Poor, poor sea turtles. A new study from Global Change Biology discovered plastic in the guts of sea turtles across the Atlantic, Pacific and Mediterranean. The study observed more than 100 sea turtles of all seven species, and in all of them, found microplastics. Researchers from the University of Exeter and Plymouth Marine Laboratory, in [...]
Author: Valerie Royzman
Dinner has been served — with a little side of microplastics
An October 2018 study in the Environmental Science & Technology journal found more than 90 percent of salt worldwide is contaminated with microplastics. In other words, you’re eating microplastics. Essentially, microplastics are “small particles of plastic that are smaller than 5 mm,” according to the International Institute for Sustainable Development. Our cosmetic products and facial [...]
Environmental reporting on the Ohio EPA is … frustrating
Two weeks ago, I turned in my first story for an environmental journalism and data course at Kent State. My partners, Cameron Hoover and Adam Kirasic, and myself covered hazardous waste in East Liverpool, Ohio, and contacted several sources from Heritage Thermal Services and the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency for the story. We all agreed [...]
The EPA’s top 5 most common hazardous substances
Superfund sites are normally fuming with hazardous substances, many of these toxic to humans and the environment. When the U.S. government recognized areas contaminated with hazardous waste were threatening the health of communities, it created the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) — AKA Superfund — in 1980. If you’d like to learn [...]
What’s a Superfund site, anyway? Here’s a basic breakdown
Well, to answer your question — and pretty obvious from the photo — Superfund sites are not very pretty. According to the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) website, Superfunds are “contaminated sites … due to hazardous waste being dumped, left out in the open, or otherwise improperly managed.” Most of the time, these are “manufacturing facilities, processing [...]
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