The Latest from EnviroBlog

Wal-Mart's 153 California stores are in danger of an audit from the state Department of Pesticide Regulation for selling home and lawn pesticides not approved for use in the state.

Key Issues: 

Chemical Policy

Pesticides

Straight from the Jackson Clarion-Ledger: E-mail sent to various U.S. Attorney's offices: SUBJECT: Have you had any cases involving the levees in New Orleans?

Key Issues: 

Environment

AP reports that University of North Carolina tests in 21 states found average mercury levels in tuna and swordfish at 1.1 parts per million, over the government's limit of 1 ppm. The samples came from supermarket chains, including Safeway and Whole Foods, and some groups are pushing for supermarkets to include warning signs with their seafood displays.

Key Issues: 

Mercury

Chemicals in Food

EPA's new human pesticide testing legislation prohibits intentional dosing of pregnant women and children, but will allow some human testing, subject to ethical standards and approval of a review board the agency plans to set up.

Key Issues: 

Pesticides

Here is a news story you may need to read twice. It's about people on energy company payrolls, consultants whose livelihoods depend on plundering our natural treasures, and who are now charged with screening requests to… plunder our natural treasures. When the Bureau of Land Management gives industry reps a stack of applications and a rubber stamp, it’s not outsourcing – it’s oligarchy.

Key Issues: 

Oil & Gas Drilling

Two Utah state agencies have denied a request for an independent testing program of mercury levels in fish in the Great Salt Lake Basin. In February the U.S. Geological Survey announced that the lake has the highest concentration of toxic mercury ever found in the environment.

Key Issues: 

Toxics

Mercury

As the New York Times editorialized on August 17, Congress will soon debate how to trim the nation's agricultural budget by $3 billion dollars. EWG agrees with the Times that Congress should not cut closely-monitored food stamp programs, but instead chop widely-abused farm subsidy programs that mostly help corporate farms, not small family farms.

Key Issues: 

Subsidies

Asarco, a subsidiary of mining conglomerate Grupo Mexico, filed for bankruptcy Wednesday, leaving taxpayers holding the bag on an estimated $1 billion in environmental cleanups in a dozen states that the company has dragged its feet on for more than a decade. The copper mining company has also been implicated in 95,000 personal-injury asbestos lawsuits.

Key Issues: 

Asbestos

In the past week, activists have pressed Teflon maker DuPont to clean up its act on two fronts. Environmental groups demanded that the company monitor groundwater around its local plant, the only one in the US that makes this indestructible, cancer-causing chemical, and the steeworkers' union urged carpet and clothing retailers and fast food companies to warn consumers that their products may be coated with chemicals that break down into DuPont's toxic Teflon chemical.

Key Issues: 

Toxics

Chemical Policy

Nonstick Chemicals

Consumer Products

Cookware

Food Containers

Chemicals in Food