The Nature Conservancy, scrambling to shield oyster beds from the Gulf Oil Spill, faces a PR backlash as a result of its partnership with oil giant BP to help fund its work.
"As the price tag for what could be the modern world's largest man-made oil spill continues to mount, navigating the complex path towards determining who will foot the bills resulting from the Deepwater Horizon accident could become as difficult as avoiding the oil plume in the Gulf of Mexico."
"Although the exact cause of the Deepwater Horizon explosion isn't certain, at least a dozen offshore drilling experts agree that cement, or pipes encased by cement, had to have failed first."
"More than ever, people are worried about how all the chemicals we're exposed to are affecting our health: among them a family of chemicals known as phthalates, which are used in everyday plastics. ... Recently the EPA, put phthalates on a list of chemicals that 'may present a risk' to the environment or human health. That's because they disrupt hormone activity and some preliminary studies show that they may be causing a slow and steady demasculinizing of men."
Climate scientists are receiving a rash of threats, hate-mail, and physical acts of intimidation from right-wing hate groups unhappy with the conclusions about man-made climate change which data have led them to.
"The gooey oil washing into the maze of marshes along the Gulf Coast could prove impossible to remove, leaving a toxic stew lethal to fish and wildlife, government officials and independent scientists said."
"In the days since President Obama announced a moratorium on permits for drilling new offshore oil wells and a halt to a controversial type of environmental waiver that was given to the Deepwater Horizon rig, at least seven new permits for various types of drilling and five environmental waivers have been granted, according to records."
"BP has rebuffed demands from government officials and environmentalists to use a less-toxic dispersant to break up the oil from its massive offshore spill, saying that the chemical product it is now using continues to be 'the best option for subsea application.'"
"Four years after being voted from office, former Rep. Richard Pombo (R) of California is attempting to resurrect his political career in a new district where few voters know his record for seeking to rewrite some of the nation's premier environmental laws."
"The federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry has been under tough Congressional scrutiny over the last two years for what critics assert are flawed evaluations of health risks at the nation’s worst contaminated sites. Now the Government Accountability Office has issued a report detailing some problems with the agency’s internal policies and inconsistent monitoring by its management."
