"Harry Truman was president the last time we exported more energy than we imported. Now complete energy independence may be within reach as President Obama plans to tap all domestic sources to achieve that goal."
President Obama will send his budget request for fiscal 2013 to Congress today. It is expected to fund the clean energy programs he mentioned in his State of the Union speech. But Congress, which actually appropriates the money, will have the last word. Republicans want to cut many environmental and clean-energy programs drastically. After agency-specific budget briefings today, some agency heads will explain the budget requests to Congressional committees later in the week.
"Religious-right leaders are slamming a green evangelical group for casting support for Environmental Protection Agency rules to cut power plant mercury emissions as a 'pro-life' position." (EPA says the new standards "will avert up to 11,000 premature deaths, 4,700 heart attacks and 130,000 asthma attacks every year.")
"U.S. production of short-chain chlorinated paraffins has ceased under a settlement agreement between the Environmental Protection Agency and Dover Chemical, EPA announced on Feb. 7. These substances are persistent, bioaccumulative, and toxic, according to the agency."
"When US government scientists began sampling the air from a tower north of Denver, Colorado, they expected urban smog — but not strong whiffs of what looked like natural gas. They eventually linked the mysterious pollution to a nearby natural-gas field, and their investigation has now produced the first hard evidence that the cleanest-burning fossil fuel might not be much better than coal when it comes to climate change."
New FDA tests reveal that some brands of lipsticks contain levels of lead higher than the strictest limit (California's) recommended for health. FDA has not concluded that there is any cause for consumer concern.
"An ingredient in plastics and food-can linings coaxes cells from the pancreas to inappropriately secrete the hormone insulin, a finding that bolsters earlier links between type 2 diabetes and low-dose exposure to the chemical."
"It's a heavy metal. It's linked to learning problems in school children. And every child is exposed. Sounds like lead? It's cadmium. Signs are emerging that cadmium – a widespread contaminant that gets little attention from health experts and regulators – could be the new lead. Children with higher cadmium levels are three times more likely to have learning disabilities and participate in special education, according to new research."
"About 21 months ago, a proposed list of widely used chemicals that may pose health risks landed at the White House’s Office of Management and Budget for review. It’s still there."
"The nuclear industry is celebrating the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission's decision to give the go-ahead for a utility company to build two new nuclear reactors in Georgia, the first license to be granted for a new reactor in the U.S. since 1978. But last year's accident at reactors in Fukushima, Japan, still clouds the future of nuclear power, as does the cost of new power plants."
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