DuPont, a major U.S. chemical company, for years hid what it knew about the threats to employees and neighbors from a chemical -- perfluorooctanoic acid, also known as PFOA or C8 -- that can cause cancer and other health damage. The PFOA was used in operations of DuPont's Washington Works plant in Parkersburg, WV. Its health damage was the focus of a major class-action lawsuit.
"A Baltimore City Circuit Court judge has ruled that the information railroads submit to the state about the volume and frequency of their crude oil shipments is public."
"The Obama administration is expected to propose as soon as Tuesday the first-ever federal regulation to cut emissions of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas that contributes to global warming, by the nation’s oil and natural-gas industry, officials familiar with the plan said on Monday."
"The Obama administration is giving Shell permission to fully drill an exploratory well in the Arctic Ocean and burrow into potential oil-bearing rock thousands of feet below the seafloor that previously was off limits."
"The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has tightened standards for the nation's landfills to reduce emissions of methane and other harmful air pollutants."
"Foes of the Obama administration's plan for cutting greenhouse gas emissions from the power sector have lodged their first formal challenge to the newly finalized Clean Power Plan, asking federal judges to postpone the rule's deadlines."
"The annual Burning Man festival received a permit to use federal land in Nevada’s desert after a clash over federal land managers’ expensive requests."
"A federal judge on Wednesday approved Exxon Mobil Corp's $5.07 million settlement of charges that it violated the federal Clean Water Act and state environmental laws in connection with a 2013 oil spill in central Arkansas."
Federal agencies sometimes wait years to respond to Freedom of Information Act requests, then ask if they are still interested in receiving the requested information. Now the Justice Department's Office of Information Policy has issued an official "guidance" that frowns slightly on overuse of the "still interested?" practice.
"The facts show the state's purpose in enacting the statute was to protect industrial animal agriculture by silencing its critics," district Judge B. Lynn Winmill wrote. Sometimes investigative journalists need to go undercover. And sometimes muckraking journalists need undercover whistleblowers to tip them to abuses.
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