Environment | WPN World People News

A walrus and pup on an ice floe in the Chukchi Sea. Shell Oil was given its two remaining permits for oil exploration to drill in the Chukchi on July 22, 2015.

Today, groups active in protecting our nation’s waters filed a legal challenge to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Army Corps of Engineers (COE) recent Clean Water Rule in order to ensure that the rule protects the nation’s waters from pollution and destruction as required by the Clean Water Act and Supreme Court case law.

An EPA settlement with two North Canaan mineral processing companies for the companies’ alleged failure to file required toxic release inventory information requires that two local emergency response units be provided with $28,700 of equipment that will help firefighters to better protect local residents in emergencies.

Thanks to its management, Doñana has become the main stronghold of conservation for one of the most threatened European mammals – the Iberian Lynx (Lynx pardinus), a species recently brought back from the brink of extinction. Following six decades of decline, the population of the Iberian Lynx increased from 52 mature individuals in 2002 to 156 in 2012. The species has now moved from the Critically Endangered to Endangered category on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species™.

In a landmark decision, EU member states unanimously agreed to ban a toxic chemical from its clothing imports, closing a trade loophole that previously put the health of its citizens and environment at risk.

A young girl carries a jerrycan she just filled at a water tank in the Tishreen camp for displaced people in Aleppo, Syria.

Rego Realty Corp. and six associated property-owning companies, and one individual, will pay a penalty to settle EPA claims that they failed to follow federal lead-based paint disclosure requirements when renting nineteen housing units in Hartford, Conn.

Radioactive contamination in the forests and land of Iitate district in Fukushima prefecture is so widespread and at such a high level that it will be impossible for people to safely return to their homes, a Greenpeace Japan investigation revealed Tuesday. The findings follow the Abe Government’s announcement on 12th June 2015 to lift evacuation orders by March 2017 and terminate compensation by 2018, which effectively forces victims back into heavily contaminated areas.

Pan Am Railways has agreed to settle EPA allegations that they violated the federal Clean Water Act at two of its railyards operating in Waterville, Maine, and East Deerfield, Mass. The company has agreed to pay a fine of $152,000 to resolve the violations.