This story was produced in collaboration with High Country News. When I visited Christina Gonzalez and her family in April, she sat slumped in her family’s worn black faux-leather couch, trying to recall which explosion had shaken her neighborhood the most. The seven decades they’ve lived in Wilmington, California, are marked by the dates of […]
New Jersey is one major step closer to implementing a groundbreaking environmental justice law. Two years ago, the state passed legislation to limit industrial pollution in neighborhoods with a high concentration of people of color, low-income households, or residents who don’t speak fluent English. Now, the state’s environmental protection agency has proposed regulations spelling out […]
Labels like “carbon neutral” and “climate positive” can make it seem like some brands have climate action all figured out. But anyone who tries to look behind the curtain at what companies are actually doing to cut emissions will find a more complicated reality. There are no standards for how companies should account for or […]
This story is published in collaboration with KCET. As the country erupted in protest against racial and economic inequalities in June 2020, two 22-year-olds and their unborn child lost their lives in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Wilmington, California. They weren’t killed by police or by COVID-19, but the place where they died embodied those […]
This story is published in collaboration with The Guardian. For Daniel Delgado, the Fourth of July marked a turning point in 2020. It was the first holiday after COVID-19 had kept much of America locked down. In nine days, he’d be entering his 20s. He planned to spend his birthday relishing the Arizona sun with […]
Canada has long touted ambitious targets to address global warming. But only now does it have a comprehensive roadmap to meet them. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau released a sweeping 2030 Emissions Reduction Plan on Tuesday, laying out a series of actions the country will take to cut climate pollution 40 to 45 percent below […]
“For years and generations, wars have been fought over oil,” Vice President Kamala Harris said at an April event in Chicago, Illinois. “In a short matter of time, they will be fought over water.” Harris did not appear to know that just 40 miles away from the downtown office where she warned the country of […]
Last week, the White House released a beta version of a tool intended to govern the implementation of its much-publicized “Justice40” program. Justice40 promises that at least 40 percent of the benefits of government spending on infrastructure, clean energy, and other climate-related programs will be directed to disadvantaged communities. The Climate and Economic Justice Screening […]
After years of bureaucratic delays, a federal lawsuit, civil rights investigation, sporadic hunger strikes by more than 100 residents, and countless protests outside Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s home, Chicago’s Department of Public Health has denied an operating permit to a controversial scrapyard that prompted national outrage and accusations of environmental racism. The announcement last Friday ends […]
Methane emissions from the oil, gas, and coal industries are 70 percent higher than official government estimates around the world, according to the International Energy Agency’s latest methane report released Wednesday. As demand for energy rebounds from its COVID-19-induced slump in 2020, the report highlights the need for improved methane monitoring and plugging leaks — […]