News Articles
| CHINA: Earth-Friendly Elements, Mined Destructively by Keith Bradsher, New York Times December 26th, 2009 Some of the greenest technologies of the age, from electric cars to efficient light bulbs to very large wind turbines, are made possible by an unusual group of elements called rare earths. Most of these come from China. “In many places, the mining is abused,” said Wang Caifeng, the top rare-earths industry regulator at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in China. |
| US: Monsanto's dominance draws antitrust inquiry by Peter Whoriskey, Washington Post November 29th, 2009 For plants designed in a lab a little more than a decade ago, they've come a long way: Today, the vast majority of the nation's two primary crops grow from seeds genetically altered according to Monsanto company patents. Now Monsanto -- like IBM and Google -- has drawn scrutiny from U.S. antitrust investigators. |
| IVORY COAST: Trafigura offers deal to 31,000 Africans over dumped waste http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/africa/article6837795.ece October 17th, 2009 British oil trader Trafigura has offered to settle a court case brought by 31,000 Africans who say that they were injured in the largest personal injuries class action mounted in an English court. The action resulted from the dumping of 400 tonnes of waste in the Ivory Coast by an oil tanker, the Probo Koala, in 2006 — one of the worst pollution disasters in recent history. |
| IVORY COAST: Trafigura offers deal to 31,000 Africans over dumped waste by Frances Gibb, The Times (London) October 17th, 2009 British oil trader Trafigura has offered to settle a court case brought by 31,000 Africans who say that they were injured in the largest personal injuries class action mounted in an English court. The action resulted from the dumping of 400 tonnes of waste in the Ivory Coast by an oil tanker, the Probo Koala, in 2006 — one of the worst pollution disasters in recent history. |
| IVORY COAST: Toxic waste: company to pay by AFP, Times Live September 17th, 2009 Victims will receive compensation after seeking legal action in Britain against Trafigura oil company. Waste from a ship the company chartered was illegally dumped in Abidjan, killing 17 people and causing more than 100,000 to seek medical help in 2006. |
| US: Clean Water Laws Are Neglected, at a Cost in Suffering by Charles Duhigg, New York Times September 12th, 2009 Violations of the Clean Water Act have risen steadily across the nation, an extensive review of water pollution records by The New York Times found. Polluters include small companies, like gas stations, dry cleaners, and shopping malls. They also include large operations, like chemical factories, power plants, sewage treatment centers and one of the biggest zinc smelters, the Horsehead Corporation of Pennsylvania. |
| US: Chevron annual meeting heats up over Ecuador suit by Jordan Robertson, Washington Post May 27th, 2009 In a combative and sometimes colorful annual meeting, Chevron's CEO and chairman exchanged barbs with activists over pollution in the Amazon rain forest and the company's human rights record. The nation's second-largest oil company is awaiting a verdict from a judge in Ecuador that could come with a $27 billion price tag. |
| US: Board cancels hearing under Bayer pressure by Ken Ward, Jr., The Charleston Gazette February 25th, 2009 The U.S. Chemical Safety Board has canceled a public meeting to brief local residents on its investigation of an August 2008 explosion that killed two Bayer Institute plant workers. Chemical plant security activists expressed shock; the meeting was also to discuss concerns about a methyl isocyanate tank located near the site of the deadly blast. |
| SWITZERLAND: Davos Scales Back Glitz by Associated Press, New York Times January 25th, 2009 The economic crisis that emerged out the collapse of securities based on shaky U.S. mortgages poses challenges for the Davos World Economic Forum, an arena that has championed market-driven approaches. |
| VIETNAM: Vietnam Cracks Down on Polluters by Martha Ann Overland, TIME October 17th, 2008 Long before a government report confirmed it, villagers living along the banks of the Thi Vai river in the Mekong Delta knew full well that the waterway was dead. They had complained for years that industrial waste discharged into the Thi Vai had poisoned their wells, killed all the fish and was making them sick. Yet it wasn't until cargo companies refused to dock at the river's main port — saying that the toxic brew was eating through the ships' hulls — that Vietnam officials were willing to get tough on polluters. |
| IVORY COAST: Ivory Coast workers can't sue firms in U.S. by Bob Egelko, San Francisco Chronicle September 25th, 2008 Ivory Coast plantation workers who claim they were sterilized by a U.S.-made pesticide can't sue the manufacturers and distributors of the chemical in the United States because they can't show the companies intended to harm them, a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday. |
| INDIA: Decades Later, Toxic Sludge Torments Bhopal by Somini Sengupta, New York Times July 7th, 2008 Residents of Bhopal, India continue to suffer from Union Carbide's toxic legacy, this time in the form of toxic waste that still languishes inside a shoddy warehouse on the old factory grounds. Ailments such as cleft palates and mental retardation are appearing in numbers of Bhopali children, raising questions about contaminated soil and groundwater, clean-up, and liability. |
| EUROPE: Chemical Law Has Global Impact by Lyndsey Layton, Washington Post June 12th, 2008 Europe this month rolled out new restrictions on makers of chemicals linked to cancer and other health problems. The changes follow eight years of vigorous opposition from the U.S. chemical industry giants like DuPont, and the Bush administration. |
| CHINA: In China City, Protesters See Pollution Risk of New Plant by Edward Wong, New York Times May 6th, 2008 Residents took to the streets of Chengdu to protest a $5.5 billion ethylene plant under construction by PetroChina, reflecting a surge in environmental awareness by urban, middle-class Chinese determined to protect their health and the value of their property. |
| GLOBAL: 2 Reports At Odds On Biotech Crops by Rick Weiss, The Washington Post February 14th, 2008 Dueling reports released yesterday -- one by a consortium largely funded by the biotech industry and the other by a pair of environmental and consumer groups -- came to those diametrically different conclusions. |
| US: Uranium Exploration Near Grand Canyon
by FELICITY BARRINGER, The New York Times February 7th, 2008 With minimal public notice and no formal environmental review, the Forest Service has approved a permit allowing a British mining company to explore for uranium just outside Grand Canyon National Park, less than three miles from a popular lookout over the canyon’s southern rim. |
| PERU: For Peru's Indians, Lawsuit Against Big Oil Reflects a New Era by Kelly Hearn, The Washington Post January 31st, 2008 Oxy is Occidental Petroleum, the California-based company that pulled a fortune from this rain forest from 1972 to 2000. It is also the company that Maynas and other Achuar leaders now blame for wreaking environmental havoc -- and leaving many of the people here ill. |
| CHINA: Tainted Drugs Tied to Maker of Abortion Pill
by JAKE HOOKER and WALT BOGDANICH, The New York Times January 31st, 2008 A huge state-owned Chinese pharmaceutical company that exports to dozens of countries, including the United States, is at the center of a nationwide drug scandal after nearly 200 Chinese cancer patients were paralyzed or otherwise harmed last summer by contaminated leukemia drugs. |
| GLOBAL: False 'Green' Ads Draw Global Scrutiny
by Tom Wright, Wall Street Journal January 30th, 2008 With companies eager to tout their "green" credentials to consumers, advertising watchdogs are stepping up efforts to rein in marketers that make false or exaggerated claims. |
| US: Protests Greet Nuclear Power Resurgence in US South by Matthew Cardinale, IPS January 14th, 2008 Residents and environmental activists are in a bitter dispute with large U.S. energy corporations and the federal government over the safety of nuclear power, as more than a dozen corporations plan to, or have filed, paperwork to open new nuclear power plants, primarily in the U.S. South. |
| NIGERIA: Inefficient Gas Flaring Remains Unchecked by Sam Olukoya, IPS January 10th, 2008 Some of the largest multinational oil companies in the world -- including the U.K. and Dutch owned Shell, the French company Total, and the American companies Mobil and Chevron -- are responsible for the bulk of the scores of gas flares burning in Nigeria. |
| IRAQ: 2005 Use of Gas by Blackwater Leaves Questions by JAMES RISEN, New York Times January 10th, 2008 In 2005 Blackwater accidentally dropped teargas on US soldiers, which has raised significant new questions about the role of private security contractors in Iraq, and whether they operate under the same rules of engagement and international treaty obligations that the American military observes. |
| US: Suit says IBM dumped chemicals in New York state
by Dan Wilchins and Philipp Gollner, Reuters January 3rd, 2008 Neighbors of a former IBM plant in New York state sued the company on Thursday, saying it released chemicals into the air, ground and water for nearly 80 years that caused birth defects and cancer. |
| CHINA/US: The Recalls’ Aftershocks by Louise Story and David Barboza, New York Times December 22nd, 2007 Toy makers are investigating whether they need to treat their tainted products with stabilization chemicals or if they must seal the toys in giant polyethylene bags. |
| CHINA: China Grabs West’s Smoke-Spewing Factories by Joseph Kahn and Mark Landler, New York Times December 21st, 2007 In its rush to re-create the industrial revolution that made the West rich, China has absorbed most of the major industries that once made the West dirty. |
| GERMANY: FSC's 'Green' Label for Wood Products Gets Growing Pains by Tom Wright and Jim Carlton, Wall Street Journal October 30th, 2007 The Forest Stewardship Council -- a widely recognized third-party labeling system to identify "green" wood and paper products -- has acknowledged that some companies using its label are destroying pristine forests and says it plans to overhaul its rules. |
| US: 77 multi-million dollar suits filed against Monsanto by Chris Dickerson, WV Record October 5th, 2007 A Charleston attorney has filed more than 70 cancer lawsuits against Monsanto and related companies over its old plant in Nitro. |
| US: Evoking Vietnam clash, Wisconsin students to protest Halliburton visit by Ryan J. Foley, AP, Houston Chronicle September 19th, 2007 Students at Madison protest against Halliburton Co. recruiters, evoking memories of a 1967 protest of Dow, which made napalm for the US military. |
| INDONESIA: Mr. Clean: Accused of Poisoning Indonesian Villagers, Rick Ness Tries to Prove His Innocence by David Case, Mother Jones magazine September 10th, 2007 Ever since Rick Ness was accused of contaminating pristine Indonesian water, he's been spending a million a month to convince the world that he's innocent. And once you meet him, you'll want to believe him. |
| US: FTC: Milk Ads Not Misleading by Sam Hananel, Guardian (UK) August 28th, 2007 Federal regulators have turned down a request from Monsanto Co. to take action against dairy companies that advertise milk as free of synthetic hormones. |
| WORLD: We must count the true cost of cheap China by Richard McGregor, Financial Times August 2nd, 2007 In the wake of the multiple scandals over tainted Chinese food and drug exports in recent months, Chinese goods now have an indelible image of being not just cheap, but life-threatening as well. But the fact that wrongly labelled foods, liquor and pharmaceuticals have routinely sickened and even killed people en masse in China has been largely overlooked. |
| US: Mattel Recalls One Million Toys by Louise Story , New York Times August 2nd, 2007 Mattel, the maker of Barbie dolls and Hot Wheels cars, is recalling nearly one million toys in the United States today because the products’ surfaces are covered in lead paint. According to Mattel, all the toys were made by a contract manufacturer in China. |
| EUROPE: A Genetically Modified Potato, Not for Eating, Is Stirring Some Opposition in Europe by Elisabeth Rosenthal, The New York Times July 24th, 2007 Amflora potatoes, likely to become the first genetically modified crop in the last decade to be approved for growth in Europe, have become the unlikely lightning rod in the angry debate over such products on the Continent. |
| CHILE: Chile Must Pay US$5.4 Million to Aricans Living Amid Toxic Waste
by Mike Hager, The Santiago Times June 1st, 2007 In a landmark case, Chile’s Supreme Court ruled this week that the state must compensate 356 residents of two slums in the northern mining city of Arica for health problems brought on by years of exposure to open deposits of toxic waste. Promel, the Swedish company responsible for the importation of the toxic materials, cannot compensate the plaintiffs because the company no longer exists. |
| CYPRUS: US company’s toxic waste under scrutiny in Cyprus Today's Zaman May 10th, 2007 US mining company Cyprus Mines Corporation dumped 10 million tons of toxic waste on the island during its 60-year-long operations on Cyprus. |
| UK: Monsanto helped to create one of the most contaminated sites in Britain by John Vidal, The Guardian (UK) February 12th, 2007 Previously unseen Environment Agency documents from 2005 show that almost 30 years after being filled, Brofiscin is one of the most contaminated places in Britain. According to engineering company WS Atkins, in a report prepared for the agency and the local authority in 2005 but never made public, the site contains at least 67 toxic chemicals. Seven PCBs have been identified, along with vinyl chlorides and naphthalene. |
| UK: UK class action starts over toxic waste dumped in Africa by John Vidal, Guardian (UK) January 8th, 2007 Lawyers will today begin preparing the ground for one of the largest class actions heard in the UK over 400 tonnes of allegedly highly toxic waste dumped in the Ivory Coast from a cargo ship chartered by a London-based company. |
| UK: Probe after workers burned in toxic leak The Northern Echo January 5th, 2007 Dozens of workers at a Teesside chemical plant received hospital treatment after suffering burns and breathing difficulties following a leak of 4.5 tonnes of toxic chemicals. |
| US: Toxic Teflon: Compounds from Household Products Found in Human Blood by Stan Cox, Alternet January 2nd, 2007 DuPont and other companies use those synthetic compounds to make an extraordinarily wide range of products, including nonstick cookware (e.g, Teflon), grease-resistant food packaging (e.g., microwave popcorn and pizza boxes), stain-resistant fabrics and carpets (e.g., Stainmaster), shampoos, conditioners, cleaning products, electronic components, paints, firefighting foams, and a host of other artifacts of modern life. |
| US: Shareholders to Dow: Deal with Mass Poisoning Fallout by Aaron Glantz, One World US December 9th, 2006 Owners of more than $278 million in shares of Dow Chemical field a shareholder resolution this week demanding the company address outstanding issues from a 1984 explosion at a pesticide plant in India. |
| UK: Renowned cancer scientist was paid by chemical firm for 20 years by Sarah Boseley, The Guardian (UK) December 8th, 2006 A world-famous British scientist failed to disclose that he held a paid consultancy with a chemical company for more than 20 years while investigating cancer risks in the industry, the Guardian can reveal. |
| US: Polluting Ohio HazWaste Incinerator Fined $750,000 Environment News Service December 5th, 2006 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Department of Justice have reached an agreement with Von Roll America Inc. on alleged clean air and hazardous waste violations at the company's commercial hazardous waste incinerator in East Liverpool, Ohio. |
| PHILIPPINES: Banana firm bars DoH team from proving chemical poisoning by Jeffrey M. Tupas, Inquirer (PHIL) December 1st, 2006 Experts from the Department of Health (DoH) were denied entry Thursday by the management of the Tagum Agricultural Development Corporation, Inc. (Tadeco) to the company-owned hospital in Panabo City where victims of toxic chemical inhalation from the nearby town of Braulio Dujali in Davao del Norte were confined. |
| WORLD: Safety of Nanotechnology Needs More Attention Environment News Service November 28th, 2006 The number of consumer products made with nanotechnology is exploding, with a 70 percent increase in the past eight months. While recognizing the value of these molecular-level advances, critics say the Bush administration is doing too little to ensure the safety of nanotechnology for workers and the public. |
| EU: Chemicals: A tale of fear and lobbying by Matthew Saltmarsh, International Herald Tribune October 27th, 2006 Three years ago, Margot Wallstrom, who was then the European Union's environment commissioner, revealed to a startled Brussels press corps that a blood test had found the presence of 28 artificial chemicals in her body, including DDT, a pesticide banned from European farms since 1983, when it was found to harm wildlife and attack the nervous system. |
| US: Honeywell Agrees to $451 Million Lake Cleanup Environment News Service October 13th, 2006 Aerospace giant Honeywell Inc. has agreed to spend $451 million to clean up contaminated sediments in Onondaga Lake, one of the most polluted lakes in the United States. The lake, a sacred site to Native America tribes, is heavily contaminated with an array of toxic metals and chemicals and is one of only three lakes listed as a federal Superfund site. |
| IVORY COAST: Toxic dumpers face jail term Reuters September 24th, 2006 SUSPECTS charged in connection with the dumping of toxic waste in Ivory Coast, which killed seven people and made thousands ill, could face up to 20 years in jail if convicted, a Justice Ministry official said. |
| IVORY COAST: Waste Headed for a Third World Bin by Julio Godoy, Inter Press Service September 21st, 2006 The Panamanian flagged ship Probo Koala unloaded more than 550 tonnes of toxic waste at Abidjan port in C- te d'Ivoire a month back. Emissions from that toxic waste have killed seven people and poisoned thousands. |
| INDIA: Union Carbide Must Clean Bhopal Mess - Residents by Nityanand Jayaraman, Inter Press Service (IPS) September 1st, 2006 After an appellate court in the United States rejected claims by Bhopal city residents, seeking compensation from Union Carbide for environmental contamination around the site of the world's worst industrial disaster, plans are afoot to have the case transferred to India. |
| US: It's Not Easy Being Green: Are weed-killers turning frogs into hermaphrodites?
by William Souder, Harpers August 25th, 2006 In the summer of 1997, Tyrone Hayes, a biologist at the University of California, Berkeley, accepted what seemed a harmless offer to join a panel of eight other scientists investigating the safety of the common weed-killer atrazine. The panel had been commissioned by atrazine's inventor and primary manufacturer, the Swiss-based chemical giant then called Novartis and since renamed Syngenta. The company wanted to know if its product threatened “non-target” organisms, including fish, reptiles, and amphibians—creatures whose fate had remained largely unexplored through the half century in which atrazine had become the most heavily used herbicide in the United States as well as one of its most widespread environmental contaminants. |
| US: River remains toxic, but not quite as bad by Jeremiah Stettler, The Saginaw News The Tittabawassee River is less toxic than once thought, a World Health Organization report suggests. But it's still toxic. |
| AUSTRALIA: Toxic cocktail released in fire by Jason Gregory, Michael Corkill and Margaret Slocombe , The Courier Mail June 29th, 2006 A HIGH-LEVEL government report into toxic hazards at a notorious industrial estate north of Brisbane is expected to find several violations of chemical storage rules by businesses located on the site. |
| EU: Brussels to raise fines for cartels tenfold by David Gow, The Guardian (UK) June 28th, 2006 Companies found guilty of anti-competitive practices will face multibillion euro fines or more than 10 times the current tariffs for abusing their monopoly and taking part in cartels under draconian new competition guidelines adopted by the European Commission today. |
| US: Ag-Mart influence alleged by Kristin Collins, The News and Observer June 11th, 2006 A state report on pesticides and birth defects might have been influenced by the company that was its focus, some researchers who worked on the report say. |
| CANADA: Abnormal Birth Rates in Canadian Native Reserve by Cindy Drukier and Rory Xu, The Epoch Times June 9th, 2006 There's something is in the air at the Aamjiwnaang First Nations reserve near Sarnia, Ontario. But it's not just in the air. It's also in the water, the soil, and in the residents themselves: alarming levels of toxic chemicals, believed to be behind the area's skewed birth ratios. In Aamjiwnaang, two girls are born for every boy. |
| ARGENTINA: Argentina to Take Legal Action Against U.S. Biotech Giant Monsanto in Spain by David Haskel, BNA June 1st, 2006 Argentina will take legal action against Monsanto in Spain and in other European nations if the U.S. biotechnology giant continues to block Argentine soy shipments from reaching European Union markets, an Argentine Agriculture Secretariat official said. |
| US: Cargill Fined by State Over Toxic Spill into Bay by Paul Rogers, San Jose Mercury News June 1st, 2006 State water officials have fined Cargill Salt $71,000 after the Newark company spilled thousands of gallons of toxic brine last year along the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay. |
| US: Deformities in infants blamed on migrant worker pesticide exposure Associated Press/News 14 Carolina May 25th, 2006 North Carolina health officials urged closer communication between the state's agriculture, labor and health departments and stricter enforcement of pesticide laws after three severely deformed children were born to migrant farmworkers. |
| COSTA RICA: Court Rules Dupont's Fungicide Damaged Costa Rican Farmers' Crops Environment News Service May 18th, 2006 Lead counsel Don Russo of Don Russo, P.A., and lawyers with Holland & Hart Wednesday obtained an award of $113.48 million on behalf of 27 Costa Rican leatherleaf fern farmers in a lawsuit against E.I. DuPont de Nemours & Co. |
| COSTA RICA: Farmers Win Suit vs. DuPont
by Randall Chase, Associated Press May 17th, 2006 A group of Costa Rican fern growers received a multimillion-dollar award against DuPont Co. on Wednesday for damages to their crops caused by the fungicide Benlate. |
| INDIA: India rejects wheat from Australia by Orietta Guerrera, The Age May 2nd, 2006 Wheat exporter AWB has rushed a high-level delegation to India, after the country refused to unload 50,000 tonnes of Australian wheat that it claims contain unacceptable levels of pesticide. |
| US: Recycling: Not Apple's Core Value by Pete Mortensen, Wired April 26th, 2006 Despite its image as a progressive corporate citizen, Apple Computer had one of the worst recycling records in the American PC industry -- until last week. But even after Apple unveiled its first free computer recycling program Friday, it still falls short of competitors like Hewlett-Packard and Dell, observers say. |
| HONG KONG: Hong Kong Stores Accused in Pesticide Scare Agence France Presse April 18th, 2006 Hong Kong supermarkets have halted some vegetable sales amid a new food scare after pressure group Greenpeace accused grocery chains of selling produce tainted with dangerous levels of pesticides. |
| UK: Eight arrests after goldmine raid by Paul Carter, The Daily Telegraph April 16th, 2006 FIFTY environmental activists have stormed and occupied an open cut goldmine in Western New South Wales, halting mining operations, and causing the arrest of eight protesters, police and the activists said today. |
| US: E-waste dump of the world by Tim Johnson, The Seattle Times April 9th, 2006 When discarded computers vanish from desktops around the world, they often end up in Guiyu, which may be the electronic-waste capital of the globe. |
| US: US lawmakers come to Bhopal gas victims help Rediff.com April 5th, 2006 Eleven members of US Congress today filed an amicus brief with the country's Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit on behalf of more than 20,000 victims of the 1984 Union Carbide chemical disaster in Bhopal. |
| US: Benzene Fears Prompt Call for Banning Some Soft Drinks at Schools by David Goldstein, Knight Ridder March 28th, 2006 Some leading public-health experts want education officials to ban certain soft drinks from public schools until they're proved safe and free of the cancer-causing chemical benzene. |
| VIETNAM: Agent Orange Victims Gather to Seek Justice Reuters March 28th, 2006 Vietnam War veterans from the United States, South Korea, Australia and Vietnam gathered on Tuesday to call for more help for the victims of the Agent Orange defoliant used by the U.S. military. |
| LATIN AMERICA: Victims of Glyphosate by Roberto Villar Belmonte, Inter Press Service News Agency March 16th, 2006 The pain and suffering of victims of toxic agrochemicals invaded the international negotiations on biosafety in Curitiba, Brazil this week with the accounts of a Paraguayan mother whose son died from herbicide poisoning and local residents of a neighbourhood in Córdoba, Argentina facing a severe health crisis caused by the fumigation of surrounding fields. |
| US: Mercury control program approved despite objections by Jeff DeLong, Reno-Gazette-Journal March 9th, 2006 A mandatory program to control mercury emissions from Nevada gold mines was approved by state officials Wednesday over the objections of environmentalists and residents from the neighboring states of Utah and Idaho. |
| US: Deal Reached to Clean Toxic Bronx Site by Timothy Williams, The New York Times March 4th, 2006 For more than 40 years, Hexagon Laboratories made pharmaceuticals on a quiet stretch of Peartree Avenue not far from Co-op City in the Bronx. When the company abandoned the site in 1989, it left behind thousands of gallons of toxic waste. |
| AUSTRALIA: Rally asks pulp fact or pulp fiction by Tim Martain, The Mercury March 2nd, 2006 Describing the proposed Gunns Ltd pulp mill as "cutting edge" was farcical, a toxic chemicals expert said yesterday. |
| US: Chromium Evidence Buried, Report Says by Rick Weiss, The Washington Post February 24th, 2006 Scientists working for the chromium industry withheld data about the metal's health risks while the industry campaigned to block strict new limits on the cancer-causing chemical, according to a scientific journal report published yesterday. |
| US: HazChem Criminal Who Sent Waste to Rotterdam Fined $2 Million Environmental News Service February 17th, 2006 Joel Udell and two affiliated businesses, Pyramid Chemical Sales Co. and Nittany Warehouse LP, were sentenced on Tuesday to pay more than $2 million in restitution and fines for mishandling hazardous wastes in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, and in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. |
| US: EPA cites Northshore Mining for clean-air violations by John Meyers, Duluth News Tribune February 16th, 2006 The EPA alleged Wednesday that Northshore, a subsidiary of Cleveland-Cliffs and its former owner, Cyprus Minerals, modified three taconite furnaces at its Silver Bay processing plant without installing the best available pollution control technology. |
| INDONESIA: U.S. mine to pay Jakarta $30 million to settle suit by Jane Perlez, The New York Times February 16th, 2006 Newmont Mining agreed Thursday to pay $30 million to Indonesia in a settlement of a civil lawsuit in which the government argued that the company had polluted a bay with arsenic and mercury. |
| US: Teflon Chemical a Likely Carcinogen by Randall Chase, Associated Press February 15th, 2006 A group of scientific advisers to the Environmental Protection Agency voted unanimously Wednesday to approve a recommendation that a chemical used in the manufacture of Teflon and other nonstick and stain-resistant products should be considered a likely carcinogen. |
| US: Kraft, US Surgical Caught Leaking Ozone Depleting Chemicals
Environmental News Service February 13th, 2006 A fine of more than $100,000 may be levied against the international company Kraft Foods for Clean Air Act violations at the company’s Woburn, Massachusetts processing plant. |
| US: EPA probing why arsenic found at toxic cleanup site by Jan Barry, North Jersey Media Group February 7th, 2006 The federal Environmental Protection Agency is investigating the source of arsenic found at a cleanup site in Upper Ringwood where a Ford Motor Co. contractor recently removed tons of paint sludge. |
| BULGARIA: Bulgarians Protest Use of Cyanide Leaching by Michael Werbowski, World Press February 5th, 2006 The cyanide "leakage" that killed tons of fish in the Czech river Labe (Elbe) recently has re-focused public attention throughout central and Eastern Europe to the environmental and human dangers associated with this toxic chemical, especially when it spills into a nearby river or tributary. |
| US: Mountaintop Removal Mining Permits Challenged in West Virginia Environment News Service February 2nd, 2006 To stop the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers from permitting streams, valleys, historic places, and communities across West Virginia to be destroyed by mountaintop removal coal mining and valley fills, West Virginia citizen groups went back to court Wednesday. |
| US: PCB Damage to South Carolina Waters Costs Texas Company $20 Million Environment News Service February 2nd, 2006 Schlumberger Technology Corporation, headquartered in Texas, has agreed to pay $11.8 million to federal and state agencies for damge to natural resources caused by the presence of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB’s) in the Twelvemile Creek, Lake Hartwell and surrounding areas, the Justice Department has announced. |
| US: $8.5 million from ex-smelter owner will aid cleanup by Lisa Stiffle, Seattle Post Intelligencer February 1st, 2006 A former smelter owner has agreed to pay the federal government $8.5 million to help pay for the massive cleanup of lead and toxic chemicals on Harbor Island. |
| US: EPA Calls for End to Releases of Chemical in Teflon Process by Marla Cone, Los Angeles Times January 26th, 2006 In a rare move to phase out a widely used industrial compound, the Environmental Protection Agency announced Wednesday that it was asking all U.S. companies to virtually eliminate public exposure to a toxic chemical used to make Teflon cookware and thousands of other products. |
| US: Ramapough Mountain Indians Sue Ford Over Toxic Contamination The Environmental News Service January 21st, 2006 Attorneys representing the Ramapough Mountain Tribe and other residents of Ringwood, New Jersey have filed a lawsuit against Ford Motor Company and other defendants for property damage and personal injuries allegedly caused by the improper disposal of toxic waste from Ford’s former Mahwah, New Jersey automobile plant. |
| US: General Electric workers sue Monsanto over PCBs by Carey Gillam, Reuters January 4th, 2006 More than 500 General Electric Co. employees have sued Monsanto Co. along with two related companies, claiming they were exposed to toxic chemicals manufactured for decades by Monsanto, the company said Wednesday. |
| INDONESIA: The Cost of Gold: The Hidden Payroll by Jane Perlez and Raymond Bonner, The New York Times December 27th, 2005 Months of investigation by The New York Times revealed a level of contacts and financial support to the military not fully disclosed by Freeport, despite years of requests by shareholders concerned about potential violations of American laws and the company's relations with a military whose human rights record is so blighted that the United States severed ties for a dozen years until November. |
| US: Study Tied Pollutant to Cancer; Then Consultants Got Hold of It by Peter Waldman , Wall Street Journal December 23rd, 2005 Amid contemporary debates about safe levels of chromium-6, a PG & E funded PR scandal involving medical report is remembered. |
| US: Wal-Mart Under Investigation for Hazardous Waste Associated Press December 20th, 2005 |
| Europe: EU fines likely for Bayer and Chemtura by Matthew Newman, Bloomberg News December 19th, 2005 European Union regulators plan to fine Bayer and Chemtura this week for fixing prices of rubber chemicals, according to four people with firsthand knowledge of the investigation. |
| US: DuPont fined more than $10M over Teflon by Randall Chase, Associated Press December 14th, 2005 DuPont Co. has agreed to pay $10.25 million in fines and $6.25 million for environmental projects to settle allegations by the Environmental Protection Agency that the company hid information about the dangers of a toxic chemical used to make the non-stick coating Teflon, officials said Wednesday. |
| US: EPA, DuPont in Settlement Over Chemical The Associated Press November 29th, 2005 Federal regulators have reached an agreement with DuPont to settle allegations the company hid information about the dangers of a toxic chemical known as C8 used in the manufacture of Teflon. |
| US: Engineer: DuPont hid facts about paper coating by Elizabeth Weise, USA TODAY November 16th, 2005 A former engineer for the DuPont company has accused his ex-employer of concealing test results almost two decades ago that showed toxic chemicals leaching out of a paper coating used to give grease resistance to microwave popcorn bags, fast food and candy wrappers, and pizza box liners. |
| US: Bottler to Pay $1 Million for Pollution of 2 Rivers by Wendy Thermos, Los Angeles Times November 11th, 2005 Runoff was harmful to humans and marine life, EPA says. Fines came in civil and criminal cases. |
| CHILE: Pulp Mill Reopens Despite Charges of Killing Swans by Gustavo González, Inter Press Service August 18th, 2005 The imminent reopening of a pulp mill that polluted a nature sanctuary in Chile has further fueled environmentalists' criticisms of the Ricardo Lagos administration -- and is setting the scene for future conflicts with indigenous and fishing communities. |
| US: Politicians' private-jet uses raises questions by Dean Calbreath , San Diego Union-Tribune August 5th, 2005 Although the flights may be legal, critics say they serve as prime examples of how federal contractors and lobbyists use travel and other perks to make friends on Capitol Hill. |
| US: Is Nevada a Toxic Neighbor? by Jeff DeLong, Reno Gazette-Journal July 10th, 2005 With concern mounting that Nevada gold mines are belching clouds of toxic mercury downwind to neighboring states, officials are being urged to tighten regulations regarding the dangerous pollutant. |
| US: Cleanup Costs for Toxic Gas Additive Could be Billions
by Michael Gardner, Copley New Service June 15th, 2005 Staring at potential payouts in the billions of dollars, the U.S. oil industry is maneuvering to escape responsibility for cleaning up after MTBE, the now-banned toxic gasoline additive that has seeped into drinking water across the country. |
| CHINA: 'Green Olympics' eyed for 2008 Beijing Games by Liu Weifeng , China Daily June 15th, 2005 More than 30 enterprises, half from abroad, met to discuss clean technology, renewable and recyclable materials and the huge market sparked by the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. Companies present included BASF, NatureWorks, Unitika, Mitsubishi Chemical and Mitsui Chemical. |
| Chemicals May Damage Male Babies BBC May 27th, 2005 Chemicals found in many everyday products can harm male reproductive development, research suggests. |
| US: Senomyx's Fake Flavors
by By Melanie Warner, New York Times April 6th, 2005 Unlike artificial sweeteners, Senomyx's chemical compounds will not be listed separately on ingredient labels. Instead, they will be lumped into a broad category - "artificial flavors" - already found on most packaged food labels. |
| US: Dow's Knowledge Factory by Brian McKenna, Ecology Center February 11th, 2004 Nearly a century later, Dow's influence on Michigan colleges and universities would surely have caught Veblen's eye were he still alive. Several schools tout their Dow connections and use their Dow colleges of engineering, applied science, and chemistry to attract students and faculty. Dow has spread its name by funding other university programs in journalism, public relations, and public health as well. |
| INDIA: Holding Corporate Terrorists Accountable by Indra Sinha, AlterNet May 6th, 2003 At noon on May 1, two Indian women, watched by a crowd of sympathizers, seated themselves on the sidewalk under the bull statue on Wall Street to begin "a fast unto death." Rasheeda Bee and Champa Devi Shukla are survivors of what the people of Bhopal still refer to as "that night." |
| INDIA: After Beatings, Activists Promised Access to Bhopal Site by Ranjit Devraj, InterPress Service December 4th, 2002 NEW DELHI, Dec 4 (IPS) -- After brutal beatings and police detention, environmental activists have been promised free access to the pesticides factory in central Bhopal city which 18 years ago was the scene of the world's worst ever industrial disaster. |
| US: Cosmetics Industry Approves Controversial Chemicals by Cat Lazaroff, Environment News Service November 20th, 2002 The U.S. Cosmetics Ingredients Review panel has approved the continued use of phthalates in cosmetics, concluding that the chemicals are "safe as currently used." Activist groups, noting that the European Union has just ordered the phase out of some phthalates in cosmetics, said the panel's decision leaves U.S. women at risk of exposure to chemicals that some tests suggest may be linked to birth defects. |
| USA: Bush Chokes Reactive Chemical Regulations Environment News Service April 30th, 2002 WASHINGTON DC -- Evidence that the Bush administration killed a proposal to tighten regulation of a group of hazardous chemicals is presented in a new report by the Center for Public Integrity, a Washington, DC based nonprofit group of investigative journalists. |
| Canada: Giant Food Chain Rejects Chemical Pesticides Environment News Service March 12th, 2002 TORONTO, Ontario, Canada -- Canada's largest food distributor has made a public commitment to stop marketing chemical pesticides by next spring. Loblaw Companies Limited announced today that it will no longer sell chemical pesticides in all of its 440 garden centers across Canada by 2003. |
| Germany: Farben to Create Slave Labor Fund Associated Press August 23rd, 2000 IG Farben, the German chemical company that made poison gas for Nazi death camps, will set up a compensation fund for Nazi-era slave laborers within weeks, an official in charge of liquidating the once-great firm said Wednesday. |
| Shintech Environmental Racism Lousiana Environmental Action Network and Greenpeace USA September 1st, 1999 In September 1998, the environmental justice movement in the US had a very important victory against a major corporation, Shintech, a subsidiary of Shin-etsu Chemical of Japan. |