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"Analysis: Dow's New Corn: 'Time Bomb' Or Farmers' Dream?"

"A new biotech corn developed by Dow AgroSciences could answer the prayers of U.S. farmers plagued by a fierce epidemic of super-weeds. Or it could trigger a flood of dangerous chemicals that may make weeds even more resistant and damage other important U.S. crops. Or, it could do both."

Source: Reuters, 04/25/2012

"'Garbage' Chemical Threatens Valley Water"

"A 1974 memo from Dow Chemical describes several chemicals in a widely used farm fumigant as 'garbage.' Today, one of those useless chemicals threatens drinking water for more than 1 million people across the San Joaquin Valley. Now linked to cancer, the toxin was waste from a plastic-making process. Chemical companies often mix such leftovers to create other products to avoid the cost of disposal, says one long-time chemical engineer."

Source: Fresno Bee, 04/23/2012

Comment: "Silent Hives"

"In 2006, when beekeepers began to report that their hives were suffering from a mysterious affliction, a wide variety of theories were offered to explain what was going on. ... Over the last few weeks, several new studies have come out linking neonicotinoids to bee decline. As it happens, the studies are appearing just as 'Silent Spring,' Rachel Carson’s seminal study of the effect of pesticides on wildlife, is about to turn fifty: the work was first published as a three-part series in The New Yorker, in June, 1962. It’s hard to avoid the sense that we have all been here before, and that lessons were incompletely learned the first time around."

Source: New Yorker, 04/23/2012

"Long-Gone Lead Factories Leave Dangerous Poisons"

"Ken Shefton is furious about what the government knew eight years ago and never told him — that the neighborhood where his five sons have been playing is contaminated with lead. Their Cleveland home is a few blocks from a long-forgotten factory that spewed toxic lead dust for about 30 years."

Source: USA TODAY, 04/20/2012

"Farm Group Seeks U.S. Halt On "Dangerous" Crop Chemicals"

"A coalition of more than 2,000 U.S. farmers and food companies said Wednesday it is taking legal action to force government regulators to analyze potential problems with proposed biotech crops and the weed-killing chemicals to be sprayed over them."

Source: Reuters, 04/19/2012

"U.S. Caps Emissions in Drilling for Fuel"

"WASHINGTON -- Oil and gas companies will have to capture toxic and climate-altering gases from wells, storage sites and pipelines under new air quality standards issued on Wednesday by the Environmental Protection Agency. The rule is the first federal effort to address serious air pollution associated with the natural gas drilling process known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, which releases toxic and cancer-causing chemicals like benzene and hexane, as well as methane, a powerful greenhouse gas."

Source: NY Times, 04/19/2012

"Gulf Seafood Deformities Alarm Scientists"

Fishermen -- and LSU Prof. Jim Cowan -- say that eyeless shrimp and fish with lesions are becoming common in the Gulf of Mexico, with the 2010 BP oil pollution believed to be the likely cause.

Source: Aljazeera, 04/18/2012

"If The Food's in Plastic, What's in the Food?"

"In a study published last year in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, researchers put five San Francisco families on a three-day diet of food that hadn't been in contact with plastic. When they compared urine samples before and after the diet, the scientists were stunned to see what a difference a few days could make: The participants' levels of bisphenol A (BPA), which is used to harden polycarbonate plastic, plunged — by two-thirds, on average — while those of the phthalate DEHP, which imparts flexibility to plastics, dropped by more than half."

Source: Wash Post, 04/18/2012

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