On the fiftieth anniversary of the controversial weedkiller’s release, a Friends of the Earth analysis – New Roundup, New Risks – finds that residential Roundup products are more toxic to consumers and the environment than ever before. Not only has manufacturer Bayer [OTCMKTS: BAYRY] failed to remove glyphosate from all Roundup products, as promised, but new formulations of Roundup are 45 times […]
Hundreds of industrial facilities with toxic pollutants were in Hurricane Milton’s path as it passed over Central Florida, less than two weeks after Hurricane Helene flooded communities across the Southeast. By James R. Elliott, Rice University; Dominic Boyer, Rice University, and Phylicia Lee Brown, Rice University The Conversation Milton targeted boat and spa factories along […]
Hundreds of industrial facilities with toxic pollutants were in Hurricane Helene’s path as the powerful storm flooded communities across the Southeast in late September 2024. Near the coast and into Georgia, Helene swept over paper mills, fertilizer factories and oil and gas storage facilities. James R. Elliott, Rice University; Dominic Boyer, Rice University, and Phylicia […]
The US is on the brink of making a major climate misstep. According to a new CIEL analysis, planned petrochemical projects across the US could add a staggering 153.8 million metric tonnes of CO2 equivalent (CO₂e) emissions annually. This is equal to the emissions of nearly 40 coal power plants or all US domestic commercial aviation emissions. The implications […]
Levels of methane in the atmosphere have soared by record-breaking amounts since 2020, according to new research. Methane, a potent greenhouse gas, locks in around 80 times more warming over the course of two decades than CO2, but fades more quickly from the atmosphere. As a result, cutting methane emissions is widely viewed as a crucial part […]
From cereal boxes to our distinct milk bags, we’ve been told that one of the best things we can do for the planet is to embrace the circular economy — reusing, repurposing or reallocating assets to ensure they’re kept within useful circulation as long as possible, and ideally forever. Martin J. Pasqualetti, Arizona State University; Chad […]
Plastic waste is piling up at a daunting pace around the world. The World Bank estimates that every person on the planet generates an average of 1.6 pounds (0.74 kilograms) of plastic waste daily. To curb this flow, 175 nations are negotiating a binding international treaty on plastic pollution, with a completion target of late […]
Plastic waste is piling up at a daunting pace around the world. The World Bank estimates that every person on the planet generates an average of 1.6 pounds (0.74 kilograms) of plastic waste daily. Sarah J. Morath Sarah J. Morath, Wake Forest University The Conversation To curb this flow, 175 nations are negotiating a binding […]
A new report from the national advocacy group Food & Water Watch presents a stark picture of the immense amount of climate-killing methane emissions emanating from the top two sources of such pollution: fossil fuel fracking and corporate factory farming. While carbon dioxide still remains a larger source of greenhouse gas emissions, methane has a vastly outsized impact on […]
About 10 years ago, a very thick book written by a French economist became a surprising bestseller. It was called “Capital in the 21st Century.” In it, Thomas Piketty traces the history of income and wealth inequality over the past couple of hundred years. Jared Starr, UMass Amherst The Conversation The book’s insights struck a […]
It’s a very tough time for the fish and ecosystem of the San Francisco Bay Delta Estuary, with ocean salmon season closed off the California and most of Oregon due to the collapse of Sacramento and Klamath River fall-run Chinook populations as the Delta smelt gets closer and closer to extinction in the wild. One […]
From rural Pennsylvania to Los Angeles, more than 17 million Americans live within a mile of at least one oil or gas well. Since 2014, most new oil and gas wells have been fracked. Fracking, short for hydraulic fracturing, is a process in which workers inject fluids underground under high pressure. The fluids fracture coal […]
An unwelcome visitor is headed for Florida and the Caribbean: huge floating mats of sargassum, or free-floating brown seaweed. Nearly every year since 2011, sargassum has inundated Caribbean, Gulf of Mexico and Florida coastlines in warm months, peaking in June and July. This brown tide rots on the beach, driving away tourists, harming local fishing […]
T’S 6 P.M. and the pink-tinged skies turn black above Agolan, a village on the outskirts of Erbil in the Kurdistan region of northern Iraq. Thick plumes of smoke have begun to billow out of dozens of flaring towers, part of an oil refinery owned by an Iraqi energy company called the KAR Group. The towers are just […]
Headaches and lingering chemical smells from a fiery train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, have left residents worried about their air and water – and misinformation on social media hasn’t helped. Andrew J. Whelton, Purdue University The Conversation State officials offered more details of the cleanup process and a timeline of the environmental disaster during […]