Manchin may have been outside the mainstream of the Democratic party in his views, but in a closely divided Senate,...
Climate Activists Blockade Citigroup’s Doors with Model Pipeline and Protest Bank’s Ties to Israel
NEW YORK—Tensions were high outside of Citigroup’s global headquarters on Friday morning as climate activists blockaded the doors for an hour and hundreds of employees waited in the plaza to get to work. The demonstration marked the end of the second week of the “Summer of Heat on...
New York’s Chronically Underfunded Parks Department Is Losing the Fight Against Invasive Species, Disrepair and Climate Change
NEW YORK—On a warm Wednesday morning in June, half a dozen volunteers slip on waders and gloves provided by the Van Cortlandt Park Alliance, a small nonprofit dedicated to preserving and supporting the Bronx park. They are preparing to go to war with the water chestnut, an aquatic invasive species that has spread a dense canopy across a large portion of the park’s large main pond.
Q&A: What’s in the Water of Alaska’s Rusting Rivers, and What’s Climate Change Got to Do With it?
From our collaborating partner “Living on Earth,” public radio’s environmental news magazine, an interview by managing producer Jenni Doering with Jon O’Donnell, ecologist for the Arctic Inventory and Monitoring Network at the National Park Service. The rapid climate change happening to our planet is often invisible.
Why is Rhino Poaching Down at This Park? The Reasons May Not Be Good
In recent years, the South African government has touted the steady decline of rhino poaching in Kruger National Park, the largest wildlife sanctuary in the country and a habitat for many of these iconic horned mammals. But a new study, published Friday in Science Advances, suggests there may be more...
Effort to Save a Historic Water Tower Put Lead in this North Carolina Town’s Soil
BYNUM, N.C.—Pitted with rust, an empty water tower looms over this old mill village. In its short shadow rests an organic community garden, where overripe tomatoes dangle from dying vines and pepper plants droop, yellowed and parched. It’s peak growing season, but the garden gates are locked. This...
California’s Bay Area is Heating Up. Its Infrastructure Isn’t Designed For It
The San Francisco Bay Area is set to endure its first heat wave of the year this month. On June 4, the National Weather Service warned of temperatures touching 100 in the coming weeks. As temperatures across the world rise, each summer is becoming hotter and hotter. Especially in the Bay Area, where summers have historically rarely topped 85 degrees Fahrenheit, the effects of climate change are beginning to appear rather drastically. And contemporary architecture isn’t built for accommodating heat waves and rising temperatures.
How Can Solar Farms Defend Against Biblical-Level Hailstorms?
When a baseball-size hailstone slams into a solar panel at more than 90 mph, the result is not pretty. We saw this in March, when a hailstorm decimated parts of the 350-megawatt Fighting Jays solar project in southeast Texas. Images circulated on social media and in news coverage of thousands of panels pockmarked with white circles of broken glass. Right-wing outlets were eager to amplify what they saw as evidence of the unreliability of solar power.
Europe’s New ESG Rules Spark Questions About What Sustainable Investing Looks Like
The European Union’s move to tighten rules for sustainable investing will put two-thirds of Europe’s so-called ESG funds on notice, forcing thousands of them to either sell off $40 billion in assets or change their names in a way that more accurately and transparently reflects their holdings. Last...
Out of Site, Out of Mind? New Study Finds Missing Apex Predators Are Too Often Neglected in Ecological Research
Change the world slowly enough, and even scientists can turn into something like the proverbial frogs in a saucepan, unaware that they are gradually starting to boil. A new study, published today in BioScience, revealed how scientists often fail to consider historical states of the world when conducting ecological research. Using gray wolves as a case study, the meta-analysis found that almost 60 percent of journal articles and graduate theses conducted on plant and animal communities affected by wolves, or their removal from an area, from 1955 to 2021 neglected to mention gray wolves or other large carnivores in any of their writing.
With Heat Waves, an Increased Risk for Heart Problems, New Research Shows
As a cardiologist in the largest city in the nation’s fastest-warming region, Ethan Katznelson has daily, first-hand knowledge of how high temperatures can put stress on the human heart. Katznelson, who practices at New York Presbyterian Weill Cornell Medical Center, regularly sees the cardiovascular stress suffered by patients who...
Developing Countries Say Their Access Difficulties at Bonn Climate Talks Show Justice Issues Obstruct Climate Progress
This year’s annual United Nations climate talks in Bonn started the way COP28 in Dubai ended last December, with some representatives from developing countries in the Global South feeling excluded from the process and even unwanted. “Do we really need to stay in Bonn for such conferences,” said Proscovier...
Inside Climate News Selects 10 Fellows Specializing in Climate, Environment and Justice Reporting
Inside Climate News’ summer 2024 class of fellows will report from locations across the country as part of a program designed to hone its participants’ writing and reporting skills and deepen their subject matter expertise related to climate change and attribution science, environmental justice, renewable energy, and conservation and regulatory issues at the federal, state and local levels.
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