When the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency ended most uses of the notorious pesticide DDT back in 1972, it wasn’t just because of the poison’s then suspected links to cancer and serious reproductive effects in humans. Evidence also suggested that the chemical would bioaccumulate in ...

US regulators claim they are not legally required to regulate toxic PFAS chemicals in sewage sludge spread on farmland across the country, according to a court filing the government made this week in response to a lawsuit from an environmental watchdog group. In its Sept. 9 filing, the ...

The Interior Department posted a revised scientific integrity policy last month. It requires each component agency to appoint a career staff person as scientific integrity officer. But to one group of scientists, the policy differs little from protections that were greatly weakened during ...

Now it’s likely the environmental groups will have to file their own lawsuit with the 10th Circuit, demanding the EPA’s tougher open-access rule be put back in place. Coloradans wanting to check up on actual air pollution emissions from oil and gas or other sites will be “getting ...

Utility company NV Energy will begin constructing the Greenlink West system in December and expects it to be in service by May 2027. The project’s recent record of decision allows the BLM along with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, National Park Service, and the Department of Energy to ...

The proposed route and its impacts on the national monument, as well as undeveloped desert lands across seven counties, is part of an ongoing debate over green energy and how the infrastructure needed to get that electricity to the power grid will forever change previously untouched places ...

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“In desert areas, off-road vehicles can be quite destructive,” said Jeff Ruch, director of the Pacific Regional Office of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. “They rip up whatever vegetation is there and make the land uninhabitable for wildlife.” Ruch called the ...

Though Western states are critical of the BLM policy, environmental activists lauded the rule as a much-needed way for conservation groups to improve the environment and revitalize public lands. Supporters also say the rule gives energy and mining companies a way to offset the ...

Known as “forever chemicals” because of their longevity, these toxic contaminants are now being detected, sometimes at high levels, on farmland across the country, including in Texas, Maine, Michigan, New York and Tennessee. In some cases the chemicals are suspected of sickening or ...

The lawsuit against the EPA states that the federal agency violated the Clean Water Act and the Administrative Procedures Act for failing to identify certain PFAS as “toxic pollutants” in sewage sludge and failing to regulate them where information exists to show that the chemicals ...

As visitation numbers continue to reach new heights, national parks are having trouble staffing enough rangers to keep up with demand, according to the nonprofit organization Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. “The Park Service’s ranger force is in deteriorating ...

The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Park Service were required to develop management plans for commercial air tours over national parks and tribal lands after Congress passed the National Parks Air Tour Management Plan Act in 2000. But it took almost two decades for the ...

EPA’s re-classification “dangerously ignores science and downplays the risks individuals face when they are exposed to 1,3-D,” wrote the attorneys general of seven states and the District of Columbia in a 2020 letter to the Office of Pesticide Programs. Top law enforcement officers ...

The NPS held an open comment period last year to gather feedback from the public and local, state, tribal, and federal agencies. The review gauged the potential e-bike impact in national parks on non-motorized trails. The Finding of No Significant Impact confirmed the 2020 decision that ...

A lack of park rangers puts more visitors in harm’s way, said Jeff Ruch, PEER’s Pacific director. “People are going deeper into places where they shouldn’t be and getting into trouble,” said Ruch, noting that park search-and-rescue calls have more than tripled between 2015 ...

The completion of the new environmental assessment and an accompanying finding of no significant impact is the latest turn for a public lands debate that gained speed in 2019 when the Trump administration ordered park superintendents to allow electric bicycles to be used throughout the ...

Parvini and his daughter participated in a small, preliminary study by PEER, or the Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, which involved wiping their hands with specialized wipes to detect chemicals after playing on turf and grass. The study confirmed that kids pick up PFAS ...

“I think the PFAS drinking water standards are one of the first big cases where you will see how the Loper decision is being applied,” said Tim Whitehouse, executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. “These decisions will open everything up to more and ...

The plan also calls for amending the National Environmental Policy Act to favor big business. Among other provisions, NEPA requires the federal government to include the public in federal land decisions. Project 2025 directs a future administration to set page limits and arbitrary ...