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Environmental Justice

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Environmental Justice

#1

Post by Tiredretiredlawyer »

https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate- ... l-justice/
EPA unveils new office to place environmental justice at agency’s core
In creating a high-profile new Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights, the administration hopes to enshrine a focus on equity for long-polluted communities that will “outlive all of us,” says Administrator Michael Regan.



WARREN COUNTY, N.C. — Forty years ago, Dollie Burwell was a young mother in this rural farming region, determined to fight North Carolina’s decision to dump thousands of truckloads of contaminated soil nearby.

Fearing the site could sully groundwater and become a magnet for other toxic waste, Burwell and other local Black women organized fierce protests that carried on for weeks. Protesters lay in the road to block rumbling trucks. They marched, chanted and prayed. They got arrested, again and again.

Ultimately, they failed to stop the 22-acre dump. But their efforts spurred other pollution-burdened U.S. communities to take notice and band together to fight what became known as environmental racism.

A historical sign now marks the place that “sparked [the] environmental justice movement” — and Burwell, now 74, is widely acknowledged as a mother of that movement. But as she returned to Warren County on Saturday, even she struggled to grasp what her long-ago protest had achieved.
"Mickey Mouse and I grew up together." - Ruthie Tompson, Disney animation checker and scene planner and one of the first women to become a member of the International Photographers Union in 1952.
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Environmental Justice

#2

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Some images of the area at the head of the article
Alaska gold, copper mine blocked over environmental worries

BECKY BOHRER and PATRICK WHITTLE
Tue, January 31, 2023 at 2:04 PM GMT+1

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency took an unusually strong step Tuesday and blocked a proposed mine heralded by backers as the most significant undeveloped copper and gold resource in the world because of concerns about its environmental impact on a rich Alaska aquatic ecosystem that supports the world's largest sockeye salmon fishery.

The move, cheered by Alaska Native tribes and environmentalists and condemned by some state officials and mining interests, deals a heavy blow to the proposed Pebble Mine. The intended site is in a remote area of southwest Alaska's Bristol Bay region, about 200 miles (322 kilometers) southwest of Anchorage.

It's accessible only by helicopter and snowmobile in winter, developer Pebble Limited Partnership said in a permit application with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. As proposed, it called for a mining rate of up to 73 million tons a year.

An appeal by the Pebble partnership of a separate rejection of a key federal permit is unresolved.

In a statement, Pebble Limited Partnership CEO John Shively called the EPA's action “unlawful” and political and said litigation was likely. Shively has cast the project as key to the Biden administration's push to reach green energy goals and make the U.S. less dependent on foreign nations for such minerals.

The Pebble Limited Partnership is owned Canada-based Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd.

The Pebble deposit is near the headwaters of the Bristol Bay watershed, which supports a bounty of salmon “unrivaled anywhere in North America,” according to the EPA.

Tuesday's announcement marks only the 14th time in the roughly 50-year history of the federal Clean Water Act that the EPA has flexed its powers to bar or restrict activities over their potential impact on waters, including fisheries. EPA Administrator Michael Regan said his agency's use of its so-called veto authority in this case “underscores the true irreplaceable and invaluable natural wonder that is Bristol Bay.”

The veto is a victory for the environment, economy and tribes of Alaska's Bristol Bay region, which have fought the proposal for more than a decade, said Joel Reynolds, western director and senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council.

The mine would have jeopardized the region’s salmon fishery, which brings 15,000 jobs to the area and supplies about half the world’s sockeye salmon, Reynolds said. The 2022 harvest was more than 60 million fish, state officials reported last year.

“It’s a victory for science over politics. For biodiversity over extinction. For democracy over corporate power," Reynolds said.

The EPA, citing an analysis by the Army Corps of Engineers, said discharges of dredged or fill material to build and operate the proposed mine site would result in a loss of about 100 miles (160 kilometers) of stream habitat, as well as wetlands.

The Pebble partnership has maintained the project can coexist with salmon. The partnership's website says the deposit is at the upper reaches of three “very small tributaries” and expresses confidence any impacts on the fishery “in the unlikely event of an incident” would be “minimal.”

Republican Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy said the EPA's veto was a dangerous precedent that could affect future development in the state, while state Attorney General Treg Taylor called the agency's action “legally indefensible."

"Alarmingly, it lays the foundation to stop any development project, mining or non-mining, in any area of Alaska with wetlands and fish-bearing streams,” Dunleavy said.

Alaska Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski said she opposed the mine but that the EPA's veto shouldn't be allowed to jeopardize future mining operations in the state.

“This determination must not serve as precedent to target any other project in our state and must be the only time EPA ever uses its veto authority under the Clean Water Act in Alaska," Murkowski said in a statement.



https://www.yahoo.com/news/feds-rare-ve ... 42381.html
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Environmental Justice

#3

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Toxic ‘forever chemicals’ found in toilet paper around the world
Research finds waste flushed down toilets and sent to sewage plants probably responsible for significant source of water pollution

Tom Perkins
Mon 13 Mar 2023 09.00 GMT

All toilet paper from across the globe checked for toxic PFAS “forever chemicals” contained the compounds, and the waste flushed down toilets and sent to sewage treatment plants probably creates a significant source of water pollution, new research has found.

Once in the wastewater plant, the chemicals can be packed in sewage sludge that is eventually spread on cropland as fertilizer, or spilt into waterways.

“Toilet paper should be considered as a potentially major source of PFAS entering wastewater treatment systems,” the study’s authors wrote.

PFAS are a class of about 14,000 chemicals typically used to make thousands of consumer products resist water, stains and heat. They are called “forever chemicals” because they do not naturally break down, and they are linked to cancer, fetal complications, liver disease, kidney disease, autoimmune disorders and other serious health issues.

The study checked 21 major toilet paper brands in North America, western Europe, Africa, Central America and South America, but it did not name the brands.

The peer-reviewed University of Florida report did not consider the health implications of people wiping with contaminated toilet paper. PFAS can be dermally absorbed, but no research on how it may enter the body during the wiping process exists. However, that exposure is “definitely worth investigating, said David Andrews, senior scientist with the Environmental Working group, a public health non-profit that tracks PFAS pollution.

Brands that used recycled paper had just as much PFAS as those that did not, and it may be that there is no avoiding PFAS in toilet paper, said Jake Thompson, the study’s lead author and a University of Florida grad student

“I’m not rushing to change my toilet paper and I’m not saying that people should stop using or reduce the amount of toilet paper they use,” he added. “The issue is that we’re identifying another source of PFAS, and it highlights that the chemicals are ubiquitous.”

The PFAS levels detected are low enough to suggest the chemicals are used in the manufacturing process to prevent paper pulp from sticking to machinery, Thompson said. PFAS are often used as lubricants in the manufacturing process and some of the chemicals are commonly left on or in consumer goods.





https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... ilet-paper
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#4

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Artificial turf potentially linked to cancer deaths of six Phillies ball players – report
The lawn replacement – largely fallen out of favor in professional sports these days – contains large amounts of toxic chemicals

Tom Perkins
Fri 10 Mar 2023 10.00 GMT

A report on a possible link between a rare brain cancer that killed six professional US baseball players and toxic chemicals in artificial turf is raising a new round of questions over whether synthetic sports fields pose a health threat to athletes and others who use them.

The six athletes, who all died from glioblastoma, played most of their careers with the Philadelphia Phillies, a team that for decades competed on artificial turf in Veterans Stadium, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported.

All artificial turf is made with toxic PFAS compounds and some types are still produced with recycled tires that can contain heavy metals, benzene, volatile organic compounds and other carcinogens, and a growing number of US municipalities and states have banned or proposed banning them.

The Phillies players’ deaths are more evidence that regulators need to prohibit synthetic fields, said Kyla Bennett, a former Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) scientist now with the Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility non-profit.

“There is a high number of Philadelphia Phillies diagnosed with this rare cancer and it looks weird, so that should be a red flag,” said Bennett. “We don’t know what those chemicals are doing to us – what happened to exercising caution when we’re talking about human health?”



https://www.theguardian.com/society/202 ... fical-turf
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Environmental Justice

#5

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All fish tested from Michigan rivers contain ‘forever chemicals’, study finds
Researchers found PFAS chemicals – used to make products resistant to heat and water – in all samples of 12 species of fish

Tom Perkins in Detroit
Fri 24 Feb 2023 14.35 GMT

All fish caught in Michigan rivers and tested for toxic PFAS contained the chemicals – and at levels that present a health risk for anyone eating them, according to a new study.

Researchers checked 100 fish samples that represented 12 species in the Huron and Rouge rivers.

PFAS are a class of about 12,000 compounds used to make products resistant to water, stains and heat. They are known as “forever chemicals” because they do not naturally break down, and they have been linked to cancer, high cholesterol, liver and kidney disease, fetal complications and other serious health problems in humans.

The chemicals are thought to be polluting drinking water for more than 200 million people, and the study is the second this year to suggest widespread contamination of freshwater US fish.

The independent studies and research from state and federal regulators have shed light on a potential health threat in Michigan and nationally that public health advocates say needs urgent attention.

The findings are “sad”, said Erica Bloom, one of the study’s co-authors with the Ecology Center, an environmental non-profit that tracks PFAS contamination in the state.

“It just demonstrates how ubiquitous these chemicals are in the environment,” she said.

The levels found in fish sampled from those rivers ranged from about 11,000 parts per trillion (ppt) to 180,000 ppt, and tests revealed 14 different kinds of PFAS compounds.

While no state or federal limits on the amount of PFAS in fish or other food exist, Michigan’s health department issues “do not eat” advisories for fish fillets with levels over 300,000 ppt of PFOS, just one kind of PFAS compound. Fillets typically have lower levels of PFAS than the organs, which were included in Ecology Center’s testing.




https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... fish-study
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Environmental Justice

#6

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I have a cheap subscription to the WSJ which allows me to share this article - America Is Wrapped in Miles of Toxic Lead Cables
W. Kevin Vicklund
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Environmental Justice

#7

Post by W. Kevin Vicklund »

Power utilities have a similar problem with PILC (paper insulated lead sheath cable). I'm actively involved in designing a training facility like the ones mentioned in the article

https://electricenergyonline.com/energy ... -cable.htm
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Environmental Justice

#8

Post by Dave from down under »

:thumbsup:
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