Chemicals

"Tiny bits of plastic are contaminating mussels from the European Arctic to China in a sign of the global spread of ocean pollution that can end up on people’s dinner plates."

"The Trump administration has quietly delayed action on dangerous solvents that the Environmental Protection Agency had previously planned to ban."

"Missouri has issued its first fines over the misuse of a farm chemical in 2016 that went on to be linked in different formulations to widespread U.S. crop damage this year, the state said on Thursday."

"President Trump’s nominee to oversee the Environmental Protection Agency’s chemical safety division on Wednesday withdrew his name from consideration for the post in the face of mounting opposition."

"U.S. Steel failed to test a Lake Michigan tributary for highly toxic hexavalent chromium after blue liquid "with visible solids" poured out of one of the company's northwest Indiana plants in late October, according to documents posted online Tuesday by state regulators."

"Minnesota became the latest U.S. state on Tuesday to restrict controversial weed killers made by Monsanto Co and BASF SE that were linked to widespread crop damage, while Arkansas took a step back from imposing new limits."

"North Dakota's agriculture commissioner says he's scrapping a new requirement that people inform the state before applying the weed killer dicamba, but he's keeping a new restriction on when the herbicide can be sprayed."

"The cost of harmful chemical and heavy metal exposures around the world likely tops 10 percent of the global GDP, according to a new study."