Environment | WPN World People News

National and regional clean air, clean energy, and conservation groups took legal steps last Friday to defend Washington state’s authority to enact the Clean Air Rule that requires reductions in carbon pollution from the area’s largest polluters.

A ban on fishing below a depth of 800 meters in the North-East Atlantic was backed by Parliament on Tuesday. This ban will apply to bottom trawling, which often wrecks sea bed habitats, and also restrict deep-sea fishing to the area where it took place between 2009 and 2011. Tougher checks at sea and transparent data collection rules will also apply.

Manufacturing facilities in Norwood and in Worcester, subsidiaries of a multinational building materials company, have taken steps to come into compliance with federal clean water laws in order to settle claims by the US Environmental Protection Agency that they discharged stormwater and contaminated groundwater in violation of their permits and violated federal oil spill prevention and discharge laws.

On December 12, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is finalizing standards for applicators who apply restricted-use pesticides that are not available for purchase by the general public, and require special handling.

This image acquired by the Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8, shows a close-up of the terminus of Alaska's Hubbard Glacier on July 22, 2014. With a near-real-time view of how glaciers and ice sheets are moving, researchers can integrate information about atmosphere and ocean conditions to determine what causes these ice sheets to change – and what that means for how much ice is flowing into the ocean. That could help provide critical information to coastal communities that will be most impacted by rising oceans.

WWF is disappointed that the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certification of New Zealand’s orange roughy fishery has been upheld despite objections raised by WWF.

Sinclair Casper Refining Company has paid $655,000 to reimburse the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for response costs incurred at the Empire State Oil Company Refinery Site in Thermopolis, Wyoming. The company entered into a settlement agreement with EPA for the recovery of past costs associated with the cleanup of the site, including the removal of asbestos, in September. EPA received payment last week.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is finalizing standards for applicators who apply restricted use pesticides that are not available for purchase by the general public, and require special handling, on December 12.

The Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines (CHR), on December 8, initiated the next steps in the world’s first-ever national investigation into human rights harms resulting from climate change, despite apparent opposition from some fossil fuel companies.

The giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis) is now threatened with extinction.