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DNA detectives in Antarctica: probing 6,000 years of penguin poo for clues to the past

New ancient DNA research on Adélie penguin poo in Antarctica shows how several species respond to environmental change over time, including southern elephant seals.

Jamie WoodStudies of ancient DNA have tended to focus on frozen land in the northern hemisphere, where woolly mammoths and bison roamed. Meanwhile, Antarctica has received relatively little attention. We set out to change that. The most suitable sediments are exposed near the coast of the icy continent, where penguins like to breed. Their poo is a rich source of DNA, providing information about the health of the population as well as what penguins have been eating. Our new research opens a window on the past of Adélie penguins in Antarctica, going back 6,000 years. It also offers a surprise glimpse into the shrinking world of southern elephant seals over the past 1,000 years. Understanding how these species coped with climate change in the past can help us prepare for the future. Wildlife in Antarctica faces multiple emerging threats and will likely need support to cope with the many challenges ahead. A unique marine ecosystem Adélie penguins are particularly sensitive to changes in their environment. This makes them what we call a “sentinel species”, providing an early warning of imbalance or dysfunction in the coastal ecosystem. Their poo also provides a record of how they responded to changes in the past. In our new research, we excavated pits up to 80cm deep at ten Adélie penguin colonies along the 700km Ross Sea coastline. We then collected 156 sediment samples from different depths in each excavation. Six of these colonies were still active, meaning birds return annually to breed. The other four had been abandoned at various times over the past 6,000 years. From these sediments we generated 94 billion DNA sequences, which provided us with an unparalleled window into the past lives of Adélie penguins and their ecosystem. We detected the DNA of several animal species besides Adélie penguins. These animals included two other birds, three seals and two soil invertebrates. Not all of this DNA came from penguin poo. Our samples also contained DNA from feathers, hairs or skin cells of other species in the environment at the time. Sediment samples were taken from ten penguin colonies of various ages, six active (white dot) and four abandoned (coloured dot), on the coast of Ross Sea in Antarctica. Wood, J., et al (2025) Nature Communications, CC BY-NC-ND Penguin population size and diet When we took a closer look at the DNA from penguins of the present day, we found more genetic diversity in samples from larger colonies. Recognising this relationship between genetic diversity and colony size enabled us to estimate the size of former colonies. We could also reconstruct population trends through time. For example, in samples from active colonies, we found penguin genetic diversity increased as we sampled closer and closer to the surface. This may reflect population growth over the past century. The DNA also revealed changes in penguin diets over time. Over the past 4,000 years, the penguins in the southern Ross Sea switched from mainly eating one type of fish – the bald notothen – to another, Antarctic silverfish. The bald notothen lives beneath the sea ice, so this prey-switching was likely driven by a change in sea ice extent compared with the past. Examples of an active Adélie penguin colony (Cape Hallett), and a 6,000 year old abandoned Adélie penguin colony site (Terra Nova Bay). Jamie Wood Surprise! Elephant seals We made an unexpected discovery at Cape Hallett, in the northern Ross Sea. This is the site of an active penguin colony. Samples of sediment from close to the surface contained lots of penguin DNA and eggshell. But samples from further down, where penguin DNA and eggshell were scarce, contained DNA from southern elephant seals. Today, elephant seals are uncommon visitors to the Antarctic continent, and breed on subantarctic islands including Macquarie, Campbell and Antipodes Islands. Yet, bones of elephant seal pups found along the Ross Sea coast indicate the species used to breed in the area. Carbon dating of these bones indicate elephant seal colonies began disappearing from the southern Ross Sea around 1,000 years ago. Over the following 200 years, colonies in the northern Ross Sea began vanishing too. As the climate cooled and the extent of sea ice increased, elephant seals could no longer access suitable breeding sites. These sites were then taken over by Adélie penguins who expanded into areas once occupied by seals. Our DNA evidence suggests Cape Hallett was one of the last strongholds of southern elephant seals on the icy continent. But we may yet again see elephant seals breeding on the Antarctic mainland as the world warms and sea ice melts. Even more ancient DNA in Antarctica Our study spans the past 6,000 years, but our research suggests it would be possible to go even further back. The DNA fragments we found were very well preserved, showing little of the damage expected in warmer climates. So it should be possible to obtain much older DNA from sediments on land in Antarctica – maybe even 1 million-year-old DNA, as recently reported from Antarctic sediments beneath the ocean floor. Worthy of lasting protection In December 2017, 2.09 million square kilometres of the Ross Sea and adjoining Southern Ocean became the world’s largest marine protected area. Establishing the protection was a major achievement, yet it was only afforded for 35 years. After 2052, continuation of the region’s protected status will require international agreement. Knowledge of the vulnerability of local species and their risk in the face of change will play a key role in informing the decision. Our research provides a case study for how ancient environmental DNA can contribute towards this understanding. This research was part of the Ross Sea Region Research and Monitoring Programme,, funded by the New Zealand Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment.Theresa Cole does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Slim margins, climate disasters, and Trump’s funding freeze: Life or death for many US farms

Federal programs are a lifeline for farmers. Now many are questioning whether they can stay in business.

When the Trump administration first announced a freeze on all federal funding in January, farmers across the country were thrust into an uncertain limbo.  More than a month later, fourth-generation farmer Adam Chappell continues to wait on the U.S. Department of Agriculture to reimburse him for the $25,000 he paid out of pocket to implement conservation practices like cover cropping. Until he knows the fate of the federal programs that keep his small rice farm in Arkansas afloat, Chappell’s unable to prepare for his next crop. Things have gotten so bad, the 45-year-old is even considering leaving the only job he’s ever known. “I just don’t know who we can count on and if we can count on them as a whole to get it done,” said Chappell. “That’s what I’m scared of.”  In Virginia, the funding freeze has forced a sustainable farming network that supports small farmers throughout the state to suspend operations. Brent Wills, a livestock producer and program manager at the Virginia Association for Biological Farming, said that nearly all of the organization’s funding comes from USDA programs that have been frozen or rescinded. The team of three is now scrambling to come up with a contingency plan while trying not to panic over whether the nearly $50,000 in grants they are owed will be reimbursed.  “It’s pretty devastating,” said Wills. “The short-term effects of this are bad enough, but the long-term effects? We can’t even tally that up right now.”  In North Carolina, a beekeeping operation hasn’t yet received the $14,500 in emergency funding from the USDA to rebuild after Hurricane Helene washed away 60 beehives. Ang Roell, who runs They Keep Bees, an apiary that also has operations in Florida and Massachusetts, said they have more than $45,000 in USDA grants that are frozen. The delay has put them behind in production, leading to an additional $15,000 in losses. They are also unsure of the future of an additional $100,000 in grants that they’ve applied for. “I have to rethink my entire business plan,” Roell said. “I feel shell-shocked.” Within the USDA’s purview, the funding freeze has targeted two main categories of funding: grant applications that link agricultural work to diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives and those enacted under the Inflation Reduction Act, which earmarked more than $19.5 billion to be paid out over several years. Added to the uncertainty of the funding freeze, among the tens of thousands of federal employees who have lost their jobs in recent weeks were officials who manage various USDA programs. Following the initial freeze, courts have repeatedly ordered the administration to grant access to all funds, but agencies have taken a piecemeal approach, releasing funding in “tranches.” Even as the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Interior have released significant chunks of funding, the USDA has moved slowly, citing the need to review programs with IRA funding. In some cases, though, it has terminated contracts altogether, including those with ties to the agency’s largest-ever investment in climate-smart agriculture.  In late February, the USDA announced that it was releasing $20 million to farmers who had already been awarded grants — the agency’s first tranche.  According to Mike Lavender, policy director with the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition, that $20 million amounts to “less than one percent” of money owed. His team estimates that three IRA-funded programs have legally promised roughly $2.3 billion through 30,715 conservation contracts for ranchers, farmers, and foresters. Those contracts have been through the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, Conservation Stewardship Program, and Agricultural Conservation Easement Program. “In some respects, it’s a positive sign that some of it’s been released,” said Lavender. “But I think, more broadly, it’s so insignificant. For the vast majority, [this] does absolutely nothing.” U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins announced the agency is unfreezing some funds, but it’s unclear how much is being released and how soon. Saul Loeb / AFP via Getty Images A week later, USDA secretary Brooke Rollins announced that the agency would be able to meet a March 21 deadline imposed by Congress to distribute an additional $10 billion in emergency relief payments. Then, on Sunday, March 2, Rollins made an announcement that offered hope for some farmers, but very little specifics. In a press statement, the USDA stated that the agency’s review of IRA funds had been completed and funds associated with EQIP, CSP, and ACEP would be released, but it did not clarify how much would be unfrozen. The statement also announced a commitment to distribute an additional $20 billion in disaster assistance.  Lavender called Rollins’ statement a “borderline nothingburger” for its degree of “ambiguity.” It’s not clear, he continued, if Rollins is referring to the first tranche of funding or if the statement was announcing a second tranche — nor, if it’s the latter, how much is being released. “Uncertainty still seems to reign supreme. We need more clarity.”  The USDA did not respond to Grist’s request for clarification.  Farmers who identify as women, queer, or people of color are especially apprehensive about the status of their contracts. Roell, the beekeeper, said their applications for funding celebrated their operations’ diverse workforce development program. Now, Roell, who uses they/them pronouns, fears that their existing contracts and pending applications will be targeted for the same reason. (Federal agencies have been following an executive order taking aim at “Ending Radical And Wasteful Government DEI Programs.”)  “This feels like an outright assault on sustainable agriculture, on small businesses, queer people, BIPOC, and women farmers,” said Roell. “Because at this point, all of our projects are getting flagged as DEI. We don’t know if we’re allowed to make corrections to those submissions or if they’re just going to get outright denied due to the language in the projects being for women or for queer folks.” The knock-on effects of this funding gridlock on America’s already fractured agricultural economy has Rebecca Wolf, senior food policy analyst at Food & Water Watch, deeply concerned. With the strain of an agricultural recession looming over regions like the Midwest, and the number of U.S. farms already in steady decline, she sees the freeze and ongoing mass layoffs of federal employees as “ultimately leading down the road to further consolidation.” Given that the administration is “intentionally dismantling the programs that help underpin our small and medium-sized farmers,” Wolf said this could lead to “the loss of those farms, and then the loss of land ownership.”   Other consequences might be more subtle, but no less significant. According to Omanjana Goswami, a soil scientist with the advocacy nonprofit Union of Concerned Scientists, the funding freeze, layoffs, and the Trump administration’s hostility toward climate action is altogether likely to position America’s agricultural sector to contribute even more than it does to carbon emissions.  Agriculture accounted for about 10.6 percent of U.S. carbon emissions in 2021. When farmers implement conservation practices on their farms, it can lead to improved air and water quality and increase soil’s ability to store carbon. Such tactics can not only reduce agricultural emissions, but are incentivized by many of the programs now under review. “When we look at the scale of this, it’s massive,” said Goswami. “If this funding is scaled back, or even completely removed, it means that the impact and contribution of agriculture on climate change is going to increase.” Read Next US Forest Service firings decimate already understaffed agency: ‘It’s catastrophic’ Katie Myers, Juanpablo Ramirez-Franco, & Izzy Ross The Trump administration’s attack on farmers comes at a time when the agriculture industry faces multiple existential crises. For one, times are tight for farmers. In 2023, the median household income from farming was negative $900. That means, at least half of all households that drew income from farming didn’t turn a profit.  Additionally, in 2023, natural disasters caused nearly $22 billion in agricultural losses. Rising temperatures are slowing plant growth, frequent floods and droughts are decimating harvests, and wildfires are burning through fields. With insurance paying for only a subset of these losses, farmers are increasingly paying out of pocket. Last year, extreme weather impacts, rising labor and production costs, imbalances in global supply and demand, and increased price volatility all resulted in what some economists designated the industry’s worst financial year in almost two decades.  Elliott Smith, whose Washington state-based business Kitchen Sync Strategies helps small farmers supply institutions like schools with fresh food, says this situation has totally changed how he looks at the federal government. As the freeze hampers key grants for the farmers and food businesses he works with across at least 10 different states, halting emerging contracts and stalling a slate of ongoing projects, Smith said the experience has made him now consider federal funding “unstable.”  All told, the freeze isn’t just threatening the future of Smith’s business, but also the future of farmers and the local food systems they work within nationwide. “The entire food ecosystem is stuck in place. The USDA feels like a troll that saw the sun. They are frozen. They can’t move,” he said. “The rest of us are in the fields and trenches, and we’re looking back at the government and saying, ‘Where the hell are you?’” This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Slim margins, climate disasters, and Trump’s funding freeze: Life or death for many US farms on Mar 5, 2025.

London exhibition explores design based on needs of nature and animals

Curator of Design Museum show says ‘human-centric’ approach to design needs overhaul amid climate crisisDesigners need to “fundamentally rethink our relationship with the natural world”, according to the curator of a new exhibition which argues the needs of nature and animals should be considered when creating homes, buildings and products.Justin McGuirk, the curator of the upcoming More Than Human exhibition at the Design Museum in London, said our current “human-centric” approach to design needs to be radically overhauled as the world adapts to the climate crisis. Continue reading...

Designers need to “fundamentally rethink our relationship with the natural world”, according to the curator of a new exhibition which argues the needs of nature and animals should be considered when creating homes, buildings and products.Justin McGuirk, the curator of the upcoming More Than Human exhibition at the Design Museum in London, said our current “human-centric” approach to design needs to be radically overhauled as the world adapts to the climate crisis.Kombu Nudibranch by Julia Lohmann. Photograph: Julia Lohmann Studio/c/o The Design Museum“We’re stuck in a carbon accountancy model which is basically about doing everything exactly the same as we currently do, just a little bit less bad,” he said. “That’s not really going to cut it.”McGuirk believes there needs to be “a fundamental shift in position” for all designers.“Every design project needs to think about how it’s affecting other species, or either limiting its impact on other species, or ideally promoting the health of other species,” he said.The More Than Human exhibition, which opens on 11 July, presents ideas for how the world of design could achieve the shift McGuirk and others are calling for.There’s a pavilion that is specifically designed to encourage insects to nest in its exterior, a project in New York where a wave breaker has been built using a colony of oysters rather than concrete, and it features a “monumental seaweed installation” by the artist Julia Lohmann.Innovative design ideas that help restore damaged and dying marine ecosystems such as coral reefs, which are dying at record rates around the world, are also included.Reef Design Lab’s Living Seawalls – an artificial habitat for marine life – will feature alongside the lab’s Modular Artificial Reef Structure II, which is placed on the ocean floor to help regenerate and repopulate natural reef structures.McGuirk said there’s a sense that humans are detached from nature. “We extract what we need and then we build what we want. But actually we’re interdependent with all these living systems, so it’s really a new way of thinking that we’re trying to encourage,” he added.The More Than Human movement first emerged in the late 1990s when David Abram, the cultural ecologist, geo-philosopher and performance artist, coined the term. It has since moved from the theoretical to the real world.Micrographia by Johanna Seelemann. Photograph: c/o The Design Museum“It’s really only been around in theory for about 20 years,” said McGuirk. “But I’ve noticed among a younger generation of designers that this is becoming much more a way of thinking for them.”The exhibition is the first curatorial collaboration between the Design Museum and its national design research programme, Future Observatory, which launched in 2021 and champions new design thinking on environmental issues.Tim Marlow, director and CEO of the Design Museum said: “It’s important for museums and cultural institutions to respond to the complex issues facing our planet and society at present. It’s also important to shift perspectives from a human-centric view of the world to one closer to nature, which will make this a landmark exhibition in every sense.”

Coral Reefs in Vietnam Face Collapse. Can Conservation Efforts Turn the Tide?

The coral reefs of Nha Trang, Vietnam, are in severe decline due to climate change, overfishing, and pollution

NHA TRANG, Vietnam (AP) — The gentle waves off the coast of central Vietnam's Nha Trang obscure an open secret: The life-giving coral reefs below are dying. The waters are eerily devoid of fish. The bounty of the ocean is coming to an end.This is why Binh Van — who fished in these waters for over two decades — now charters his boat to Vietnamese tourists wanting to experience the thrill of fishing in the deep waters of the South China Sea. But there is only squid, which is flourishing in oceans warmed by climate change, to catch. His passengers don’t mind as the boat moves away from Nha Trang’s twinkling beach resorts. But Van is pensive.It wasn't always like this. There was a time when he'd catch 70 kilograms (154 pounds) of fish, like tuna and grouper, in one night. He can't make money on the squid.“Now I usually go home empty-handed,” he said.Southeast Asia's coral reefs make up over a third of the world's coral reefs and are part of the ‘Coral Triangle', a richly biodiverse marine area that generally stretches from the Philippines to Indonesia to the Solomon Islands. But most of these are now at risk of being destroyed. Only 1% of Vietnam's reefs are still healthy, and in those cases it's because of their remoteness, according to the World Resources Institute. Reefs worldwide are at risk from warmer and more acidic waters that weaken coral reefs and result in them bleaching because they've expelled the algae that helps them survive. Bleached corals need time to recover but bleaching events — when many corals lose color at the same time — are happening more frequently because of climate change, said Clint Oakley, who studies corals at Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand.“It’s a compounding problem. It takes more than a year for them to fully recover,” he said.The coral reefs of Nha Trang have also had to contend with local pressures as Vietnam’s economy boomed and coastal towns grew. Sediment from construction harms corals. Runoff from agriculture, sewage and booming aquaculture trigger algal blooms that block sunlight and choke corals. Intense overfishing killed off fishes that support reef health. By 2019, an outbreak of a predatory, thorny starfish — made likelier because of the reef's disturbed ecological balance — had killed nearly 90% by eating corals of the surviving reefs by 2019, said Konstantin S. Tkachenko, a professor of marine ecology at Russia’s Samara University who has been studying Vietnam's reefs for years.This has affected not only the local fishing industry — reefs provide food, shelter, and breeding grounds for fish — but also Vietnam’s tourism industry, especially among divers from all over the world who flock to the Southeast Asian country because of its long coastline. The underwater landscape is becoming infamous for different types of waste: Glass bottles where revelers party, nylon fishing lines where fishing boats lurk and plastic everywhere. Fish that clean reefs and keep them healthy by eating algae or parasites, like the distinctive Picasso triggerfish and the beaked Indian parrotfish, have disappeared, said Michael Blum of Rainbow Divers, a diving company in Vietnam.“When you don’t have the cleaners, the (reefs) suffocate,” he said. He and others have been diving every Friday to collect waste since October, bringing up more than 100 kilograms (220 pounds) of trash.Niecey Alexander, a tourist who began diving in December, said that it wasn't until she was underwater that she realized how small the world above water is compared to the vast ocean and the life it sustains. After her first dive to collect waste she said that it was mostly from tourism. “People not really thinking about waste when they're going into these adventures,” she said.Tourism and reefs can go hand in hand if they're well-managed, said Emma Camp, a coral expert at the University of Technology Sydney in Australia. She said that there are instances of tourism supporting marine conservation and programs to help reefs recover. But unsustainable tourism practices — too many people, or people doing things like dropping their anchors on the reefs — can cause harm.“They can be very positive for an area, allowing people to fall in love with a reef by allowing them to experience it firsthand,” she said.Preserving the tourism brochure image of its natural beauty will be crucial for Vietnam as it tries to compete with its neighbors to boost post-pandemic revenue from tourism to $42 billion. It wants to attract 23 million international tourists and over 120 million visits by domestic tourists in 2025. For context, the region's most popular destination, Thailand, wants 40 million international visitors and 200 million domestic visits in 2025.And in cities like Nha Trang, its long stretches of golden sand beaches and traditional fishing villages now coexist with the rapid construction of resorts, restaurants and bars. Vietnam insists that it is making efforts to make tourism sustainable. In 2001, it established 160 square kilometers (61 square miles) of land and water as its first protected marine area. But problems have persisted, from destructive practices that used explosives or poison to excessive tourism and coastal construction, said Vietnamese state media. In 2022, local authorities paused tourism to give the reef time to recover while removing predatory starfish and cleaning the seabed. The government has also approved a coral nursery project to support the recovery of the ecosystem.But even though a marine patrol was established to protect the waters to ensure that fishermen don't enter the marine park, Blum said fishing in the protected area was continuing.“We go out in the morning, we are chasing the fishing boats away. We leave in the afternoon, and the fishing boats are coming back in,” Blum said.Tkachenko, the Russian scientist, said the Southeast Asian country could do more to protect them. It could create more marine parks where protections are actually enforced, obligate the tourism industry to restore vegetation on the coasts to reduce sediment pouring into the ocean, restore degraded reefs through coral culture and by introducing animals that balance reef ecosystems, and regulating fisheries.He pointed to the scores of fishing vessels that dot the coasts of Nha Trang. “What do you think is the chance to survive for any tiny fish or sea bottom inhabitant under such tremendous fishing pressure daily?” he said.Ghosal reported from Hanoi, Vietnam.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

US Supreme Court Reins in EPA Power to Police Water Pollution Discharge

By John KruzelWASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court dealt a blow to the Environmental Protection Agency in a ruling on Tuesday involving a...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court dealt a blow to the Environmental Protection Agency in a ruling on Tuesday involving a wastewater treatment facility owned by the city of San Francisco that could make it harder for regulators to police water pollution.The justices, in a 5-4 decision, ruled that the EPA exceeded its authority under a landmark anti-pollution law by including vague restrictions in a permit issued for the wastewater treatment facility, which empties into the Pacific Ocean. The city had sued to challenge the EPA restrictions.The ruling, authored by conservative Justice Samuel Alito, reversed a decision by the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that had upheld the permit.Alito wrote that the EPA exceeded its powers under the landmark Clean Water Act of 1972 by imposing undefined requirements on permit-holders related to water quality standards in the receiving body of water."This case involves provisions that do not spell out what a permittee must do or refrain from doing; rather, they make a permittee responsible for the quality of the water in the body of water into which the permittee discharges pollutants," Alito wrote."When a permit contains such requirements, a permittee that punctiliously follows every specific requirement in its permit may nevertheless face crushing penalties if the quality of the water in its receiving waters falls below the applicable standards," Alito added.Water quality standards are devised by states and subject to federal approval.Conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett wrote a dissent that was joined by the court's three liberal members."EPA is required to issue the limitations necessary to ensure that the water quality standards are met," Barrett wrote. "So taking a tool away from EPA may make it harder for the agency to issue the permits that municipalities and businesses need in order for their discharges to be lawful."The Supreme Court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, has limited the EPA's reach in recent years as part of a series of rulings curbing the power federal regulatory agencies.(Reporting by John Kruzel; Editing by Will Dunham)Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

Supreme Court Makes It Harder For EPA To Police Sewage Discharges

The 5-4 decision is the latest in which conservative justices have reined in pollution control efforts.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A divided Supreme Court on Tuesday made it harder for environmental regulators to limit water pollution, ruling for San Francisco in a case about the discharge of raw sewage that sometimes occurs during heavy rains.By a 5-4 vote, the court’s conservative majority ruled that the Environmental Protection Agency overstepped its authority under the Clean Water Act with water pollution permits that contain vague requirements for maintaining water quality.The decision is the latest in which conservative justices have reined in pollution control efforts.Justice Samuel Alito wrote for the court that EPA can set specific limits that tell cities and counties what can be discharged. But the agency lacks the authority “to include ‘end-result’ provisions,” Alito wrote, that make cities and counties responsible for maintaining the quality of the water, the Pacific Ocean in this case, into which wastewater is discharged.“When a permit contains such requirements, a permittee that punctiliously follows every specific requirement in its permit may nevertheless face crushing penalties if the quality of the water in its receiving waters falls below the applicable standards,” he wrote.One conservative justice, Amy Coney Barrett, joined the court’s three liberals in dissent. Limits on discharges sometimes still don’t insure water quality standards are met, Barrett wrote.“The concern that the technology-based effluent limitations may fall short is on display in this case,” Barrett wrote, adding that “discharges from components of San Francisco’s sewer system have allegedly led to serious breaches of the water quality standards, such as ‘discoloration, scum, and floating material, including toilet paper, in Mission Creek.’”The case produced an unusual alliance of the liberal northern California city, energy companies and business groups.The EPA has issued thousands of the permits, known as narrative permits, over several decades, former acting general counsel Kevin Minoli said.The narrative permits have operated almost as a backstop in case permits that quantify what can be discharged still result in unacceptable water quality, Minoli said.With the new restrictions imposed by the court, “the question is what comes in place of those limits,” Minoli said.Go Ad-Free — And Protect The Free PressThe next four years will change America forever. But HuffPost won't back down when it comes to providing free and impartial journalism.For the first time, we're offering an ad-free experience to qualifying contributors who support our fearless newsroom. We hope you'll join us.You've supported HuffPost before, and we'll be honest — we could use your help again. We won't back down from our mission of providing free, fair news during this critical moment. But we can't do it without you.For the first time, we're offering an ad-free experience to qualifying contributors who support our fearless journalism. We hope you'll join us.You've supported HuffPost before, and we'll be honest — we could use your help again. We won't back down from our mission of providing free, fair news during this critical moment. But we can't do it without you.For the first time, we're offering an ad-free experience to qualifying contributors who support our fearless journalism. We hope you'll join us.Support HuffPostAlready contributed? Log in to hide these messages.Alito downplayed the impact of the decision, writing that the agency has “the tools needed” to insure water quality standards are met.

Ethics violation lodged against former CalRecycle director

Less than one year after Rachel Wagoner resigned as director of CalRecycle, she's working for a coalition of plastic and packaging companies.

For lawmakers and lobbyists who worked on ensuring the passage of California’s landmark plastic waste law, Rachel Wagoner’s abrupt career shift was nothing short of jaw dropping.The former director of CalRecycle — who oversaw, wrote and promoted the single-use plastic legislation known as SB 54 — is now the executive director of the Circular Action Alliance, a coalition of plastic and packaging companies determined to delay, if not derail, the law.And it’s not clear her pivot is legal.On Feb. 19, an anonymous whistleblower submitted a formal complaint to California’s Fair Political Practices Commission, asking the agency to investigate Wagoner on the grounds that she violated a ‘switching sides’ ban that prevents former regulators from receiving compensation to work against the state on matters they once oversaw. “It’s pretty egregious,” said Sean McMorris, transparency, ethics and accountability program manager for California Common Cause, a political watchdog group. “I don’t know how else to say it, regardless of whether any laws were broken or not, the public’s going to look at that and say, ‘What’s going on here? This is pretty suspicious.’”Others say Wagoner was instrumental in pushing for regulations and language she is now calling problematic.“It certainly raises a lot of concerns,” said Sen. Ben Allen (D-Santa Monica), who authored and sponsored the original legislation.Wagoner did not respond to questions from The Times, but in an email exchange from Feb. 12, she did said she was proud of the time she worked for the state government and feels privileged to have been asked to advise companies and to provide “information on SB 54 and California environmental and regulatory laws and processes.”She said she does not advocate for the companies she represents in her new role — which include some of the world’s largest producers and distributors of plastic packaging, including Amazon, Coca-Cola, Conagra, Procter & Gamble and Target. She said she just provides them with information.Larine Urbina, a spokesperson for the coalition, said the state’s political practices commission had not reached out to her organization, and therefore “it wouldn’t be appropriate for me to comment at this time.”SB 54, the plastic waste law Wagoner helped craft, was designed to reduce single-use plastics and packaging and shift the responsibility of plastic waste to the companies that manufacturer, market or sell those products — and away from the consumer and local jurisdictions. That can be done either by reducing the amount of single-use plastics these companies create and sell, or by manufacturing products that can be recycled or composted.According to one state analysis, 2.9 million tons of single-use plastic and 171.4 billion single-use plastic components were sold, offered for sale or distributed during 2023 in California.Single-use plastics and plastic waste more broadly are considered a growing environmental and health problem. In recent decades, the accumulation of plastic waste has overwhelmed waterways and oceans, sickening marine life and threatening human health.While the bill was signed into law in 2022, regulations designed to govern it had not yet been finalized. For the past two years, stakeholders representing plastic manufacturers and producers, packaging companies, environmental groups and waste haulers have hashed out and negotiated proposed regulations — debating such things as the definition of “producer,” or where on food service items the words “reusable” or “refillable” must be displayed. Throughout this period, CalRecycle — which was led by Wagoner until March 2024 — helped guide the discussions and incorporated feedback into several proposed drafts of those rules. For instance, in early June 2022, as the stakeholders were hammering out the first set of regulations, it became apparent that someone — the state or the industry — would periodically need to assess the state’s waste infrastructure to ensure material was getting to where it needed to go and was being properly disposed of according to the law. The industry is responsible for meeting those targets — which include, among other requirements, that 65% of all single-use plastic packaging in the state is recycled by 2032.The stakeholders had initially agreed this costly, time- and personnel-intensive evaluation should be conducted by the industry. This would allow the industry to evaluate the assessment as it was being conducted and be responsible for it. But according to sources, Wagoner — who was director of the state agency — decided that responsibility should fall to CalRecycle. Several drafts of the proposed rules and changes were shared with The Times.Now, Wagoner and her industry coalition are complaining that the state is taking too long to do the assessment — which is expected to be completed in January 2026 — and, as a result, she said, it is compromising the ability of her organization to develop a program to meet their targets, which they need to have finalized by April 2026.“This timeline is challenging even under ideal conditions,” she said in a Feb. 12 email. “The planning process will have to start without this required data and will be difficult to complete because of this delay.”In addition, Wagoner’s critics say she oversaw regulation changes that some experts say would have potentially opened the door for certain kinds of chemical recycling technologies — technologies that superheat plastics and turn them into fuel or other kinds of plastics — including one from Eastman Chemical Co., a company that Wagoner began consulting for a few months after she stepped down from CalRecycle. The changes in the regulations — which included wording about hazardous materials — have since been corrected and addressed.On Feb. 7, Eastman Chemical ran a sponsored ad in the Sacramento Bee heralding the benefits of recycling technologies. They also spent $177,500 in the fourth quarter lobbying CalRecycle on the SB 54 regulations.The Circular Action Alliance and other industry-friendly groups, such as the California Chamber of Commerce, have also been actively lobbying the governor’s office since mid-December, urging Newsom to delay finalization. In a Dec. 15 letter to Newsom, the Chamber claimed the new law would cost California consumers more than $300 per year, a number that he said came from the state’s own economic analysis. A Times review of that analysis shows just the opposite, however.The state’s economists said they anticipated an increase in personal income — starting with a $3 bump in 2024 and climbing to $131 by 2032.In 2020, Wagoner was picked by Newsom to run CalRecycle. Prior to that, she had worked in the governor’s office as a senior legislative strategist alongside Ann Patterson — who until Friday was Newsom’s Cabinet secretary. Patterson stepped down soon after her husband, Nathan Barankin, became the governor’s chief of staff.Wagoner served as CalRecycle director through March 2024, when she resigned, she said, for personal reasons. She became the executive director of the Circular Action Alliance on Dec. 4, after consulting for Eastman Chemical for several months.The Fair Political Practices Commission has not yet determined whether they will conduct an investigation or not. According to a Feb. 25 letter addressed to Wagoner, the former CalRecycle director has until March 11 to provide the agency with information to support her case, at which time, the agency will decide how to proceed.“What happened may not be illegal, and I am not a lawyer, but I don’t think the public believes this is how it should work in California,” said Heidi Sanborn, founding Director of the California Product Stewardship Council.

The Supreme Court Muddied the Clean Water Act Yet Again

The Supreme Court dealt another blow to federal environmental protections on Tuesday in a major water pollution case. In a 5–4 ruling in City and County of San Francisco v. EPA, the justices held that the Environmental Protection Agency could no longer hold certain polluters responsible when the cleanliness of American waterways fell below minimum acceptable standards.Justice Samuel Alito, who wrote for the court, ruled that the agency had gone beyond what the Clean Water Act allowed. “We hold that the two challenged provisions exceed the EPA’s authority,” he wrote. “The text and structure of the CWA, as well as the history of federal water pollution legislation, make this clear. And resorting to such requirements is not necessary to protect water quality.”In a dissenting opinion, Justice Amy Coney Barrett wrote that the majority had badly misread the text and history of the Clean Water Act’s provisions at issue. (The court’s three liberal justices joined her.) But she also argued that her colleagues had done so in pursuit of a specific outcome that was at odds with what Congress had written.“Really, the Court’s argument reduces to the broader policy concern that it may be difficult for regulated entities to comply with receiving water limitations and that they may lack adequate notice of a violation,” she wrote. Those polluters could bring other types of legal challenges in those cases, Barrett explained, but “these concerns do not speak to the relevant question here, which is whether receiving water limitations comport with the Act.”The case represents yet another victory in the Roberts court for polluters, who have again persuaded five conservative justices to adopt stilted readings of environmental laws to reduce their regulatory burdens. The plaintiff in this case—one of the most environmentally conscious cities in the nation—is an unusual one. But the author of the majority opinion was not. Tuesday’s ruling is also a victory for Alito himself, who appears almost eager to rewrite the Clean Water Act more narrowly whenever the opportunity presents itself.At issue in the case is how the Clean Water Act—and, through it, the EPA—regulates offshore water pollution. The question is particularly important for San Francisco. Like many other major U.S. cities, it handles stormwater and wastewater through the same sewage system. That system is able to treat both types of water without issue under normal circumstances.When it rains or snows more than usual, however, the city’s sewer system discharges some of the overflow into the Pacific Ocean. That overflow typically consists of an untreated mixture of wastewater, stormwater, and various urban pollutants. That would violate the Clean Water Act, which generally prohibits the disposal of such pollutants into the nation’s waters.One of the EPA’s tools to combat water pollution under the Clean Water Act is to issue permits for facilities that routinely discharge pollutants into American waterways. Those permits allow the EPA to set certain requirements for would-be polluters to ensure that their outflows meet minimum safety and sanitary thresholds. In exchange for their compliance, permittees are immunized from public or private environmental lawsuits for the duration of the permit, relieving them of the expenses of litigation and short-term regulatory changes.San Francisco is challenging its current permit requirements on multiple grounds. The one that reached the high court in this particular case centered on what Alito called the permit’s “end-result requirements.” In addition to meeting certain minimum requirements at the outset, the EPA also can also levy penalties against permittees if the relevant body of water—which the court calls the “receiving waters”—falls below minimum quality standards.Alito concluded that the Clean Water Act gave the EPA no authority to impose such end-result requirements on would-be polluters. The law allows the agency to impose “any more stringent limitation” that is “necessary to meet” state and federal “water quality standards” established by law or by federal regulation. Alito argued that the term “limitation” only allowed restrictions before the fact, not afterward.“A provision that tells a permittee that it must do certain specific things plainly qualifies as a limitation,” he wrote. “Such a provision imposes a restriction ‘from without.’ But when a provision simply tells a permittee that a particular end result must be achieved and that it is up to the permittee to figure out what it should do, the direct source of restriction or restraint is the plan that the permittee imposes on itself for the purpose of avoiding future liability. In other words, the direct source of the restriction comes from within, not ‘from without.’”Barrett was not persuaded, to say the least. “Limitation,” she wrote, “is simply a synonym for ‘a restrictive condition.’” She noted that “limitations” based on end results were common in everyday life, like a college limiting scholarships to students who maintain a minimum GPA or an employer who limits bonuses to workers based on performance standards. The end-result requirements, Barrett explained, give “practical effect” to water-quality standards “by making them enforceable.”She also emphasized that the plaintiffs would still not be without options to challenge those conditions under her reading of the law. “There is no getting around it: The receiving water limitations are ‘limitations,’” she wrote. “If they are vague or unreasonable, they are vulnerable to challenge on one or both of those grounds. But even a vague or unreasonable limitation is still a ‘limitation.’”Barrett’s reference to Alito’s “broader policy concerns” when it comes to the Clean Water Act is a familiar one. Two years ago, in Sackett v. EPA, he wrote the majority opinion in a decision that sharply limited what types of wetlands count as the “waters of the United States,” the key term for the act’s jurisdiction. Alito held that only wetlands with a “continuous surface connection” to larger bodies of water fell under the Clean Water Act’s terms.In that instance, Justice Brett Kavanaugh dissented from the court’s new interpretation, which he argued was at odds with the statutory text. “The Court’s test narrows the Clean Water Act’s coverage of ‘adjacent’ wetlands to mean only ‘adjoining’ wetlands,” he wrote. “But ‘adjacent’ and ‘adjoining’ have distinct meanings.” Kavanaugh warned at length that the court’s misreading of the statutory text “will leave some long-regulated adjacent wetlands no longer covered by the Clean Water Act, with significant repercussions for water quality and flood control throughout the United States.”In a separate dissent, Justice Elena Kagan agreed with Kavanaugh and argued that Alito’s misreading of the law was driven by his own policy preferences. She pointed to his own phrasing choices that depicted the EPA as a heavy-handed brute and ordinary Americans as its hapless victims. “Congress, [Alito] scolds, has unleashed the EPA to regulate ‘swimming pools and puddles,’ wreaking untold havoc on ‘a staggering array of landowners,’” she wrote. “Surely something has to be done; and who else to do it but this court? It must rescue property owners from Congress’s too-ambitious program of pollution control.”As evidence of his policy views, Kagan cited Alito’s references to “crushing consequences” for those caught in the EPA’s web. Alito—perhaps intentionally, perhaps not—used the same adjective in Tuesday’s ruling. “When a permit contains such requirements,” he wrote in the San Francisco ruling, “a permittee that punctiliously follows every specific requirement in its permit may nevertheless face crushing penalties if the quality of the water in its receiving waters falls below the applicable standards.” (Emphasis mine.)Alito’s opinion only carries the force of law because four of his colleagues agreed to it. At the same time, the opinions in Sackett and San Francisco speak volumes about the court’s priorities and sympathies. Alito hypothesized at one point about a city that “devise[d] a careful plan” for water quality, “diligently implement[ed]” that plan, and still faced “dire potential consequences” if it failed. The EPA is presumed at every turn to be an onerous, malevolent creature; American cities and companies are well-meaning actors who humbly seek the regulatory relief that only the Supreme Court can offer. Alito and his colleagues are all too happy to provide it, even when the Clean Water Act itself doesn’t.

The Supreme Court dealt another blow to federal environmental protections on Tuesday in a major water pollution case. In a 5–4 ruling in City and County of San Francisco v. EPA, the justices held that the Environmental Protection Agency could no longer hold certain polluters responsible when the cleanliness of American waterways fell below minimum acceptable standards.Justice Samuel Alito, who wrote for the court, ruled that the agency had gone beyond what the Clean Water Act allowed. “We hold that the two challenged provisions exceed the EPA’s authority,” he wrote. “The text and structure of the CWA, as well as the history of federal water pollution legislation, make this clear. And resorting to such requirements is not necessary to protect water quality.”In a dissenting opinion, Justice Amy Coney Barrett wrote that the majority had badly misread the text and history of the Clean Water Act’s provisions at issue. (The court’s three liberal justices joined her.) But she also argued that her colleagues had done so in pursuit of a specific outcome that was at odds with what Congress had written.“Really, the Court’s argument reduces to the broader policy concern that it may be difficult for regulated entities to comply with receiving water limitations and that they may lack adequate notice of a violation,” she wrote. Those polluters could bring other types of legal challenges in those cases, Barrett explained, but “these concerns do not speak to the relevant question here, which is whether receiving water limitations comport with the Act.”The case represents yet another victory in the Roberts court for polluters, who have again persuaded five conservative justices to adopt stilted readings of environmental laws to reduce their regulatory burdens. The plaintiff in this case—one of the most environmentally conscious cities in the nation—is an unusual one. But the author of the majority opinion was not. Tuesday’s ruling is also a victory for Alito himself, who appears almost eager to rewrite the Clean Water Act more narrowly whenever the opportunity presents itself.At issue in the case is how the Clean Water Act—and, through it, the EPA—regulates offshore water pollution. The question is particularly important for San Francisco. Like many other major U.S. cities, it handles stormwater and wastewater through the same sewage system. That system is able to treat both types of water without issue under normal circumstances.When it rains or snows more than usual, however, the city’s sewer system discharges some of the overflow into the Pacific Ocean. That overflow typically consists of an untreated mixture of wastewater, stormwater, and various urban pollutants. That would violate the Clean Water Act, which generally prohibits the disposal of such pollutants into the nation’s waters.One of the EPA’s tools to combat water pollution under the Clean Water Act is to issue permits for facilities that routinely discharge pollutants into American waterways. Those permits allow the EPA to set certain requirements for would-be polluters to ensure that their outflows meet minimum safety and sanitary thresholds. In exchange for their compliance, permittees are immunized from public or private environmental lawsuits for the duration of the permit, relieving them of the expenses of litigation and short-term regulatory changes.San Francisco is challenging its current permit requirements on multiple grounds. The one that reached the high court in this particular case centered on what Alito called the permit’s “end-result requirements.” In addition to meeting certain minimum requirements at the outset, the EPA also can also levy penalties against permittees if the relevant body of water—which the court calls the “receiving waters”—falls below minimum quality standards.Alito concluded that the Clean Water Act gave the EPA no authority to impose such end-result requirements on would-be polluters. The law allows the agency to impose “any more stringent limitation” that is “necessary to meet” state and federal “water quality standards” established by law or by federal regulation. Alito argued that the term “limitation” only allowed restrictions before the fact, not afterward.“A provision that tells a permittee that it must do certain specific things plainly qualifies as a limitation,” he wrote. “Such a provision imposes a restriction ‘from without.’ But when a provision simply tells a permittee that a particular end result must be achieved and that it is up to the permittee to figure out what it should do, the direct source of restriction or restraint is the plan that the permittee imposes on itself for the purpose of avoiding future liability. In other words, the direct source of the restriction comes from within, not ‘from without.’”Barrett was not persuaded, to say the least. “Limitation,” she wrote, “is simply a synonym for ‘a restrictive condition.’” She noted that “limitations” based on end results were common in everyday life, like a college limiting scholarships to students who maintain a minimum GPA or an employer who limits bonuses to workers based on performance standards. The end-result requirements, Barrett explained, give “practical effect” to water-quality standards “by making them enforceable.”She also emphasized that the plaintiffs would still not be without options to challenge those conditions under her reading of the law. “There is no getting around it: The receiving water limitations are ‘limitations,’” she wrote. “If they are vague or unreasonable, they are vulnerable to challenge on one or both of those grounds. But even a vague or unreasonable limitation is still a ‘limitation.’”Barrett’s reference to Alito’s “broader policy concerns” when it comes to the Clean Water Act is a familiar one. Two years ago, in Sackett v. EPA, he wrote the majority opinion in a decision that sharply limited what types of wetlands count as the “waters of the United States,” the key term for the act’s jurisdiction. Alito held that only wetlands with a “continuous surface connection” to larger bodies of water fell under the Clean Water Act’s terms.In that instance, Justice Brett Kavanaugh dissented from the court’s new interpretation, which he argued was at odds with the statutory text. “The Court’s test narrows the Clean Water Act’s coverage of ‘adjacent’ wetlands to mean only ‘adjoining’ wetlands,” he wrote. “But ‘adjacent’ and ‘adjoining’ have distinct meanings.” Kavanaugh warned at length that the court’s misreading of the statutory text “will leave some long-regulated adjacent wetlands no longer covered by the Clean Water Act, with significant repercussions for water quality and flood control throughout the United States.”In a separate dissent, Justice Elena Kagan agreed with Kavanaugh and argued that Alito’s misreading of the law was driven by his own policy preferences. She pointed to his own phrasing choices that depicted the EPA as a heavy-handed brute and ordinary Americans as its hapless victims. “Congress, [Alito] scolds, has unleashed the EPA to regulate ‘swimming pools and puddles,’ wreaking untold havoc on ‘a staggering array of landowners,’” she wrote. “Surely something has to be done; and who else to do it but this court? It must rescue property owners from Congress’s too-ambitious program of pollution control.”As evidence of his policy views, Kagan cited Alito’s references to “crushing consequences” for those caught in the EPA’s web. Alito—perhaps intentionally, perhaps not—used the same adjective in Tuesday’s ruling. “When a permit contains such requirements,” he wrote in the San Francisco ruling, “a permittee that punctiliously follows every specific requirement in its permit may nevertheless face crushing penalties if the quality of the water in its receiving waters falls below the applicable standards.” (Emphasis mine.)Alito’s opinion only carries the force of law because four of his colleagues agreed to it. At the same time, the opinions in Sackett and San Francisco speak volumes about the court’s priorities and sympathies. Alito hypothesized at one point about a city that “devise[d] a careful plan” for water quality, “diligently implement[ed]” that plan, and still faced “dire potential consequences” if it failed. The EPA is presumed at every turn to be an onerous, malevolent creature; American cities and companies are well-meaning actors who humbly seek the regulatory relief that only the Supreme Court can offer. Alito and his colleagues are all too happy to provide it, even when the Clean Water Act itself doesn’t.

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