• Water

New Study Shows Higher Lead Exposure Risk for Bottle-Fed and Black Infants

• babies
• human health
• lead
• tap water

by Amy Lupica, ODP Contributing Writer A new study released last week found that 80% of homes in the U.S. have lead in their tap water and that babies fed formula mixed with tap water were the most at risk for lead exposure. Additionally, researchers found that Black infants were more likely to be exposed […]

• Water

Siberia’s Arctic Sea Ice Hasn’t Formed Yet This Year

• climate change
• ice
• sea ice
• Siberia

by Ashira Morris, ODP Contributing Writer We’ve reached another dangerous climate milestone: for the first time in recorded history, it’s late October and there is no Arctic in Siberia’s Laptev sea. The seasonal sea ice usually melts in the summer and reforms by this time. These ice-free waters put Arctic sea ice at its lowest […]

• Water

Trump Administration OKs Draining the Swamp — The Okefenokee Swamp

• Clean Water Act
• mining
• Okefenokee Swamp
• rollback
• swamp
• titanium
• water
• Wildlife Refuge
• WOTUS

Companies have been trying to mine near Georgia’s Okefenokee Swamp National Wildlife Refuge for decades without success, but last August the Army Corps of Engineers determined that now it needs no federal Clean Water Act permit because there are no water bodies that are covered by the law that will be impacted. 

Why This Matters:  The president of Twin Pines claims that the mining operation won’t affect the swamp.

• Water

Trump’s Plumbing Obsession: Showers, Sinks and The Third Thing

• efficiency
• hair
• showerhead
• toilet
• water

Donald Trump has been boasting on the campaign trail about his “rollback” on plumbing standards  — taking credit for making it possible to wash hands (huh?) and for making dishwashers faster and even for a more powerful toilet flush.

Why This Matters:  Trump claims to have “freed” water and as a result, women in the suburbs “like him a lot.”  Well, that is not true either.

• Water

Addressing the Sources of PFAS Contamination

• California
• Forever Chemicals
• PFAS

by Natasha Lasky, ODP Contributing Writer On Tuesday, September 29, Gavin Newsom signed into law a measure that bans a class of over 4,000 toxic chemicals known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) from firefighting foams due to their impacts on human health. This ban came weeks before a  peer-reviewed study by scientists at the […]

• Water

Drinking Water Woes Continue In Michigan and California

• brain damage
• clean water
• drinking water
• Flint
• Forever Chemicals
• lead pipes
• PFAS

This week the vulnerabilities in the nation’s drinking water supplies once again came into full view.  In California, a study for the state’s water resources control board revealed that 60% of California’s public water supply wells contain toxic per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances or PFAS, the so-called forever chemicals.  Meanwhile, citizens in Flint, Michigan filed a lawsuit on behalf of 2,600 children claiming that three big banks that were funding a pipeline project caused the city to rely on the Flint River as a temporary water source.