BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (WIAT) — Amid a large-scale EPA superfund cleanup of contaminated soil in north Birmingham, residents are also worried about what’s being emitted into the air from local plants.
After complaints from neighbors about different smells and air that’s difficult to breathe, a CBS 42 investigation revealed that not all nearby industries are compliant with EPA guidelines. Jefferson County Department of Health Director of Environmental Health Jonathan Stanton told us Bluestone Coke was issued a notice of violation of local and federal air regulations.
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St. Croix residents are demanding answers from a U.S. Virgin Islands oil refinery, and from the officials regulating it, in the wake of a series of recent accidents that they worry have exposed them to toxic chemicals and endangered their health.
Since restarting operations in February, the Limetree Bay oil refinery has experienced at least three accidents that have directly affected the neighborhoods surrounding it. That includes a chemical release that occurred during maintenance on the plant last week that produced a nauseating odor, forcing schools to shut down and send children home for the second time in less than a month.
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Living among fracking wells is linked to higher rates of hospitalizations and deaths due to heart attacks, according to a new study.
The study, published in the Journal of Environmental Research, compared heart attack rates in Pennsylvania counties with fracking to demographically similar counties in New York where fracking is banned.
“There’s a large body of literature linking air pollution with poor cardiovascular health and heart attacks, but this is really the first study to look at this from a population level related to fracking,” Elaine Hill, a researcher at the University of Rochester Medical Center and one of the study’s co-authors, told EHN.
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“We all had to deal with it. I know at least every person I grew up with within this area,” Kashmere Garden’s resident Nakia Osbourne said. “I’m 44 right now, almost 45. Half of them have a child that has a disability.”
Osbourne’s son, Charlie, was one of them. He was born with autism and severe intellectual disabilities. He died in 2014 at the age of 13 from a burn accident, but Osbourne said his life proves what everyone already knows. Creosote, once used at the Union Pacific facility, hit the community hard.
“They destroyed a lot of people’s lives,” Osburne said. “Because people were dying from cancer. Mothers were dying from cancer like crazy. And now the kids. Now it’s trickling down to the kids. The great-grandkids.”
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Chemical giants DuPont and Daikin knew the dangers of a PFAS compound widely used in food packaging since 2010, but hid them from the public and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), company studies obtained by the Guardian reveal.
The chemicals, called 6:2 FTOH, are now linked to a range of serious health issues, and Americans are still being exposed to them in greaseproof pizza boxes, carryout containers, fast-food wrappers, and paperboard packaging.
The companies initially told the FDA that the compounds were safer and less likely to accumulate in humans than older types of PFAS, also known as “forever chemicals” and submitted internal studies to support that claim.
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Some of the biggest natural gas companies are moving to brand their product as low-emissions — a plan that could transform the industry even as it spurs accusations of green washing.
The gas producers and exporters are turning to third-party companies to prove their products release less methane and other pollutants than competitors, partly in an effort to stand out in a market that prioritizes environmentally conscious investments.
Environmentalists say, though, that certifying a portion of the industry’s production won’t solve the overall problem of methane pollution from oil and gas activity. And new research shows that cutting methane, a potent greenhouse gas, is a key strategy to battling the climate crisis.
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Photo Credit: Brett Carlsen/REUTERS/Newscom
A recent study confirms what community members and environmental justice advocates have been saying for years: people of color in the United States suffer greater harm from air pollution than White people.
The study, from the online journal Science Advances, found that communities of color are disproportionately exposed to higher amounts of a fatal air pollutant.
“Systemic disparity exists at all income levels. Consistent with a large body of evidence, we find that racial disparities are not simply a proxy for economic-based disparities. POC (people of color) at every income level are disproportionately exposed by the majority of sources,” according to the authors of the study.
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The complaint urges federal officials to withhold lucrative grants until the city overhauls its land-use policies. Zoning and planning ordinances protect industries in certain parts of Chicago without considering the health and well-being of people who live nearby, many of whom are Black and Latino.
“Racist policies are killing our neighborhood by making it a dumping ground for the dirtiest and most dangerous polluters,” said Peggy Salazar, director of the Southeast Environmental Task Force, one of three nonprofit groups that petitioned for federal intervention.
Photo Credit: Zbigniew Bzdak/Chicago Tribune
Jasmin Buggs reeled in her line and looked with dismay at the bare metal hook.
The shrimp bait was gone — again.
Likely it was yanked off by a stealthy stingray or nabbed by a passing whiting.
Buggs and her boyfriend regularly fish in Mackay River off the edge of an old bridge that once connected Brunswick and St. Simons Island. Though both live locally, neither were aware of any pollution or fish advisory notices on the Back River, the next bridge over, due to suspected pollution from the old Hercules industrial plant. The 152-acre industrial site, marked by the white smoke billowing from a tall smokestack, is visible from the bridge across the marsh.
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Photo Credit: Laura Corley/The Current
The United States has a schizophrenic relationship with the environment.
It boasts a spectacular system of more than 400 national park sites; a robust environmental lobby; and strong federal environmental law, including the landmark Endangered Species Act, which is credited with saving the bald eagle and the grizzly bear from extinction.
Yet it also harbors a dark side, including an insatiable appetite for fossil fuels; a longstanding romance with behemoth, gas-guzzling vehicles; and perhaps the highest per capita generation of plastic waste in the world.
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Photo Credit: Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP Photo