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Sean Duffy defends pause on transportation grants

“We are looking for ... the green and the social justice,” Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy acknowledged.

Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy on Wednesday faced bipartisan pressure to move quickly on infrastructure spending and reduce bureaucratic red tape that delays projects and makes them more expensive. But members of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee who questioned Duffy were divided on some of the causes — Republicans focused on environmental rules while Democrats asked why projects already approved by the previous administration are now being reviewed for mentions of climate change, environmental justice, or equity and diversity.

Transportation
Climate

Federal Judge Questions Whether EPA Move to Rapidly Cancel 'Green Bank' Grants Was Legal

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan on Wednesday questioned a Department of Justice attorney over whether the Environmental Protection Agency violated the law when it terminated $20 billion in green bank grants allegedly without following the proper process

A federal judge on Wednesday pressed an attorney for the Environmental Protection Agency about whether the agency broke the law when it swiftly terminated $20 billion worth of grants awarded to nonprofits for a green bank by allegedly bulldozing past proper rules and raising flimsy accusations of waste and fraud.In a nearly three-hour hearing, U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan said the government had provided no substantial new evidence of wrongdoing by the nonprofits and considered technical arguments that could decide whether she is even the right person to hear the case.Climate United Fund and other groups had sued the EPA, its Administrator Lee Zeldin and Citibank, which held the grant money, saying they had illegally denied the groups access to funds awarded last year to help finance clean energy and climate-friendly projects. They want Chutkan to give them access to those funds again, saying the freeze had paralyzed their work and jeopardized their basic operations.“What plaintiffs are saying is if you wanted to stop that money from going out, you should have gone through the procedures under the” law, Chutkan said, adding that instead of doing that, the EPA appears to have demanded the bank simply freeze the funds and then quickly terminated the grants.The Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, commonly referred to as a “green bank,” was authorized by the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. However, its goals run counter to the Trump administration’s opposition to climate-friendly policies and its embrace of fossil fuels. Zeldin quickly made the bank a target, characterizing the grants as a “gold bar” scheme marred by conflicts of interest and potential fraud.“Twenty billion of your tax dollars were parked at an outside financial institution, in a deliberate effort to limit government oversight — doling out your money through just eight pass-through, politically connected, unqualified and in some cases brand-new” nonprofit institutions, Zeldin said in a previously posted video.The nonprofits say Zeldin and the EPA led an evidence-free scheme to end the grants, in violation of the law and their contracts, which only allowed termination in limited circumstances like fraud or major performance failures – not ideological opposition.Chutkan noted that EPA allegedly demanded Citibank stop providing funds that had already been awarded without letting the nonprofits know or responding to their questions. “Is that lawful?” she asked.“It certainly is lawful, your honor. I don't know if it is the best course of action or the one that in retrospect that we all wish the agency would have followed,” responded Department of Justice Attorney Marcus Sacks for the EPA. The EPA said it does not comment on pending litigation.The Trump administration says that it was allowed to terminate the contracts based on oversight concerns and shifting priorities. The nonprofits are trying to make grand constitutional and statutory arguments that simply don’t apply, the government said.“At bottom, this is just a run-of-the-mill (albeit large) contract dispute,” federal officials said in a court filing. That argument is important. If the government successfully argues the case is a contract dispute, then they say it should be heard by a different court that can only award a lump sum – not force the government to keep the grants in place. Federal officials argue there is no law or provision in the Constitution that compels EPA to make these grants to these groups.The nonprofits, which also include the Coalition for Green Capital and Power Forward Communities, argue the EPA was focused on ending the grants quickly, even if their methods violated the law. They said the agency appeared to have pressured a high-ranking prosecutor in the U.S. Attorney’s Washington office to pressure Citibank to freeze the funds. That prosecutor resigned rather than follow through. Then the Trump administration pushed Citibank to freeze the money, which the bank did, according to the nonprofits.“The purported terminations are the fruit of EPA’s clandestine, weekslong effort to freeze plaintiffs’ money without ever giving plaintiff notice of what was happening or an opportunity to correct it,” according to the nonprofits.The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environmentCopyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See - Feb. 2025

Climate
Energy
Government

This Is What Forecasters Mean When They Talk About a 100-Year Flood

Weather forecasts sometimes warn of storms that can unleash such unusual rainfall that they are described as 100-year or even 500-year floods

Weather forecasters sometimes warn of storms that unleash such unusual rain they are described as 100-year or even 500-year floods. Here’s what to know about how scientists determine how extreme a flood is and how common these extreme events are becoming. What does a 100-year flood mean? Scientists use math to help people understand how unusual a severe flood is and how to compare the intensity of one flood to another. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, one statistic scientists use is the percentage chance that a flood of a specific magnitude will happen. A 500-year flood means such an event has a 1 in 500 chance, or 0.2%, of occurring in a year. Another concept scientists use is how frequently an event of a certain intensity is expected. For example, a meteorologist can look at the average recurrence interval of an anticipated flood and see that a similar event is only expected once every 25 years.Agencies have preferred expressing the percent chance of a flood occurring rather than the recurrence interval because that statistic better represents the fact that rare floods can happen within a few years of each other. It's sort of like rolling a pair of dice and getting double six's twice in a row. It's rare, but statistically possible. Another term people hear during an impending flood is that it could be a once-in-a-generation or once-in-a-lifetime event, a casual way of saying a flood could be unlike anything many people have experienced. How flooding is changing with the climate Researchers from the University of Chicago calculated that Houston, Texas, was struck by three 500-year flood events within 24 months from 2015 through 2017. The events included Hurricane Harvey, the heaviest recorded rainfall ever in the U.S. Homes and businesses were destroyed and cars were swept away by the floods.Although math can calculate how often to expect floods of specific magnitudes, nature has its own plans, including irregularity. Many interconnected systems in the environment, such as local weather patterns and larger events like El Nino, can contribute to the changing likelihood of floods. Since the early 1900s, precipitation events have become heavier and more frequent across most of the U.S. and flooding is becoming a bigger issue, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Gases emitted by humans, like carbon dioxide and methane, are warming the atmosphere, allowing it to hold more water vapor. For every 1 degree of Fahrenheit that the temperature warms, the atmosphere can hold nearly 4% more water, which is a 7% increase for every 1 degree Celsius, said Victor Gensini, professor of atmospheric sciences at Northern Illinois University. That vapor eventually falls back to the ground as rain or snow. “We’ve absolutely seen a shift in the probability distribution of heavy rainfall over the last three decades,” Gensini said. Other regions have experienced drought due to changing precipitation patterns. According to NASA, major droughts and periods of excessive precipitation have been occurring more frequently. Globally, the intensity of extreme wet and dry events is closely linked to global warming. ___Seth Borenstein contributed to this report from Washington, D.C. The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See - Feb. 2025

Business
Climate
CO2

Invisible losses: thousands of plant species are missing from places they could thrive – and humans are the reason

Many native plants are missing from habitats where they should thrive – even in wilder areas. Why? Human actions such as logging, poaching and setting fires.

Samantha Terrell/ShutterstockIf you go walking in the wild, you might expect that what you’re seeing is natural. All around you are trees, shrubs and grasses growing in their natural habitat. But there’s something here that doesn’t add up. Across the world, there are large areas of habitat which would suit native plant species just fine. But very often, they’re simply absent. Our new research gauges the scale of this problem, known as “dark diversity”. Our international team of 200 scientists examined plant species in thousands of sites worldwide. What we found was startling. In regions heavily affected by our activities, only about 20% of native plant species able to live there were actually present. But even in areas with very little human interference, ecosystems only contained about 33% of viable plant species. Why so few species in wilder areas? Our impact. Pollution can spread far from the original source, while conversion of habitat to farms, logging and human-caused fires have ripple effects too. Conspicuous by their absence Our activities have become a planet-shaping force, from changing the climate through our emissions to farming 44% of all habitable land. As our footprint has expanded, other species have been pushed to extinction. The rates of species loss are unprecedented in recorded history. When we think about biodiversity loss, we might think of a once-common animal species losing numbers and range as farms, cities and feral predators expand. But we are also losing species from within protected areas and national parks. To date, the accelerating loss of species has been largely observed at large scale, such as states or even whole countries. Almost 600 plant species have gone extinct since 1750 – and this is likely a major underestimate. Extinction hotspots include Hawaii (79 species) and South Africa’s unique fynbos scrublands (37 species). But tracking the fate of our species has been difficult to do at a local scale, such as within a national park or nature reserve. Similarly, when scientists do traditional biodiversity surveys, we count the species previously recorded in an area and look for changes. But we haven’t tended to consider the species that could grow there – but don’t. Many plants have been declining so rapidly they are now threatened with extinction. What did we do? To get a better gauge of biodiversity losses at smaller scale, we worked alongside scientists from the international research network DarkDivNet to examine almost 5,500 sites across 119 regions worldwide. This huge body of fieldwork took years and required navigating global challenges such as COVID-19 and political and economic instability. At each 100 square metre site, our team sampled all plant species present against the species found in the surrounding region. We defined regions as areas of approximately 300 square kilometres with similar environmental conditions. Just because a species can grow somewhere doesn’t mean it would. To make sure we were recording which species were genuinely missing, we looked at how often each absent species was found growing alongside the species growing at our chosen sites at other sampled sites in the region. This helped us detect species well-suited to a habitat but missing from it. We then cross-matched data on these missing species against how big the local human impact was by using the Human Footprint Index, which measures population density, land use and infrastructure. Of the eight components of this index, six had a clear influence on how many plant species were missing: human population density, electric infrastructure, railways, roads, built environments and croplands. Another component, navigable waterways, did not have a clear influence. Interestingly, the final component – pastures kept by graziers – was not linked to fewer plant species. This could be because semi-natural grasslands are used as pasture in areas such as Central Asia, Africa’s Sahel region and Argentina. Here, long-term moderate human influence can actually maintain highly diverse and well-functioning ecosystems through practices such as grazing livestock, cultural burning and hay making. Semi-natural pastures preserve many different plant species. Pictured: the Hulunbuir grasslands in Inner Mongolia, China. Dashu Xinganling/Shutterstock Overall, though, the link between greater human presence and fewer plant species was very clear. Seemingly pristine ecosystems hundreds of kilometres from direct disturbance had been affected. These effects can come from many causes. For instance, poaching and logging often take place far from human settlements. Poaching an animal species might mean a plant species loses a key pollinator or way to disperse its seeds in the animal’s dung. Over time, disruptions to the web of relationships in the natural world can erode ecosystems and result in fewer plant species. Poachers and illegal loggers also cut “ghost roads” into pristine areas. Other causes include fires started by humans, which can threaten national parks and other safe havens. Pollution can travel and settle hundreds of kilometres from its source, affecting ecosystems. Our far-reaching influence can also hinder the return of plant species, even in protected areas. As humans expand their activities, they often carve up natural areas into fragments cut off from each other. This can isolate plant populations. Similarly, the loss of seed-spreading animals can stop plants from recolonising former habitat. What does this mean? Biodiversity loss is not just about species going extinct. It’s about ecosystems quietly losing their richness, resilience and functions. Protecting land is not enough. The damage we can do can reach deep into conservation areas. Was there good news? Yes. In regions where at least a third of the landscape had minimal human disturbance, there was less of this hidden biodiversity loss. As we work to conserve nature, our work points to a need not just to preserve what’s left but to bring back what’s missing. Now we know what species are missing in an area but still present regionally, we can begin that work. The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Animals
Climate
Conservation

Two years into his term, has Gov. Shapiro kept his promises to regulate Pennsylvania’s fracking industry?

PITTSBURGH — Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro ran on a promise to regulate Pennsylvania’s oil and gas industry more stringently. Two years into his term, the Environmental Health Project, a public health advocacy nonprofit focused on fracking, has published a report that assesses the Shapiro administration’s progress. “Despite some steps in the right direction, we are still missing the boat on actions that can improve our economic, environmental, and health outcomes,” Alison L. Steele, executive director of the Environmental Health Project, said during a press conference. As attorney general, Shapiro spearheaded a 2020 grand jury report that concluded, in his words, that “when it comes to fracking, Pennsylvania failed” in its “duty to set, and enforce, ground rules that protect public health and safety.” During his campaign for governor in 2022, Shapiro said that if elected, he would implement the eight recommendations made by that grand jury, which included expanding no-drill zones from 500 to 2,500 feet from homes, requiring fracking companies to publicly disclose all chemicals used in wells before they’re drilled, and providing a “comprehensive health response” to the effects of living near fracking sites, among other measures. Some progress has been made on enacting those recommendations, Steele said, but “there are more opportunities available to Gov. Shapiro over the next two years of his term.” The report applauds the Shapiro administration’s progress on some environmental health measures “despite increasing challenges at the federal level,” including identifying and plugging 300 abandoned oil and gas wells, promoting renewable energy projects, and proposing alternatives to the state’s stalled participation in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). But the report also says the Shapiro administration has fallen short on regulating the oil and gas industry to reduce health risks, prioritizing clean energy that doesn’t include fossil fuels, and fully supporting a just transition to renewable energy.The Shapiro administration has yet to expand no-drill zones in Pennsylvania from the required 500 feet to 2,500 feet, still doesn’t require fracking companies to publicly disclose all chemicals used in fracking, and has failed to acknowledge the science on health risks of exposure to shale gas pollution, according to the report. The report also says that, despite positive efforts to advance environmental justice, agencies like the Pennsylvania Department of Health and Department of Environmental Protection are not engaging enough with frontline communities and health care providers in fracking communities, and that the Department of Environmental Protection needs additional funding to enforce existing environmental regulations. While the Shapiro administration was able to obtain a 14% increase in funding for the Department of Environmental Protection in the 2024-2025 budget, “the bulk of the 2024-2025 funding was earmarked for staff in the permitting division, not the enforcement division, where a real regulatory need exists,” according to the report. Shapiro called for an additional 12% increase in funding for the agency in the 2025-2026 budget, but details about how those funds would be allocated have not yet been released. The report makes the following recommendations for the Shapiro administration: Urge the General Assembly to amend Act 13 and mandate greater distances between homes, schools, hospitals, and fracking sites.Press the legislature to require full disclosure of all chemicals used in fracking wells, even if they are considered proprietary or a trade secret.Develop a comprehensive health plan for preventing fossil fuel pollution exposureAddress cumulative emissions when permitting fracking sites.Further increase funding for the Department of Environmental Protection and the Department of Health.Call on the state’s departments of health and environmental protection to work more closely and transparently with communities.Take a precautionary approach to petrochemicals, blue hydrogen, and liquified natural gas.Transition away from fossil fuels and toward renewable forms of energy. Steele acknowledged that some of the recommendations, including increasing the distance between wells and homes, would require new legislation. The Republican-controlled state senate vocally opposes any new regulations for the oil and gas industry, limiting what the Shapiro administration can achieve. “In those cases,” Steele said, “he could at least use his authority to vocally encourage legislative action.” Pennsylvania state Rep. Dr. Arvind Venkat, an emergency physician who represents parts of western Pennsylvania, said these recommendations are timely as federal environmental protections are being rolled back under the Trump administration. “What we're seeing out of DC is as extreme an attack on environmental regulation and the scientific understanding of the relationship between the environment and health as I've seen in my lifetime,”Venkat said during the press conference. “Both parties are pushing more things down to the state and local level, so as bad as this is…it creates an opportunity for us to be far more responsible than we have been at the state level.”Editor’s note: The Environmental Health Project and Environmental Health News both receive funding from the Heinz Endowments.

PITTSBURGH — Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro ran on a promise to regulate Pennsylvania’s oil and gas industry more stringently. Two years into his term, the Environmental Health Project, a public health advocacy nonprofit focused on fracking, has published a report that assesses the Shapiro administration’s progress. “Despite some steps in the right direction, we are still missing the boat on actions that can improve our economic, environmental, and health outcomes,” Alison L. Steele, executive director of the Environmental Health Project, said during a press conference. As attorney general, Shapiro spearheaded a 2020 grand jury report that concluded, in his words, that “when it comes to fracking, Pennsylvania failed” in its “duty to set, and enforce, ground rules that protect public health and safety.” During his campaign for governor in 2022, Shapiro said that if elected, he would implement the eight recommendations made by that grand jury, which included expanding no-drill zones from 500 to 2,500 feet from homes, requiring fracking companies to publicly disclose all chemicals used in wells before they’re drilled, and providing a “comprehensive health response” to the effects of living near fracking sites, among other measures. Some progress has been made on enacting those recommendations, Steele said, but “there are more opportunities available to Gov. Shapiro over the next two years of his term.” The report applauds the Shapiro administration’s progress on some environmental health measures “despite increasing challenges at the federal level,” including identifying and plugging 300 abandoned oil and gas wells, promoting renewable energy projects, and proposing alternatives to the state’s stalled participation in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). But the report also says the Shapiro administration has fallen short on regulating the oil and gas industry to reduce health risks, prioritizing clean energy that doesn’t include fossil fuels, and fully supporting a just transition to renewable energy.The Shapiro administration has yet to expand no-drill zones in Pennsylvania from the required 500 feet to 2,500 feet, still doesn’t require fracking companies to publicly disclose all chemicals used in fracking, and has failed to acknowledge the science on health risks of exposure to shale gas pollution, according to the report. The report also says that, despite positive efforts to advance environmental justice, agencies like the Pennsylvania Department of Health and Department of Environmental Protection are not engaging enough with frontline communities and health care providers in fracking communities, and that the Department of Environmental Protection needs additional funding to enforce existing environmental regulations. While the Shapiro administration was able to obtain a 14% increase in funding for the Department of Environmental Protection in the 2024-2025 budget, “the bulk of the 2024-2025 funding was earmarked for staff in the permitting division, not the enforcement division, where a real regulatory need exists,” according to the report. Shapiro called for an additional 12% increase in funding for the agency in the 2025-2026 budget, but details about how those funds would be allocated have not yet been released. The report makes the following recommendations for the Shapiro administration: Urge the General Assembly to amend Act 13 and mandate greater distances between homes, schools, hospitals, and fracking sites.Press the legislature to require full disclosure of all chemicals used in fracking wells, even if they are considered proprietary or a trade secret.Develop a comprehensive health plan for preventing fossil fuel pollution exposureAddress cumulative emissions when permitting fracking sites.Further increase funding for the Department of Environmental Protection and the Department of Health.Call on the state’s departments of health and environmental protection to work more closely and transparently with communities.Take a precautionary approach to petrochemicals, blue hydrogen, and liquified natural gas.Transition away from fossil fuels and toward renewable forms of energy. Steele acknowledged that some of the recommendations, including increasing the distance between wells and homes, would require new legislation. The Republican-controlled state senate vocally opposes any new regulations for the oil and gas industry, limiting what the Shapiro administration can achieve. “In those cases,” Steele said, “he could at least use his authority to vocally encourage legislative action.” Pennsylvania state Rep. Dr. Arvind Venkat, an emergency physician who represents parts of western Pennsylvania, said these recommendations are timely as federal environmental protections are being rolled back under the Trump administration. “What we're seeing out of DC is as extreme an attack on environmental regulation and the scientific understanding of the relationship between the environment and health as I've seen in my lifetime,”Venkat said during the press conference. “Both parties are pushing more things down to the state and local level, so as bad as this is…it creates an opportunity for us to be far more responsible than we have been at the state level.”Editor’s note: The Environmental Health Project and Environmental Health News both receive funding from the Heinz Endowments.

Chemicals
Energy
Health

Alcohol makes male fruit flies more attractive

Alcohol increases the release of chemical sex signals and makes males more attractive to females.

Male fruit flies that drink alcohol become more attractive to females, according to a new study.Adding alcohol to males' food increases their release of chemicals that attract females and leads to higher mating success. Fruit flies, or Drosophila melanogaster, are often found around our food waste bins as they feed on rotting fruit which gradually produces alcohol.Scientists have been trying to study why they are attracted to alcohol and how it affects them.Previous research has studied different theories about this attraction, such as the flies were seeking a euphoric state or a substitute for the high of mating among males rejected by females.Study author Bill Hansson, head of the Department of Evolutionary Neuroethology at the Max Planck Institute, said such research has taken an anthropomorphic view of fly behaviour, whereas this latest study suggests drinking alcohol gives the flies a reproductive advantage."We don't think flies drink alcohol because they are depressed," he said.The fly's attraction both to the carbohydrates and yeast in rotting fruit, as well as to the alcohol, cannot be separated, he added.In the study, alcohol, and particularly methanol, increased the males' production and release of chemical sex signals, called pheromones, which made them more attractive to females.Pheromones are released into the air from one individual to influence the behaviour of another animal of the same species.Males were therefore strongly attracted to alcohol, especially those males which had never mated.The new study also showed that the fly's response to smelling alcohol is controlled by three different neural circuits in its brain.While two are responsible for attracting male flies to small amounts of alcohol, a third ensures that excessive amounts have a deterrent effect. Because alcohol is toxic, the fly's brain must carefully weigh the risks and benefits of drinking it, and it does this by balancing signals of attraction with aversion."This means that the flies have a control mechanism that allows them to get all the benefits of alcohol consumption without risking alcohol intoxication," lead author Ian Keesey, of the University of Nebraska, said. For their investigations, the researchers combined physiological studies - such as imaging techniques to visualise processes in the fly brain, chemical analyses of environmental odours, and behavioural studies. The paper is published in the journal Science Advances.

Chemicals
Animals
Science

CERN scientists release blueprint for the Future Circular Collider

Top minds at the world’s largest atom smasher have released a blueprint for a much bigger successor that could vastly improve research into the remaining enigmas of physics. The plans for the Future Circular Collider — a nearly 91-kilometer (56.5-mile) loop along the French-Swiss border and below Lake Geneva — published late Monday put the finishing details on a project roughly a decade in the making at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research. The FCC would carry out high-precision experiments in the mid-2040s to study “known physics” in greater detail, then enter a second phase — planned for 2070 — that would conduct high-energy collisions of protons and heavy ions that would “open the door to the unknown,” said Giorgio Chiarelli, a research director at Italy’s National Institute of Nuclear Physics. “History of physics tells that when there is more data, the human ingenuity is able to extract more information than originally expected,” Chiarelli, who was not involved in the plans, said in an e-mail. For roughly a decade, top minds at CERN have been making plans for a successor to the Large Hadron Collider, a network of magnets that accelerate particles through a 27-kilometer (17-mile) underground tunnel and slam them together at velocities approaching the speed of light. The blueprint lays out the proposed path, environmental impact, scientific ambitions and project cost. Independent experts will take a look before CERN’s two dozen member countries — all European except for Israel — decide in 2028 whether to go forward, starting in the mid-2040s at a cost of some 14 billion Swiss francs (about $16 billion). CERN officials tout the promise of scientific discoveries that could drive innovation in fields like cryogenics, superconducting magnets and vacuum technologies that could benefit humankind. Outside experts point to the promise of learning more about the Higgs boson, the elusive particle that has been controversially dubbed “the God particle,” which helped explain how matter formed after the Big Bang. Work at the Large Hadron Collider confirmed in 2013 the existence of the Higgs boson, the central piece in a puzzle known as the standard model that helps explains some fundamental forces in the universe. CERN Director-General Fabiola Gianotti said the future collider “could become the most extraordinary instrument ever built by humanity to study the constituents and the laws of nature at the most fundamental levels in two ways,” by improving study of the Higgs boson and paving the way to “explore the energy frontier,” and by looking for new physics that explain the structure and evolution of the universe. One unknown is whether the Trump administration, which has been cutting foreign aid and spending in academia and research, will continue to support CERN a year after the Biden administration pledged U.S. support for the study and collaboration on the FCC’s construction and “physics exploitation” if it’s approved. The United States is home to 2,000 users of CERN, making them the single largest national contingent among the 17,000 people working there, including outside experts abroad and staff on site, Gianotti said. While an observer state and not a member, the U.S. doesn’t pay into the CERN regular budget but has contributed to specific projects. Most of the CERN regular budget comes from Europe. Costas Fountas, the CERN Council president, said he had spoken with some U.S. National Science Foundation and Department of Energy staff who relayed the message that so far “they’re ‘under the radar of the cuts of the Trump administration’. That’s their words.” CERN scientists, engineers and partners behind the plans considered at least 100 scenarios for the new collider before coming up with the proposed 91-kilometer circumference at an average depth of 200 meters (656 feet). The tunnel would be about 5 meters (16 feet) in diameter, CERN said. —Jamey Keaten, Associated Press

Top minds at the world’s largest atom smasher have released a blueprint for a much bigger successor that could vastly improve research into the remaining enigmas of physics. The plans for the Future Circular Collider — a nearly 91-kilometer (56.5-mile) loop along the French-Swiss border and below Lake Geneva — published late Monday put the finishing details on a project roughly a decade in the making at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research. The FCC would carry out high-precision experiments in the mid-2040s to study “known physics” in greater detail, then enter a second phase — planned for 2070 — that would conduct high-energy collisions of protons and heavy ions that would “open the door to the unknown,” said Giorgio Chiarelli, a research director at Italy’s National Institute of Nuclear Physics. “History of physics tells that when there is more data, the human ingenuity is able to extract more information than originally expected,” Chiarelli, who was not involved in the plans, said in an e-mail. For roughly a decade, top minds at CERN have been making plans for a successor to the Large Hadron Collider, a network of magnets that accelerate particles through a 27-kilometer (17-mile) underground tunnel and slam them together at velocities approaching the speed of light. The blueprint lays out the proposed path, environmental impact, scientific ambitions and project cost. Independent experts will take a look before CERN’s two dozen member countries — all European except for Israel — decide in 2028 whether to go forward, starting in the mid-2040s at a cost of some 14 billion Swiss francs (about $16 billion). CERN officials tout the promise of scientific discoveries that could drive innovation in fields like cryogenics, superconducting magnets and vacuum technologies that could benefit humankind. Outside experts point to the promise of learning more about the Higgs boson, the elusive particle that has been controversially dubbed “the God particle,” which helped explain how matter formed after the Big Bang. Work at the Large Hadron Collider confirmed in 2013 the existence of the Higgs boson, the central piece in a puzzle known as the standard model that helps explains some fundamental forces in the universe. CERN Director-General Fabiola Gianotti said the future collider “could become the most extraordinary instrument ever built by humanity to study the constituents and the laws of nature at the most fundamental levels in two ways,” by improving study of the Higgs boson and paving the way to “explore the energy frontier,” and by looking for new physics that explain the structure and evolution of the universe. One unknown is whether the Trump administration, which has been cutting foreign aid and spending in academia and research, will continue to support CERN a year after the Biden administration pledged U.S. support for the study and collaboration on the FCC’s construction and “physics exploitation” if it’s approved. The United States is home to 2,000 users of CERN, making them the single largest national contingent among the 17,000 people working there, including outside experts abroad and staff on site, Gianotti said. While an observer state and not a member, the U.S. doesn’t pay into the CERN regular budget but has contributed to specific projects. Most of the CERN regular budget comes from Europe. Costas Fountas, the CERN Council president, said he had spoken with some U.S. National Science Foundation and Department of Energy staff who relayed the message that so far “they’re ‘under the radar of the cuts of the Trump administration’. That’s their words.” CERN scientists, engineers and partners behind the plans considered at least 100 scenarios for the new collider before coming up with the proposed 91-kilometer circumference at an average depth of 200 meters (656 feet). The tunnel would be about 5 meters (16 feet) in diameter, CERN said. —Jamey Keaten, Associated Press

Energy
Nature
Science

Oregon moves to regulate harmful ‘forever chemicals’

The state Department of Environmental Quality is adding six PFAS to Oregon's list of more than 800 regulated contaminants.

Oregon’s list of regulated hazardous substances is getting its first update in nearly two decades with the addition of six “forever chemicals” known to harm human health.The Oregon Department of Environmental Quality on Tuesday announced it would add six perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, to the state’s list of more than 800 regulated contaminants and begin creating regulations to limit Oregonians’ exposure to them.“We need this rulemaking to hold parties responsible for contamination and to address that contamination,” said Sarah Van Glubt, a manager in DEQ’s environmental cleanup program who is leading the rulemaking. “Otherwise, right now, everything is voluntary. We can’t require parties to test and treat for these chemicals.”The Environmental Quality Commission is expected to vote on adding the chemicals to the state’s list and adopting new regulations on or after May 21.PFAS are human-made chemical chains used in products such as flame retardants, nonstick cookware and waterproof clothing that do not break down or go away naturally but instead have for decades leached into rivers and streams and contaminated soil, water and even air.They are thought to now be in the blood of everyone in the U.S., according to research and testing from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and can lead to increased risks for cancers, heart damage, high cholesterol and birth defects, among other adverse health effects.Suspected sources of past or ongoing PFAS pollution in Oregon include 139 commercial airports that are or were required to maintain PFAS-containing firefighting foam on site, as well as 18 municipal fire training facilities near 20 of the most populous cities in the state, according to rulemaking documents from DEQ.Officials at Portland International Airport began testing for PFAS in 2017 in and around a firefighter training ground there used by the Air National Guard. They identified PFAS contamination adjacent to the nearby Columbia Slough and found PFAS-impaired fish and aquatic species. They’ve since switched to using PFAS-free firefighting foam and have begun initial stages of cleanup.Oregon lawmakers are considering a bill — Senate Bill 91 — that would ban PFAS from firefighting foam used on the ground by firefighters. The Oregon Senate voted to pass the bill nearly unanimously in February, but a vote in the House has not yet been scheduled.Other sites to potentially test for PFAS contamination include 22 bulk fuel facilities and 93 metal plating facilities in Oregon.In 2024, the U.S. Envionmental Protection Agency added several PFAS to the federal list of regulated hazardous substances, and mandated states begin testing for them in drinking water systems.The Oregon Health Authority has identified PFAS in 35 Oregon public drinking water systems, with 24 of those exceeding the EPA’s new drinking water standards for the compounds. The state has until April 2026 to adopt the federal agency’s new PFAS standards and public water systems have until April 2029 to comply with those standards.DEQ’s new regulations would apply to PFAS pollution in rivers, lakes, soil and groundwater but would not address potential contamination released through the air, such as when biosolids and sewage sludge containing PFAS are burned, releasing PFAS into the air, or potential PFAS contamination from those biosolids being spread on farm fields as fertilizer.Biosolids filtered from Portland’s sewer and wastewater get heated and dried out in anaerobic digesters and sent to farms in eastern Oregon as fertilizer. The department doesn’t test those biosolids, which likely contain PFAS.Department spokesman Antony Sparrow said the EPA is developing a risk assessment for sewage sludge that will inform future state regulations.Van Glubt said the department is working on a strategic plan that would combine the work of DEQ’s air, water, biosolids and other teams, as well as work being done at other agencies, to deal with ongoing PFAS issues.“This rule making really is just addressing one piece of the puzzle,” she said. “There are other issues at play with PFAS that will need to be addressed.”Oregon’s hazardous substances list was last updated in 2006, when environmental regulators added methane to the list.Participate in the rulemaking: Email comments to PFAS2025@deq.oregon.gov. Join a public hearing on April 22 at 11 a.m. here or 6 p.m. here-- Alex Baumhardt, Oregon Capital ChronicleThe Oregon Capital Chronicle, founded in 2021, is a nonprofit news organization that focuses on Oregon state government, politics and policy.

Chemicals
Government
Pollution

Ministers lose appeal against Yorkshire anglers’ river pollution ruling

Appeal court finds in favour of Pickering Fishery Association members who wanted river to be cleanedA group of anglers trying to restore the ecosystem of a river have seen off a challenge by the environment secretary, Steve Reed, who claimed that cleaning up their waterway was administratively unworkable.Reed took an appeal against a group of anglers from North Yorkshire, who had won a legal case arguing that the government and the Environment Agency’s plans to clean up the Upper Costa Beck, a former trout stream devastated by sewage pollution and runoff, were so vague they were ineffectual. Continue reading...

A group of anglers trying to restore the ecosystem of a river have seen off a challenge by the environment secretary, Steve Reed, who claimed that cleaning up their waterway was administratively unworkable.Reed took an appeal against a group of anglers from North Yorkshire, who had won a legal case arguing that the government and the Environment Agency’s plans to clean up the Upper Costa Beck, a former trout stream devastated by sewage pollution and runoff, were so vague they were ineffectual.The environment secretary decided, after Labour won the election last year, to continue the challenge which had begun under the previous Conservative government.On Wednesday, the appeal court found in favour of the anglers, the Pickering Fishery Association.The judges dismissed Reed’s argument that it is administratively unworkable to develop specific measures to clean up individual rivers, lakes and streams as is required by law under the Water Framework Directive – legislation which aims to improve the quality of rivers, lakes and coastal waters.Andrew Kelton, solicitor from Fish Legal which represented the anglers, said: “This case goes to the heart of why the government has failed to make progress towards improving the health of rivers and lakes in England.“Only 16% of waterbodies – 14% of rivers – are currently achieving ‘good ecological status’, with no improvement for at least a decade, which comes as no surprise to us having seen how the Environment Agency at first proposed, but then for some reason failed to follow through with, the tough action needed against polluters in this case.”He said the Upper Costa Beck was just one of 4,929 waterbodies, but was a case study in regulatory inaction in the face of evidence of declining river health.The Costa Beck is failing to achieve good ecological status under the Water Framework Directive regulations partly because of sewage pollution and runoff from farms.The anglers, who have spent more than 10 years trying to get the authorities to clean up the river, took the government and the EA to court in an attempt to force action. They successfully argued that the plan by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the EA to improve the stream lacked the legally required measures necessary to restore it – for example, it did not include the tightening of discharge permits for sewage treatment works.The judge in the high court found that the government had unlawfully failed to assess and identify specific measures to achieve the legally mandatory targets for the waterbody. That ruling was on Wednesday upheld by the appeal court.Penelope Gane, head of practice at Fish Legal, said Reed could now show a real commitment to restoring rivers and lakes.“What we need is meaningful action to clean up rivers,” she said. “Anything short of that will be a tacit admission that the government has abandoned its environmental ambitions for water.”Defra have been approached for comment.

Pollution
Government
Water

The climate movement needs lawyers. This ‘pro bono bootcamp’ helps connect the dots.

It's not just high-profile lawsuits — climate solutions need contracts, corporate advice, and IP filings.

The vision “Every lawyer has skills that can help the climate. We’ve just gotta make the connections.” — Environmental lawyer and advocate Matthew Karmel The spotlight “How many lawyers does it take to break a Guinness World Record?” Matthew Karmel posed this question on LinkedIn in February, adding, “No, this isn’t a bad lawyer joke; it’s a reason for climate optimism.” Karmel, a principal at the law firm Offit Kurman and the chair of its environmental and sustainability law practice group, is one of the organizers of the Climate Pro Bono Bootcamp, a two-day virtual conference dedicated to helping more lawyers and legal professionals figure out how to donate their time and skills to advance climate work. When people — including lawyers themselves — think of the intersection between climate and law, their minds may go straight to high-profile climate lawsuits or other legal action aimed at holding big polluters and inactive governments accountable. But there are many other forms of legal support that climate causes might need, from simple contracts to forming a new business or nonprofit to legal defense. “There are so many attorneys working at large law firms, small law firms — attorneys everywhere who just don’t do litigation, but are still very passionate about climate change and want to apply their skills in that way,” said Stephanie Demetry, the executive director of Green Pro Bono, an organization that matches attorneys with companies, nonprofits, grassroots leaders, and others who need legal assistance to advance climate solutions. Karmel had the idea for the conference in late 2023, after he had been working with Green Pro Bono for a few years. “I was sitting there thinking, Why isn’t everyone doing this?” he recalled. “The things I’m doing aren’t unique. It doesn’t require specialized legal skills. It requires passion, and the general legal knowledge that every lawyer has.” He approached Demetry with the idea of hosting a training to help demystify what climate-related pro bono work can entail and build up the network of attorneys interested in offering it. They held the first bootcamp in January of 2024 and had around 700 attendees — far exceeding their expectations. After the event, Demetry said, Green Pro Bono more than doubled the number of attorneys in its network and also saw a 53 percent increase in the number of projects that got picked up. But for this year’s bootcamp, planned for late April, they’re aiming to increase that attendance — and setting the ambitious goal of growing it a hundredfold. That’s the number that would break a Guinness World Record for the largest attendance at a virtual law conference in one week (yes, this entry truly does exist). It might be a longer-term goal, but it’s one they’re serious about. Breaking the record, Karmel said, would be a powerful way to demonstrate the growing interest in climate action among the legal community, and also an opportunity to reach thousands more attorneys, students, and others with the event’s key message: that you don’t have to choose between your day job and working for the causes you care about. I spoke with Karmel and Demetry about the goals of the conference, the wide array of skills and expertise that legal professionals have to offer to climate solutions, and the value of having pro bono work built into a career. Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity. Q. Would you say that there is a growing appetite among legal professionals to volunteer their time and skills for the climate cause? Demetry: From our organizational perspective, absolutely. I joined [Green Pro Bono] three years ago, and every year since I’ve been there, there has been huge percentage growth in our network of attorneys who want to take on cases — but there’s also a huge increase in the amount of clients and work that we actually have. So it’s growing in a proportional rate, which is great. We’re seeing a lot of interest from younger people, from students, too. Even within the last couple of months, I would say we’ve gotten a lot of attorney volunteer requests, but also organizational volunteer requests — people who are just trying to get involved in this space in some way, at a time where it’s quite pivotal. Karmel: The legal industry has a tremendous history of pro bono. That volunteerism is something that’s baked into the legal industry. When I started as a junior lawyer, my firm encouraged it. I got credit at the firm for doing pro bono. This is something that the legal community recognizes as something we have a responsibility to do, and that benefits the rule of law. Lawyers see themselves in this white-knight sort of way, and I do, too. The access to justice — we facilitate the movings of policy and of everything through law. That gives a tremendous opportunity for lawyers. Q. Like you mentioned, this isn’t just about environmental law or high-profile climate lawsuits. What are some of the other ways that lawyers might help facilitate climate solutions? Karmel: I’m an environmental lawyer. That’s what I do. But the pro bono work I do isn’t even limited to environment — it’s oftentimes even the reverse of what people think. There is some, but the majority of the climate pro bono requests are not environmental requests. That first thing is almost a misnomer. I’ve done a software licensing agreement for a software-as-a-service sustainability platform for art galleries. The idea was, art galleries don’t have enough of their own resources to hire sustainability coordinators, so let’s have this software that takes in inputs of what you’re doing at the gallery and outputs sustainability recommendations. They needed a simple agreement — that was just a very simple licensing and funding agreement, and had nothing to do with environmental law. Just a basic contract. And anyone with basic contracting skills and access to a couple of CLE [Continuing Legal Education] online videos could have done this. There’s lots of things like that. Basic corporate contracts, basic corporate formation, that’s a huge part of it. There’s also lots of policy-based things which aren’t purely environmental. Demetry: I see a lot of intellectual property requests that are very, very pivotal to these organizations. Recently, we helped a medical organization that was developing a compactable syringe to get a patent on that technology. And their projected environmental impact was a 40 percent reduction in the carbon emissions from shipping syringes to rural and remote medical settings around the world. We try at Green Pro Bono to be as expansive and as non-gatekeeping as possible with the clients that we accept. We also get a lot of nonprofits that are looking for advice on, “Hey, we wanna start maybe some sort of community thrift store to bring in additional income to the nonprofit. Is that appropriate? Can a nonprofit do that?” The simple questions that can make a big difference to those organizations, and help them to reinvest the money they would be spending on legal services into their actual innovations and the services they’re providing in their communities — it’s kind of a backdoor way to use the lawyering skills that you have to expedite those innovations and make sure those organizations can continue to carry out their mission. So you’re maybe not directly involved in anything that looks climate-like at all on the backend, but the impact of what you’re doing is actually moving that needle forward a lot. Q. How does all of that inform your curriculum for the bootcamp? What are you planning to cover this year? Karmel: This second year, we’ve really grouped around two topics. One is the master topic of litigation and advocacy, and two is the master topic of corporate work or transactional work. We have one day devoted to each of those pillars. So in the first day, we’re gonna focus on litigation and advocacy and talk about creating policy, advocating for policy, what those skills look like, how that gets done. Then also: What litigation is happening right now? How is litigation that’s happening, matters before the Supreme Court, how do those things impact pro bono that is getting done, and how is it going to continue to impact it? On day two, we’re going to dive deeper than we did last year on specific transactional-related issues and give people skills and give them perspectives on using those. Q. I know that you all are going for a Guinness World Record. Can you tell me a little bit more about that? Karmel: We’re thinking about transformation constantly. That’s why we created this. We’re looking at the world, seeing how it can be different — seeing this untapped resource and saying, What can we do to crack this thing open? What can we do that is going to excite people, energize them? And honestly, I was just randomly brainstorming and someone posted online about a Guinness World Record they had seen and how weird it was. So I just went online, and they have a Guinness World Record for the largest online virtual law conference, and I did not know that such a world record existed. It was [in 2020], about 66,000 people on legal impacts relating to COVID and pandemic-time issues — which were huge, hot issues. And we thought, Geez, how impactful would it be to break that record? For climate, for lawyers, for the country where it is now — it would be such a statement to break that record this year, to say no matter what is going on, we did that. We know that people are coming to this to be part of a community, to be part of a movement that’s trying to do this work. And so it was a way to try to make it even more meaningful, to take it up to the next level. It is partially a cheeky idea: 700 was beyond our concept last year — 66,000, frankly, we haven’t even figured out how we’re gonna pay for the Zoom if we get 66,000 people on there. But we will! If we can do that, we will. Stephanie, what did you think when I came to you with this idea? Demetry: Yeah, I thought it was wild. And exciting, though. I think it’s good to shoot for the moon in these situations. It’s what the moment demands, so why not try? Last year we only had a month or two to prepare, and we really weren’t even sure if we’d get a hundred people. So we were very invigorated coming off of that. Karmel: We’re gonna break it one year. My goal is to have this conference be something that happens every year until forever. I was going to say until it’s not needed anymore, but the fact is, this will always be needed because this is about showing people that they can craft careers that matter to them. You don’t have to choose between a soulless job and a soulful job. Any job can be something that you bring your heart and soul to. — Claire Elise Thompson More exposure Read: an opinion piece by Karmel about the importance of pro bono work (Grist) Read: about the end of the youth climate lawsuit Juliana v. United States — and the movement it ignited (Grist) Read: an interview with legal scholar Carol Liao about how climate change will impact different areas of law, and why “all lawyers will need to be climate lawyers” (Canadian Lawyer) Read: a profile of Julian Aguon, an attorney from Guam fighting for climate justice on a global stage (Grist) A parting shot Another example of a group of professionals with special skills and resources, who have often rallied to support causes and communities, is chefs. In the aftermath of the L.A. fires earlier this year, a number of chefs and restauranteurs offered free meals to those affected by the fires and to first responders. Here, a taco truck contracted by the food-aid organization World Central Kitchen set up shop to feed emergency and utility workers. IMAGE CREDITS Vision: Mia Torres / Grist Parting shot: Robyn Beck / AFP via Getty Images This story was originally published by Grist with the headline The climate movement needs lawyers. This ‘pro bono bootcamp’ helps connect the dots. on Apr 2, 2025.

Climate
Business
Food

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