Uncategorized
All Stories
-
Feeling Sheepish
Sierra Nevada bighorn sheep gained endangered status Monday, eight months after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service had given the species a temporary, emergency listing. An estimated 125 bighorns remain in the 400-mile-long Sierra Nevada range, less than half the population of 15 years ago. The bighorn herds have been devastated by hunting, domestic sheep […]
-
Pay the Bill
Democratic presidential hopeful Bill Bradley attacked corporate pork yesterday, announcing that as president he would work to eliminate tax shelters, loopholes, and subsidies that favor big companies, including those engaged in environmentally destructive practices. Bradley specifically said he wants to cut benefits to mining companies that drill on public land and pay small royalties, oil […]
-
Into Thin Air
A federal court has struck another blow to EPA’s clean-air efforts, ordering the EPA to change a rule that would have expanded a program to require the use of reformulated gasoline, which burns more cleanly than conventional gasoline. The rule, issued in September 1998, would have allowed up to 80 municipalities not in violation of […]
-
No Kidding
Far too little is known about the health risks facing kids in the U.S. from the use of pesticides at schools, according to a General Accounting Office report conducted at the request of Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.). About 2,300 cases of pesticide-related exposure in schools were reported to poison-control centers from 1993 to 1996, and […]
-
Getting Wasted
As of 1998, Americans were recycling 28.8 percent of the municipal solid waste stream, up from 16 percent in 1990 and 10 percent in 1980. But after years of rapid growth, recycling rates seem to be leveling off and many states and municipalities are finding it difficult to achieve their more ambitious recycling goals. Today […]
-
Car Trek: The Next Generation
This weekend General Motors will unveil its experimental Precept car, a diesel-electric hybrid that gets almost 80 miles to the gallon and is probably the most expensive single car ever built. Like similar experimental models from Ford and DaimlerChrysler, it was constructed under the umbrella of the industry-government Partnership for a New Generation of Vehicles. […]
-
Hong Kong Phooey
Hong Kong businesses are starting to worry that the city’s abysmal air quality and pollution problems will hinder their ability to attract talented new employees. Hong Kong’s smog problems are largely the result of diesel-powered vehicles in the city and factories in the nearby Chinese province of Guangdong. Ozone levels, an indicator of smog, have […]
-
Stick This in Your Pipeline
U.S. taxpayer dollars are being spent to help finance a gas pipeline through a rare forest ecosystem in Bolivia, in violation of Clinton administration policies, enviro groups say. U.S. energy giants Enron and Shell are working with the Bolivian consortium Transredes to build a 243-mile pipeline that will run through Bolivia’s Chiquitano dry forest, considered […]
-
More Pollution Than a Barrel of Monkeys
Trash from one household burned in a backyard barrel may release more dioxins, furans, and other chlorine-containing pollutants into the air than tons of trash burned by a municipal waste incinerator serving tens of thousands of homes, according to a new report by EPA scientists, being published in the journal Environmental Science & Technology. An […]
-
Do Cry Over Spilt Oil
While large oil spills threaten sea birds off the coast of France and in a Turkish shipping channel this week, scientists are warning that even small oil spills may harm marine bird populations to a much greater degree than previously thought. “Marine birds are slow to reproduce, and they’re migratory. Even a small spill that […]
