pollution

October 17, 2024

Algae bloom kills hundreds of sea lions off California

Hundreds of sea lions off the coast of California have been poisoned this year amid a “highly unusual” algae bloom that has persisted in southern and central parts of the state into October.

Experts believe the blooms, which are becoming more common, may be linked to warming and changing ocean conditions. They harm sea life when algae produce a neurotoxic chemical that can be taken up by fish and crustaceans and absorbed by the larger animals that eat them.

Off the US west coast, the proliferations of algae, sometimes called “red tides”, usually peak in the late spring. For the last three years, however, harmful blooms have come on strong in the summer and, this year, lasted into autumn before mostly petering out.

That is “highly unusual,” according to Clarissa Anderson, a researcher with the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, who is also the director of the Southern California Coastal Ocean Observing System, which tracks harmful algal blooms.

“It’s catching us all off guard,” Anderson said.

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October 11, 2024

In Hurricane Milton’s wake, toxic “gypstacks” threaten Tampa Bay area

By Shannon Kelleher

As southwest Florida reels from the impact of Hurricane Milton this week, the first hurricane to directly hit the Tampa Bay area in a century, environmentalists are bracing for another possible impact – the contamination of local waterways from towering stacks of toxic industrial waste in the storm’s path.

When phosphate is processed into fertilizers for farmland, enormous quantities of phosphogypsum are left behind as heaps of concrete-like waste called “gypstacks,” which are topped with liquid waste ponds. Most US phosphate production takes place in Florida, with 25 of the 30 gypstacks located in the Sunshine State – a quantity totaling over a billion tons. The waste contains heavy metals as well as radium, which decays into a radioactive gas that causes lung cancer, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

“We refer to [the stacks] as ‘Florida’s Mountains’,” said Ragan Whitlock, staff attorney for the environmental nonprofit the Center for Biological Diversity, noting that the heaps of toxic chemical waste are each hundreds of feet wide and hundreds of feet tall. “Lesser storms than hurricanes have created massive structural integrity problems at these stack systems,” he said.

Of Florida’s 25 gypstacks, 22 were “at least generally in Hurricane Milton’s track,” said Whitlock, with three located directly near the bay. Whitlock said he is worried about pollution from the stacks impacting both the bay and the Floridan aquifer, which almost 10 million people depend on for drinking water.

The largest US producer of phosphate fertilizer, The Mosaic Company, confirmed in an email Friday that stormwater at its Riverview site, where it stores toxic phosphogypsum waste from fertilizer production, made its way into Tampa Bay after a water collection system onsite became overwhelmed following the hurricane.

“At this time, we believe some of that impacted stormwater made its way to an outfall which discharges into Tampa Bay,” said the Mosaic spokesperson. “The issue was addressed yesterday and is not continuing. The volume may have been greater than the 17,500 gallon reporting standard. We expect water quality impacts, if any, to be modest.”

Mosaic said in a September 30 statement that early assessments showed “limited damage” to its facilities following Hurricane Helene, a Category 4 storm that hit Florida on September 27, although its Riverview facility “experienced water intrusion caused by the storm surge.” In an early June statement, Mosaic said it was “prepped and ready” for hurricane season.

October 8, 2024

PFAS levels increasing in Arctic animals, study finds

By Douglas Main

Concentrations of toxic pollutants known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are continuing to increase in Arctic animals such as polar bears despite efforts to rein in their use, according to a new study.

One type of PFAS known to be of particular harm, PFOS, was largely phased out starting 20 years ago. But average levels in several populations of polar bears and seals have continued to go up in recent years, according to the paper, published this month in the journal Science of the Total Environment.

Exposure to some PFAS, also called “forever chemicals,” increases the risk of a wide range of health harms to humans and animals, scientists have found.

“There’s nothing in the Arctic that isn’t contaminated by PFAS,” says study co-author Rainer Lohmann, who studies persistent organic pollutants as an environmental chemist at the University of Rhode Island. “It’s just very sad.”

Of the animals looked at in the study, polar bears had the highest concentrations of various types of PFAS, approximately 10 times what has been found in people in the region.

Troubling findings were also seen for a type of PFAS called PFNA. Average concentrations of PFNA have steadily risen over the last couple decades in all populations of polar bears and seals studied, and appear to still be on the rise, according to the paper.

The latest published work adds to more than 200 studies that have turned up PFAS in well over 600 animal species, including those that are threatened or endangered.

October 1, 2024

Postcard from California: State sues ExxonMobil for plastics recycling fraud

By Bill Walker

Last year, California Attorney General Rob Bonta filed a monumental lawsuit against five of the world’s largest petrochemical companies for an alleged “decades-long campaign of deception” about fossil fuels’ harm to the climate and the climate crisis’ devastating impacts on the state. The complaint built on similar fraud and liability suits against Big Oil by US cities, counties and states, and “rolled them all into a super-case” backed by the legal resources of the world’s fifth-largest economy.

Now Bonta has filed another sweeping lawsuit against ExxonMobil, also named in last year’s suit, alleging that for more than 50 years it has deceived the public by fraudulently promoting recycling as the solution to the ever-growing global plastic waste crisis.

Plastics are made from polymers – synthetic chemical substances derived from oil and gas – and ExxonMobil is the world’s largest producer of polymers used to manufacture single-use plastics. The suit claims that ExxonMobil’s advertising, marketing and lobbying campaigns have peddled the false promise of plastics recycling, even while knowing recycling “will never be able to process more than a tiny fraction of the plastic waste it produces.”

Americans discarded more than 50 million tons of plastic waste in 2021, but despite the deceptive chasing-arrows symbol on most plastic items, only about 5% was recycled into new plastic goods. The vast majority of plastic waste is dumped in landfills, eventually fouling oceans and rivers, littering the landscape, endangering wildlife and building up in our bodies. Curbing the crisis will require slashing plastic production, but the plastics industry keeps making more. Worldwide production is projected to reach 590 million metric tons by 2050, an increase of 30%.

“For decades, ExxonMobil has been deceiving the public to convince us that plastic recycling could solve the plastic waste and pollution crisis when they clearly knew this wasn’t possible,” Bonta said in a news release. “ExxonMobil lied to further its record-breaking profits at the expense of our planet and possibly jeopardizing our health. Today’s lawsuit shows the fullest picture to date of ExxonMobil’s decades-long deception.”

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September 24, 2024

Fossil fuel planned expansions could thwart efforts to slow climate change, report finds

By Dana Drugmand

Plans for an expanded footprint of US fossil fuel-derived chemical production facilities would unleash millions of tons of heat-trapping emissions that could undermine efforts to confront the climate crisis, according to a report issued Tuesday.

The analysis by the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL) determined that 70 projects in various stages of development would create total annual emissions exceeding that of US commercial aviation, and on par with the annual emissions of 39 coal plants.

“The planned petrochemicals buildout in the United States is a profound threat to the climate,” the CIEL report warns. “If built, these petrochemical facilities will generate huge greenhouse gas emissions and lock in fossil fuel production for decades.”

The petrochemical sector in the US already emits about 335 million metric tons of CO2-equivalent pollution annually – more than the annual emissions of entire countries like Spain – and the planned expansion is estimated to add at least another 153.8 MMT of annual emissions, the analysis finds.

As the new report explains, the petrochemical sector is a growing yet underrecognized source of climate pollution, set for rapid expansion as fossil fuel usage in the energy sector starts to wane. The International Energy Agency projects that petrochemicals will be the biggest driver of global oil demand, accounting for nearly half of the demand growth through 2050.

American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM), the chief US trade association for the petrochemical industry, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. AFPM says on its website that it “supports the aspiration of the Paris Accord to address climate change through global cooperation and greenhouse gas emissions reductions” and that greenhouse gas emissions from the fuel and petrochemical industries are subject to federal and state regulations.

September 17, 2024

Debate grows over whether some PFAS chemicals have a place in clean energy

By Shannon Kelleher

As the planet warms at an alarming rate, culminating in the hottest summer on record, nations worldwide are rapidly scaling up so-called clean energy technologies that can replace the world’s dependence on climate change-inducing fossil fuels.

More than 100 countries last year committed to triple renewable energy capacity by 2030 to try to slow climate change and reduce the related devastating human and environmental toll from increasingly frequent and extreme weather events.

In the United States, manufacturers of electric vehicles (EVs) and EV batteries have announced more than $188 billion in investments over the last nine years, with most of the money committed during the last two. And this May, the US Department of Energy (DOE) announced a $71 million investment in projects to expand access to solar power – dubbed the “cheapest form of energy” by the DOE.

But behind the enthusiasm lies a little-discussed but looming concern. Many of these technologies being heralded as tools to turn back climate change rely on fluoropolymers, a family of plastics that are part of a class of chemicals known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). Many types of PFAS are considered so hazardous that the US and many other countries have targeted them for elimination.

PFAS have been identified as ubiquitous environmental pollutants that don’t break down naturally, with several linked to a range of human health problems. Fluoropolymer safety for humans and the environment is still a matter of debate.

But the paradox of boosting the use of potentially harmful types of PFAS chemicals in order to create technologies that can address harmful climate change is stirring debate among some experts and prompting a deeper look at the pursuit of “clean energy”.

“Obviously, the green energy transition is very important,” said Ian Cousins, a professor at the University of Stockholm in Sweden who studies the environmental impact of PFAS. “I don’t want to hinder that. But at the same time… the green industry should be not just green energy but green in every regard.”

September 12, 2024

EPA battles environmentalists in court over regulation of CAFOs and water pollution

By Keith Schneider

A coalition of environmental organizations faced off against the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in federal appellate court on Thursday in the latest skirmish in a long-running battle over the agency’s regulatory approach to water contamination connected to industrial agricultural operations.

The groups, led by the nonprofit Food & Water Watch, told a three-judge panel of the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals that the EPA must strengthen its oversight of what are known as concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs).

The agency is unlawfully allowing roughly half of the nation’s more than 20,000 big livestock and poultry feeding facilities around the country to operate without permits required under the 1972 Clean Water Act, the groups argued to the court. And, they said, the agency is violating the law by authorizing CAFOs to store and spread manure so haphazardly that the drinking water for millions of people is at risk as thousands of streams, lakes and other waterways are polluted with harmful bacteria, nitrates, phosphorus and other contaminants.

The agency has “failed” for more than a decade to adequately regulate these operations, Food & Water Watch lawyer Emily Miller told the court.

The hearing Thursday stems from a petition filed by Food & Water Watch and other groups in 2017 that called for the EPA to require CAFOs to obtain water quality permits and strengthen permit standards to protect waterways from the manure generated by the animal operations. The petition also urged the agency to reconsider an exemption that immunizes CAFOs from any water pollution caused by storms washing manure off of saturated fields.

The Trump administration ignored the petition. Last summer, the EPA formally denied the petition, but announced it would form a committee to recommend any changes in how the agency regulated CAFOs. Food & Water Watch, joined by four other national organizations and eight environmental groups from five states, then sued the EPA, demanding it reconsider its decision.

In the court hearing, EPA attorney Paul Cirino told the judges that the agency had initiated a detailed study of CAFO operations and pollution in January and established a study group last summer that is scheduled to issue recommendations on CAFO oversight next year. The new information, he said, would guide the agency’s actions about how to respond to the environmental groups’ concerns.

But Miller pushed back. “EPA has already spent seven years when it could have been taking its statutory mandate seriously,” she said. “Now they want some undefined amount of time thinking rather than acting.”

A court ruling on the matter could take months.

August 12, 2024

Movement to limit CAFO pollution seen strengthened by Michigan court ruling

By Keith Schneider

A recent state court decision could transform how animal agriculture is regulated in Michigan, and potentially influence how other state and federal regulators oversee the industry’s mammoth waste stream, according to environmental lawyers and activists.

The optimism from environmental advocates comes after the Michigan Supreme Court ruled on July 31 that the state’s Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) has full authority to require industrial animal agriculture to take much stronger actions to manage the torrent of manure waste polluting waterways. The closely watched case pit the administration of Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer against the powerful agricultural industry, led by the Michigan Farm Bureau.

“The decision is extremely powerful language for EGLE to act,” said Carrie La Seur, the legal director of For Love of Water, an environmental law and policy group that intervened on behalf of the state. “It’s clear that EGLE gained a lot of authority through this ruling.”

Michigan is one of many US states contending with rampant ground and surface water pollution caused by agricultural production. A key source of the pollution are the nation’s more than 21,000 large dairy, cattle, hog, and poultry operations, known as Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations or CAFOs.

The nationwide problem extends across the ocean. On Aug 9, the Center for Food Safety environmental group gave legal notification to a Hawaii “megadairy” of their intention to file a lawsuit in federal court. The allege the dairy has been illegally “discharging animal waste, solid manure, liquid manure, milk waste, and chemical pollutants” into the state’s waterways and into the Pacific Ocean.

August 6, 2024

Postcard from California: Big Oil is not dead yet

By Bill Walker

As California advances toward its goal of virtually eliminating the use of fossil fuels in 20 years, the state has dealt the oil and gas industry a barrage of body blows.

Four years ago, Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered a ban on the sale of new gasoline-powered cars and trucks starting in 2036, while diesel-powered freight trucks will be outlawed by 2042. A 2022 law banned new oil and gas drilling near homes, schools and hospitals, and Newsom has directed regulators to end to all drilling in the state by 2045.

Last year, California also established a watchdog agency to monitor the state’s petroleum industry for alleged price-gouging at the pump, among other consumer protection provisions. And State Attorney General Rob Bonta filed a sweeping lawsuit against five of the world’s biggest oil companies for their decades-long coverup of the climate impact of burning fossil fuels.

The industry whines that the Newsom administration wants to put it out of business, and headlines declare that it faces the “end of the road” in California.

But Big Oil is not dead yet.

July 24, 2024

PFAS increasingly added to pesticides, study finds

By Shannon Kelleher

Despite widespread alarm about the health and environmental impacts of toxic PFAS, the chemicals are increasingly being added to pesticides applied in homes and crops across the US, according to a new study.

The findings, published July 24 in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, add to growing concerns about PFAS contamination in the US food system and waterways and highlight pesticides’ “underappreciated” role in the problem, said David Andrews, a senior scientist at the Environmental Working Group and an author of the study

The study revealed that per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) account for 14% of all active ingredients in pesticides used in the US, including almost one-third of active ingredients approved in the last decade. Even when PFAS are not intentionally added to these products, the fluorinated containers in which they are stored have been found to leach PFAS into their contents, the study concluded.

“This is truly frightening news, because pesticides are some of the most widely dispersed pollutants in the world,” Nathan Donley, the environmental health science director at the Center for Biological Diversity and an author of the study, said in a statement. “Lacing pesticides with forever chemicals is likely burdening the next generation with more chronic diseases and impossible cleanup responsibilities.”

The authors reviewed pesticide data from the US EPA, the US Geological Survey, and the Canadian Pest Management Regulatory Agency, as well as publicly available databases, finding that PFAS-laced pesticides are regularly used nationwide on staple crops including corn, wheat, kale, spinach, apples and strawberries. PFAS are also common ingredients in flea treatments for pets and sprays to kill insects, they found.

The study comes on the heels of a petition delivered to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Monday by the Center for Food Safety and other nonprofits, asking the agency to ban PFAS in pesticides.