EHN Originals

HOUSTON — Multiple Houston-area oil and gas facilities that have previously violated the pollution limits in their permits have recently applied for new federal operating permits or renewals. These facilities include the Chevron Pasadena Refining facility, the LyondellBasell Houston refinery, and the Chevron Phillips Chemical Sweeny Complex in Brazoria County, all of which are seeking…

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Ashley couldn’t stop staring at her hands. Swollen and slightly twisted, her fingers looked more like “deformed sausages,” as she described them, than what you’d expect to see in a relatively healthy twenty-seven-year-old woman. She held her hands out as she greeted me, then pulled them back to unfasten her coat, struggling and wincing as…

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PITTSBURGH — On Wednesday, the morning after hurricane-like weather conditions killed at least four people and caused power outages at more than 400,000 homes in southwestern Pennsylvania, community advocates and scientists held an event to discuss how President Donald Trump’s first 100 days in office have set back climate action and harmed environmental health and…

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Editor’s note: This story was originally published in The New Lede, a journalism project of the Environmental Working Group, and is republished here with permission. Billed as a type of food system that works in harmony with nature, “regenerative” agriculture is gaining popularity in US farm country, garnering praise in books and films and noted…

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PITTSBURGH — The greater Pittsburgh metropolitan area is among the 25 regions in the country with the worst air pollution, according to a new report from the American Lung Association. The nonprofit public health organization’s annual “State of the Air” report uses a report card-style grading system to compare air quality in regions across the…

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In California’s agricultural heartland, where fields of grapes and strawberries stretch for miles, a sharp, acrid smell often lingers in the air. That smell is sulfur dioxide — a toxic gas formed when elemental sulfur, the most widely used pesticide in the United States, reacts with sunlight and air. Often promoted as “natural” and approved…

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Health impacts are likely being underestimated by traditional risk models used by regulators, according to a new study that has found a different way to measure the cumulative risk air pollution poses to health. The new method, which accounts for the ways numerous chemical exposures impact the entire body, found increased risks to people’s brains,…

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This article was originally published by U.S. Right To Know and is republished here with permission under a Creative Commons license. Chemicals found in common food packaging plastics like cling film and snack pouches may interfere with the body’s natural 24-hour sleep-wake cycle, increasing the risk of sleep disorders, diabetes, immune problems, and even cancer,…

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It’s a difficult time to be an environmental advocate. On his first day as president, Trump reversed most of the Biden administration’s climate policies with a series of executive orders. Since then, the administration has frozen funding for clean energy projects and community climate grants, and put most of the U.S. The Environmental Protection Agency’s…

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Es un momento difícil para ser activista ambiental. En su primer día como presidente, Trump revirtió casi todo las políticas climáticas de la administración de Biden con una serie de órdenes ejecutivas. Desde entonces, la administración ha congelado la financiación para proyectos de energía limpia y subvenciones climáticas, puso en baja administrativa a la oficina…

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