Where does the groundwater go? GE proposes final PCB landfill plan for Rest of River cleanup

Greg Sukiennik | The Berkshire Eagle

FDA Announces PFAS Used in Grease-Proofing Agents for Food Packaging No Longer Being Sold in the U.S.

Press Release

"February 28, 2024 Today, the FDA announced that grease-proofing substances containing Per and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS) are no longer being sold by manufacturers for food contact use in the U.S. market. The completion of the voluntary market phase-out of these substances used on food packaging paper and paperboard, eliminates the primary source of dietary exposure to PFAS from authorized food contact uses. To protect public health, in 2020, following our post-market safety assessment, the FDA obtained commitments from manufacturers to cease sales for food contact use in the U.S. of grease-proofing substances that contain certain types of PFAS. Today’s announcement marks the fulfillment of these voluntary commitments. In addition, the FDA has confirmed that other manufacturers have voluntarily stopped sales of other food contact substances (which contain different types of PFAS) intended for use as grease-proofing agents in the U.S. Grease-proofing substances are applied on paper and paperboard packaging to prevent the leaking of grease and oil, and for water-resistant properties. The substances containing PFAS were applied to fast-food wrappers, microwave popcorn bags, take-out paperboard containers, pet food bags, as well as other similar types of packaging. While the original commitment letters received by the FDA from the manufacturers state that paper and paperboard products containing these food contact substances could take 18 months to exhaust the market supply from the last date of sale, most of the companies have exited the market prior to their original phase-out date. In addition, FDA is working towards a validated analytical method that would allow us to monitor the market for these food contact substances in food packaging. As part of our commitment to food chemical safety and our reevaluation of chemicals authorized for use in food, we will continue to conduct our post-market safety evaluations to ensure that our risk determinations continue to be accurate and based in the current science..." READ MORE

Higher temperatures force New England fishers off ice early: 'Global warming is real'

Erin McCormick | The Guardian

"For generations, residents have hauled tiny fishing shacks on to frozen lakes, but milder winters are forcing them to quit early. New England fishers are on thin ice this winter as warming temperatures force them to abandon their lake perches months ahead of schedule, an alarming reality that could jeopardize the future of a deeply rooted recreational tradition. Ice fishing is a way of life in places like New Hampshire, where people flock to frozen lakes each winter with their bob-houses in tow. These little houses – diminutive, hand-built wooden shanties mounted on sled gliders so they can be pulled into the middle of frozen lakes – have long offered protection from the freezing northern winds. In recent years they have become ever more elaborate, with holes built into their floors for hauling in fish, along with heaters, solar panels, lights and even TVs. But ice fishers are increasingly finding themselves stuck on the lakeside after being forced to abandon their efforts unseasonably early. On a recent Tuesday in late February, with midwinter temperatures pushing into the balmy 50s, fishers on New Hampshire’s Lake Winnepocket were scrambling to pull their bob-houses off the rapidly melting ice.

Johnny Cutter and Ethan O’Neil rushed to slide their ice shanties off the lake with winches and tractor-like all terrain vehicles, before it got warm enough for them to fall through the ice. 'Global warming is real,' said Cutter, wading through puddles in his ice cleats. 'I never thought it was, but it is.' O’Neil, who was working to hoist his little house on to some rounded logs so he could roll it on to planks lined up on the lakeshore, agreed. 'Tell everybody in the lower states to stop using their air conditioners, so we’ll have winter up here.' According to Stephen Baron, a meteorologist with the nearest National Weather Service station, in Gray, Maine, temperatures never dropped below 0F (-18C) in the area around Concord, New Hampshire, this winter – a phenomenon that has not occurred since the winter of 1952-53. 'As of right now, the average temperature is only one-tenth of a degree off of it being the warmest winter ever on record,' he said, adding that those Concord records go all the way back to 1869. Cutter has been ice fishing on nearby lakes in New Hampshire since his youth, when his stepdad brought him out on the ice with a pup tent and a portable heater brand-named 'Mr Buddy'. 'The houses then weren’t as glamorous as the ones we have now,' he said. 'Mine has a 300-watt solar panel on the top. It runs all my electrical and my TV. I even have a disco ball.' In recent years, the bob-houses have had to be pulled from the lakes far earlier than the state-mandated deadline of 1 April. Cutter said this year some of the local fishing derbies had been canceled because of the perilously thin ice. And, with a late start to winter and an early melt, his house was only on the ice for 20 days. The heating ice can create dangerous conditions for the fishers. In other parts of the country, several people have fallen in, sometimes fatally. In recent years, authorities have had to haul Jeeps and ATVs out of melting lakes.'I had to help pull out a bob-house out that fell in three years ago,' said Cutter, adding that a friend had built that house with a glass roof, which ended up turning it into a heating greenhouse that melted a hole in the ice beneath it..." READ MORE

Pittsfield Subcommittee Supports Paint Stewardship Efforts

Brittany Polito | iBerkshires

"PITTSFIELD, Mass. — The discussion of paint stewardship has reached the City Council. On Monday, the Public Works and Utilities subcommittee voted to draft a letter in support of paint stewardship legislation that diverts unwanted paint from waste streams. Paint stewardship is part of the product stewardship approach, in which manufacturers take responsibility for the end life of their products. Tom Irwin, a member of Dalton's Green Committee, has gotten a number of the county's communities on board and the bill is co-sponsored by Berkshire legislators. 'Why is product stewardship or paint stewardship important? In 2022, Massachusetts generated 6 million tons of solid waste. That was up by 6 percent from 2018 but the state only has 3.2 million tons of incineration capacity per year. This means that there's going to be at least 2.5 to 2.7 million tons of waste that has to be landfilled,' he explained. 'There are only five municipal landfills still existing in the state so it results in approximately 2.5 million tons and growing of waste that must be hauled out of state to places as far away as Ohio and South Carolina. This is expensive with increases of 30 percent to 35 percent over the last five years and it has an extremely large carbon footprint. Product stewardship in general and paint stewardship in particular, because of its near-term benefits are important tools to help decrease this expensive burden and better position Massachusetts for the future.' Through the paint stewardship program, residents bring unwanted liquid latex and oil-based paint to participating retail stores or transfer stations. The products are then hauled to reprocessing plants where 80 to 85 percent of liquid latex paint is reblended and about 80 percent of oil paint is burned as coal fuel in industrial furnaces. Consumers pay between 75 cents and a dollar per gallon at the time of purchase or $1.75 for five gallons, as Irwin said 'The goal is not to make money it's to break even.' He explained that the program is of no cost to municipalities, significantly decreases toxic waste, and serves as a model for expanded product stewardship legislation. Last month, the Environment and Natural Resources and Agriculture Committee voted in favor of the legislation and passed it to the Ways and Means Committee..." READ MORE

A New Invasive Zigzagging Across North America

Jen Weimer | The Outside Story

"Illustration by Adelaide Tyrol. There’s a new invasive insect zigzagging its way across North America. First reported by citizen scientists in Quebec in 2020, the elm zigzag sawfly (Aproceros leucopoda) has now spread to North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Massachusetts, and Vermont. This new pest, which is native to Asia, has the potential to cause major devastation to one of our native tree species. As its name suggests, this sawfly infests elms (Ulmus species), feeding on the tree’s leaves in a zigzag pattern. The larvae, which feed spring through summer, resemble tiny green caterpillars but with six or more pairs of prolegs (fleshy abdominal limbs); caterpillars have five or fewer pairs of prolegs. These larvae eventually consume entire leaves and may completely defoliate trees. Branch dieback and tree mortality can occur if trees are severely defoliated for several years in a row. Once done feeding, the larva spins into a cocoon – attached to a leaf during summer, or overwintering in leaf litter – where it pupates into an adult. The adult sawflies are all female and are parthenogenic, meaning they can reproduce asexually without fertilization from a male. They emerge in the spring and lay up to 50 eggs on leaf tips. The eggs hatch in about a week. In our region, elm zigzag sawflies typically produce two generations per year. In their native Asia, there may be as many as four generations per year. The number of generations produced each year determines the amount of defoliation. You may be asking, 'Didn’t Dutch elm disease already kill off all the elm trees?' While the disease has decimated elms, it did not eliminate them, and resistant trees exist. Researchers are working to breed these survivors and restore the species to critical habitats including floodplains. In river floodplains such as those found along the Connecticut River, the American elm is a foundation species – one that forms the base of an ecological community and influences biodiversity. Restoring elm is even more important now, with the loss of ash tree species from emerald ash borer (another invasive species) and the increase of flooding events due to climate change. The Nature Conservancy (TNC) is working with the US Forest Service on a large elm restoration project in the Northeast. The project, initiated by former TNC floodplain forest ecologist Christian Marks, began a decade ago with the crossbreeding of survivor trees from the Northeast with trees resistant to Dutch elm disease. Since 2014, researchers have planted more than 11,000 of these hybrid elms at 72 sites across New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Vermont, and New Hampshire. Although these trees face pressure from deer browsing, flooding, ice jams, and other insect infestations, survival rates are as high as 88 percent at some research sites. In 2026, researchers plan to inoculate surviving trees with the fungus that causes Dutch elm disease to determine which trees are truly resistant. The final goal of the project is to create seed orchards of elms that are disease resistant and climate adapted. TNC Senior Conservation Planner Gus Goodwin manages the project and is hopeful it will be a success despite this new threat. While elm zigzag sawfly has not been detected in the elm restoration plantings in the Northeast, researchers have detected the pest in Ohio, where they have replicated the work done by TNC..." READ MORE

US SEC to vote on long-awaited overhaul of corporate climate disclosure rules

Douglas Gillison, Isla Binnie, Ross Kerber | Reuters

"WASHINGTON/NEW YORK, March 6 (Reuters) - Wall Street's top regulator will vote on Wednesday whether to adopt rules that could overhaul requirements for U.S.-listed companies to report climate-related risks. The proposed U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission rules aim to standardize climate-related company disclosures about greenhouse gas emissions, risks and how much money they are spending on the transition to a low-carbon economy. The agency says such information is important for investors. Currently, U.S. securities regulations do not impose common standards for climate-related disclosures. The SEC says investors need such information to be consistent and comparable. Currently, companies produce climate information on their own terms. 'As an investor, we expect full transparency about a company's fundamentals, especially climate-related risks that pose serious negative financial consequences,' said Dan Chu, executive director of Sierra Club Foundation. 'Without higher accountability standards, companies can withhold critical information that prevents us from making informed investment decisions rooted in full due diligence.' Chu said that failure to strengthen climate risk disclosure requirements would mean the SEC was 'falling short of its mission to protect investors.' First proposed two years ago, the rules would join similar requirements in Europe and California, as part of Democratic President Joe Biden's agenda to address climate change threats through federal agencies. The pending regulations have been bogged down by pushback from companies and Republican state officials who say they overreach the SEC's remit and will be burdensome for many organizations. They are expected to bring legal challenges once the rule is finalized. While the SEC has not published a final draft, Reuters reported last month that it has dropped its most ambitious "Scope 3" plank which would have required companies to disclose emissions from their supply chains. That change could help the rule withstand court challenges, sources said. Sources familiar with the matter also told Reuters last month the SEC has softened requirements for disclosures of Scope 1 and 2 emissions - pollution categories for which companies are directly responsible.Many Democrats and climate activists worried that the changes will make the final rule ineffective..." READ MORE