EPA quietly backtracks on claims US has phased out toxic Pfas compounds

The EPA has found that virtually no level of exposure to either in drinking water is safe, and the International Agency for Research on Cancer classifies Pfoa as “carcinogenic to humans” and Pfos as “possibly carcinogenic”. Still, the EPA is allowing Houston-based Inhance to produce containers from which Pfoa has been found to leach at high levels into the containers’ contents. The company makes up to 200m plastic containers annually used across the US economy…

 https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/oct/18/epa-pfas-compounds-toxins

 

The EPA Is About to Hand Oil and Gas Companies a Huge Methane-Related Gift – Mother Jones

Rolling back regulations will give industry players “exactly what they’ve long wanted.”…

 https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2026/10/epa-zeldin-methane-emissions-rules-rollback-oil-gas-super-emitter-program/

 

‘Love letter’: California AG takes aim at Trump’s links to Big Oil - POLITICO

Bonta also challenged Trump’s relationships with the fossil fuel industry and corporations, accusing him of failing to enforce antitrust laws. 

“Trump has been writing an ongoing love letter, or at least attempting to, to the fossil fuel industry, writing different chapters and different verses and trying to provide them giveaways time and time again,” he said…

 https://www.politico.com/news/2026/09/28/love-letter-california-ag-takes-aim-at-trumps-links-to-big-oil-01094545

 

US environment agency let Bayer pick regulations for destructive weedkiller, documents show

 Environmental Protection Agency asked firm to choose rules it wanted for dicamba, then put the choices in a proposed federal rule…

 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/sep/20/epa-bayer-regulation-pesticide-dicamba

 

The EPA Would Rather Monitor Water for Abortion Pills than Pollution – Mother Jones

The agency is easing climate rules for power plants while testing water for mifepristone…

 https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2026/09/the-epa-would-rather-monitor-water-for-abortion-pills-than-pollution/

 

Former EPA Officials: Trump Is Letting Data Centers Make People Sick – Mother Jones

“Over the decades, toxicologists, chemists, atmospheric scientists, modelers and engineers worked in concert with academic colleagues on behalf of the American people—not on behalf of industry,” Costa said in a press briefing last week. “We wanted to carry out EPA’s mission of protecting people’s health from industrial air pollution.” 

 Now, though, that work force has been gutted. The Trump administration has dismantled EPA’s main research office, and the agency’s priorities have shifted away from strict enforcement of pollution standards. “Transforming the nation’s energy system, while diminishing its scientific capacity to understand what the impacts are going to be, makes no sense,” Costa said…

 https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2026/09/trump-epa-data-centers-epn-report-health-hazards/

 

EPA proposal could leave the public in the dark on data center plans | PBS News

"By eliminating the long-standing federal requirement for public notice, this proposal continues efforts by the Trump administration to turn its back on the fundamental EPA principle of transparency," said Mike Koerber, a former deputy director of EPA's air quality office...

 https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/epa-proposal-could-leave-the-public-in-the-dark-on-data-center-plans

 

Groups sue Trump’s EPA over fast-track approval of toxic datacenter chemicals

Exposure to two compounds approved can result in ‘sudden death’ and range of other serious health risks, lawsuit warns…

 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/26/trump-epa-datacenter-forever-chemicals? 

 

Trump EPA aims to exempt datacenters from disclosing air pollution, advocates warn

Trump administration proposes new rule to dismantle requirement for datacenters to publicly report air pollution…

 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/25/datacenters-air-pollution-epa

Trump Ordered to Release Billions in Resilience Grants for Disadvantaged Communities – Mother Jones

The administration, which shed a quarter of its EPA workers, now says the agency lacks the money and staff to implement the grant program...

 https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2026/08/judge-orders-trump-pay-billions-resilience-climate-grants-black-low-income-greenhouse-gas-reduction-sanitation-water-epa/

Climate Conspirituality (Conspirituality podcast #319)

Climate reality keeps colliding with denial, erasure, and rebranding — across media, politics, and religion. Temu conspiritualists weave melted stories about the origins of wildfires, while the high-class guys run meditation-and-regenerative-farming spectacle backed by Exxon money. Julian’s on that angle.

Derek will be telling us about how climate journalism is collapsing faster than the climate itself with mass environment reporting layoffs at NPR, CBS, the Washington Post, and the LA Times. Trump gutted the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. EPA webpages have been scrubbed of human-caused warming language.

Are religious institutions doing any better? In 2015, five world religions — Jewish, Catholic, Islamic, Hindu, and Buddhist — independently issued climate statements ahead of the Paris COP21 talks. Matthew looks at how they struggled to challenge the global economies they depend on.
Interview: 

https://www.conspirituality.net/episodes/319-climate-conspirituality

Remembering when it wasn’t windy enough to power our televisions #trump

 https://www.youtube.com/shorts/EbJEWwwz288

 

EPA Ordered—Again—to Release $2.8 Billion in Climate Justice Funds – Mother Jones

The Trump administration’s interpretation of a recent court ruling was “unlawful.”…

 https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2026/07/epa-ordered-again-to-release-2-8-billion-in-climate-justice-funds/

 

The War on Science (Conspirituality podcast, #316)

With so much emphasis on global politics and the World Cup in recent weeks, we’re going to focus on the somewhat quieter but intensely important bureaucratic dismantling of expertise occurring in health and science.

First, Derek looks into a recent 412-page OMB proposal that hands political appointees veto power over federal science grants, effectively killing peer review, blocking research on health disparities, and walling off American scientists from the rest of the world. Matthew counters with Canada’s own corrosive behavior.

Then we dig into the contradiction of MAHA: the pro-health movement running cover for the EPA quietly approving new forever chemical pesticides mere days after the Supreme Court gutted Americans’ ability to sue Monsanto (by way of their parent company, Bayer). Again, there’s a Canadian parallel: Bill C-30 hands cabinet the power to override Health Canada’s own scientists and approve pesticides they’ve already ruled unsafe.

Finally, Julian removes gravity from the situation by covering congressional UAP hearings where unverified whistleblower claims about alien bodies and secret programs get treated with peer-reviewed science seriousness.

Only, as with everything else in Trump’s America, the science is thin and the theater, thick.
Interview: 

https://www.conspirituality.net/episodes/316-the-war-on-science

EPA proposes weakening heavy-duty truck pollution rules : NPR

According to the EPA's analysis, the changes would save the trucking industry between $4,130 and $6,152 per diesel engine affected. Compared to the current emissions rules, the change would increase ozone-forming nitrogen oxide pollution from heavy duty trucks by 4.2% in 2030 and by 11.6% by 2055. 

The EPA did not model the resulting effect on air quality or human health, but noted that the modifications would likely reduce the benefits of prior rules changes in 2023.

 https://www.npr.org/2026/07/09/nx-s1-5886354/epa-heavy-duty-truck-emissions

 

Appeals court rejects Trump EPA bid to abandon rule restricting deadly soot pollution

Decision leaves in place Biden-era standard on pollution from coal-fired plants, factories and other industrial sources

 https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/jun/27/trump-epa-court-ruling-soot-pollution

 

Trump EPA Methane Rule Rollback to Benefit Billionaire Jeffery Hildebrand — ProPublica

Climate Rollbacks: Trump’s EPA is planning to weaken restrictions on oil and gas wells that produce very little energy but release vast amounts of methane.

A Wealthy Beneficiary: Oil billionaire Jeffery Hildebrand, a major Trump donor, is set to reap the benefits. Society as a whole will deal with the environmental costs.

The Influence Campaign: A former Hildebrand lobbyist now rewriting the EPA’s methane rules has solicited input from oil industry groups backed by the billionaire…

 https://www.propublica.org/article/trump-epa-methane-jeffery-hildebrand-hilcorp-oil-regulations

 

Judge Says EPA Illegally Canceled a $2.8 Billion Environmental Justice Program – Mother Jones

As Jackson warned, it’s hard to view it as a coincidence that a Supreme Court majority built on fossil fuel money went out of its way to help the industry. Indeed, the case is emblematic of a broader distortion of American law. Billionaires and the industries they run have a well-monied thumb on the scales of justice, an oligarchic influence operation that, among other tactics, funds a flood of amici to push the justices toward a preferred outcome…

 https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2026/06/judge-says-epa-illegally-cancelled-bidens-2-8-billion-environmental-justice-grants-program/

 

Trump officials plan to repeal limits on ‘forever chemicals’ in drinking water

Public health advocates on Monday condemned the EPA. 

“Zeldin and Kennedy are trying to sell potions out of the back of a covered wagon,” said Dr Anna Reade, director of Pfas advocacy at Natural Resources Defense Council. “The millions of Americans demanding safe drinking water are not going to fall for their hocus pocus.” 

The move is widely viewed as at odds with Donald Trump’s pledge to eliminate toxic chemicals from drinking water…

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/may/18/trump-administration-epa-pfas-water

 

Zeldin, Flustered by Elementary Math, Dodges Senator Whitehouse's Questions

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKh53Po8OXc