Waste

"Discarded face masks are piling up on Hong Kong’s beaches and nature trails, with environmental groups warning that the waste is posing a huge threat to marine life and wildlife habitats."

"The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Wednesday announced a new proposed rollback to an Obama-era regulation dealing with waste from coal-fired power plants known as coal ash."

"The Trump administration completed the fewest cleanups of toxic Superfund sites last year than any administration since the program’s first years in the 1980s, figures released by the Environmental Protection Agency indicated Wednesday."

"Many plastic items that Americans put in their recycling bins aren’t being recycled at all, according to a major new survey of hundreds of recycling facilities across the US."

"Democrats' wide-ranging anti-plastics bill garnered a severe reaction from the plastic industry after Sen. Tom Udall of New Mexico and Rep. Alan Lowenthal of California introduced the legislation yesterday."

"The total amount of production-related waste that industrial and federal facilities reported to the EPA increased from 2017 to 2018, the agency said in Toxics Release Inventory data."

"The Dart Container Corporation, which makes foam products, is a manufacturing behemoth and produced a fortune for the family behind it. Environmentalists say its products are polluting the globe."

"Bankrupt coal companies Blackjewel LLC and Revelation Energy have failed to make progress on scores of environmental obligations and might leave Kentucky taxpayers on the hook for tens of millions of dollars in reclamation costs, state officials contended during a bankruptcy hearing this week."

"The plastic shopping bag has long been hunted by state and local policymakers pushing for its extinction. But still it thrives, thanks to the deep-pocketed chemical industry that birthed it and the political influence of retailers and restaurants. Only eight states ban single-use plastic bags. Nearly twice as many have laws protecting them."

"Sustainability in fashion is a hot button topic, with retailers large and small racing to prove their green credentials, but the desire for new attire churns and the industry remains one of the world’s largest polluters as climate activists and watchdogs sound alarms."