August 28, 2020 — The Society of Environmental Journalists' Fund for Environmental Journalism has awarded an additional $48,768 for 11 new story projects selected via its Rapid Response story project grants on a wide range of environmental issues and regions. SEJ previously awarded $76,760 in grants, and expects to award additional grants in the next month.
Eligible topics this round: Climate change or conservation in North America; oceans and coasts globally; water security in the United States; and the Mississippi River basin.
To date, SEJ's Rapid Response Grants have funded:
- Fund Journalists: 52 professional journalists, photographers and editors will receive stipends of up to $2,000 each.
- Increase Representation: More than 60% of the funds have been awarded to story projects focused on under-represented communities or diverse perspectives on environmental issues.
- Support Local Stories: More than two-thirds of the story projects focus on a local or regional issue, ranging from Mississippi's floodplains to Canada's Pacific coast.
The recipients of the Fund for Environmental Journalism Rapid Response grants (Round 2) are:
John Antonelli, for "The Earth is Tired." The film will take a deep dive into the lives of the typical Haitian farmer and fisherman. As they go about their daily struggle to survive, they inevitably intersect with the work of Jean Wiener, a marine biologist in Cap Haitien, and Chavannes Jean Baptiste, an agronomist in Hinche. Both men are completely immersed in the effort to rebuild Haiti's once flourishing ecosystem, economy and dignity.
Casey Carter (pictured, right) and Colleen Cassingham, for "To Use a Mountain," an independent feature documentary that presents generational, rural American stories of environmental ruin, citizen science and ecopolitical activism in areas that once faced the possibility of federally mandated nuclear waste storage. Part dystopian exposé and part vérité tableau, this film entwines the rural geographies of the atomic age with the dreams, disillusionments and fortitudes of the stories that live within them.
William Crisp, for "Marine Pollution Investigation," an investigation that will focus on highly polluting shipping companies that are causing instances of marine pollution, as well as those that use the services provided by these shipping companies.
FEJ-funded project:
- "Environment Agency Slashes Number of Water Pollution Incident Visits," The Guardian, December 3, 2020.
- "Revealed: No Penalties Issued Under 'Useless' English Farm Pollution Laws," The Guardian, February 12, 2021.
- "Environment Agency Incident Attendance Drops by 63%," ENDS Report (requires free trial/registration).
- "How EA Enforcement Has Fallen During the Pandemic," ENDS Report (requires free trial/registration).
- "EA Water Quality Testing Yet To Return to Pre-Pandemic Levels," ENDS Report (requires free trial/registration), July 28, 2021.
- "'Scant and Misleading': Why the EA Is Under Fire for Failing To Increase Water Quality Testing," ENDS Report (requires free trial/registration).
Jeremy Deaton, for "Climate Change and the Coronavirus in Chicago." Black communities in Chicago face higher rates of COVID-19, higher rates of pollution (which exacerbates COVID-19), and also tend to be warmer than other parts of the city, yielding more severe summer heat (which worsens pollution and weakens immune systems, thereby worsening COVID-19). The data-driven story will explore how these factors intersect with other risk factors, such as limited access to fresh food and health care. (Nexus Media)
FEJ-funded project:
- "Mapping the Disparities That Bred an Unequal Pandemic," Bloomberg CityLab, September 30, 2020.
- "How Racist Housing Policies Created a Public Health Crisis in Chicago," Nexus Media News, October 8, 2020.
J. Carl Ganter and Brett Walton, for "Drowning in Debt: As Past-Due Water Bills Mount, Health and Economies Struggle." Household water debt is an underappreciated factor in the tenuous balance between the affordability of water and sewer service in the United States and budget stability for municipal utilities. Circle of Blue's reporting team is hand-collecting data on outstanding water debt from major cities across the United States to uncover where are the pain points for people, their utilities and their cities.
FEJ-funded project:
- "Millions of Americans Are In Water Debt," Circle of Blue, August 5, 2020, by Brett Walton.
- "Nine Things To Know About Household Water Debt," Circle of Blue, August 6, 2020, by Brett Walton.
- "Utilities Ordered To Forgive Customer Water Debt," Circle of Blue, August 12, 2020, by Brett Walton.
- Detroit Water Debt Interactive Dashboard. Produced in partnership with Qlik, a leading data visualization company, the dashboard crossreferences water and sewage balances acquired during the research phase of the series. These are then compared these records against percentages of people below the poverty line by zip code and racial demographics.
Paul Koberstein and Jessica Applegate, for "Investigating Forest Carbon Offsets." Our investigation found that forest carbon offsets granted by the state of California protect trees in Southeast Alaska in exchange for carbon emissions stemming from oil drilling in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge, a rare, rich and highly vulnerable ecosystem. We also found that the offsets fail to reduce carbon emissions as required under California's carbon cap-and-trade law. (Cascadia Times)
FEJ-funded project:
- "Carbon Conundrum: A Native Alaskan Company's Promise To Save Its Forests Benefits Local Ecosystems, But Given the Zero-Sum Game That's Carbon Offsets, It Delays Meaningful Action on Climate Change," Earth Island Journal, Winter 2021.
- "Native Alaskan Company Involved in Controversial Carbon Offsets Project To Quit Logging," Earth Island Journal, January 21, 2021.
Cooper McKim, for "Carbon Valley," which follows one underdog competitor through an international carbon-capture competition underway in Wyoming. The series explores the long-term viability of carbon capture as both a solution to climate change and a means to keeping Wyoming's declining coal industry afloat.
FEJ-funded project:
- "Carbon Valley" (podcast episodes 1-9 inclusive)
David Moskowitz, for "Wild Salmon, Fish Farms and First Nations." In the waters around Vancouver Island, Canada, the future of wild salmon hang in the balance in a tug-of-war between Scandinavian corporations that operate open-water fish farms and conservation interests that see these farms as the final nail in the coffin for wild salmon runs up and down the British Columbia coast. This moment presents opportunities and risks for sovereign First Nations with increasing power over what goes on within the boundaries of their traditional territory. Within a complicated matrix of influences, each First Nation must sort out how to balance traditional cultural values, food security and economic opportunity.
FEJ-funded project:
- "Some First Nations Are Fighting Fish Farms in BC to Protect Their Waters and Cultures," Civil Eats, December 7, 2020.
- "Raising Salmon," Earth Island Journal, Winter 2021.
Julia Rosen, for "Cap-and-Trade and Environmental Justice: What Does an Equitable Cap-and-Trade Program Look Like?" This report will investigate the impacts of California's cap-and-trade program on communities of color and will examine the research behind proposed solutions in order to shed light on what an equitable cap-and-trade program might look like. (Yes Magazine)
FEJ-funded project:
- "Can California’s Cap and Trade Actually Address Environmental Justice?" Yes! Magazine, November 20, 2020.
- "Groups Question Effectiveness of CA Cap-and-Trade Program," YES! and partner Public News Service and its affiliate California News Service, November 23, 2020.
Emily Sekine, for "Bayou Sutra." During World War II, around 16,000 Japanese Americans from the Pacific Coast were relocated to Arkansas, incarcerated by the U.S. government, and forced to turn acres of swampland in the Mississippi Delta into productive agricultural land. The story of Japanese-American wartime incarceration is not often thought of as an environmental story, but it has a lot to do with current debates over industrial agriculture, climate change and the loss of the wetlands. It͛'s also part of a much longer history of unjust labor practices and destructive land management policies in the South, which reveals that efforts to control the unruliness of the Mississippi River watershed are fundamentally tied to efforts to control the unruliness of certain populations.
FEJ-funded project:
- "Bayou Sutra: Phantom Swamplands and the Legacy of Japanese American Internment," Orion Magazine, September 1, 2021.
Gavin Smith, for "Toxic Military Contamination — Environmental and Health Impacts of PFAS in Aqueous Firefighting Foams at Bases Nationwide." PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances), carcinogens now found on 651 U.S. military sites, have taken a terrible toll in terms of environmental cleanup and health issues for those exposed. Civilian Exposure, which has been reporting on toxic military exposure for years, is creating and disseminating a series of articles/podcasts about the toxic substances on U.S. military bases, potential exposures, any ongoing cleanup efforts and future health impacts.
FEJ-funded project (articles):
- "ChemFAQs: PFAS," Civilian Exposure.
- "PFAS and Afghanistan: Who’s Responsible Now?" Civilian Exposure.
- "PFAS in Popular Bottled Water Brands," Civilian Exposure.
- "Profile on PFOA and PFOS," Civilian Exposure.
- "Wells up to 16 Miles Away From Chemours Plant Test Positive for Harmful Toxic Chemicals," Civilian Exposure.
- "Military Bases and Fire Fighting Foam," Civilian Exposure.
- "Navy Expands Testing for PFAS in Kitsap," Civilian Exposure.
- More articles
FEJ-funded project (podcasts):
- "Season 2, Episode 1," Civilian Exposure, February 10, 2021.
- "Season 1, Episode 11," Civilian Exposure, December 9, 2020.
- "Season 1, Episode 8," Civilian Exposure, November 12, 2020.
- "Season 1, Episode 7," Civilian Exposure, October 26, 2020.
- "Season 1, Episode 6," Civilian Exposure, October 19, 2020.
- "Season 1, Episode 5," Civilian Exposure, June 15, 2020.
- More podcasts
For the last 10 years, SEJ's Fund for Environmental Journalism has helped foundation partners and individual donors support journalism projects that are editorially independent and independently juried. Support for the Rapid Response grants comes from The Hewlett Foundation, The Bullitt Foundation, Walton Family Foundation and other foundation and individual donors to the Fund for Environmental Journalism.