Environment
Little done to deter violations of Clean Air Act
Through analysis of Clean Air Act data kept by the Environmental Protection agency, The Journal Gazette (Fort Wayne, Ind.) found government regulators have a list of more than 200 facilities in Indiana they say have broken air pollution laws in the past three years, yet little or nothing has been done to stop them. The…
Read MoreDevelopers abuse loopholes in Brownfield Cleanup Program
Rick Moriarty of The Post-Standard (Syracuse, N.Y.) reports on abuses of loopholes in the state’s Brownfield Cleanup Program, a law meant to encourage development on contaminated property through tax credits for environmental cleanup. The developer of Destiny USA, a stalled shopping mall expansion project, could collect up to $54 million in tax breaks despite insignificant…
Read MoreLeaking underground tanks leave legacy of contamination in Pennsylvania
An investigation of leaky underground storage tanks in the Lehigh Valley by Christopher Baxter and Tim Darragh of The Morning Call (Allentown, Pa.) found spills left lingering for years or even decades, homeowners kept in the dark about nearby problems and inconsistent tracking and enforcement by the state Department of Environmental Protection. The project includes…
Read MoreEx-residents slow to be notified of toxic water on Marine base
Despite a 2007 law requiring the Marine Corps to notify former residents of Camp Lejeune, N.C. that they may have been exposed to contaminated water between 1957 and 1987, many have never been notified while others are just now finding out, according to a report by Barbara Barrett of McClatchy Newspapers. “The Marines have registered…
Read MoreStimulus funds go to troubled corporations
Will Evans of California Watch found large corporations in California are getting hundreds of millions of dollars in federal stimulus dollars despite a history of environmental violations and a host of other legal problems.
Read MoreRegulations crippling commercial fishing industry
A Life at Sea/A Life at Risk, a six-part series by The Press of Atlantic City (N.J.), examined the crushing impact of federal and state fishing regulations on New Jersey’s $1 billion a year commercial fishing industry. “The regulations use size limits, gear restrictions, seasons, quotas and other methods to reduce the catch. A new…
Read MorePuerto Rican refinery had history of problems, neglect
Mc Nelly Torres, a freelance journalist, and Omaya Sosa Pascual, of El Centro Periodistico Investigativo de Puerto Rico, report decades of environmental violations, financial distress and neglect behind the company that owns the refinery where the Oct. 23 deadly explosion took place in Puerto Rico. The stories, a collaboration between journalists in Miami and Puerto…
Read MoreClean energy stimulus funds ending up overseas
The latest report from the Investigative Reporting Workshop at the American University shows that the majority of clean-energy grants paid out from stimulus funds have gone to overseas companies. “Of the $1.05 billion in clean-energy grants handed out by the government since Sept. 1, 84 percent – a total of $849 million – has gone…
Read MoreHistorical records used to identify forgotten lead smelter
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is opening an investigation of possible lead contamination in an Atlanta neighborhood after The Atlanta Journal-Constitution unearthed old documents showing that a lead smelter spewed lead dust over the area for decades. Old smelting industry directories, property records and mothballed regulatory files were used to identify the old Evans Metal…
Read MoreEnvironmental violations continue due to uneven enforcement
A review of Pennsylvania environmental records by Christopher Baxter of The Morning Call (Allentown, Penn.) found eight years of stop-and-go enforcement by the Department of Environmental Protection that allowed a steel coating plant to continue operating despite violating dozens of environmental regulations.
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