Donald Trump's EPA has said that easing the pollution standards for coal plants would alleviate costs for utilities that run older coal plants at a time when demand for power is soaring amid the expansion of datacenters used for artificial intelligence. But environmental groups have said that weakening standards for mercury, a neurotoxin that can impair babies' brain development, and other air toxics will lead to higher health-related costs.
In the most wide-ranging analysis of the global plastic system, the Pew Charitable Trusts, in collaboration with academics including at Imperial College London and the University of Oxford, said plastic, a material once called revolutionary and modern, was now putting public health, world economies and the future of the planet at risk. If nothing is done, plastic pollution will more than double in the next 15 years to 280m metric tonnes a year, the equivalent to a rubbish truck full of plastic waste being dumped every second.
Delta Air Lines has agreed to a $78.75 million class-action settlement with Los Angeles County residents whose homes, schools and properties were doused with jet fuel when a Delta Boeing 777 dumped 15,000 gallons over a populated area in January 2020. The settlement, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, includes a $78.75 million compensation fund along with a technical testing program intended to address claims that the fuel drop hurt local property values due to stigmas of contamination.