"The Environmental Protection Agency says an internal task force appointed to revamp how the nation’s most polluted sites are cleaned up generated no record of its deliberations."
"When the Zortman Landusky gold and silver mine, located upstream from Montana’s enormous Fort Belknap reservation, went bankrupt in 1998, the cost of the cleanup fell on the US taxpayer. The costs keep growing."
As President Trump continues to fill environment and energy leadership positions in 2018, one source of stories will be potential conflicts of interest for appointed regulators and agency leaders. This week's TipSheet runs down more than 20 key appointments to watch at EPA, Interior, Ag, Energy and more.
"A senior executive at the Russian nuclear processing plant suspected of being behind a spike of radioactivity over Europe this fall admitted Wednesday that the isotope recorded does emerge as part of the plant’s production cycle but said its levels are negligible."
"U.S. Steel failed to test a Lake Michigan tributary for highly toxic hexavalent chromium after blue liquid "with visible solids" poured out of one of the company's northwest Indiana plants in late October, according to documents posted online Tuesday by state regulators."
"The man President Trump picked to regulate coal believes that mining is simply 'accelerated erosion.'"
"The Environmental Protection Agency released a list of Superfund sites around the country Friday that it said regulators will target 'for immediate and intense attention.'"
"It’s one of the dirtiest places in America. Former residents of Tar Creek, Oklahoma, want to know why Trump’s EPA chief didn’t prosecute allegations of wrongdoing during a federal buyout program."
"U.S. EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt is instructing agency officials to effectively drop enforcement of one key facet of the New Source Review program, in what could be a prelude to broad changes in the handling of air permits for both new plants and expansions of existing facilities."
"The head of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) is seeking a 30-day extension in the agency’s timeline to consider a proposal to prop up coal and nuclear power plants."
