Water
Nothing is more important to your health and quality of life than safe drinking water and clean streams and lakes. Across the country, pollution from farms is one of the primary reasons water is no longer clean or safe. Agriculture is the leading source of pollution of rivers and streams surveyed by U.S. government experts, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Thankfully, if we make simple changes in the way we farm, we can take a big step toward clean water.
During the campaign, President-elect Donald Trump pledged to residents of Flint, Mich., that the lead crisis that poisoned their drinking water “would have never happened if I were president.”
“Drill, baby, drill!”
During her failed bid for vice president in 2008, that was Sarah Palin's crowd-pleasing chant promoting her energy policy. Now the pithy catchphrase – and the former Alaska governor herself – could make a comeback.
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Photo Courtesy of Christopher Halloran / shutterstock.com
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When Americans gather to celebrate Thanksgiving next week, we may not agree on the outcome of the election. But we all agree that the food being served should be safe, healthy and clearly labeled. If we’re giving thanks in a restaurant, we will want calorie information on the menu and to know that the people preparing and serving their meals are paid a decent wage. And regardless of where we gather, we will want to be sure that their neighbors have enough to eat
Hurricane Matthew's rampage through North Carolina's coastal plain flooded more than 140 feces-strewn swine and poultry barns, more than a dozen open pits brimming with hog waste and thousands of acres of manure-saturated fields, an analysis by EWG and Waterkeeper Alliance reveals.
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It’s another busy week at EWG. Here’s some news you can use from this week.
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Scientists, pediatricians and public health officials from the U.S. and around the globe agree that there is no safe level of lead exposure. Even the smallest amounts can cause irreversible changes, including diminished IQ and behavioral problems in children.
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In the last three years, farmers in parts of California's Central Valley irrigated nearly 100,000 acres of food crops with billions of gallons of oil field wastewater possibly tainted with toxic chemicals, including chemicals that can cause cancer and reproductive harm, according to an EWG analysis of state data.
Read MoreWhen high water breaches animal barns, waste lagoons or fields with applied manure, the nearby surface water becomes toxic.
Read MoreBeginning this Friday, EWG will post news you can use – some of the recent media coverage featuring our content and spokespeople.
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In the last three years, farmers have irrigated 95,000 acres of food crops with billions of gallons of oil field wastewater possibly tainted with toxic chemicals.
Read MoreIt’s hard to think of an administration that has done more to change what Americans eat and how we grow our food than the Obama administration.
PFOA, a carcinogenic chemical formerly used to make DuPont's Teflon, contaminates drinking water for at least 7 million Americans and is in virtually everyone’s blood.
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Drinking water supplies for two-thirds of Americans are contaminated with the carcinogenic chemical made notorious by the film "Erin Brockovich," which was based on the real-life poisoning of tap water in a California desert town. But there are no national regulations for the compound – and the chemical industry is trying to keep it that way.
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Under an Environmental Protection Agency program, from 2013 to 2015, local water utilities took more than 60,000 water samples and found chromium-6 in more than 75 percent of samples. The EPA's tests were spurred by a 2010 EWG investigation that found elevated levels of chromium-6 in the tap water of 31 of 35 cities sampled. EWG's analysis of the EPA data estimates that water supplies serving 218 million Americans have potentially unsafe levels of the chemical.
What if your neighbor poured toxic chemicals into your drinking water but only agreed to pay for part of the cleanup? Well, that’s exactly what’s happening in northeastern Wisconsin.
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In a remarkable moment of courtroom candor, an attorney representing the Environmental Protection Agency admitted last week the EPA "blew it" in botched efforts to regulate a hazardous chemical in the drinking water of up to 17 million Americans.
Low-tech, low-cost prairie strips on farms – buffers of grass, trees or other permanent vegetation planted along the banks of rivers, streams, lakes and other waterways – can reduce toxic farm pollution runoff, clean up drinking water and reduce water bills for consumers, according to a recent analysis by the Union of Concerned Scientists.
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As news about North Carolina’s governor and his administration downplaying the risks of drinking water contaminated with hexavalent chromium unfolds, two leading environmental health advocates are pushing the Obama administration to finally set a nationwide standard for the highly toxic chemical.
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