Cookies help us run our site more efficiently.

By clicking “Accept”, you agree to the storing of cookies on your device to enhance site navigation, analyze site usage, and assist in our marketing efforts. View our Privacy Policy for more information or to customize your cookie preferences.

Accept Deny

GoGreenNation News

Learn more about the issues presented in our films
Show Filters

We study glaciers. ‘Artificial glaciers’ and other tech may halt their total collapse | Brent Minchew and Colin Meyer

How might we prevent sea-level rise? Satellite-based radar, solar-powered drones, robot submarines and lab-based ‘artificial glaciers’ could all play a roleSea levels are rising faster than at any point in human history, and for every foot that waters rise, 100 million people lose their homes. At current projections, that means about 300 million people will be forced to move in the decades to come, along with the social and political conflict as people migrate inland. Despite this looming crisis, the world still lacks specific, reliable forecasts for when and where the seas will rise – and we have invested almost nothing in understanding whether and how we can slow it down.Societies must continue to focus on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but it’s increasingly clear that the world needs to do more: we need to predict the future of the world’s ice with precision, and to explore safe, science-backed methods to keep it from melting away. Continue reading...

Sea levels are rising faster than at any point in human history, and for every foot that waters rise, 100 million people lose their homes. At current projections, that means about 300 million people will be forced to move in the decades to come, along with the social and political conflict as people migrate inland. Despite this looming crisis, the world still lacks specific, reliable forecasts for when and where the seas will rise – and we have invested almost nothing in understanding whether and how we can slow it down.Societies must continue to focus on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but it’s increasingly clear that the world needs to do more: we need to predict the future of the world’s ice with precision, and to explore safe, science-backed methods to keep it from melting away.What does that look like? A growing group of scientists at universities and non-profits are testing a new approach, one that treats ice not as a distant, untouchable force, but as a system we can understand, anticipate and conserve.The challenge is vast. The largest drivers of sea-level rise are ocean-bound glaciers whose loss is largely driven by warm ocean currents melting their undersides, a deep ocean process that will continue even as we reduce emissions. Like enormous ice cubes dumped into a glass of water, collapsing glaciers can raise sea levels precipitously.Most concerning is the Florida-sized Thwaites glacier in west Antarctica, called the “doomsday glacier” because it is the keystone holding back the much larger west Antarctic ice sheet. If, as satellite observations indicate, Thwaites continues to collapse, the west Antarctic ice sheet would go with it, raising global sea levels more than 6ft, displacing more than half a billion people, in our children’s lifetimes. Notably, while we believe reducing carbon emissions is critical for climate resilience, even bringing emissions to preindustrial levels will not slow this collapse.This scenario is daunting, but we are not powerless. The way we see it, there has never been a better time to meet this challenge head-on. We are the beneficiaries of decades of polar and glacier research strengthened by innovative technologies that allow us to monitor the ice sheets, study relevant phenomena in the laboratory and combine this knowledge in computational models to forecast sea-level rise.Technologies we can bring to bear include satellite-based radar, solar-powered drones, robot submarines, lab-based “artificial glaciers” and advanced computing technologies, including artificial intelligence.What might be possible in the future to prevent sea-level rise? Glaciers, which flow like rivers of ice over a bed of rock and sediment, can naturally freeze themselves to their beds under the right conditions, as the Kamb ice stream in west Antarctica did about 200 years ago. This freezing occurred in only a few relatively small areas under Kamb, and yet the entire glacier has virtually stopped flowing and is currently accumulating ice.We cannot afford to debate until the tide is at our doorImportantly, this freezing-induced stabilization, which has lasted for centuries, did not affect the stability of surrounding areas, suggesting there are nature-inspired solutions that could stabilize Thwaites, and other areas, at reasonable cost and risk, especially compared with the astronomical costs and existential risks of unchecked sea-level rise. One approach that shows promise would involve drilling to the bed of Thwaites and installing passive heat pumps, known as thermosiphons, to cool its base.These are only ideas at this stage. It will take years of research and development to understand if and how we might stabilize ice sheets. Such efforts will need to consider the views of multiple governing bodies and stakeholders and follow established engineering frameworks, including Nasa’s Technology Readiness Level (TRL) system, which assesses viability throughout a deliberative development process. Innovation and speed are of the essence because of the human and economic toll of sea-level rise, but so too are scientific discipline and environmental responsibility.We cannot “move fast and break things” – but we also cannot afford to debate until the tide is at our door.Philanthropy is currently picking up where governments have failed to fund at scale. For example, the recently concluded International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration (ITGC), a partnership between the US and the UK, provided on average about US$7m each year from 2018 to 2025. That is considered a major investment in this field, yet it is vanishingly small next to the hundreds of billions lost to coastal flooding every year. Accelerating preparations for sea level rise requires greater and sustained funding commitments.As scientists who have studied ice sheets and glaciers for years, we were resigned to documenting their demise. But we’ve decided to embrace a more proactive approach to this problem, which means applying our knowledge and skills to rapidly improve sea-level forecasts, so we all know what’s coming and when, and, in parallel, to research and develop solutions that could slow rates of sea-level rise.All of us must face the fact that sea levels will continue to rise, with major implications for ourselves, our children and our grandchildren. However, facing that reality is not the same as accepting it. We must start now to combine emissions reduction with careful, responsible exploration of new options to slow sea-level rise and prevent worst-case scenarios.If we fail to find new options, we will at least know that we did everything we could, while helping humanity prepare for what’s coming. And if we succeed, we will have done something once thought out of reach: we’ll have preserved the world’s coastlines, and given future generations the chance to live by stable seas. Dr Brent Minchew is the co-founder and chief scientist at the Arête Glacier Initiative and a professor of geophysics at Caltech Dr Colin Meyer is the co-founder and deputy scientist at the Arête Glacier Initiative and an associate professor of engineering at Dartmouth College

Crisis
Science
Water

China Announces Another New Trade Measure Against Japan as Tensions Rise

China has escalated its trade tensions with Japan by launching an investigation into imported dichlorosilane, a chemical gas used in making semiconductors

BEIJING (AP) — China escalated its trade tensions with Japan on Wednesday by launching an investigation into imported dichlorosilane, a chemical gas used in making semiconductors, a day after it imposed curbs on the export of so-called dual-use goods that could be used by Japan’s military.The Chinese Commerce Ministry said in a statement that it had launched the investigation following an application from the domestic industry showing the price of dichlorosilane imported from Japan had decreased 31% between 2022 and 2024.“The dumping of imported products from Japan has damaged the production and operation of our domestic industry,” the ministry said.The measure comes a day after Beijing banned exports to Japan of dual-use goods that can have military applications.Beijing has been showing mounting displeasure with Tokyo after new Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi suggested late last year that her nation's military could intervene if China were to take action against Taiwan — an island democracy that Beijing considers its own territory.Tensions were stoked again on Tuesday when Japanese lawmaker Hei Seki, who last year was sanctioned by China for “spreading fallacies” about Taiwan and other disputed territories, visited Taiwan and called it an independent country. Also known as Yo Kitano, he has been banned from entering China. He told reporters that his arrival in Taiwan demonstrated the two are “different countries.”“I came to Taiwan … to prove this point, and to tell the world that Taiwan is an independent country,” Hei Seki said, according to Taiwan’s Central News Agency.“The nasty words of a petty villain like him are not worth commenting on,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning retorted when asked about his comment. Fears of a rare earths curb Masaaki Kanai, head of Asia Oceanian Affairs at Japan's Foreign Ministry, urged China to scrap the trade curbs, saying a measure exclusively targeting Japan that deviates from international practice is unacceptable. Japan, however, has yet to announce any retaliatory measures.As the two countries feuded, speculation rose that China might target rare earths exports to Japan, in a move similar to the rounds of critical minerals export restrictions it has imposed as part of its trade war with the United States.China controls most of the global production of heavy rare earths, used for making powerful, heat-resistance magnets used in industries such as defense and electric vehicles.While the Commerce Ministry did not mention any new rare earths curbs, the official newspaper China Daily, seen as a government mouthpiece, quoted anonymous sources saying Beijing was considering tightening exports of certain rare earths to Japan. That report could not be independently confirmed. Improved South Korean ties contrast with Japan row As Beijing spars with Tokyo, it has made a point of courting a different East Asian power — South Korea.On Wednesday, South Korean President Lee Jae Myung wrapped up a four-day trip to China – his first since taking office in June. Lee and Chinese President Xi Jinping oversaw the signing of cooperation agreements in areas such as technology, trade, transportation and environmental protection.As if to illustrate a contrast with the China-Japan trade frictions, Lee joined two business events at which major South Korean and Chinese companies pledged to collaborate.The two sides signed 24 export contracts worth a combined $44 million, according to South Korea’s Ministry of Trade, Industry and Resources. During Lee’s visit, Chinese media also reported that South Korea overtook Japan as the leading destination for outbound flights from China’s mainland over the New Year’s holiday.China has been discouraging travel to Japan, saying Japanese leaders’ comments on Taiwan have created “significant risks to the personal safety and lives of Chinese citizens in Japan.”Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See – December 2025

Chemicals
Business
Technology

How Urban Gardens Can Bolster American Democracy

But when Kate Brown, an environmental historian at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), looks at urban gardens, she sees a deep-rooted history of activism and sustainability—one that spans centuries, continents, and communities. Brown distilled her research on the subject into her forthcoming book, Tiny Gardens Everywhere: The Past, Present, and Future of the Self-Provisioning […] The post How Urban Gardens Can Bolster American Democracy appeared first on Civil Eats.

When people walk or drive past urban gardens, they often just see what’s on the surface. Raised beds on a small plot. Seedlings poking through the dirt. Perhaps bright pops of colorful produce, like tomatoes or peppers. But when Kate Brown, an environmental historian at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), looks at urban gardens, she sees a deep-rooted history of activism and sustainability—one that spans centuries, continents, and communities. Throughout, Brown reveals a common thread: Unused urban spaces disparaged by the powerful as “wastelands” were, in reality, areas where working-class and poor communities used gardening to build self-sustaining livelihoods. Brown distilled her research on the subject into her forthcoming book, Tiny Gardens Everywhere: The Past, Present, and Future of the Self-Provisioning City. The chapters cover feudal England, 19th-century Berlin, and early 20th-century Washington, D.C., as well as modern-day Chicago; Mansfield, Ohio; and Montgomery, Alabama, traversing time and space to illuminate their connected stories. Throughout, Brown reveals a common thread: Unused urban spaces disparaged by the powerful as “wastelands” were, in reality, areas where working-class and poor communities used gardening to build self-sustaining livelihoods. Civil Eats spoke with Brown about her book, the histories of urban gardens, and why she thinks urban gardeners can transform people and society. You’re known for your writings about nuclear disasters, particularly Chernobyl. This book seems to be a slightly different turn in your work. What made you focus on urban gardens? When I was in the Chernobyl zone, I came across all these people who were picking berries in the radioactive swamps and selling them to people [there]. So that really got me thinking about plants—because plants can be sources of pollution [and toxins]. Or you could think of these plants as our allies, doing what an army of soldiers had not managed to do: They were cleaning up the environment. They were taking radioactive isotopes and bringing them in neat little round purple packages. If we’d taken those berries and deposited them as radioactive waste, it would [have been] a really affordable and fantastic form of cleanup. So then I started to think, “How else do people in tough circumstances use plants as their allies?” I started looking at cities. [In the] 1850s, people were getting pushed out of their peasant villages, where they farmed the land and foraged and raised animals, and they went to big cities for industrial jobs. What I noticed is that they go to the edges of the cities, and they find [underdeveloped] areas they call “wastes.” They can use the wastes around them to procure food, fuel, and shelter. Around Berlin in 1850, these urban gardeners took whatever they could find—garbage, beer mash, pulp from sugar beet factories, kitchen scraps, animal manure, human manure—and they built human-engineered soils and created a green shantytown. They started to build the sinews of the social welfare network that we so rely on today. My sense is they were doing what plants and microbes and fungi do in soils: They’re sharing, creating mutual aid societies, supporting each other. And what comes of that is not a realm of scarcity, but one of abundance. People thrived in these infrastructure-less, green shantytowns, and then wherever I started to look, I found places like this. Your book reveals how urban gardens nurture health, despite a prevailing stereotype of cities as dirty or unclean, particularly during the industrial era. Can you describe a bit about what you found at the intersection of public health and urban gardening? Take Washington, D.C., for example. . . . People know the Potomac River, but very few are aware that there’s a second river called the Anacostia River. If you cross it, there’s a part of town that has been historically Black, where Black people could buy lots of land. What we found east of the Anacostia is that in these communities that got going around 1910 to 1920, people bought not one lot but two to six. And when they did that, they put a tiny house in the middle and then used all the rest of the land around it to garden. Where sanitation comes in is that these neighborhoods were ignored by the congressmen in charge of D.C. at the time. These were mostly Dixie Democrats, they were racist, and they just didn’t put any infrastructure in that part of town. . . . So there’s no sewer systems, there’s no garbage pickup, there’s no paved surfaces. And it’s pretty densely populated. So if you’re following the germ theory, you would expect to have all kinds of outbreaks of disease, especially fecal-borne diseases. But there doesn’t seem to be any sign of this. In fact, people had outdoor privies, and then they would either compost what was in the privy themselves, or nightsoil workers would come and bring [that compost] to the dump, which was run by a company called the Washington Fertilizer company. And the Washington Fertilizer company had hundreds of pigs running around this area. Composted nightsoil, digested by the pigs, would be brought to local farms but also to these gardens, and people would use it with their other household compost. They’d [also] take water that came down from their roofs and kitchen water, run it through gravel, and then have pretty clean water that they could use to water their plants. They were doing all the things that would be considered green architecture today, that they had invented themselves in the 1920s and ’30s. Your book emphasizes that working-class people are often at the forefront of urban gardening. What is it about urban gardening that makes it an effective or necessary tool for marginalized groups? People are drawing from the bounty of their gardens [and] they’re creating these kinds of societies that then start to solve other problems. These are communities that are not getting the benefit of state largesse. They’re often either overtly discriminated against or they’re just simply ignored. So they’re using their spontaneously created mutual aid societies, which includes plants and microbes and animals, to share this bounty as a kind of public wealth. You feature stories of people who have started up urban gardens to feed themselves and their communities, but faced interference from bureaucratic forces. Municipal laws prevented a couple living in the Chicago suburbs from building a hoop house to grow food during the winter, for example. Can or should urban farming be advanced by policymakers, or do you see it as mostly an alternative to our political and food systems? This family had a hoop house safely in the backyard. They grew a lot of food in the summer, and then they were always sad in November when it was starting to get cold. So they put up this hoop house, and they could be in there with T-shirts and grow the cold-weather greens that they really enjoyed all winter long. A neighbor complained, the city told them to take it down, and they kept fighting it. They pursued this for seven years. The city leaders would say things like, “What are you growing there? Why don’t you just go to Whole Foods? We’re a suburb, not an agricultural region.” And so [they] pursued this all the way down to the state legislature and passed the Right to Garden law. Just a couple of states in the country have this right, [that] says no matter the municipality, no matter [the] homeowner association rules, people have the right to grow food on their private property and on other property that’s not being used. That’s one of the motivations for writing this book. We’re facing major environmental and ecological problems that are going to lead to all kinds of other problems, like wars and economic distress. I think a lot of people feel like we can’t do anything about it. We can’t get anything changed at the U.N. level. We certainly can’t get an act of Congress passed. But we can get our municipalities to change code. What if every time you build a new condo, you have to have a garden spot the size of a parking space? Suddenly everything can start to change. There’s more green space, which means there’s more places for rain to fall that prevent flooding. There’s more green space, which means the cities are cooler and people are outside on the streets [more]. In this time, when so many people feel lost and alienated and lonely, this simple change in zoning on a municipal level could change the whole nature of American democracy. You described your book as part manifesto. What do you hope people take away from it? What I’m hoping people take away is that we still have commons that we devote to moving and parking cars, and we should ask for those back. For humans—not machines—and for plants, animals, insects, and microbes. Part of this manifesto is that these commons are not a free-for-all. What the commons provide is common bounty, a common wealth, that is off the market. My hope is that we start with these commons in cities, where by 2050, the majority of people in the world will live, and from there, that understanding of transactions starts to spread. So that’s my manifesto, to think back to common right: the right to food, fuel, and shelter. More useful, I argue, than the right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Nobody can eat those. Very few people can attain those without having access to money and power. But common law rights provided food, fuel, and shelter for everyone. And that’s, I think, where we need to start again. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. The post How Urban Gardens Can Bolster American Democracy appeared first on Civil Eats.

Activism
Technology
Food

Texas clears the way for petrochemical expansion as experts warn of health risks

Public Health Watch chronicles a fossil-fuel infrastructure boom that could worsen air pollution in some areas and exacerbate climate change.

Let’s establish some baselines.  Texas is responsible for more greenhouse-gas emissions than Saudi Arabia or the global maritime industry. Its oil, gas and petrochemical operations discharge tens of millions of pounds of toxic pollutants into the air each year, comprising almost one-fifth of such releases in the United States. It is the nation’s top emitter of the carcinogens benzene, ethylene oxide and 1,3-butadiene.  It accounts for 75 percent of the petrochemicals made in the U.S. It is an engine of the world’s plastics industry, whose products clog oceans and landfills and, upon breaking down, infuse human bodies with potentially dangerous microplastics. Despite all of this, the state’s commitment to fossil-fuel infrastructure is unwavering, driven by economics. Oil and gas extraction, transportation and processing contributed $249 billion to the state’s gross domestic product and supported 661,000 jobs in 2021, according to the most recent reports from the Texas Economic Development & Tourism Office. An industrial construction spurt is well into its second decade, with little sign of slowing. Since 2013, 57 petrochemical facilities have been built or expanded in the state, according to the nonprofit Environmental Integrity Project’s Oil & Gas Watch, which tracks these activities.  Over half are in majority-minority neighborhoods, the group’s data show. Over the next five years, 18 new plants and 23 expansions are planned or are already under  construction. Twelve of these projects collectively will be allowed to release the same amount of greenhouse gases as 41 natural gas-fired power plants, according to the companies’ filings with the state. Emissions estimates for the other projects were not available.  All 41 petrochemical projects will also be permitted to release 38.6 million pounds of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s highest-priority pollutants, including carcinogens and respiratory irritants, according to company filings. Places like Jefferson County, in far southeastern Texas, and Harris County, which includes Houston, could see their air quality deteriorate, putting the public at increased risk of cancer, respiratory illness, reproductive effects and other life-altering conditions. Five projects are to be sited within a five-mile radius of Channelview, an unincorporated part of Harris County plagued by extremely high levels of cancer-causing benzene and a surge in barge traffic – an underappreciated cause of air pollution – on the San Jacinto River. Companies have announced dozens more projects, including seven near Channelview, but haven’t begun the process of obtaining permits from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, or TCEQ, which will allow them to construct facilities that release pollutants into the air. The odds are in their favor: In the past quarter-century, the TCEQ has denied less than 0.5 percent of new air permits and amendments, often required for plant expansions. For six months, Public Health Watch has been reviewing TCEQ permits, analyzing air-quality and census data and talking to scientific experts, advocates, elected officials, industry representatives and residents of Harris and Jefferson counties to try to capture the scope and potential health consequences of the petrochemical buildout.  Here are three out of 13 scenes from that buildout. View the full interactive feature at publichealthwatch.org. Andy Morris-Ruiz Home of Spindletop booms again: Jefferson County Jefferson County has a quarter-million residents and stretches from Beaumont in the northeast to McFaddin National Wildlife Refuge on the Gulf of Mexico. Its Spindletop field birthed Texas’s first full-scale oil boom in 1901; today it is once again an axis of industry zeal. Just off Twin City Highway, where Nederland meets Beaumont, cranes are assembling a plant that will produce anhydrous ammonia and other chemicals used to make fertilizer and alternative fuels. According to state permits issued to owner Woodside Energy, the facility is authorized to annually add almost 80,000 pounds of nitrogen oxides, which can cause acute and chronic respiratory distress, to Nederland’s air. Nitrogen oxides also contribute to ground-level ozone pollution, the primary component in smog. Uncontained, ammonia can sear the lungs and kill in sufficient concentrations. Four people formally objected to the facility’s expansion last summer but were unable to stop it. Officials in Jefferson County embraced the plant, granting Woodside a 10-year property-tax exemption, and a $209 million tax abatement from the Beaumont Independent School District. About two miles to the southeast of Woodside, Energy Transfer wants to erect a large ethane cracker on the Neches River. The hulking plant will heat ethane, a component of natural gas, to extremely high temperatures, “cracking” the molecules to make ethylene, a building block for plastics. According to Energy Transfer’s permit application, the cracker would be allowed to release nearly 10 million of pounds of volatile organic compounds, or VOCs, which contribute to ozone and can cause effects ranging from throat and eye irritation to cancer, along with nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide, another smog-forming chemical that interferes with the body’s oxygen supply.  The TCEQ told Public Health Watch in an email that the project “is protective of human health and the environment and no adverse effects are expected to occur.”  There were seven formal objectors to the ethane cracker, among them Reanna Panelo, a lifelong Nederland resident who was 23 when she wrote to the TCEQ two years ago. “It is not fair nor is it morally right to build such a monstrous and horrendous plant designed to kill the surrounding area, residents and environment, for company gain,” wrote Panelo, who said generations of her family had been tormented by cancer. The TCEQ executive director is processing Energy Transfer’s permit application, despite comments submitted in October by the Environmental Integrity Project alleging the project could violate ambient air-quality standards for particulate matter — fine particles that can exacerbate asthma, cause heart disease and contribute to cognitive decline. The Nederland Independent School District authorized a $121 million tax break for Energy Transfer. Nine miles south of Nederland, in Port Arthur, two ethane crackers are poised for expansion and three new petrochemical facilities are planned, according to Oil & Gas Watch. Read Next How a Koch-owned chemical plant in Texas gamed the Clean Air Act Naveena Sadasivam & Clayton Aldern “It’s the worst possible situation you can imagine,” said John Beard, a Port Arthur native and founder of Port Arthur Community Action Network, an environmental advocacy group. “You’re living in a toxic atmosphere that with every breath is potentially killing you.” Air quality in Jefferson County has improved over the years — mostly a product of stricter regulation — but is still far from pristine. The American Lung Association gave the county an “F” for ozone pollution in its 2025 State of the Air Report Card. A pungent haze occasionally envelops the county, portions of which have some of the highest cancer risks from air toxics in the nation, according to the Environmental Defense Fund’s Petrochemical Air Pollution Map. Indorama Ventures in Port Neches is one of the main drivers of risk — it makes the potent carcinogen ethylene oxide and releases more of the gas into the air than any other facility in the U.S., federal data show. Peter DeCarlo, an atmospheric chemist and a professor at the Johns Hopkins Whiting School of Engineering, and a team of fellow scientists recently drove an air-monitoring van through neighborhoods bordering Indorama. They measured levels of ethylene oxide “greatly exceeding what is acceptable for long-term exposure,” DeCarlo told Public Health Watch. The county’s level of particulate matter already exceeds national air-quality standards. Jefferson County spent 18 years in violation of the standard for ground-level ozone, but improved after 2009. Now, the county’s ozone levels are creeping upward again. DeCarlo said that the new sources of pollution slated for the region could push the county over the limit again — subjecting it to tougher oversight — and worsen its fine-particle problem.  In a statement to Public Health Watch, Woodside said its ammonia plant is 97 percent complete and represents “a $2.35 billion investment in American energy, supporting approximately 2,000 construction jobs and hundreds of permanent ongoing jobs . . . Once operational [it] is expected to increase US ammonia production by more than 7 percent, strengthening domestic agriculture, food production and manufacturing, while potentially doubling US ammonia exports.”  The company said it met with four residents who filed comments with the TCEQ and appreciated “the strong community support for the project.” Energy Transfer and Indorama Ventures did not respond to requests for comment. Andy Morris-Ruiz Historic Black neighborhood threatened with extinction: Beaumont, Jefferson County The Charlton-Pollard neighborhood, on Beaumont’s south side, was established in 1869 by freed slave and school founder Charles Pole Charlton. In the mid-20th century it was a cultural hub — home to Beaumont’s “Black Main Street” and some of the oldest Black churches and schools in the city. It was part of the Chitlin’ Circuit, a group of performance venues during the Jim Crow era, which hosted James Brown, Ray Charles and other luminaries. Segregation, disinvestment and expanding industrial operations — railways, an international seaport and a petrochemical complex — gradually eroded Charlton-Pollard’s rich culture and institutions. Stores, schools and a hospital have closed, and now the buffer between the north end of the neighborhood and advancing industrial development is thinning.   The Port of Beaumont has acquired 78 parcels in Charlton-Pollard’s sparsely populated northeastern corner since 2016, property records show. This year it paved a lot the size of 18 football fields in their place, where it plans to store cargo, including building materials for new and expanding petrochemical plants. The lot lies across the street from the 97-year-old Starlight Missionary Baptist Church and two blocks from Charlton-Pollard Elementary School.  “The port recognizes the deep history of Charlton-Pollard and remains committed to operating responsibly and respectfully within that framework,” said Chris Fisher, the port’s director and CEO. He said he and his team have been transparent with the Charlton-Pollard Neighborhood Association, only developing in a specially zoned “transitional area” in the northeastern corner. In the 1990s and early 2000s, some residents asked the port to buy their properties, Fisher said. Later, after plans for the paved lot were solidified, the port began offering property owners 50 percent to 100 percent above appraised value and, in some cases, $15,000 relocation allowances, he said. “We kind of made sure that everybody that we dealt with was better off than before we did anything,” Fisher said. The port condemned properties when owners couldn’t be located or had unpaid taxes, he said. The neighborhood association’s president, Chris Jones, a 45-year-old former Beaumont mayoral candidate, said the port’s acquisitions are “the continuation of a long pattern. One  where Black neighborhoods were first under-documented, then under-invested, and ultimately treated as expendable in the path of industry.” When residents sold their properties, they “were navigating declining property values, loss of services, and the clear signal that the area was being prioritized for industrial use,” Jones said. “In that context, selling is often less about choice and more about survival.” He worries that the removal of trees and the addition of pavement will intensify heat and worsen noise pollution for those left in the neighborhood. Rail traffic supporting local industry has already increased, he said, and his status as an Army veteran makes him “vexed at the sound of a horn.” Jones and some allies hope to win historical designations for several churches in Charlton-Pollard to stave off further industrial encroachment. Environmental hazards are not new to Charlton-Pollard. A refinery now owned by Exxon Mobil was built less than a mile away in 1903. Almost a century later, residents filed a complaint with the EPA’s Office of Civil Rights, accusing the TCEQ of allowing the company to pollute above safe levels, increase emissions without public input and exceed permitted limits without penalty. The case was settled in 2017 after the TCEQ agreed to install an air monitor near the site and hold two public meetings. Charlton-Pollard still lies within the 99th percentile nationwide for cancer risk from air pollution, according to the Environmental Defense Fund.  In addition to the refinery, Exxon Mobil now operates a chemical plant, a polyethylene plant and a lubricant plant within the complex; last year the company said it plans to build a chemical-recycling facility there as well. Six more petrochemical projects are planned by other companies within five miles of Charlton-Pollard. In short, anyone who hasn’t been bought out by the port may breathe increasingly dirty air. Jefferson County is already violating the EPA’s standard for particulate matter, and diesel-burning trains and maritime vessels accommodating the industry expansion are large emitters of fine particles, as well as smog-forming nitrogen oxides.  Most infuriating, Jones said, is the idea that industrial development in Jefferson County is being underwritten in part by tax breaks even as Beaumont’s basic infrastructure — roads, sewage treatment — crumbles. Not long ago, he said, he saw “fecal waste” collecting in the Irving Avenue underpass. “The shit just rolled onto the street.” (Voters approved a $264 million bond package in November to improve streets and drainage) Andy Morris-Ruiz Fine particles, ozone and the body In addition to spewing carcinogens like benzene and 1,3-butadiene, petrochemical plants release large amounts of “criteria pollutants” —  the six common airborne substances the EPA regulates most closely. Regions across the country struggle to meet federal air-quality standards for two of these in particular: ground-level ozone and particulate matter. Dr. John Balmes, a professor emeritus at the University of California Berkeley School of Public Health, is a physician advisor to both the EPA and the California Air Resources Board, which regulates air quality in a state that’s had serious ozone and particulate-matter problems for years. He’s researched the effects of both pollutants on the body and helped craft EPA standards for them. Balmes said plant emissions will represent only a portion of particulate and ozone pollution from the petrochemical expansion in Texas. Transportation — diesel trucks, trains and ships — will add to the burden, he said. (Railyards and ports are often located in low-income and minority neighborhoods, like Charlton-Pollard.) Particulate matter and ozone can wreak havoc on the body, Balmes said. Fine particles, known as PM2.5, are about 20 times smaller than a human hair. When they’re inhaled, they don’t break down, and the body’s immune cells remain in a heightened state of response. Their ability to fight off infection is weakened. Fine particles often make their way into the bloodstream and trigger cardiovascular problems, such as heart attacks and congestive heart failure. They can also accumulate in the brain, contributing to cognitive decline and strokes. A 2023 analysis conducted for Public Health Watch by two researchers estimated that 8,405 Texans died from fine-particle pollution in 2016. Exposure to the particles also led to thousands of new cases of Alzheimer’s, asthma and strokes, the researchers found. Last year, an EPA advisory board, on which Balmes served, recommended tightening the National Ambient Air Quality Standard for PM2.5. The EPA said the new standard would prevent 4,500 premature deaths and yield $46 billion in net health benefits over more than a decade. According to federal data, 16 Texas counties, including Jefferson, violate the new standard, which the Trump administration has vowed to abandon. Environmental groups and regulators have been fighting ozone pollution for more than 70 years. Ozone gas is formed when two pollutants — VOCs and nitrogen oxides — are released from stacks and tailpipes and react in the presence of sunlight. When ozone enters the body, it chemically burns the respiratory system, leading to inflammation. It’s so caustic that it can break down synthetic rubber. Acute exposure can worsen asthma; chronic, high-level exposure can cause permanent lung damage. The eight-county Houston-Galveston-Brazoria area, with roughly 7.2 million people, has been under continual threat from ozone for two decades. It spent over half of that time classified as being in “serious” or “severe” violation of the EPA’s eight-hour standards. Still, 35   petrochemical projects in the region have been announced or permitted by the TCEQ.   “Adding 35 petrochemical plants to a region that is already in serious ozone [violation] is the wrong way to go in terms of public health,” Balmes said. Explore all 13 scenes from Texas’s petrochemical expansion at publichealthwatch.org. This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Texas clears the way for petrochemical expansion as experts warn of health risks on Jan 7, 2026.

Health
Chemicals
Pollution

This startup helps enterprising resellers prevent nearly a million pounds of returns from ending up in landfills

Americans are likely to have spent a record $1 trillion-plus this holiday shopping season alone, and about $5.5 trillion in retail sales in all of 2025, according to estimates by the National Retail Federation. That includes many unhappy returns for retailers: And when it comes back to them, a lot of the $850 billion in returned merchandise is often cheaper to discard than to inspect, sort, and resell—adding millions of tons to landfills every year. “This is a massive ecological problem, as well as a financial problem for these companies,” says Ryan Ryker, CEO of rScan. Based in South Bend, Indiana, the startup has developed software and logistics services to help transfer these products from the beleaguered original sellers to resellers more eager to do the work of making money on a returned product. “There’s a lot of people who are looking to make side cash,” says cofounder and chief logistics officer Julian Marquez about their small-business clients. But it’s not easy. Instead of getting, say, a shipping pallet of all the same product, such as a power tool, resellers have to sort through a mishmash that can contain dozens of different items—including many one-offs. rScan’s offering for them sounds simple: a barcode-scanning app. But behind that is an entire data infrastructure to help resellers understand what they’ve got and how to sell it. Scanning the UPC barcode on a box pulls up the item’s product name and brand, images, detailed descriptions, and manuals. Resellers can first ascertain the product’s condition and whether everything that should be in the box is. If they decide it’s worth selling, rScan can pull from its database the dozens of product attributes required by online marketplaces and format complete product listings tailored to venues such as Amazon, eBay, or Shopify. The company regularly scrapes these sites to survey what products are selling for and estimate a price for the reseller’s listing. rScan charges 30 cents per month per unique item that is scanned and in their catalogue for as long as it’s listed for sale online. (So selling 10 of the same product would cost 30 cents per month, total.) The company also takes a percentage of monthly sales, from 1% to 3.9% on a sliding scale that ramps up as vendors sell more. Clients range from newbies working out of a garage to what Ryker calls, “sellers that are doing multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars per year.” Retailers from High School For Ryker, rScan was tailored to the challenges he’d personally encountered. “Resale is something I previously dabbled in prior to the pandemic. From there, there was a lot of returns going on with COVID, the rise in e-commerce sales, things of that nature,” he says.  But his retail experience goes back to high school in the 2010s when he and Marquez established their own apparel brand, called Culture Clothing, which ran for a couple years and grossed about $45,000 in its best year. They mostly sold at concerts and show venues, but also called on another classmate, Rod Baradaran, to set up an ecommerce site. In 2021, the three reunited to cofound rScan. Baradaran reprised his tech role, coding the app and the online services, developing the price-setting algorithm, and serving as COO. (A fourth cofounder, Michael Altenburger, joined a few months later.) The company—which was bootstrapped by the founders—now has 36 employees. Taking on a Clunky System It’s not that returned goods would all go into the trash without rScan. “The real advantage of being able to get this online faster and on ecommerce [platforms] is that you have a much wider market where these products can be distributed and actually used,” says Baradaran. The three seem especially proud of helping side-hustlers make ends meet. Marquez also works in the RV manufacturing industry around South Bend—which has taken a hit in recent years, with hundreds of layoffs in 2025 alone. He helped one of his coworkers get into online resale as a safety net when his earnings dropped.  “If he didn’t have rScan at the time, he would have had to either sell something or lose a part of the lifestyle that he was already used to living with,” says Marquez. He was able to take advantage of rScan’s physical as well as virtual services. The company runs a warehouse to receive returned goods from retailers, hold them for small clients who don’t have their own storage space, and help arrange shipping to buyers. It was also a chance to test and refine the software by running their own resale business. “We kind of dogfooded our own product when we first started,” says Baradaran. In May 2025, rScan upgraded to a 53,000-square-foot warehouse in South Bend. Living Up to Values While they have eschewed outside investors so far, rScan recognizes it may need to go that route to scale up. “We want to make sure that they share the same vision as us, and as long as that’s aligned—absolutely,” says Baradaran. Helping not just sellers but the planet is a key part of that vision. By its own accounting, rScan says it has saved over 840,000 pounds of products from going into the trash. After rScan scales more, the founders plan to seek independent verification of their ecological impact in the process of becoming a Benefit Corporation. To be certified as a B Corp, a company has to pass an initial and ongoing evaluation by the nonprofit B Lab of its environmental impact, social responsibility, transparency, and accountability to all stakeholders—not just investors. “Ultimately, our goal is to democratize entrepreneurship,” Baradaran says in an email. “In doing so, we drive sustainability by extending the lifecycle of consumer goods that would otherwise end up in landfills.”

Americans are likely to have spent a record $1 trillion-plus this holiday shopping season alone, and about $5.5 trillion in retail sales in all of 2025, according to estimates by the National Retail Federation. That includes many unhappy returns for retailers: And when it comes back to them, a lot of the $850 billion in returned merchandise is often cheaper to discard than to inspect, sort, and resell—adding millions of tons to landfills every year. “This is a massive ecological problem, as well as a financial problem for these companies,” says Ryan Ryker, CEO of rScan. Based in South Bend, Indiana, the startup has developed software and logistics services to help transfer these products from the beleaguered original sellers to resellers more eager to do the work of making money on a returned product. “There’s a lot of people who are looking to make side cash,” says cofounder and chief logistics officer Julian Marquez about their small-business clients. But it’s not easy. Instead of getting, say, a shipping pallet of all the same product, such as a power tool, resellers have to sort through a mishmash that can contain dozens of different items—including many one-offs. rScan’s offering for them sounds simple: a barcode-scanning app. But behind that is an entire data infrastructure to help resellers understand what they’ve got and how to sell it. Scanning the UPC barcode on a box pulls up the item’s product name and brand, images, detailed descriptions, and manuals. Resellers can first ascertain the product’s condition and whether everything that should be in the box is. If they decide it’s worth selling, rScan can pull from its database the dozens of product attributes required by online marketplaces and format complete product listings tailored to venues such as Amazon, eBay, or Shopify. The company regularly scrapes these sites to survey what products are selling for and estimate a price for the reseller’s listing. rScan charges 30 cents per month per unique item that is scanned and in their catalogue for as long as it’s listed for sale online. (So selling 10 of the same product would cost 30 cents per month, total.) The company also takes a percentage of monthly sales, from 1% to 3.9% on a sliding scale that ramps up as vendors sell more. Clients range from newbies working out of a garage to what Ryker calls, “sellers that are doing multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars per year.” Retailers from High School For Ryker, rScan was tailored to the challenges he’d personally encountered. “Resale is something I previously dabbled in prior to the pandemic. From there, there was a lot of returns going on with COVID, the rise in e-commerce sales, things of that nature,” he says.  But his retail experience goes back to high school in the 2010s when he and Marquez established their own apparel brand, called Culture Clothing, which ran for a couple years and grossed about $45,000 in its best year. They mostly sold at concerts and show venues, but also called on another classmate, Rod Baradaran, to set up an ecommerce site. In 2021, the three reunited to cofound rScan. Baradaran reprised his tech role, coding the app and the online services, developing the price-setting algorithm, and serving as COO. (A fourth cofounder, Michael Altenburger, joined a few months later.) The company—which was bootstrapped by the founders—now has 36 employees. Taking on a Clunky System It’s not that returned goods would all go into the trash without rScan. “The real advantage of being able to get this online faster and on ecommerce [platforms] is that you have a much wider market where these products can be distributed and actually used,” says Baradaran. The three seem especially proud of helping side-hustlers make ends meet. Marquez also works in the RV manufacturing industry around South Bend—which has taken a hit in recent years, with hundreds of layoffs in 2025 alone. He helped one of his coworkers get into online resale as a safety net when his earnings dropped.  “If he didn’t have rScan at the time, he would have had to either sell something or lose a part of the lifestyle that he was already used to living with,” says Marquez. He was able to take advantage of rScan’s physical as well as virtual services. The company runs a warehouse to receive returned goods from retailers, hold them for small clients who don’t have their own storage space, and help arrange shipping to buyers. It was also a chance to test and refine the software by running their own resale business. “We kind of dogfooded our own product when we first started,” says Baradaran. In May 2025, rScan upgraded to a 53,000-square-foot warehouse in South Bend. Living Up to Values While they have eschewed outside investors so far, rScan recognizes it may need to go that route to scale up. “We want to make sure that they share the same vision as us, and as long as that’s aligned—absolutely,” says Baradaran. Helping not just sellers but the planet is a key part of that vision. By its own accounting, rScan says it has saved over 840,000 pounds of products from going into the trash. After rScan scales more, the founders plan to seek independent verification of their ecological impact in the process of becoming a Benefit Corporation. To be certified as a B Corp, a company has to pass an initial and ongoing evaluation by the nonprofit B Lab of its environmental impact, social responsibility, transparency, and accountability to all stakeholders—not just investors. “Ultimately, our goal is to democratize entrepreneurship,” Baradaran says in an email. “In doing so, we drive sustainability by extending the lifecycle of consumer goods that would otherwise end up in landfills.”

Business
Culture
Food

Legal Immunity for Pesticide Companies Removed from EPA Funding Bill

January 6, 2026 – After a legislative fight led by Representative Chellie Pingree (D-Maine), members of Congress stripped a controversial provision out of the latest version of a bill that funds the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The bill is expected to move forward in the House this week, as lawmakers rush to finalize the 2026 […] The post Legal Immunity for Pesticide Companies Removed from EPA Funding Bill appeared first on Civil Eats.

January 6, 2026 – After a legislative fight led by Representative Chellie Pingree (D-Maine), members of Congress stripped a controversial provision out of the latest version of a bill that funds the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The bill is expected to move forward in the House this week, as lawmakers rush to finalize the 2026 appropriations process by Jan. 30 to avoid another government shutdown. The provision, referred to as Section 435, would have made it harder for individuals to sue pesticide manufacturers over alleged health harms. Bayer, which for years has been battling lawsuits alleging its herbicide Roundup causes non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, has lobbied for the provision, among other political and legal efforts to protect the corporation’s interests. When the provision first appeared in the bill earlier this year, Pingree quickly introduced an amendment to remove it. At that time, she wasn’t able to get enough votes to take it out. “It had fairly strong Republican support,” she told Civil Eats in an exclusive interview. (In December, the Trump administration also sided with Bayer in a Supreme Court case that could deliver a similar level of legal immunity through the courts instead of legislation.) Pingree said she kept up the battle, and, over the last several months a number of other groups put pressure on Congress to remove the rider, including environmental organizations, organic advocates, and MAHA Action, the biggest organization supporting the Trump administration and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Make America Healthy Again agenda. MAHA Action celebrated the development with a post on X that said, “WE DID IT!,” though they did not mention Pingree. Kelly Ryerson, a prominent MAHA supporter who led efforts to lobby against the rider, thanked a group of Republicans on X for the end result. Pingree said she’s happy to share the credit with advocates. “It was my fight, but nobody does this alone. There are advocates on the environment and organic side that have been at this for a long time. But Republicans got a lot of calls going into the markup, they knew there was a lot of interest on the MAHA side,” she said. “It’s important to have a win to show there is widespread bipartisan support for restricting these toxic chemicals in our food and our environment.” Pingree said she’s been told the rider will likely come up again if the farm bill process restarts, and its supporters could also try to insert it in other legislation. The funding bill also rejects deep cuts to the EPA budget that the Trump administration requested and instead proposes a small decrease of around 4 percent. And, like the agriculture appropriations bill passed in November, it includes language that restricts the ability of the EPA to reorganize or cut significant staff without notifying Congress. (Link to this post.) The post Legal Immunity for Pesticide Companies Removed from EPA Funding Bill appeared first on Civil Eats.

Agriculture
Chemicals
Food

West Virginia Program That Helped Communities Tackle Abandoned Buildings Is Running Out of Money

A West Virginia program that helped communities demolish abandoned buildings is running out of money, and state lawmakers haven't proposed any new solutions

From their home on Charleston’s, West Virginia's West Side, Tina and Matt Glaspey watched the house on the corner of First Avenue and Fitzgerald Street go downhill fast. A family with a young daughter left because they didn’t feel safe. The next owner died. After that, the police were responding regularly as people broke into the vacant home. The Glaspeys say that in just two years, the small brick house went from occupied to condemned, left without power or water, repeatedly entered by squatters. “One day, we noticed a bright orange sticker on the door saying the building was not safe for habitation,” Tina said. “It shows how quickly things can turn, in just two years, when nothing is done to deal with these properties.” City officials say the house is following the same path as hundreds of other vacant properties across Charleston, which slowly deteriorate until they become unsafe and are added to the city’s priority demolition list, typically including about 30 buildings at a time. Until this year, a state program helped communities tear these buildings down, preventing them from becoming safety hazards for neighborhoods and harming property values. But that money is now depleted. There is no statewide demolition program left, no replacement funding, and no legislation to keep it running, leaving municipalities on their own to absorb the costs or leave vacant buildings standing. Across West Virginia, vacant properties increase while a state program designed to help runs out of money The state’s Demolition Landfill Assistance Program was established in 2021 and was funded a year later with federal COVID-19 recovery funds. Administered through the Department of Environmental Protection, the fund reimbursed local governments for the demolition of abandoned buildings that they couldn’t afford on their own. The state survey was the first step in the program to determine the scope of the need and assess local government capacity to address it. It was distributed to all 55 counties and more than 180 municipalities. However, the need is far greater. Carrie Staton, director of the West Virginia Brownfields Assistance Center, has worked with communities on abandoned buildings for about 14 years. She said most counties don’t have the resources, funding or staffing to manage dilapidated housing on their own. “We’re just so rural and so universally rural. Other states have at least a couple of major metro areas that can support this work,” she said. “We don’t. It just takes longer to do everything.” Charleston has spent millions demolishing hundreds of vacant buildings As the state’s largest city, Charleston has more tools than most local governments, including access to federal funds that smaller communities don’t have. That has allowed the city to spend more than $12 million over the past seven years demolishing over 700 unsafe and dilapidated structures.But John Butterworth, a planner for the city, said Charleston still relied on state demolition funding to help cover those costs, which averaged about $10,000 per property, including any environmental cleanup. “It’s a real cost,” he said. “It’s a necessary one to keep neighbors safe, but it is very expensive.”He said the city received $500,000 from the state program during its last round of funding to help tear down properties that drew repeated complaints from neighbors. “I think people are really relieved when we can say that the house that’s been boarded up for a year or more is coming down,” he said. “Where the concern often comes from neighbors is, what comes next?”One vacant home on Grant Street had fallen into disrepair before being demolished in May of last year. Cracks filled the walls. Dirt and moldy debris were caked on the floors. Broken glass and boarded-up windows littered the property as plants overtook the roof and yard. Eventually, the city was able to get the owner to donate the property, which was then given to Habitat for Humanity as part of its home-building program. Now, the property is being rebuilt from scratch. Construction crews have already built the foundation, porch and frame, and it is expected to be finished within the year after its groundbreaking last October. Andrew Blackwood, executive director of Habitat for Humanity of Kanawha and Putnam counties, said the property stood for at least five years, deteriorating. The home had signs of vandalism and water damage and was completely unsalvageable. He said that of the 190 homes the organization has built in both counties, nearly 90% of them have been complete rebuilds after the previous structure was demolished. A statewide problem without a statewide plan Lawmakers have said they recognize the scale of the problem, but none have proposed other ways for tearing down dangerous structures. Fayette County used state demolition money as it was intended, which was to tear down unsafe buildings that had become public safety hazards to nearby residents. With help from the state program, the county tore down 75 dilapidated structures, officials said, removing some of the most dangerous properties while continuing to track the progress of others through a countywide system. County leaders hoped to expand their demolition efforts on their own this year, but those plans have been put on hold. The county had to take over operations of a local humane society after it faced closure and will need to fundraise, said John Breneman, president of the Fayette County Commission. Former Sen. Chandler Swope, R-Mercer, said that kind of budget pressure is exactly why he pushed for state involvement in demolition funding. Swope, who helped create the state fund for the demolition of dilapidated buildings in 2021, said the idea grew from what he saw in places where population loss left empty homes, which local governments had no way to tear down.“They didn’t have any money to tear down the dilapidated properties, so I decided that that should be a state obligation because the state has more flexibility and more access to funding,” he said.Swope said he’d always viewed the need as ongoing, even as state budgets shift from year to year.“I visualized it as a permanent need. I didn’t think you would ever get to the point where it was done,” he said. “I felt like the success of the program would carry its own priority.” But four years later, that funding is gone, and lawmakers haven’t found a replacement. Other states, meanwhile, have created long-term funding for demolition and redevelopment.Ohio, for example, operates a statewide program that provides counties with annual demolition funding. Funds are appropriated from the state budget by lawmakers. Staton said West Virginia’s lack of a plan leaves communities stuck.“Abandoned buildings are in every community, and every legislator has constituents who are dealing with this,” she said. “They know it’s just a matter of finding the funding.”And back on the West Side, the Glaspeys are left staring at boarded windows and an overgrown yard across the street. Matt said, “Sometimes you think, what’s the point of fixing up your own place if everything around you is collapsing?” This story was originally published by Mountain State Spotlight and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See – December 2025

Government
Mountains
Water

What Trump’s Venezuela strategy means for Black communities

Environmental justice advocates warn that refining Venezuelan oil will concentrate more pollution and cancer risk in majority-Black communities along the Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coast.

Environmental justice advocates warn that refining Venezuelan oil will concentrate more pollution and cancer risk in majority-Black communities along the Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coast.

Pollution
Water

Pesticide industry ‘immunity shield’ stripped from US appropriations bill

Democrats and the Make America Healthy Again movement pushed back on the rider in a funding bill led by BayerIn a setback for the pesticide industry, Democrats have succeeded in removing a rider from a congressional appropriations bill that would have helped protect pesticide makers from being sued and could have hindered state efforts to warn about pesticide risks.Chellie Pingree, a Democratic representative from Maine and ranking member of the House appropriations interior, environment, and related agencies subcommittee, said Monday that the controversial measure pushed by the agrochemical giant Bayer and industry allies has been stripped from the 2026 funding bill. Continue reading...

In a setback for the pesticide industry, Democrats have succeeded in removing a rider from a congressional appropriations bill that would have helped protect pesticide makers from being sued and could have hindered state efforts to warn about pesticide risks.Chellie Pingree, a Democratic representative from Maine and ranking member of the House appropriations interior, environment, and related agencies subcommittee, said Monday that the controversial measure pushed by the agrochemical giant Bayer and industry allies has been stripped from the 2026 funding bill.The move is final, as Senate Republican leaders have agreed not to revisit the issue, Pingree said.“I just drew a line in the sand and said this cannot stay in the bill,” Pingree told the Guardian. “There has been intensive lobbying by Bayer. This has been quite a hard fight.”The now-deleted language was part of a larger legislative effort that critics say is aimed at limiting litigation against pesticide industry leader Bayer, which sells the widely used Roundup herbicides.An industry alliance set up by Bayer has been pushing for both state and federal laws that would make it harder for consumers to sue over pesticide risks to human health and has successfully lobbied for the passing of such laws in Georgia and North Dakota so far.The specific proposed language added to the appropriations bill blocked federal funds from being used to “issue or adopt any guidance or any policy, take any regulatory action, or approve any labeling or change to such labeling” inconsistent with the conclusion of an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) human health assessment.Critics said the language would have impeded states and local governments from warning about risks of pesticides even in the face of new scientific findings about health harms if such warnings were not consistent with outdated EPA assessments. The EPA itself would not be able to update warnings without finalizing a new assessment, the critics said.And because of the limits on warnings, critics of the rider said, consumers would have found it difficult, if not impossible, to sue pesticide makers for failing to warn them of health risks if the EPA assessments do not support such warnings.“This provision would have handed pesticide manufacturers exactly what they’ve been lobbying for: federal preemption that stops state and local governments from restricting the use of harmful, cancer-causing chemicals, adding health warnings, or holding companies accountable in court when people are harmed,” Pingree said in a statement. “It would have meant that only the federal government gets a say – even though we know federal reviews can take years, and are often subject to intense industry pressure.”Pingree tried but failed to overturn the language in a July appropriations committee hearing.Bayer, the key backer of the legislative efforts, has been struggling for years to put an end to thousands of lawsuits filed by people who allege they developed cancer from their use of Roundup and other glyphosate-based weed killers sold by Bayer. The company inherited the litigation when it bought Monsanto in 2018 and has paid out billions of dollars in settlements and jury verdicts but still faces several thousand ongoing lawsuits. Bayer maintains its glyphosate-based herbicides do not cause cancer and are safe when used as directed.When asked for comment on Monday, Bayer said that no company should have “blanket immunity” and it disputed that the appropriations bill language would have prevented anyone from suing pesticide manufacturers. The company said it supports state and federal legislation “because the future of American farming depends on reliable science-based regulation of important crop protection products – determined safe for use by the EPA”.The company additionally states on its website that without “legislative certainty”, lawsuits over its glyphosate-based Roundup and other weed killers can impact its research and product development and other “important investments”.Pingree said her efforts were aided by members of the Make America Healthy Again (Maha) movement who have spent the last few months meeting with congressional members and their staffers on this issue. She said her team reached out to Maha leadership in the last few days to pressure Republican lawmakers.“This is the first time that we’ve had a fairly significant advocacy group working on the Republican side,” she said.Last week, Zen Honeycutt, a Maha leader and founder of the group Moms Across America, posted a “call to action”, urging members to demand elected officials “Stop the Pesticide Immunity Shield”.“A lot of people helped make this happen,” Honeycutt said. “Many health advocates have been fervently expressing their requests to keep chemical companies accountable for safety … We are delighted that our elected officials listened to so many Americans who spoke up and are restoring trust in the American political system.”Pingree said the issue is not dead. Bayer has “made this a high priority”, and she expects to see continued efforts to get industry friendly language inserted into legislation, including into the new Farm Bill.“I don’t think this is over,” she said.This story is co-published with the New Lede, a journalism project of the Environmental Working Group

Chemicals
Health
Science

Webinar: Cell Tower Risks 101 - What You Need To Know To Protect Your Community

Featuring Theodora Scarato, MSW, Director of the Wireless & EMF Program at Environmental Health SciencesCell towers near homes and schools bring many health, safety and liability risks. From fire, to the fall zone, property value drops and increased RF radiation exposure, Theodora Scarato will cover the key issues that communities need to understand when a cell tower is proposed in their neighborhood.With the federal government proposing unprecedented rulemakings that would dismantle existing local government safeguards, it’s more critical than ever to understand what’s at stake for local communities and families.Webinar Date: January 7th, 2026 at 3 pm ET // 12 pm PTRegister to join this webinar HERETheodora Scarato is a leading expert in environmental health policy related to cell towers and non-ionizing electromagnetic fields. She has co-authored several scientific papers, including a foundational paper in Frontiers in Public Health entitled “U.S. policy on wireless technologies and public health protection: regulatory gaps and proposed reforms.” She will highlight key findings and policy recommendations from this publication during the webinar.To learn more about the health and safety risks of cell towers, visit the EHS Wireless & EMF Program website: Top 10 Health, Safety, and Liability Risks of Cell Towers Near Schools and HomesCell Towers Drop Property ValuesThe FCC’s Plan to Fast Track Cell TowersOfficial Letters Opposing FCC Cell Tower Fast-Track RulesWatch our previous webinar: FCC and Congressional Proposals To Strip Local Control Over Cell Towers Webinar - YouTube youtu.be

Featuring Theodora Scarato, MSW, Director of the Wireless & EMF Program at Environmental Health SciencesCell towers near homes and schools bring many health, safety and liability risks. From fire, to the fall zone, property value drops and increased RF radiation exposure, Theodora Scarato will cover the key issues that communities need to understand when a cell tower is proposed in their neighborhood.With the federal government proposing unprecedented rulemakings that would dismantle existing local government safeguards, it’s more critical than ever to understand what’s at stake for local communities and families.Webinar Date: January 7th, 2026 at 3 pm ET // 12 pm PTRegister to join this webinar HERETheodora Scarato is a leading expert in environmental health policy related to cell towers and non-ionizing electromagnetic fields. She has co-authored several scientific papers, including a foundational paper in Frontiers in Public Health entitled “U.S. policy on wireless technologies and public health protection: regulatory gaps and proposed reforms.” She will highlight key findings and policy recommendations from this publication during the webinar.To learn more about the health and safety risks of cell towers, visit the EHS Wireless & EMF Program website: Top 10 Health, Safety, and Liability Risks of Cell Towers Near Schools and HomesCell Towers Drop Property ValuesThe FCC’s Plan to Fast Track Cell TowersOfficial Letters Opposing FCC Cell Tower Fast-Track RulesWatch our previous webinar: FCC and Congressional Proposals To Strip Local Control Over Cell Towers Webinar - YouTube youtu.be

Government
Health
Science

No Results today.

Our news is updated constantly with the latest environmental stories from around the world. Reset or change your filters to find the most active current topics.

Join us to forge
a sustainable future

Our team is always growing.
Become a partner, volunteer, sponsor, or intern today.
Let us know how you would like to get involved!

CONTACT US

sign up for our mailing list to stay informed on the latest films and environmental headlines.

Subscribers receive a free day pass for streaming Cinema Verde.
Thank you! Your submission has been received!
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.