Pollution

"Fifteen states and two cities sued the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Tuesday for declining to tighten air quality standards for ozone pollution, the main ingredient in smog."

"Methane leaking out of the more than 4 million abandoned oil and gas wells in the United States and Canada is a far greater contributor to climate change than government estimates suggest, researchers from McGill University said on Wednesday."

"President-elect Joe Biden will order U.S. agencies on Wednesday to revisit fuel efficiency standards as well as rules governing emissions from airplanes, and appliance and building energy efficiency standards, the transition team said."

"The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is facing two legal challenges from environmental groups and a coalition of 12 states and Washington, D.C., over its new emissions standards for airlines."

"Environmental and civil rights groups are suing the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over a new lead rule critics argue doesn't do enough to remove the lead pipes that contaminate drinking water."

"Air quality regulators have lifted the limits on the number of cremations that can be performed in Los Angeles county, citing a death rate that is more than double the pre-pandemic norm and an unmanageable backlog of dead bodies."

"A wheelbarrow and a handful of metal grids for capturing litter, emblazoned with the words “Renew Oceans,” sit rusting outside an empty, padlocked office in the Indian city of Varanasi, a short walk from the Ganges."

"Toyota Motor is set to pay a $180 million fine for longstanding violations of the Clean Air Act, the U.S. attorney’s Office in Manhattan announced on Thursday, the largest civil penalty ever levied for a breach of federal emissions-reporting requirements."

"A queue of cars stretched for more than a half mile outside a church in Flint on Thursday morning, filled with residents waiting for free cases of bottled water, as they have since tainted water began streaming out of their taps six years ago. Miles away in downtown Flint, something more novel was happening: A line of state officials, most prominently Rick Snyder, the former governor, were charged with crimes connected to the crisis."

"The Navajo Nation’s Department of Justice announced Wednesday it has settled with mining companies to resolve claims stemming from a 2015 spill that resulted in rivers in three western states being fouled with a bright-yellow plume of arsenic, lead and other heavy metals."