Environment | WPN World People News

On February 12, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced a settlement valued at more than $920,000 with the Imperial Irrigation District for its improper disposal of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) at a former electricity substation. The District must spend $543,000 to replace equipment currently containing PCBs and perform an audit of 9 inactive substations. The District, the sixth largest utility in California, providing electric power to more than 145,000 customers in the Imperial Valley and parts of Riverside County, will also pay a $379,000 civil penalty.

EPA Region 7 conducted Compliance Evaluation Inspections at Analytical Bio-Chemistry Laboratories Inc.’s (ABC Labs’) two facilities in Columbia, Mo., in April 2012. The inspections revealed violations of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) related to the storage and handling of hazardous waste at each facility. The company has agreed to pay a $19,040 civil penalty to settle allegations that it violated RCRA.

The whooping crane is one of the most endangered animals on earth. EPA admitted that during their migration, whooping cranes “will stop to eat and may consume arthropod prey” that may have been exposed to 2,4-D, and that in sufficient amounts, such exposure is toxic to the cranes.

As part of federal efforts to protect and restore Puget Sound, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has settled with Supervalu Holdings, Inc., a Minneapolis, MN, based national wholesale grocery distributor, for federal stormwater pollution violations. The violations stem from EPA inspections at three Supervalu facilities (two in Tacoma, one in Auburn) in 2013, which documented several Clean Water Act violations at each facility. Supervalu has also agreed to pay a $120,000 penalty.

Up to an estimated 39 million cubic metres of dredge material could be dumped in the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Site.

In a preliminary hearing on Pillai’s arbitrary offloading, on January 11, Delhi High Court told government representatives that holding a different opinion to the government does not constitute being ‘anti-national’, and demanded an affidavit and court evidence to justify claims that Pillai was working against Indian national interest.

Two years after Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) announced a new “forest conservation” policy, APP’s pledge to halt forest clearing has held, but its forests are still disappearing.

Members of the 115th Fighter Wing Communications Flight perform initial acceptance testing on a 10 meter tactical UHF/VHF antenna at Truax Field in Madison, Wis., Sept. 14, 2014. The antenna was received as part of a Joint Incident Site Communications Capability (JISCC) package the unit will use to augment the state's Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear, and high yield Explosive Enhanced Response Force Package (CERFP).