Environmental Health News

It's no secret that asbestos is dangerous. But it might come as a surprise how some Canadian businessmen willfully put young labourers - college and high school students among them - in serious harm's way, and just to save a buck.

Carbon dioxide measurements in the Earth's atmosphere did not break the symbolic milestone of 400 parts per million at a Hawaiian observatory last week, according to a revised reading from the nation's climate observers.

Mexico's giant Popocatepetl volcano may generate lava flows, explosions of "growing intensity" and ash that could reach miles away, the National Center for Disaster Prevention said Monday.

After another dry winter across much of the West, fire officials are poised for a tough wildfire season that will be even more challenging because federal budget cuts mean fewer firefighters on the ground, Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said Monday.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and an environmental group came to vastly different interpretations of a federal review panel's decision Monday on the troubled San Onofre nuclear plant. The plant's owner, meanwhile, said it is still trying to figure out what the ruling means.

West Nile virus killed 286 people in the United States last year, making it the deadliest year yet for the virus, the Centers for Disease Control reported on Monday. Texas was especially hard hit by the virus, which is carried by mosquitoes and which only arrived in the United States in 1999.

Men who were exposed to Agent Orange chemicals used during the Vietnam War are at higher risk for life-threatening prostate cancer than unexposed veterans, researchers have found.

A domestic natural gas boom already has lowered U.S. energy prices while stoking fears of environmental disaster. Now U.S. producers are poised to ship vast quantities of gas overseas as energy companies seek permits for proposed export projects that could set off a renewed frenzy of fracking.

On the third day after his father's death from a respiratory infection, Hussein al-Sheikh began to feel feverish. He and his father were victims of what doctors believe is a novel coronavirus, the new SARS-like disease that first emerged in the Gulf last year and has gone on to claim 18 lives, nine of them in the kingdom.

Since a building collapse April 24 killed at least 1,100 garment workers in Bangladesh in one of the deadliest industrial tragedies in history, the country has gone from one of the industry's greatest assets to one of its biggest liabilities.

Sometimes, drinking a few beers after class can save the planet. A just-launched online "game" dreamed up during one such beer-drinking session aims to do that by encouraging people to supply much needed data about the world's power plants that burn fossil fuels.

Climate change could lead to the widespread loss of common plants and animals around the world, according to a new study released Sunday in the journal Nature Climate Change. Coffee, chocolate, teak, sugar maple, pineapple and cotton all show large contractions.

The humble honey bee and its cousins play a vital role in Canada’s agricultural industry, pollinating $2-billion worth of fruit and vegetables every year. Yet Ontario bees are under threat. They are dying in large numbers and the loss is devastating.

Congress hasn't enacted a Water Resources Development Act, authorizing U.S. Army Corps of Engineers projects and providing policy direction, since 2007. Senate Bill 601 is an achievement, but it's important to be wary of provisions that would undermine of the nation's bedrock environmental laws.

It's no surprise that Senate Republicans grouse about Obama enforcing civil rights laws or limiting greenhouse-gas emissions. They are entitled to their policy views. It’s a different matter for them to block confirmation to Cabinet positions of the officials in charge of those policies.

A handful of activists on the widespread use of biosolids in conventional agriculture. They allege, among other things, that the EPA-approved treatment of biosolids doesn't address all the possible contaminants in the waste.

The USDA has been given by Congress a shockingly weak framework for regulating GM crops, which is why it's a surprise to see the Obama USDA standing up, even a little, to a powerful, well-funded industry.

We know that CO2 is increasing; we knew this moment would come; we know that four hundred is no more different from three hundred and ninety-nine than it is from four hundred and one. Still, the number should shake us, if not shock us.

Just two seasons exist here: the rainy and the dry. The Sahel has seen both drought and downpours intensify, but scientists don't know whether the long-term trend is drier or wetter. And that has huge policy and humanitarian implications.

The federal Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs is supposed to review proposed rules within 90 days of receiving them, with the possibility of a single, 30-day extension. That’s four months, maximum. Why has the chemicals of concern list been at OIRA for three years? No one is saying.