Plans for two new U.S. facilities that will use hydrogen instead of coal to make steel hold the promise of decarbonizing this essential but dirty industry. But don’t expect overnight change. Reporter Maria Gallucci looks at the complexities of making the switch, from ditching the blast furnace to reducing pollution all along the supply chain.
New federal regulations governing a group of “forever chemicals” under the Safe Drinking Water Act — a rule years in the making — have important implications for local drinking water supplies and, per the latest TipSheet, local environment reporting. A look at the problem with PFAS, the complicated route to its regulation and more than a dozen story ideas and reporting resources.
"A coalition of mostly red states launched the first legal challenge against the Biden administration’s recent environmental permitting rule on Tuesday."
A massive data set that tracks greenhouse gas emissions in the United States is now newly updated, and the latest Reporter’s Toolbox calls it essential for informed reporting on U.S. climate policy. Its three decades-plus of measurements can help journalists track big emitters near them and from a variety of major sources ranging from landfill methane to industrial polluters.
Mid-pandemic, freelancer Erika Bolstad struck out from Oregon for the boom-bust Bakken oil fields of North Dakota, with cash from a grant, two story assignments and years of book research. She shares her experience on the road, dealing with COVID risks, tricky timing and a stubborn bureaucracy, as well as a generous well-plugger and supportive editors. Read the new FEJ StoryLog.
For all the talk about the energy transition and the robust growth in electric vehicle sales, there’s one big reason for unease: getting charged. The new Backgrounder takes a deep dive on the state of EV charging stations in the United States, exploring Tesla’s diminishing dominance, coming charger standardization, charging levels, software and for-pay realities, plus the effects of government policy.
Hundreds of hydropower dams in the United States will see their licenses expiring in the next decade, generating years-long federal relicensing processes. That prospect calls for close local and regional coverage of the complicated balance between renewable energy needs with negative environmental impacts. The latest TipSheet explains the licensing process and the dam backstory, along with a dozen story ideas and reporting resources.
Fast fashion’s lack of sustainability has long been the subject of news media coverage. But now the realities of climate change mean that fashion reporting must be reimagined to include the lived environmental and human rights realities of workers making what we wear, writes contributor Yessenia Funes in the new Voices of Environmental Justice column. Ideas and resources for getting past simplistic fashion industry narratives.
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