SWAMPSCOTT — Even as local elected officials gathered to celebrate the seeming success of a new temporary treatment unit in treating stormwater drainage to make King’s Beach safe for the public, neighbors protested about the noise the unit makes.
Local leaders gathered on the corner of Eastern Avenue and Humphrey Street in Swampscott on Friday morning for a ribbon-cutting of a the treatment unit, a joint effort between Swampscott and Lynn.
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LONDON — The British government has apologized for the death of a 9-year-old girl who is believed to be the first person in the U.K. to have air pollution listed on her death certificate, after a decade-long battle that highlighted the risks vehicle emissions pose to children in low-income communities.
The apology was part of a settlement announced Thursday in a lawsuit filed by the mother of Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah, who developed severe asthma just before her 7th birthday and suffered severe seizures before she died on Feb. 15, 2013. The government also made an undisclosed financial settlement.
“Although this isn’t going to bring Ella back, we finally accept this is acknowledgement of what happened to her, and to put the issue of air pollution firmly on the map, that it’s a public health crisis … and something needs to be done about it,’’ Rosamund Adoo-Kissi-Debrah, Ella’s mother, said after meeting with government officials. “Today it is finally over, but I am going to continue, and I have been reassured by the government that they’re going to be continuing to work with me to clean up the air.”
Rosamund Adoo-Kissi-Debrah fought to reopen the coroner’s inquest into Ella’s death after the so-called Dieselgate scandal revealed how Volkswagen obscured the true level of emissions released by its diesel-powered vehicles. Research by the Royal College of Physicians later showed that about 40,000 deaths can be attributed to outdoor air pollution each year in the U.K., with the burden falling most heavily on low-income communities close to busy roads and other major sources of emissions.
Ella grew up just 25 meters (yards) from the South Circular Road, a major conduit for traffic along the southern edge of central London.
Britain’s High Court in May 2019 set aside the findings of the original inquest, which attributed Ella’s death to asthma.
In December 2020, a second inquest found that air pollution was a contributing factor in Ella’s death, along with acute respiratory failure and severe asthma.
Throughout her illness, Ella was exposed to levels of nitrogen dioxide and particulate matter that exceeded World Health Organization guidelines, Deputy Coroner Philip Barlow ruled. There was also a “recognized failure” to bring nitrogen dioxide levels within the limits set by European Union and domestic law.
“Ella’s mother was not given information by health professionals about the health risks of air pollution and its potential to exacerbate asthma,” Barlow said. “If she had been given this information, she would have taken steps which might have prevented Ella’s death.”
The child’s estate, which is administered by her mother, sued the Environment Department, the Department for Transport and the Department of Health and Social Care for compensation over Ella’s illness and premature death.
The government on Thursday described Ella’s death as a “tragedy,” and said her mother’s public campaign for better air quality had “made a considerable impact.”
Adoo-Kissi-Debrah said Environment Minister Emma Hardy reaffirmed her commitment to pass legislation that will bring the U.K. in line with WHO standards, according to a statement released by her law firm, Hodge Jones & Allen.
“On behalf of the government departments who were party to the claim, we again take this opportunity to say we are truly sorry for your loss and to express our sincerest condolences to you as Ella’s mother, to her siblings, and to everyone who knew her,’’ the government said in the statement. “To lose a loved one at such a young age is an immeasurable loss.”
NEW DELHI (AP) — As India gears up for Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights, people are divided over whether they should celebrate by setting off firecrackers, which worsen the country’s chronic air pollution.
Diwali, which will be celebrated Thursday, is marked by socializing and exchanging gifts with family and friends. Many Indians light earthen oil lamps or candles. But every year the festivities are tinged with worries over air pollution, as smoke-emitting firecrackers cause toxic smog that can takes days to clear.
FILE – Children play with firecrackers during Diwali celebrations in New Delhi, India, on Nov. 4, 2021. (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri, File)
The capital, New Delhi, which is among India’s worst cities for air quality, is particularly impacted by the problem and is usually shrouded in toxic gray smog a day after Diwali. Authorities there and in some other states have banned the use and sale of firecrackers since 2017, asking people to opt for more sustainable options like environmentally friendly firecrackers and light shows, but the rule is often flouted. Firecrackers can be easily bought from roadside stalls and stores.
Some residents in New Delhi say the ban doesn’t make much difference, while others see it as a necessary measure to fight pollution.
Vegetable vendor Renu, who only uses one name, loves celebrating Diwali in the city. Every year her kids set off firecrackers at night. She tells them to be careful but not to refrain from using them.
A thick layer of smog hangs over the skyline of Delhi ahead of Diwali festival in New Delhi, India, Tuesday, Oct. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Shonal Ganguly)
“Diwali is a day of celebration and happiness for us which comes only once a year, and I feel the ban should not be there,” she said.
Others are against it.
Unlike most kids, Ruhaani Mandal, 13, doesn’t light firecrackers. She acknowledges it is fun, but says it is hazardous for people and animals.
“I have seen firsthand the struggle of my father, who has lost his sense of smell due to pollution, and I see how his health worsens after Diwali celebrations,” she said.
New Delhi and several northern Indian cities typically see extremely high levels of air pollution between October and January each year, disrupting businesses and shutting schools and offices. Authorities close construction sites, restrict diesel-run vehicles and deploy water sprinklers and anti-smog guns to control the haze and smog that envelopes the skyline.
Commuters drive amidst morning smog ahead of Diwali festival in New Delhi, India, Tuesday, Oct. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)
This year, thick, toxic smog has already started to engulf New Delhi. On Wednesday, authorities reported an AQI of over 300, which is categorized as “very poor.”
Several studies have estimated that more than a million Indians die each year from air pollution-related diseases. A high level of tiny particulate matter can lodge deep into the lungs and cause major health problems, including chronic respiratory diseases.
New Delhi’s woes aren’t only due to firecrackers. Vehicular emissions, farm fires in neighboring states and dust from construction are the primary causes of the capital’s air pollution woes. But health experts say the smoke emitted from firecrackers can be more hazardous.
Fishermen row their boat amidst morning smog in the river Yamuna as toxic foam floats in the river ahead of Diwali festival in New Delhi, India, Tuesday, Oct. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)
“The smoke that is produced by firecrackers contains heavy metals like sulphur, lead and toxic gases like carbon monoxide and fumes of heavy metals that are dangerous to our respiratory system,” said Arun Kumar Sharma, a community medicine professor at New Delhi’s University College of Medical Sciences.
Meanwhile, authorities in New Delhi have largely failed to enforce a strict ban on the use of firecrackers to avoid offending millions of Hindus across the country, for whom Diwali is one of the biggest festivals. To sidestep the ban, many sellers offer firecrackers online, some with the convenience of home delivery.
Gyaanchand Goyal sits in his shop in New Delhi, India, Saturday, Oct. 26, 2024. Goyal said that the ban on firecrackers has served as a disadvantage to sellers like him and affected their biggest source of income during the festive season. (AP Photo/Verda Subzwari)
Shopkeeper Gyaanchand Goyal said the ban on firecrackers has disadvantaged sellers like him and affected their biggest source of income during the festive season.
“The government enforces a restriction on firecrackers solely to demonstrate their commitment to the environment. Other than that, I don’t think there are any other consequences of this ban,” he said.
Hundreds of frozen waffle products sold in leading retailers including Walmart and Target are being recalled because of possible contamination by the listeria bacteria, according to the manufacturer.
TreeHouse Foods said Friday that it issued a voluntary recall after discovering possible contamination during routing testing at its plant. It said the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and Canadian food regulators are aware of the recall.
Listeria infections can cause mild illness including fever and diarrhea or more serious problems. The illness is most dangerous to pregnant women, newborns, adults over 65 and people with weakened immune systems, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control.
The CDC estimates that 1,600 people are infected with listeria each year in the United States and 260 die.
The recalled waffles are sold under a variety of names including Walmart’s Great Value, Target’s Good & Gather and private label brands sold by Food Lion, Kroger and Schnucks. TreeHouse published a complete list.
TreeHouse said there have been no confirmed reports of illness related to the waffles.
The company said consumers holding any of the products should dispose of them or return them to the store for credit.
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Wednesday allowed a Biden administration regulation aimed at limiting planet-warming pollution from coal-fired power plants to remain in place as legal challenges play out.
The court denied a push from Republican-led states and industry groups to block the Environmental Protection Agency rule. One justice, Clarence Thomas, publicly dissented.
Two other conservative justices, Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch, said they thought challengers would likely win on at least some of their claims eventually, but the court didn’t need to block the rule now because compliance work wouldn’t have to begin until at least June 2025. The case could end up back before the high court relatively quickly.
Justice Samuel Alito did not take part.
The rule requires many coal-fired power plants to capture 90% of their carbon emissions or shut down within eight years, though deadlines do not take effect for several years.
The power industry is the nation’s second-largest contributor to climate change, and the rule is a key part of President Joe Biden’s pledge to eliminate carbon pollution from the electricity sector by 2035 and economy-wide by 2050.
The high court earlier this month also left two other regulations in place for now, but other environmental regulations have not fared well before it in recent years. In 2022, the justices limited the EPA’s authority to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from power plants with a landmark decision. In June, the court halted the agency’s air-pollution-fighting “good neighbor” rule.
Another ruling in June, overturning a decades-old decision known colloquially as Chevron, is also expected to make environmental regulations more difficult to set and keep, along with other federal agency actions. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce cited that ruling in court papers supporting the challenge in the coal plant case.
An appeals court had allowed the EPA’s new power plant rule to go into effect.
A panel of three judges — two nominated by Democratic President Barack Obama and one by Republican President Donald Trump — found that the states were not at risk of immediate harm because compliance deadlines do not take effect until 2030 or 2032.
Environmental groups have said the standards are reasonable, cost-effective and achievable, and well within the EPA’s legal responsibility to control harmful pollution, including from greenhouse gas emissions.
The National Mining Association argued that the rules threaten the reliability of the nation’s power grid by forcing the premature closure of power plants as demand for electricity surges.
The EPA projects the rule would yield up to $370 billion in climate and health net benefits and avoid nearly 1.4 billion metric tons of carbon pollution through 2047, equivalent to preventing annual emissions of 328 million gasoline-powered cars.
NEW YORK — Activists geared up Friday for protests around the world to demand action on climate change just as a pair of major weeklong climate events were getting underway in New York City.
The planned actions in Berlin, Brussels, Rio de Janeiro, New Delhi and many other cities were being organized by the youth-led group Fridays for Future, and included the group’s New York chapter, which planned a march across the Brooklyn Bridge followed by a rally that organizers hoped would attract at least 1,000 people. More protests were planned Saturday and Sunday.
New York is hosting Climate Week NYC, an annual event that promotes climate action, at the same time the U.N. General Assembly takes up the issue on several fronts, including raising trillions of dollars to aid poorer countries suffering the most from climate change.
The New York protest was to take aim at “the pillars of fossil fuels” — companies that pollute, banks that fund them, and leaders who are failing on climate, said Helen Mancini, an organizer and a senior at the city’s Stuyvesant High School.
Youth climate protests started in August 2018 when Greta Thunberg, then an unknown 15-year-old, left school to stage a sit-down strike outside of the Swedish parliament to demand climate action and end fossil fuel use.
In the six years since Thunberg founded what became Fridays for Future, global carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels has increased by about 2.15%, according to Global Carbon Project, a group of scientists who monitor carbon pollution. The growth of emissions has slowed compared to previous decades and experts anticipate peaking soon, which is a far cry from the 43% reduction needed to keep temperature increases to an agreed-upon limit.
Since 2019, carbon dioxide emissions from coal have increased by nearly 1 billion tons (900 million metric tons), while natural gas emissions have increased slightly and oil pollution has dropped a tiny amount, according to the International Energy Agency. That growth has been driven by China, India and developing nations.
But emissions from advanced or industrialized economies have been falling and in 2023 were the lowest in more than 50 years, according to the IEA. Coal emissions in rich countries are down to levels seen around the year 1900 and the United Kingdom next month is set to shutter its last coal plant.
In the past five years, clean energy sources have grown twice as fast as fossil fuels, with both solar and wind individually growing faster than fossil fuel-based electricity, according to the IEA.
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.
This story originally appeared in Grist and is part of the Climate Desk collaboration.
In 2023, the fast-fashion giant Shein was everywhere. Crisscrossing the globe, airplanes ferried small packages of its ultra-cheap clothing from thousands of suppliers to tens of millions of customer mailboxes in 150 countries. Influencers’ “#sheinhaul” videos advertised the company’s trendy styles on social media, garnering billions of views.
At every step, data was created, collected, and analyzed. To manage all this information, the fast fashion industry has begun embracing emerging AI technologies. Shein uses proprietary machine-learning applications — essentially, pattern-identification algorithms — to measure customer preferences in real time and predict demand, which it then services with an ultra-fast supply chain.
As AI makes the business of churning out affordable, on-trend clothing faster than ever, Shein is among the brands under increasing pressure to become more sustainable, too. The company has pledged to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions by 25 percent by 2030 and achieve net-zero emissions no later than 2050.
But climate advocates and researchers say the company’s lightning-fast manufacturing practices and online-only business model are inherently emissions-heavy — and that the use of AI software to catalyze these operations could be cranking up its emissions. Those concerns were amplified by Shein’s third annual sustainability report, released late last month, which showed the company nearly doubled its carbon dioxide emissions between 2022 and 2023.
“AI enables fast fashion to become the ultra-fast fashion industry, Shein and Temu being the fore-leaders of this,” said Sage Lenier, the executive director of Sustainable and Just Future, a climate nonprofit. “They quite literally could not exist without AI.” (Temu is a rapidly rising ecommerce titan, with a marketplace of goods that rival Shein’s in variety, price, and sales.)
In the 12 years since Shein was founded, it has become known for its uniquely prolific manufacturing, which reportedly generated over $30 billion of revenue for the company in 2023. Although estimates vary, a new Shein design may take as little as 10 days to become a garment, and up to 10,000 items are added to the site each day. The company reportedly offers as many as 600,000 items for sale at any given time with an average price tag of roughly $10. (Shein declined to confirm or deny these reported numbers.) One market analysis found that 44 percent of Gen Zers in the United States buy at least one item from Shein every month.
That scale translates into massive environmental impacts. According to the company’s sustainability report, Shein emitted 16.7 million total metric tons of carbon dioxide in 2023 — more than what four coal power plants spew out in a year. The company has also come under fire for textile waste, high levels of microplastic pollution, and exploitative labor practices. According to the report, polyester — a synthetic textile known for shedding microplastics into the environment — makes up 76 percent of its total fabrics, and only 6 percent of that polyester is recycled.
If you stood on the banks of the Cache la Poudre River in Colorado after the 2020 Cameron Peak Fire, the rumbling water may have appeared black. This slurry of ash and charred soil cascaded toward the reservoirs that supply drinking water for the downstream city of Fort Collins, home to around 170,000 people. Although the water looked clear again several weeks later, Charles Rhoades, a research biogeochemist at the US Forest Service Rocky Mountain Research Station, says he is still seeing contaminants from the fire in the watershed.
Recent studies have found that while some watersheds begin to recover within five years of a fire, others may be fundamentally altered, never fully returning to their pre-fire conditions. And with wildfires becoming more common, much larger, and burning for longer as the world warms, hydrologists, ecologists, and water-management officials are scrambling to understand and mitigate the consequences fire-contaminated water can have on humans and ecosystems.
In a healthy forest, there’s a lot of “litter” on the ground—pine needles, dead leaves, debris. “It acts like a sponge,” says Rhoades. “As rainfall comes in, it moves through that layer slowly and can trickle into the soil.” When fires scorch the land, they burn that vegetation and organic matter, leaving behind a bare landscape that’s highly susceptible to erosion. Instead of filtering into the ground, rain will slide right off the surface, moving quickly, picking up soil, and carrying it into streams and rivers. Not only does this cause sediment build-up, but it can disrupt the water chemistry. Rhoades found elevated levels of nutrients, like nitrogen, in rivers almost 15 years after a high-severity fire. These nutrients can lead to harmful algal blooms, although they don’t directly impact drinking water quality. But other sites show increased levels of heavy metals like manganese, iron, and even lead after a major fire, which can complicate water-treatment processes.
Other regions across the western US, like Taos, New Mexico, and Santa Cruz, California, have faced similar issues, as wildfires increase in frequency and duration due to climate change and decades of fire-suppression practices. For much of the 20th century, the US Forest Service and other land management agencies aimed to keep all fires from burning, believing it was the best way to protect forests. But naturally occuring, low-severity fires improve forest health, preventing the accumulation of dense underbrush and dead trees that act as fuel.
“We have this huge buildup of fuel on the landscape from 140 years of fire suppression, and we know that the consequences of that—combined with increases in severe weather—make the likelihood of really intense fire behavior much higher than it used to be,” says Alissa Cordner, an environmental sociologist and professor at Whitman College in Washington state and volunteer wildland firefighter. “We also have more and more people living next to forests and migrating to places in the wildland-urban interface.” Any municipality is at risk of water contamination if a wildfire burns through its watershed.
“Consumers rarely know about all this stuff that’s going on under the hood,” says Rhoades. After a wildfire, water providers work tirelessly to ensure residents don’t experience the effects in their taps, which requires collaboration between land agencies, like the Forest Service, USGS, and local governing bodies. They perform regular water testing, install sediment-control structures, and sometimes, alter water treatment protocols to deal with the increased load of contaminants.
Environmental justice advocates gathered in 2019 outside of U.S. Ecology North in Detroit.
Environmental activists reached a “groundbreaking settlement” with Michigan regulators following a civil rights complaint over the state’s disproportionate licensing of hazardous waste facilities in predominantly Black, brown, and lower-income neighborhoods.
The settlement, announced Thursday, also addresses the approval of a significant expansion of U.S. Ecology North, a hazardous waste facility in Detroit, which has sparked intense community opposition.
After years of persistent community advocacy, the settlement is a key victory in the fight against environmental racism.
It marks the first time that the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) will be required to use a federal mapping tool that identifies areas facing greater environmental risks and challenges. The tool, the Environmental Protection Agency’s EJScreen, helps policymakers direct resources and regulations to areas most in need.
“This settlement is the culmination of years of hard-fought advocacy on the part of environmental justice communities who refused to stay quiet while hazardous materials were being stored where people of color live, work and play,” Juan Jhong-Chung, executive director of the Michigan Environmental Justice Coalition, said. “For too long, siting decisions were made without the input of the communities that would be most impacted — and what’s more, multiple facilities would often be sited next to one another, greatly increasing their cumulative impacts. We look forward to working with regulators in the implementation of these new licensing standards as we continue to build a world where no community has to live next to dangerous, life-threatening toxic waste.”
EGLE Director Phil Roos said his department shares the same goals with environmental activists.
“We look forward to continuing to work with residents across the state to ensure all Michiganders, regardless of where they live, have safe air to breathe, clean water to drink, and healthy communities to thrive in,” Roos said. “This agreement combined with recent announcements like EGLE’s new Environmental Justice Impact Grants, exemplifies the state’s commitment to empowering communities and advancing environmental justice.”
The settlement stems from a 2020 complaint filed by the Sierra Club, Michigan Environmental Justice Coalition, and residents who live near U.S. Ecology North in Detroit, which has been repeatedly cited for pollution. The complaint took aim at EGLE’s decision to renew the facility’s license and permit to increase its storage capacity.
The Great Lakes Environmental Law Center, which represented the group, argued that it was unfair to permit more hazardous waste storage in a neighborhood that is predominantly composed of lower-income residents and people of color.
The agreement provides stronger protections for residents near hazardous waste facilities. The state is now required to prevent facilities from disproportionately polluting lower-income communities or communities of color and to avoid adding emissions in areas already burdened with heavy pollution.
“For decades, Michigan’s communities of color have been the dumping ground for hazardous waste from across the country,” Nick Leonard, executive director of the Great Lakes Environmental Law Center, said. “This settlement agreement commits Michigan to putting an end to this legacy of environmental racism by centering the community in the hazardous waste licensing process through the use of Michigan’s environmental justice screening tool to conduct environmental justice and cumulative impact analyses. We look forward to working with Michigan and communities across the state to ensure these new commitments are diligently implemented and work effectively to create the environmentally just future we all deserve.”
Along with requiring environmental justice assessments, the agreement also requires EGLE to offer comprehensive translation and interpretation services for communities with limited English proficiency. The agency will also collaborate with communities to identify the most effective methods for gathering public input on hazardous waste licensing decisions and will install three low-cost air monitors around U.S. Ecology North, with the data made publicly accessible.
Local resident Pamela McWilliams applauded the agreement, saying it’s going to make communities like hers safer.
“Our community has been fighting for a long time to get equal environmental justice in our eastside neighborhood,” McWilliams said. “We understand that there is a lot of work to do to make our community safe and healthy, but we put a dent in the problem. Looking toward a better future with even more improvement.”
The state will also partner with nearby residents to design and implement a community health assessment around the facility.
“For too long the cumulative health impacts associated with pollution have been manifest in our bodies,” local resident Rev. Sharon Buttry said. “Just today my husband was scheduled for four more months of chemotherapy. We have literally sacrificed our lives for the privilege of industry to pollute. Michigan’s most vulnerable residents living near hazardous waste facilities are disproportionately people of color and low wealth. With this Civil Rights complaint case we have proven that we won’t be silenced and our lives matter.”
“Every Michigan community should be able to live free of environmental pollutants that cause them and their children harm,” Alice Jennings, an attorney with Edwards & Jennings, PC, said. “A person’s physical and mental health consequences should not depend on their race. The well being of a neighborhood should not depend on their economic or financial condition.”
Denver is heating back up, with city temperatures nearing 100 degrees Saturday afternoon, according to the National Weather Service.
If Denver hits the forecasted 98-degree high, Saturday will tie for the hottest Aug. 17 of all time in the metro area, according to NWS records. Just one degree higher and Saturday’s heat will break the record.
The current 98-degree record was set in 2020.
The heat is expected to peak at 98 degrees around 4 p.m. Saturday before dropping down to 67 degrees overnight, NWS forecasters said.
Chances of afternoon thunderstorms in the metro area are small — close to 10% — and any rain showers that hit Denver are expected to wrap up by 9 p.m., according to NWS forecasters.
“Most will stay dry, but the mountains should see some scattered high-based showers in the evening,” forecasters said. “These will decay as they try to push into the urban corridor given the dry conditions, although they may produce gusty winds at times.”
With the increased heat, an Ozone Action Day Alert has been issued for Colorado’s Front Range — including Douglas, Jefferson, Denver, western Arapahoe, western Adams, Broomfield, Boulder, Larimer, and Weld counties — through at least 4 p.m. Saturday.
Short-term exposure to unhealthy ozone levels can cause coughing; eye, nose and throat irritation; chest pain; difficulty breathing and asthma attacks, according to state officials. Long-term exposure has been linked to a variety of health issues, including lung and cardiovascular disease and premature death.
People in the affected counties should stay inside during the heat of the day, avoid driving gas- or diesel-powered cars until the alert is lifted and conserve energy by setting air conditioners to a higher temperature, air quality officials said.
Denver will cool off a bit Sunday — with temperature highs around 93 degrees — but 90-degree heat is expected to last throughout the week, according to NWS forecasters.
Stormy weather will return Sunday and Monday, but the rest of the week will be relatively dry with scattered afternoon showers, forecasters said.
Colorado has three years to lower ground-level ozone pollution to meet federal standards, and this summer’s hazy skies — caused by oil and gas drilling, heavy vehicle traffic and wildfire smoke — are putting the state in a hole as it’s already logged more dirty air days than in all of 2023.
“Our state has taken a lot of steps to improve air quality, but you can see it in the skies, you can see it in the air, that we still have work to do,” said Kirsten Schatz, clean air advocate for the Colorado Public Interest Research Group.
Two months into the 2024 summer ozone season, the Front Range already has recorded more high ozone days than the entire summer of 2023. As of Monday, which is the most recent data available, ozone levels had exceeded federal air quality standards on 28 days. At the same point in 2023, there had been 27 high-ozone days.
The summer ozone season runs from June 1 to Aug. 31. However, the region encompassing metro Denver and the northern Front Range this year recorded its first high ozone day in May, and in some years ozone pollution exceeds federal standards into mid-September.
The first benchmark is to lower average ozone pollution to a 2008 standard of 75 parts per billion. The northern Front Range is in what’s called “severe non-attainment” for that number, meaning motorists must use a more expensive blend of gasoline during the summer and more businesses must apply for federal permits that regulate how much pollution they spill into the air.
The second benchmark requires the region to lower its average ozone pollution to a 2015 standard of 70 parts per billion, considered the most acceptable level of air pollution for human health. In July, the EPA downgraded the northern Front Range to be in serious violation of that standard as the region’s ozone level now sits at 81 parts per billion. The state must now submit to the EPA a new plan for lowering emissions.
Colorado needs to meet both EPA benchmarks by 2027, or it will be downgraded again and face more federal regulation.
Of the 28 days the state has recorded high ozone pollution levels, 17 exceeded the 2008 standard of 70 parts per billion, according to data compiled by the Regional Air Quality Council, an organization that advises the state on how to reduce air pollution.
That’s bad news for the region after state air regulators predicted Colorado would be able to meet that standard by the 2027 deadline. The EPA calculates average ozone pollution levels on a three-year average, so this summer’s bad numbers will drag down the final grade.
“It’s not a good first year to have,” said Mike Silverstein, the air quality council’s executive director.
Smoke from wildfires near and far
Ground-level ozone pollution forms on hot summer days when volatile organic compounds and nitrogen oxides react in the sunlight. Those compounds and gases are released by oil and gas wells and refineries, automobiles on the road, fumes from paint and other industrial chemicals, and gas-powered lawn and garden equipment.
It forms a smog that can cause the skies to become brown or hazy, and it is harmful to people, especially those with lung and heart disease, the elderly and children. Ground-level ozone is different than the ozone in the atmosphere that protects Earth from the sun’s powerful rays.
Wildfire smoke blowing from Canada and the Pacific Northwest did not help Colorado’s pollution levels in July, and then multiple fires erupted along the Front Range over the past week, creating homegrown pollution from fine particulate matter such as smoke, soot and ash. Ultimately, though, the heavy smoke days could be wiped from the calculations from 2024, but that decision will be made at a later date.
Still, June also saw multiple high ozone days, and air quality experts say much of the pollution originates at home in Colorado and cannot be blamed on outside influences.
The out-of-state wildfire smoke sent ozone levels skyrocketing the week of July 21 to 27, Silverstein said, but it’s not the reason the numbers are high. The week prior saw ozone levels above federal standards, too, and wildfire smoke had not drifted into the region.
“Pull the wildfires out and we would probably still have had high ozone,” he said.
Jeremy Nichols, senior advocate for the Center for Biological Diversity, also warned that wildfires should not be used as an excuse for the region’s air pollution.
“While the wildfires are out of our control, there is a whole bunch of air pollution we can control,” he said. “I don’t want to let that cover up the ugliness that existed here in the first place.”
Nichols blames oil and gas drilling for the region’s smog. The state is not doing enough to regulate the industry, he said.
“We actually need to recognize we are at a point where oil and gas needs to stop drilling on high ozone days,” Nichols said. “Just like we’re told to stay home on high ozone days, business as usual needs to stop. I don’t think we’ve clamped down on them and in many respects they are getting a free pass to pollute.”
One proposal would require drilling companies to eliminate emissions from pneumatic actuating devices, equipment driven by pressurized gas to open and close valves in pipelines, Silverstein said. Oil companies already are required to make 50% of those devices emission-free, and the federal government also is requiring them to be 100% emission-free by 2035. But Colorado’s proposal would accelerate the timeline, he said.
The second proposal would tell companies to stop performing blowdowns, which is when workers vent fumes from pipelines before beginning maintenance to clear explosive gases, when an ozone alert is issued, Silverstein said.
“There are thousands of these very small events, but these small events add up to significant activity,” he said.
Gabby Richmond, a spokeswoman for the Colorado Oil and Gas Association, said the industry supports the new regulations. She said operators also were electrifying operations where possible and voluntarily delaying operational activities on high ozone days.
“Our industry values clean air, and we are committed to pioneering innovative solutions that protect our environment and make Colorado a great place to live,” Richmond said in a statement. “As a part of this commitment, we have significantly reduced ozone-causing emissions by over 50% through technology, regulatory initiatives and voluntary measures — all in the spirit of being good neighbors in the communities where we live and work.”
“Knock down emissions where we can”
Meanwhile, people who live in metro Denver and the northern Front Range are asked to do their part, too.
When the state health department issues an ozone action alert — which is a forecast for high pollution levels — people are asked to limit driving as much as possible. They also are asked to avoid using gas-powered lawn and garden equipment until later in the day when the sun starts dropping behind the mountains and temperatures fall.
It would be easy to blame Colorado’s ozone pollution on its geography, global climate change that is raising temperatures, and pollution blowing from other countries and states, Silverstein said. But Colorado has a responsibility to do its part.
“We have 4 million people and a big oil and gas field and lots of industrial activity and all of the things related to human activity all in one concentrated location with a great mountain backdrop, but it comes with a bit of a price,” he said. “So it’s up to us to find the strategies to knock down emissions where we can.”
GLOSTER, Miss. (AP) — This southern Mississippi town’s expansive wood pellet plant was so close to Shelia Mae Dobbins’ home that she sometimes heard company loudspeakers. She says industrial residues coated her truck and she no longer enjoys spending time in the air outdoors.
Dobbins feels her life — and health — were better before 2016, when United Kingdom energy giant Drax opened a facility able to compress 450,000 tons of wood chips annually in the majority Black town of Gloster, Mississippi. To her, it’s no coincidence federal regulators find residents are exposed to unwanted air particles and they experience asthma more than most of the country.
Her asthma and diabetes were once under control, but since a 2017 diagnosis of heart and lung disease, Dobbins has frequently lived at the end of a breathing tube connected to an oxygen cannister.
“Something is going on. And it’s all around the plant,” said the 59-year-old widow who raised two children here. “Nobody asked us could they bring that plant there.”
Shelia Mae Dobbins holds part of her oxygen tube inside her home in Gloster, Miss., Wednesday, May 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
Shelia Mae Dobbins walks with her oxygen tube inside her home in Gloster, Miss., Wednesday, May 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
Wood pellet production skyrocketed across the U.S. South. It helped feed demand in the European Union for renewable energy, as those coutries sought to replace fossil fuels such as coal. But many residents near plants — often African Americans in poor, rural swaths — find the process left their air dustier and people sicker.
Billions of dollars are available for these projects under President Joe Biden’s signature law combating climate change. The administration is weighing whether to open up tax credits for companies to burn wood pellets for energy.
Shelia Mae Dobbins cries as she talks about her health inside her home in Gloster, Miss., Wednesday, May 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
As producers expand west, environmentalists want the government to stop incentivizing what they call a misguided attempt to curb carbon emissions that pollute communities of color while presently warming the atmosphere.
Despite hefty pollution fines against industry players and one major producer’s recent bankruptcy, supporters say the multibillion-dollar market is experiencing growing pains. In wood pellets, they see an innovative long-term solution to the climate crisis that brings revenue necessary for forest owners to maintain plantations.
Birds fly past a pile of wood used to make pellets during a tour of a Drax facility in Gloster, Miss., Monday, May 20, 2024. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
Biomass boom
After the European Union classified biomass as renewable energy in 2009, the Southeast’s annual wood pellet capacity increased from about 300,000 tons to more than 7.3 million tons by 2017, according to research led by a University of Missouri team.
Federal energy statistics show about three dozen southern wood pellet manufacturing facilities account for nearly 80% of annual U.S. capacity. Most pellets are used for commercial-scale energy overseas.
The market brought hope for revitalization to small, disadvantaged communities. But interviews with residents of towns with large Black populations, from Gaston, North Carolina, to Uniontown, Alabama, surfaced complaints of truck traffic, air pollution and noise from pellet plants.
Dan Caston, an employee of Drax leads a tour of their plant in Gloster, Miss., Monday, May 20, 2024. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
Dan Caston, an employee of Drax, shows some of the wood pellets their plant produces in Gloster, Miss., Monday, May 20, 2024. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
Gloster has become the poster child for such tensions. In 2020, Mississippi’s environmental agency fined Drax $2.5 million for violating air emissions limits. Gloster is exposed to more particulate matter than much of the U.S. and adults have higher asthma rates than 80% of the country, according to an Environmental Protection Agency mapping tool. Median household income is about $22,000; the poverty rate is triple the national level.
Spokesperson Michelli Martin said Drax in 2021 installed pollution controls, including incinerators to decrease carbon emissions. An environmental consulting firm found “no adverse effects to human health” and that “no modeled pollutant from the facility exceeded” acceptable levels, Martin said.
The company recently committed to annual town halls and announced a $250,000 Gloster Community Fund to “improve quality of life.”
But critics aren’t swayed by showings of corporate goodwill they say don’t account for poor air. Krystal Martin, of the Greater Greener Gloster Project, returned to her hometown after her 75-year-old mother was diagnosed with lung and heart problems.
“You don’t really know you’re dealing with air pollution until most people have breathed and inhaled it for so long that they end up sick,” she said.
Krystal Martin, a Gloster native, shows pamphlets to residents Myrtis Woodard and Shelia Mae Dobbins, right, during a community meeting she organized regarding health complaints against the Drax facility in Gloster, Miss., Thursday, May 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
Krystal Martin, a Gloster native, shows pamphlets during a community meeting she organized regarding health complaints against the Drax facility in Gloster, Miss., Thursday, May 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
Brown University assistant epidemiology professor Erica Walker is studying health impacts of industrial pollutants on Gloster residents. Walker said fine particulate matter can travel deep into lungs and reach the bloodstream.
“It can also circulate to other parts of our body, leading to body-wide inflammation,” she said.
A man crosses the street in downtown Gloster, Miss., Thursday, May 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
Subsidies for an upstart industry
Environmentalists are calling on Biden to stop aiding an industry they believe runs counter to his green energy goals. At the annual United Nations climate conference, The Dogwood Alliance urged attendees to phase out wood pellets.
Enviva — the world’s largest wood pellet producer — had already received subsidies through the 2018 farm bill signed by former President Donald Trump, according to Sheila Korth, a former policy analyst with nonpartisan watchdog Taxpayers for Common Sense.
But Korth said the Biden-era Inflation Reduction Act made tax credits available to companies that create pellets for countries in Europe and Asia.
Elizabeth Woodworth, interim executive director of the US Industrial Pellet Association, said the money is a small part of lRA allocations and noted emerging technologies require government subsidies. The industry argues that replanting of trees will eventually absorb carbon produced by burning pellets.
“We need every single technology we can get our hands on to mitigate climate change,” Woodworth said. “Bioenergy is a part of that.”
Scientific studies have found firing wood pellets puts more carbon immediately into the atmosphere than coal. Pollution from biomass-based facilities is nearly three times higher than that of other energy sectors, according to a 2023 paper in the journal Renewable Energy.
In a 2018 letter, hundreds of scientists warned the EU that the “additional carbon load” from burning wood pellets means “permanent damages” including glacial melting.
A resident crosses the street for a community meeting regarding health complaints against Drax in Gloster, Miss., Thursday, May 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
Expansion plans and more burning?
Drax — with plants operating in Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi — is heading west.
The corporation signed an agreement in February with Golden State Natural Resources to identify biomass from California’s forests. The public-private venture hopes to build two plants by year’s end and produce up to 1 million tons of wood pellets annually. Another Drax project in Washington would produce 500,000 tons a year.
The Natural Resources Defense Council’s Rita Frost, who fought plants in the South, said the deal will endanger California’s low-income Latino communities much like she says the industry threatened Black southern towns.
“It’s an environmental justice problem that should not be repeated in California,” Frost said.
An employee walks toward a pile of lumber to be used during a tour of a Drax facility in Gloster, Miss., Monday, May 20, 2024. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
But a key federal decision could draw more companies into pellet combustion — not just production.
The White House is looking into whether biomass facilities should receive tax credits meant for zero-emission electricity generators. The Treasury Department is weighing whether biomass’ potential long-term carbon neutrality is sufficient even if its production increases emissions in the short term.
Spokesperson Michael Martinez said they are “carefully considering public comments” and “working to issue final rules that will increase energy security and clean energy supply as effectively as possible.”
Some environmentalists doubt the energy alternative is ultimately carbon neutral. The Southern Environmental Law Center fears the credits could be the incentive needed for the U.S. to join Europe in scaling up the burning of pellets.
“The threat here is really the growth of biomass energy production in the U.S. itself,” said senior attorney Heather Hillaker. “Which obviously will add to the total carbon and climate harms of this industry globally.”
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Pollard reported from Columbia, South Carolina. Watson reported from San Diego. Contributing were video journalist Terry Chea from San Francisco and reporter Matthew Daly from Washington, D.C.
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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.
When Pradhanang found a trash mix that could be fashioned into a platform and resist breaking down with age, she began talking to her colleagues in Nepal. By 2021, they had secured $78,000 in funding from the Asia-Pacific Network for Global Change Research, a research and policy funder, to operate a study across Nepal, India, and Bangladesh.
While Nagdaha and the Indian and Bangladeshi sites do not provide residents with drinking water, they do have cultural and religious significance. On her many visits to Nepal, Pradhanang has seen children swimming in Nagdaha’s murky water, dogs lapping at the shore, and women sitting on the banks to wash dishes and clothing. Pradhanang and The Small Earth Nepal wanted to beautify the lake as they cleaned it. They chose flowering plants that served both purposes: Indian shot (Canna indica) and scarlet sage (Salvia splendens), whose bright red flowers stand out against the gray water.
After installing the floating platforms in the fall of 2022, the researchers tested the water monthly and found results consistent with their lab trials, which showed a 99 percent reduction in nitrate levels, 80 percent reduction in phosphates, 56 percent reduction in iron, and 55 percent reduction in ammonia. Dissolved oxygen concentrations increased by half. Their results have been submitted to the Journal of Civil Engineering for review.
Growing flowering plants can add aesthetic value to a body of water, but the collaboration is staying away from growing food on the platforms, since the plants build up such high concentrations of pollutants. But people aren’t the only ones intrigued by the floating wetlands; geese and ducks flock to the mats, sitting on the platforms and pooping phosphorus-rich excrement into the water.
Pradhanang came up with a clever solution for the mischievous mallards: She tied silver ribbons around the stems of the plants, whose sharp glare drove away the birds. Though the scientists don’t want geese on the FTWS, pollinators like bees and small birds are more than welcome—as are the diverse microbial life-forms that exist on the plant roots and digest pollutants in the water for energy.
“There’s a real kind of, ‘If you build it, they will come’ phenomenon that’s associated with the floating wetlands,” says Max Rome, who did his PhD on FTWS in Boston’s Charles River and now works at the Charles River Watershed Association. “These systems are really effective for creating wetland biodiversity in a place where there’s just not room for wetlands.”
Though the trash-based systems solve some water-pollution problems, they leave others—namely, microplastics. Incorporating local trash into the mats shouldn’t make things worse overall—much of the trash is gathered from the water in the first place—but high plastic content in the water means that it can remain a risk to locals’ health, even after cleansing.
While Pradhanang and outside researchers have flagged concerns about incorporating styrofoam and other plastics into the trash-based FTWS, they say that the benefits of the mats generally outweigh the costs. “If you can use a waste product that would then just be normally in the water,” says White, “and you can use it to make a product that is actually helping to clean the water, it’s amazing.”
SAN FRANCISCO — The world’s first hydrogen-powered commercial passenger ferry will start operating on San Francisco Bay as part of plans to phase out diesel-powered vessels and reduce planet-warming carbon emissions, California officials said Friday, demonstrating the ship.
The 70-foot (21-meter) catamaran called the MV Sea Change will transport up to 75 passengers along the waterfront between Pier 41 and the downtown San Francisco ferry terminal starting July 19, officials said. The service will be free for six months while it’s being run as part of a pilot program.
“The implications for this are huge because this isn’t its last stop,” said Jim Wunderman, chair of the San Francisco Bay Area Water Emergency Transportation Authority, which runs commuter ferries across the bay. “If we can operate this successfully, there are going to be more of these vessels in our fleet and in other folks’ fleets in the United States and we think in the world.”
Sea Change can travel about 300 nautical miles and operate for 16 hours before it needs to refuel. The fuel cells produce electricity by combining oxygen and hydrogen in an electrochemical reaction that emits water as a byproduct.
The technology could help clean up the shipping industry, which produces nearly 3% of the world’s total greenhouse gas emissions, officials said. That’s less than from cars, trucks, rail or aviation but still a lot — and it’s rising.
Frank Wolak, president and CEO of the Fuel Cell & Hydrogen Energy Association, said the ferry is meaningful because it’s hard to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from vessels.
“The real value of this is when you multiply out by the number of ferries operating around the world,” he said. “There’s great potential here. This is how you can start chipping away at the carbon intensity of your ports.”
Backers also hope hydrogen fuel cells could eventually power container ships.
The International Maritime Organization, which regulates commercial shipping, wants to halve its greenhouse gas releases by midcentury.
As fossil fuel emissions continue warming Earth’s atmosphere, the Biden administration is turning to hydrogen as an energy source for vehicles, manufacturing and generating electricity. It has been offering $8 billion to entice the nation’s industries, engineers and planners to figure out how to produce and deliver clean hydrogen.
Environmental groups say hydrogen presents its own pollution and climate risks.
For now, the hydrogen that is produced globally each year, mainly for refineries and fertilizer manufacturing, is made using natural gas. That process warms the planet rather than saving it. Indeed, a new study by researchers from Cornell and Stanford universities found that most hydrogen production emits carbon dioxide, which means that hydrogen-fueled transportation cannot yet be considered clean energy.
Yet proponents of hydrogen-powered transportation say that in the long run, hydrogen production is destined to become more environmentally safe. They envision a growing use of electricity from wind and solar energy, which can separate hydrogen and oxygen in water. As such renewable forms of energy gain broader use, hydrogen production should become a cleaner and less expensive process.
The Sea Change project was financed and managed by the investment firm SWITCH Maritime. The vessel was constructed at Bay Ship and Yacht in Alameda, California, and All-American Marine in Bellingham, Washington.
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Associated Press journalist Jennifer McDermott contributed to this report from Providence, Rhode Island.
FILE – A Marathon gas station is seen, Feb. 22, 2022, in Bradenton, Fla. The federal government announced a $241.5 million settlement with Marathon Oil on Thursday, July 11, 2024, for alleged air quality violations at the company’s oil and gas operations in the Forth Berthold Indian Reservation in North Dakota. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar, File)
MOUNT STORM, W.Va. — Down a long gravel road, tucked into the hills in West Virginia, is a low-slung building where researchers are extracting essential elements from an old coal mine that they hope will strengthen the nation’s energy future.
They aren’t mining the coal that powered the steel mills and locomotives that helped industrialize America — and that is blamed for contributing to global warming.
Rather, researchers are finding that groundwater pouring out of this and other abandoned coal mines contains the rare earth elements and other valuable metals that are vital to making everything from electric vehicle motors to rechargeable batteries to fighter jets smaller, lighter or more powerful.
The pilot project run by West Virginia University is now part of an intensifying worldwide race to develop a secure supply of the valuable metals and, with more federal funding, it could grow to a commercial scale enterprise.
“The ultimate irony is that the stuff that has created climate change is now a solution, if we’re smart about it,” said John Quigley, a senior fellow at the Kleinman Center for Energy Policy at the University of Pennsylvania.
The technology that has been piloted at this facility in West Virginia could also pioneer a way to clean up vast amounts of coal mine drainage that poisons waterways across Appalachia.
The project is one of the leading efforts by the federal government as it injects more money than ever into recovering rare earth elements to expand renewable energies and fight climate change by reducing planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions.
For the U.S., which like the rest of the West is beholden to a Chinese-controlled supply of these valuable metals, the pursuit of rare earth elements is also a national security priority.
Those involved, meanwhile, hope their efforts can bring jobs in clean energy to dying coal towns and clean up entrenched coal pollution that has hung around for decades.
In Pennsylvania alone, drainage from coal piles and abandoned mines has turned waterways red from iron ore and turquoise from aluminum, killing life in more than 5,000 miles (8,000 km) of streams. Federal statistics also show about 470 square miles (about 1,200 square km) of abandoned and unreclaimed coal mine lands host more than 200 million tons of coal waste.
The metals that chemists are working to extract from mine drainage here are lightweight, powerfully magnetized and have superior fluorescent and conductive properties.
One aim of the Department of Energy is to fund research that proves to private companies that the concepts are commercially viable and profitable enough for them to invest their own money.
Hundreds of millions of dollars from President Joe Biden’s 2021 infrastructure law is accelerating the effort.
Department officials hope that by the middle of the 2030s this infusion will have spawned full-fledged commercial enterprises.
The two most advanced projects funded by the department are the one in West Virginia treating mine drainage and another processing coal dug up by lignite mining in North Dakota.
The first could be an important source of a number of critical metals, such as yttrium, neodymium and gadolinium, used in catalysts and magnets. The latter could be a major source of germanium and gallium, used in semiconductors, LEDs, electrical transmission components, solar panels and electric vehicle motors.
Researchers at each site are designing a commercial-scale operation, based on their pilot projects, in hopes of landing a massive federal grant to build it out.
The alternative would be to develop new mines, disturb more land, get permits, hire workers, build roads and connect power supplies, tasks that take years.
“With acid mind drainage, that’s already done for you,” said Paul Ziemkiewicz, director of the Water Research Institute at West Virginia University.
Ziemkiewicz began the mine drainage project almost a decade ago, helped by federal subsidies. He had envisioned it as a way to treat runoff, recover critical minerals and raise money for more mine cleanups in West Virginia.
But the Biden administration’s ambitious funding for clean energy and a domestic supply of critical minerals broadened that goal.
At the facility, drainage from a one-time coal mine — now closed and covered by a grassy slope — emerges from two pipes, and dumps about 800 gallons per minute into a retention pond.
From there the water is routed through massive indoor pools and a series of large tanks that, with the help of lime to lower the acidity, separate out most of the silicate, iron and aluminum. That produces a pale powdery concentrate that is about 95% rare earth oxides, plus water clean enough to return to a nearby creek.
The Department of Energy is funding research on coal wastes in various states.
“There are literally billions of tons of coal ash and coal waste lying around, across the country. And so if we can go back in and remine those, there’s decades worth of materials there,” said Grant Bromhal, the acting director of the Department of Energy’s Division of Minerals Sustainability.
Not only coal, but old copper and phosphate mines also hold potential, Bromhal said.
The country won’t be able to recover metals from all of them right away, but technologies the department is helping develop can satisfy a substantial part of demand in the next 20 to 30 years, Bromhal said.
“So if we get into the tens of percents or 50%, I think that’s in the realm of possibility,” he said.
Other solutions to obtain more of these metals are retrieving them from discarded devices and shifting sourcing to friendly nations and away from geopolitical rivals or unstable countries, analysts say. For now, there is only a handful of critical or rare earth mineral mines in the United States, although many more are being proposed.
One final subsidy will be required from the federal government: buy the reclaimed metals at a price that guarantees a commercially viable operation, Ziemkiewicz said.
That way China can’t simply buy up the product or use its market dominance to drive down prices and scare away private investors, he said.
Quigley, a former environmental protection secretary of Pennsylvania and a one-time small-city mayor in coal country, hopes to see a facility like Ziemkiewicz’s come to the Jeddo mine tunnel system in northeastern Pennsylvania.
The Jeddo has defied decades of efforts to treat its flow, which drains a vast network of abandoned underground mines.
It is a massive source of pollution in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, producing an estimated 30,000 to 40,000 gallons per minute.
Bringing the Little Nescopeck Creek back to life could put people to work cleaning up the stream and creating recreational opportunities from a newly revived waterway, Quigley said.
“This could mean a lot to coal communities, to a lot of people in the coal region,” Quigley said. “And to the country.”
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.
METHUEN — The city is looking to charge more for the disposal of construction materials.
The City Council took up an amendment to the charter which would increase fees for individuals dropping off debris by $2 per 100 pounds during a meeting on June 1. A public hearing on the fees will be held at 6:45 p.m. on Monday, Aug. 5, at City Hall, 41 Pleasant St. The council will later take a vote on the matter.
Under the change, residents would pay $12 per 100 pounds while the commercial rate would be set at $12.50 per 100 pounds. As outlined in the city’s municipal code, the current rate is $10 per 100 pounds for residents and $12 per 100 pounds, with a $50 minimum for commercial customers.
“There are additional costs to the city for accepting construction and demolition debris as these add to the total waste tonnage that the city must pay to dispose of,” reads the ordinance.
The city accepts construction and demolition waste at the Methuen Transfer Station, 50 Huntington Ave.
The fees will be introduced as soon as the ordinance is approved.
Department of Public Works Director Patrick Bower said contractors need to provide evidence they are working in Methuen when they dispose of materials at the transfer station.
Bower said the city has gone from using one dumpster to six in recent years for construction and demolition waste.
“We are charging more to the commercial user so if we have a contractor or something that is doing work in town we are going to charge them a little bit extra because they are technically making money,” Bower said. “The residential rate is just someone doing work at their house.”
The charter levies fees for anything from air conditioners to CPUs.
After an abundance of backyard fireworks across Detroit to celebrate the Fourth of July, the sky looks hazy, the air smells smoky, and the city is currently the most polluted in the country, according to data by IQ Air.
For a short period late Thursday and early Friday, Detroit had the worst air quality in the world.
Now, we’re in fourth place, following cities in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda, and Pakistan. The only other U.S. city in the top ten is Los Angeles, ranked seventh.
Fireworks, whether seemingly-harmless sparklers or large overhead explosions, release combustion particles and gasses into the air, which can travel for miles on wind currents, according to IQ Air. This causes air pollution to be up to ten times higher during fireworks shows than usual, mainly due to black powder and colorants.
As of Friday morning, Detroit’s overall air quality index score is 139, which is unhealthy for sensitive groups. Many areas of the city, however, have pollution levels as high as 193, falling under the category of “unhealthy for all.”
The most polluted Detroit air quality stations are Mapleridge, Gratiot Town/Ketterring, 294 Riverside Dr., Lafayette Park, Airport Sub, and Eliza Howell-Roadway. Most of Grosse Pointe is also heavily polluted.
IQ Air encourages people to protect themselves from poor air by monitoring air quality, closing doors and windows, wearing masks when outdoors, and using air purifiers inside.
Under Michigan law, consumer fireworks can be set off from June 29 through July 4 from 11 a.m. until 11:45 p.m. This is extended to July 5 when it falls on a Friday or Sunday, so whether you love them or hate them, there’s at least one more day of fireworks for Detroiters.
Celebrations may continue through the weekend, but local air quality is expected to improve over the next few days.
WASHINGTON — WASHINGTON (AP) — General Motors will pay nearly $146 million in penalties to the federal government because 5.9 million of its older vehicles do not comply with emissions and fuel economy standards.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said in a statement Wednesday that certain GM vehicles from the 2012 through 2018 model years did not comply with federal fuel economy requirements.
The fine comes after the Environmental Protection Agency said its testing showed the GM pickup trucks and SUVs emit 10% more carbon dioxide on average than GM’s initial compliance testing claimed.
The EPA says the vehicles will remain on the road and cannot be repaired. The GM vehicles on average consume about 10% more fuel than the window sticker numbers say, but the company won’t be required to reduce the miles per gallon on the stickers, the EPA said.
“Our investigation has achieved accountability and upholds an important program that’s reducing air pollution and protecting communities across the country,” EPA Administrator Michael Regan said.
GM said in a statement that it complied with all regulations in pollution and mileage certification of its vehicles. The company said it is not admitting to any wrongdoing nor that it failed to comply with the Clean Air Act.
The problem stems from a change in testing procedures that the EPA put in place in 2016, GM spokesman Bill Grotz said.
Owners don’t have to take any action because there is no defect in the vehicles, Grotz said.
“We believe this voluntary action is the best course of action to resolve the outstanding issues with the federal government,” he said.
The enforcement action involves about 4.6 million full-size pickups and SUVs and about 1.3 million midsize SUVs, the EPA said. The affected models include the Chevy Tahoe, Cadillac Escalade and Chevy Silverado. About 40 variations of GM vehicles are covered.
GM will be forced to give up credits used to ensure that manufacturers’ greenhouse gas emissions are below the fleet standard for emissions that applies for that model year, the EPA said.
Because GM agreed to address the excess emissions, EPA said it was not necessary to make a formal determination regarding the reasons for the excess emissions.
But David Cooke, senior vehicles analyst for the Union of Concerned Scientists, questioned how GM could not know that pollution exceeded initial test by more than 10% because the problem was so widespread on so many different vehicles. “You don’t just make a more than 10% rounding error,” he said.
Dan Becker, director of the Safe Climate Transport Campaign for the environmental group Center for Biological Diversity, said the violations by GM “show why automakers can’t be trusted to protect our air and health, and why we need strong pollution rules. Supreme Court, take notice!”
The Supreme Court last week rejected a 40-year-old legal doctrine known as Chevron, effectively reducing the power of the EPA and other executive branch agencies and shifting it to the courts. The doctrine has been the basis for upholding thousands of federal regulations but has long been a target of conservatives and business groups, who argue it grants too much power to the executive branch, or what some critics call the administrative state.
In similar pollution cases in the past, automakers have been fined under the Clean Air Act for such violations, and the Justice Department normally gets involved, Cooke said. Hyundai and Kia, for instance, faced Justice Department action in a similar case.
The Justice Department declined to comment.
Cooke said it’s possible that GM owners could sue the company because they are getting lower gas mileage than advertised.
In 2014, Hyundai and Kia entered into a settlement in which they had to pay a $100 million civil penalty to end a two year investigation into overstated gas mileage on window stickers of 1.2 million vehicles.
The affiliated Korean automakers denied allegations that they violated the law. Hyundai blamed the inflated mileage on honest misinterpretation of the EPA’s complex rules governing testing.
Coastal Animals Are Thriving on Plastic Pollution Out in the Pacific Ocean | Extreme Earth
In the time it takes you to read this sentence — say, four seconds — the world produces nearly 60 metric tons of plastic, almost entirely out of fossil fuels. That’s about 53,000 metric tons an hour, 1.3 million metric tons a day, or 460 million metric tons a year. Those numbers are fueling widespread and growing contamination of Earth’s oceans, rivers, and the terrestrial environment with plastic trash.
In March 2022, the United Nations’ 193 member states got together in Nairobi, Kenya, and agreed to do something about it. They pledged to negotiate a treaty to “end plastic pollution,” with the goal of delivering a final draft by 2025. The most ambitious vision espoused by member states in the negotiating sessions that have taken place so far would require petrochemical companies to stop making so much of the darn stuff by putting a cap on global plastic production.
Given the existential threat this would pose to fossil fuel and chemical companies, you might expect them to be vociferously opposed to the treaty. Yet they claim to support the agreement. They’re even “championing” it, according to statements from a handful of industry groups. The American Chemistry Council has repeatedly “welcome[d]” progress on the treaty negotiations, while an executive from the International Council of Chemical Associations told Plastics Today in April that the industry is “fully committed” to supporting an agreement.
So what exactly do plastic-producing companies want from the treaty? To answer this question, Grist sifted through dozens of public statements and policy documents from five of the world’s largest petrochemical industry trade organizations, as well as two product-specific industry groups. These documents included press releases reacting to treaty negotiating sessions and longer position statements detailing the industry’s desired pathway to a “world without waste.”
Much of what these groups have published is vague — many documents call for “targets,” for example, without saying what they should be. Grist reached out to all of the groups for clarification, but only two agreed to answer questions about the policies they support.
What we found is that, although they fall far short of what so-called “high-ambition” countries and advocacy groups would like to get out of the treaty, industry groups’ proposals to bolster recycling and waste collection could cause a significant reduction in mismanaged plastic waste — even in the absence of a cap on plastic production. According to a policy analysis tool developed by researchers at the University of California, the elements of the treaty that industry groups support, cobbled together, could cut global plastic pollution by 43 million metric tons annually by 2050 — a 36 percent reduction below business-as-usual estimates.
Meanwhile, a realistic production cap could cut annual pollution by 48 million metric tons all by itself. Excluding a production cap from the treaty will make it much harder to rein in plastic pollution, said Douglas McCauley, an associate professor of biology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and one of the creators of the policy tool. “It means you really have to ramp up your ambition on what some of the other policies would need to do,” he told Grist.
These numbers matter, because the plastic industry’s influence over the treaty negotiations seems to be growing stronger. At the most recent round of talks — held in Ottawa, Canada, at the end of April — nearly 200 petrochemical and fossil fuel lobbyists registered to attend. That’s 37 more than were registered for the previous session, and more than the number of representatives from European Union member states.
At the same time, several delegations promoted solutions on the industry’s terms. Malaysia warned about the unintended economic consequences of limiting plastic production, and India said the treaty should focus on pollution while considering plastics’ utility to modern society. Given the power of the plastics industry and the tendency of international negotiations to cater to the lowest common denominator, it’s possible that the treaty will strongly reflect these industry priorities.
How the industry sees the problem
To understand the industry position on the plastics treaty, it’s important to understand how plastic makers conceptualize the plastics crisis. While they agree that pollution is a scourge, they don’t think the solution is to reduce society’s production and use of plastic. After all, plastics come with myriad benefits. They’re inexpensive, lightweight, and widely used in important sectors like clean energy and medicine — their “unmatched properties and versatility have allowed for incredible innovations that conserve resources and make more things in life possible,” as the Plastics Industry Association has put it. America’s Plastic Makers, an arm of the American Chemistry Council, says policymakers should ensure that the material stays “in our economy and out of our environment.”
The way to do this, according to industry groups, is through “plastics circularity,” a concept that seeks to keep the material in use for as long as possible before it’s thrown away. Generally, this means more recycling. But circularity can also refer to scaled-up systems allowing plastic to be reused, or better infrastructure for waste collection. As plastic makers see it, the plastic treaty’s function should be to increase circularity while retaining the social and economic benefits derived from plastic products.
Perhaps the biggest problem faced by circularity proponents is plastic’s abysmal recycling rate. At present, the world only recycles about 9 percent of all plastic it produces; the rest gets sent to landfills or incinerators, or winds up as litter. What’s more, in most cases the material can only be reprocessed once or twice — if at all — before it has to be “downcycled” into lower-quality products like carpeting. Although some experts believe it’s impossible to recycle much more plastic due to technological and economic constraints, plastic makers say otherwise. Indeed, plastics circularity hinges on the possibility of a better recycling rate.
The industry’s first solution: Recycling targets
To that end, several industry groups — including the World Plastics Council, the self-described “global voice of the plastics industry” — are advocating for “mandatory minimum recycling rates” as part of the treaty, as well as higher targets for recycled content used in new products.
This could mean that countries, regions, or other jurisdictions would set legally binding quotas for the amount of plastic recycled within their borders and then converted into new items. Plastic makers typically favor targets that are set at the local or national level and that differentiate based on the type of plastic, since some types are harder to recycle than others.
Industry groups also want recycling targets to be “technology-neutral,” meaning they should count plastics processed through controversial “chemical recycling” techniques. Although these techniques do not yet work at scale, the industry says they will one day be able to break down mixed post-consumer plastic into their constituent polymers using high heat and pressure, and then turn those polymers back into new plastic products. Environmental experts oppose chemical recycling, pointing to evidence that it is primarily used to burn plastics or turn them into fuel.
The two policies — on plastics recycling and recycled content — could be mutually reinforcing, with the latter creating a more reliable market for the recycled material generated by the former. Ross Eisenberg, president of America’s Plastic Makers, told Grist via email that recycling and recycled content targets would “create demand signals and provide added certainty for companies to make additional investments for a circular economy, so more plastic products are reused or remade into new plastic products.”
Plastics Europe and the World Plastics Council declined to be interviewed for this article. They did not respond to questions about their support for specific recycling and recycled content targets, although Plastics Europe has voiced support for “mandatory data and reporting objectives for all stages of the life cycle of the plastics system.” For the U.S., America’s Plastic Makers supports a 30 percent recycled content requirement in plastic packaging by 2030, and for 100 percent of plastic packaging to be “reused, recycled, or recovered by 2040.”
The industry’s second solution: Infrastructure and design changes
Additional policies supported by industry groups could indirectly facilitate an increase in the plastics recycling rate by raising money for recycling infrastructure. These policies typically involve systems for “extended producer responsibility,” or EPR, requiring companies that make and sell plastics to help pay for the collection and recycling of the waste they generate, as well as the cleanup of existing plastic pollution. Every industry group Grist reached out to says it supports EPR as a part of the treaty, although some specifically note in their policy documents that such policies should be adopted at the local or national level, rather than globally. Some groups, including the American Chemistry Council and Global Partners for Plastics Circularity — an umbrella group supported by a dozen plastics associations and companies — also call more vaguely for additional financing through “public-private partnerships and blended finance.”
For plastic packaging — which accounts for about 36 percent of global plastic production — a European industry consortium called the Circular Economy for Flexible Packaging supports “mandatory legislation on product design” to make products easier to recycle. It doesn’t back any specific design elements, but points to ideas laid out by the Consumer Goods Forum, an industry-led network of consumer product retailers and manufacturers. These ideas include using clear instead of colored plastics, limiting the use of unnecessary plastic wrap, and ensuring that any adhesives or inks applied to plastic packaging don’t render it nonrecyclable. Plastics Europe additionally supports technical and design standards for biodegradable and compostable plastics intended to replace those made from fossil fuels.
Many groups also say they support targets for “pellet containment,” referring to the tiny plastic pieces that are melted down and shaped into larger items. These pellets are notorious for spilling out of manufacturing facilities or off of cargo ships and into waterways; in Europe, 20 truckloads of them escape into the environment every day. Several trade groups say in their public statements that they support an industry-led program called Operation Clean Sweep to help companies achieve “zero resin loss” by “fostering a venue for precompetitive collaboration and peer-learning opportunities.”
However, Operation Clean Sweep has been around since 1991 and has not yet achieved its goal; some policymakers have recently called for stricter regulations on plastic pellet loss.
The industry’s third solution: Application-based regulations
In addition to capping plastic production, many countries’ delegates — along with scientists and environmental groups — would like the treaty to ban or restrict some of the most problematic plastic polymers, as well as certain chemicals used in plastics. They call these “chemicals and polymers of concern,” meaning those least likely to be recycled, or most likely to damage people’s health and the environment. Potential candidates include polyvinyl chloride, widely used in water pipes, upholstery, toys, and other applications; expanded polystyrene, or EPS, the foamy plastic that’s often used in takeout food containers; and endocrine-disrupting chemicals such as phthalates, bisphenols, and per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances.
The general idea of identifying problematic chemicals and polymers in the plastics treaty is very popular; observers of the negotiations say it’s been one of the areas of greatest convergence among delegates. Industry groups are also supportive — but only of a very specific approach. According to the World Plastics Council, the treaty shouldn’t include “arbitrary bans or restrictions on substances or materials,” but rather regulations based on the “essential use and societal value” of particular types of plastic.
For instance, polystyrene used in packing peanuts and takeout containers is virtually never recycled and might be a good candidate for restriction. But the Global Expanded Polystyrene Sustainability Alliance — a trade group for EPS makers — points to evidence that, in Europe and Japan, the material can be recycled at least 30 percent of the time when it’s in a different format — namely, insulation for products like coolers, as well as big pieces used to protect fragile shipments.
In a press release, the group said this distinction in polystyrene formatting demonstrates the need to assess plastics’ “individual material applications and uses independently.”
“We’ve got five major types” of polystyrene, said Betsy Bowers, executive director of the Expanded Polystyrene Industry Alliance, a trade group representing the U.S. EPS market. “Some of them can be recycled, and some of them can’t.”
Plastics Europe has said an application-based approach could also consider plastic products on the basis of “leakage,” how easily the products become litter; the feasibility of redesigning them; or “effects on human or animal health.” That said, the organization does not support restricting plastic-related chemicals as part of the treaty, beyond what is already spelled out in existing international agreements like the Stockholm Convention. The International Council of Chemical Associations, whose members include individual chemical manufacturers and regional trade groups, does not support any chemical regulation as part of the treaty.
In an email to Grist, the American Chemistry Council said it supports a “decision-tree approach” to prevent specific plastic products from leaking into the environment. The organization said in a letter sent to President Joe Biden last May that it opposes “restrictions of trade in chemicals or polymers” because they would “make U.S. manufacturers less competitive and/or jeopardize the many benefits plastics provide to the economy and the environment.”
The International Council of Chemical Associations, the Plastics Industry Association, and the Circular Economy for Flexible Packaging initiative did not respond to Grist’s request to be interviewed for this story, or to questions about the policies they support.
The impact of the plastic industry’s favorite policies
While it’s clear that self-preservation is at the heart of the petrochemical industry’s agenda for the plastics treaty, the policies it supports could have a positive impact on plastic pollution. According to the policy analysis toolcreated by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley and the University of California, Santa Barbara, a suite of ambitious policies to hit recycling and recycled content rates of 20 percent, reuse 60 percent of plastic packaging (where applicable), and dedicate $35 billion to plastics recycling and waste infrastructure could prevent 43 million metric tons of plastic pollution annually by midcentury. Most of this reduction would come from the infrastructure funding.
McCauley, one of the creators of the tool, said these policies are certainly better than nothing. They can bring the world “closer to a future without plastic pollution,” he told Grist, although he emphasized that recycling is not a silver bullet.
The policy tool takes for granted that higher recycling and recycled content rates are achievable, but this might not be the case. Bjorn Beeler, executive director and international coordinator for the nonprofit International Pollutants Elimination Network, said a 20 percent recycling rate would be “nearly impossible” to reach, given the relatively low cost of virgin plastic and the petrochemical industry’s projected expansion over the coming decades. Jan Dell, an independent chemical engineer and founder of the nonprofit The Last Beach Cleanup, estimated the maximum possible recycled content rate for consumer product packaging would be about 5 percent, due to insurmountable technological constraints related to plastics’ toxicity.
Experts tend to favor plastic production caps as a much faster, reliable, and more straightforward way to reduce plastic pollution than relying on recycling. According to McCauley’s policy tool, capping plastic production at the level reached in 2019 would prevent 48 million metric tons of annual plastic pollution by 2050 — even in the absence of any efforts to boost recycling or fund waste management. “It’s possible to be effective without the cap,” said Sam Pottinger, a senior research data scientist at the University of California, Berkeley, and a contributor to the policy tool. “But it requires a huge amount of effort elsewhere.”
There’s no reason the plastics treaty couldn’t incorporate a production cap in addition to the industry’s preferred recycling interventions. Some experts say this would form the most effective agreement; according to the policy tool, a production cap at 2019 levels plus the suite of recycling targets and funding for waste infrastructure could prevent nearly 78 million metric tons of annual plastic pollution by 2050. Bumping up the funding for recycling and waste infrastructure to an aggressive $200 billion, in combination with the production cap and other policies, would avert nearly 109 million metric tons of pollution each year.
“We need to use all of the tools in our toolbox,” said Zoie Diana, a postdoctoral plastics researcher at the University of Toronto who was not involved in creating the policy tool. She too emphasized, however, that governments should prioritize reducing plastic production.
What the industry doesn’t like to talk about
The case for a production cap goes beyond plastic litter concerns. It would also address the inequitable impact of toxic pollution from plastic manufacturing facilities, as well as the industry’s contribution to climate change. In April, a study from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory found that plastic production already accounts for 5 percent of global climate pollution, and that by 2050 — given the petrochemical industry’s plans to dramatically ramp up plastic production — it could eat up one-fifth of the world’s remaining carbon budget, the amount of emissions the world can release while still limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit). To achieve international climate goals, some environmental groups have estimated that the world must reduce plastic production by 12 to 17 percent every year starting in 2024.
“Whether the treaty includes plastic production cuts is not just a policy debate,” said Jorge Emmanuel, an adjunct professor at Silliman University in the Philippines, in a statement describing the mountains of plastic trash that are harming Filipino communities. “It’s a matter of survival.”
Petrochemical companies, for their part, do not deeply engage with these arguments — at least not in their public policy documents. They claim that plastics actually help mitigate climate change, since the lightweight material takes less fuel to transport than alternatives made of metal and glass. And industry groups’ public statements mostly do not address environmental justice concerns related to plastic use, production, and disposal, except to vaguely say that the treaty shouldn’t harm waste pickers — the millions of workers, most of them in the developing world, who make a living collecting plastic trash and selling it to recyclers.
The fifth and final round of negotiations for the plastics treaty is scheduled to take place in Busan, South Korea, this November. Although many observers, including a group of U.S. Congressional representatives and the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, have called for conflict-of-interest policies to limit trade groups’ influence over the talks, these requests face long odds. The dozens of countries advocating for production limits may have to defend their proposals against an even larger industry presence than they did at the last session in Ottawa.
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