Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. BROWNSVILLE, Texas – In April 1991, health care workers in this border town were brought up short. In a matter of hours, three babies were born at the Community Health Clinic with anencephaly, a rare birth defect marked by the failure of the fetus […]
Climate change
Posted inDecember 3, 2001: Closing the wounds
Trash talk
It would be a blessing if it were possible to study garbage in the abstract, to study garbage without having to handle it physically. But that is not possible. Garbage is not mathematics. To understand garbage you have to touch it, to feel it , to sort it, to smell it. You have to pick […]
Posted inNovember 19, 2001: Bringing back the bosque
Pollution pickle sours landowner
NORTH DAKOTA Like tremolite asbestos fibers, the Montana-based W.R. Grace & Co. vermiculite contamination problem gets stickier with time. Last year, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency discovered asbestos-laden soil around a storage warehouse owned by the Minot Park District in Minot, N.D. While the agency is currently testing the extent of the contamination, EPA coordinator […]
Posted inNovember 19, 2001: Bringing back the bosque
Will salt sink an agricultural empire?
Feds still plugged up over disposal of irrigation waters
Posted inNovember 5, 2001: Wyoming's powder keg
All’s fair in smog and waste?
Ever wonder if being a renter increases your risk of cancer from hazardous air pollutants? Or whether your income level correlates to how far you live from a Superfund site? Now, by entering your ZIP code into a new Web site, you can get answers to questions like these, based on data collected from your […]
Posted inOctober 8, 2001: Whoa! Canada!
The smog is lifting
COLORADO Ask any Denver resident stuck in rush-hour traffic about growth along Colorado’s Front Range, and you may unleash a frustrated tirade. But despite all the new vehicles idling on the highways, Denver residents are breathing cleaner air than they were 20 years ago. In the late 1970s, Denver violated federal health standards for three […]
Posted inSeptember 10, 2001: The rise and fall of a desert stream
Texaco spill leaves residents fuming
MONTANA Despite its cheery name, metaphorical clouds hang over Sunburst, Mont., where the town’s 415 residents are grappling with a toxic disaster. About a dozen homes sit atop a gasoline pool that was formed 46 years ago when a Texaco oil refinery leaked just outside town. The underground spill contaminated groundwater and soil and released […]
Posted inSeptember 10, 2001: The rise and fall of a desert stream
New dump may trash Tacoma’s water
Locals worry they’ll drink ‘garbage juice’
Posted inMay 7, 2001: Back into the woods
Drought drains the West
Dry skies spell trouble for farmers, fish and forests
Posted inApril 23, 2001: The Big Blowup
Company leaves victims in its dust
Facing a blizzard of lawsuits, W.R. Grace & Co. declares bankruptcy
Posted inFebruary 12, 2001: Mr. Babbitt's wild ride
I am an Inuit warrior
“Let’s walk downtown and get a video,” said my husband on a starry January evening. “Are you out of your mind?” I asked, peeking at the thermometer outside the kitchen window. The red line hovered near zero. “That would mean we’d have to go outside.” “Honey,” he said, as gently as he could. “We live […]
Posted inOctober 9, 2000: The hunters and the hunted
Will Western skies be clear enough?
COLORADO PLATEAU A coalition of 12 Western states and 10 Indian tribes has a plan to clean the air over the Colorado Plateau. But critics think the Western Regional Air Partnership’s plan is too soft. The agreement, now before the Environmental Protection Agency, would bring Western states into compliance with the Clean Air Act, which […]
Posted inAugust 28, 2000: The mine that turned the Red River blue
Cement glues citizens together
A southern Colorado city could lose its newly clean reputation PUEBLO, Colo. – Cecil Ross remembers when his city was known as “Pew Town.” The wheat farmer says pollution from the state’s largest steel mill once filled the city’s air with foul-smelling odors and chemicals. Today, standing on his ranch three miles from Pueblo, Ross […]
Posted inAugust 14, 2000: Meth invasion
Dumping diesel
CALIFORNIA Southern California, home to some of the dirtiest air in the nation, is dumping diesel engines in favor of cleaner-burning energy sources such as natural gas and electricity. Last year, a report conducted by the South Coast Air Quality Management District, a local air pollution control agency, found that diesel exhaust is responsible for […]
Posted inAugust 14, 2000: Meth invasion
Composting takes out the trash
CALIFORNIA California produces nearly 48 million tons of trash every year. A decade ago, the Golden State mandated that it cut landfill waste by 50 percent in an attempt to reduce these numbers. The state is close to its goal: It’s reduced landfill waste by nearly 40 percent so far, and some say composting has […]
Posted inJuly 3, 2000: A river resurrected
Los Alamos races against time
Summer monsoons could wash laboratory waste into the San Ildefonso Pueblo and the Rio Grande
Posted inJune 5, 2000: Change on the Plains
Mining tops toxic list
NATION For the first time, the Environmental Protection Agency’s annual inventory of industrial toxic releases included hardrock mining and six other industries – and the newcomers stole the show. With the addition of these industries to the Toxics Release Inventory (HCN, 9/16/96), reported toxic releases in the United States nearly tripled, increasing from 2.6 to […]
Posted inMay 8, 2000: After the fall
Western weather waffles
The Northwest looks at a soggy summer, while the Southwest may just burn
Posted inApril 10, 2000: Beyond the Revolution
Boss must pay for poisoning employee
A judge hands down the first-ever conviction for knowingly exposing an employee to hazardous waste
Posted inJanuary 31, 2000: Searching for pasture
Cooling the waters
If the EPA has its way, Potlatch Corp. pulp mill in Lewiston, Idaho, will cool its wastewater and reduce toxic compounds flowing into the Snake River (HCN, 12/06/99). A lawsuit filed by several Idaho environmental groups prompted the Environmental Protection Agency to release a draft of a more stringent water pollution permit. It says Potlatch […]