Eric Adams remarks come as city briefly ranked world’s worst for air pollution; more firefighters to be mobilised as over 200 blazes are out of control
Over 200 “out of control” fires are currently burning across Canada as experts warn that air quality will continue to deteriorate.
Leyland Cecco reports from Toronto:
Continue reading...Hazy skies hung over north-eastern US a day after the midwest received a similar alert from the Environmental Protection Agency
Canada is dealing with a series of intense wildfires that have spread from the western provinces to Quebec, with hundreds of forest fires burning. Wind has carried smoke from the fires southward, triggering air-quality alerts throughout the United States.
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Tuesday issued a poor air-quality alert for New England, a day after parts of Illinois, Wisconsin and Minnesota received a similar advisory. Last week, US officials as far south as Maryland, Virginia and Pennsylvania reported being affected by the wildfires.
Continue reading...Amite BioEnergy, which was fined $2.5m in 2021, notified Mississippi facility had breached emission limits
A US plant that supplies wood pellets to the UK power generator Drax has violated air pollution limits in Mississippi, it has emerged.
The Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) has written to Amite BioEnergy notifying the Drax-owned company that it had violated emissions rules.
Continue reading...Maribyrnong city council says lack of enforcement of road train curfew has undermined its ability to protect residents
A “health emergency” has been declared by a Melbourne council, which claims residents are suffering above-average rates of hospitalisations for certain conditions partly due to a surge in road trains on its suburban streets.
Maribyrnong city council, which takes in Footscray in the city’s inner western suburbs, announced the declaration on Wednesday, claiming rates of illness in the municipality due to pollution “considerably exceed the Australian average”.
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Continue reading...Dirty air causes premature death of at least 1,200 children across Europe every year, says European Environment Agency
Europe is failing its children when it comes to air pollution, exposing nearly all children across the continent to air that falls below healthy standards and delaying the clean-up of the sources of pollution, research has found.
Breathing dirty air causes the premature death of at least 1,200 children across Europe each year, and many thousands more are afflicted with physical and mental health problems that could have lifelong impacts, according to the latest assessment of air pollution by the European Environment Agency.
Continue reading...American Lung Association’s study also found great disparity between coasts, with 10 of 11 most polluted counties in California
The climate crisis has upended progress on improving air quality, with one in three Americans currently living in areas with harmful levels of pollutants known to increase the risk of medical emergencies, pregnancy complications and premature death, new research reveals.
Almost 120 million people in the US are still exposed to unhealthy levels of soot and smog, according to the annual report by the American Lung Association (ALA), which found that people of color are almost four times more likely to live in the most polluted places than white Americans.
Continue reading...French hire car met emissions standard but had not been registered with TfL, resulting in penalty notices
A motorist was fined nearly £11,000 for driving his French rental car in London’s ultra-low emission zone on a three-day trip to the UK, despite the fact the vehicle met the environmental standards to enter the Ulez for nothing.
Christian Ducarre received four penalty charge notices (PCNs) after falling foul of a little-known requirement under which foreign vehicles must be registered with Transport for London (TfL) or else be deemed non-compliant by default.
Continue reading...Operator investigated for possible trickery and causing involuntary injuries over pollution levels within network
Prosecutors in Paris have opened a criminal investigation into allegations that pollution in the capital’s Métro system is putting travellers’ lives at risk.
The operator of the Métro, the RATP, is being investigated for possible trickery and causing involuntary injuries after it was claimed it had deliberately underreported pollution levels and failed to inform passengers about the dangers.
Continue reading...Test relies on visual inspection of ash to then check soil for toxins, which is ‘unlikely to give a complete picture’ of contamination
A plan to test for toxic dioxins near the site of a February train wreck in East Palestine, Ohio, is flawed and unlikely to find the dangerous substances, independent chemical pollution researchers in the US who reviewed the testing protocol told the Guardian.
Initial soil testing already revealed dioxin levels hundreds of times above the threshold that Environmental Protection Agency scientists have found poses a cancer risk, but that sampling was limited in scope.
Arcadis will largely rely on visual inspections of the ground to find evidence of dioxins, instead of systematically testing soil samples that may contain the compounds, which is standard protocol.
The plan does not say how low the levels of dioxin the company will check for will be.
Testing will only be conducted up to two miles from the accident site when ash has been found up to 20 miles away.
The testing is limited to soil and does not include food or water.
Continue reading...The research group that first exposed the scandal say ‘it’s not over’ and that governments must act
Thirteen million diesel cars producing “extreme” levels of toxic air pollution are still on the roads in Europe and the UK, according to a report, seven years after the Dieselgate scandal first exploded.
The non-profit research group, the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT), revealed in 2015 that many diesel cars were highly polluting, emitting far more nitrogen oxides on the road than in official testing. The scandal led to a more rigorous test being introduced in the EU in 2019.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Cutting-edge analysis of fine particulate levels by area reveals shocking disparities: ‘The underlying variable that is most predictive is systemic racism’
The neighborhood where Emprezz Nontzikelelo struggles to breathe the worst air in America was the only part of Bakersfield where Black families like hers were allowed to live when she was growing up.
Still populated by predominantly low-income people of color, the eastern side of Bakersfield lies downwind of the oilwells, freeways and pesticide-choked agricultural fields of California’s Central Valley and backs up to a busy rail yard that ships the valley’s produce around the nation.
Continue reading...Thai authorities struggle to contain forest fires, a persistent cause of air pollution during the dry season
The Chiang Mai authorities in northern Thailand will hand out face masks to the public as the province struggles with dangerously high levels of air pollution caused by persistent forest fires.
The fires are an annual problem between the months of December and April, when farmers set light to their fields to clear the land ready for the next crop cycle.
Continue reading...When a train derailed in a small town in Ohio last month, it shed its toxic load, spewed smoke and set off a political firestorm that is still raging
On the evening of 3 February, a train made up of 149 carriages and more than a mile long came off the rails in the small Ohio town of East Palestine. No one was injured but the train shed its cargo, which included toxic chemicals including vinyl chloride, a known carcinogen.
The Guardian’s Nina Lakhani has been reporting from East Palestine where residents have returned to their homes after those within the disaster’s exclusion zone were forced to leave the area. She tells Michael Safi that local people are furious about the way the accident happened – and how the cleanup has been handled.
Continue reading...Popularity of sport utility vehicles driving higher oil demand and climate crisis, say experts
The continued global rise in the sale of SUVs pushed their climate-heating emissions to almost a billion tonnes of carbon dioxide in 2022, according to the International Energy Agency.
The 330m sport utility vehicles on the roads produced emissions equivalent to the combined national emissions of the UK and Germany last year. If SUVs were a country, they would rank as the sixth most polluting in the world.
Continue reading...Demand for wood stoves is soaring in energy crisis despite research showing their harmful effects
Demand for wood-burning stoves, including in urban areas, has soared as households look for more affordable ways to stay warm during the energy crisis.
Campaigners have called for stricter legislation on their use because of their negative impact on air pollution and health, with wood burning in the UK gaining in popularity over the past decade.
Continue reading...The University of Melbourne study estimated that 11,105 people die prematurely from transport emissions, many more than past figures
Pollution from motor vehicles could be killing thousands more people than road accidents, with new research finding more than 11,000 Australians die prematurely every year from transport emissions.
The study from the University of Melbourne also found vehicle pollution could be putting more than 19,000 people in hospital for heart and lung issues, and causing asthma cases to spike by 66,000 each year.
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Continue reading...Legislation could see companies fined millions of pounds for making unproven environmental assertions to sell their products
When the hydrogen-powered Hyundai Nexo car was launched in the UK in the spring of 2019, it was described as “so beautifully clean” that it “purifies the air as it goes”.
Hyundai Motor UK claimed that if 10,000 of its cars were on the road, carbon emission reduction would be “equivalent to planting 60,000 trees”.
Continue reading...Government plan to educate owners and encourage fines not enough to effectively tackle air pollution
• Study links air pollution to mental ill-health
Politicians and campaigners have called for an urgent review of wood-burning stoves, which cause large amounts of pollution in urban areas.
The calls follow the admission by the environment secretary that the government had set weaker air pollution targets than it would like. The admission came as she announced a new environmental plan for England that held back from banning wood-burning stoves and settled instead for “educating” people on their use.
Continue reading...Thai capital’s already bad air made worse by forest fires and burning on farms
People in Bangkok have been advised to work from home and wear face masks due to air pollution that has worsened to unhealthy levels.
Officials urged people to use public transport rather than private cars for commuting, and said the authorities would seek to reduce sources of pollution such as outdoor burning and construction activities. Face masks would be distributed to vulnerable people, Bangkok authorities said.
Continue reading...Research charity’s bid to raise money through a scheme that goes against its own principles sparks wrath of clean air campaigners
The British Heart Foundation (BHF), which has campaigned on the pollution risks of burning wood at home, is being urged to review a charity draw for a £3m London townhouse, with a fire pit on the garden terrace and open fires in the property.
A promotional video shows wood being burned in the metal fire pit at the property in north London and an open fire next to a bath. “Take a soak in your sumptuous stone tub and relax to the crackling sounds of the roaring fireplace,” says the promotion.
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