PODCAST · news
Environmental Integrity Project
by Environmental Integrity Podcast
We discuss important environmental issues in the news and investigative reports by the nonprofit, nonpartisan Environmental Integrity Project.
Episodes
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Pushing Back Against the Trump Administration's Efforts to Weaken Coal Ash Rules
More than 2,000 coal-ash waste dumps across the U.S. are slowly leaking lead, arsenic, mercury, and other toxic metals into our underground water supplies. Under the Obama Administration, in 2015, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency imposed the nation’s first-ever federal rules for…
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Trump Administration Invokes Wartime Law to Boost U.S. Petroleum Industry
Although the Trump Administration's war on Iran was not authorized by Congress, President Trump is using it as a pretext to invoke a wartime law and provide subsidies and support to his allies in the U.S. petroleum industry. The White House recently released a memo saying the President is using…
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Trump Administration Proposes to Strip Protections from 70 Million Acres of Wetlands
Wetlands are miracles of nature. They work as the world’s kidneys, filtering and cleaning our water. Wetlands capture carbon dioxide more effectively than even forests and act as cradles of life for biodiversity, sheltering many endangered species. Despite all this, the Trump Administration on...
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Louisiana Scientist Stands up to Censorship of Her Study Critical of the Petrochemical Industry
On this week's podcast we interviewed EIP's visiting scientist, Dr. Kimberly Terrell. Facing a gag order imposed on her by Tulane University leadership because her study on racial discrimination in petrochemical industry jobs reportedly angered Louisiana’s governor, Dr. Terrell faced a new…
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Breaking Down the Fossil Fuel Handouts in Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill”
The $4 trillion Republican spending bill, signed by President Trump on July Fourth, is packed with giveaways to the oil and gas industry. These include tax breaks, opening more public lands and offshore acres to drilling, and a lowering of royalty rates that oil and gas companies must pay for...
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The Attack on Community Air Monitoring in State Legislatures
State legislatures are seeing a wave of industry-backed bills that would ban or restrict the public’s ability to test for air pollution in local communities. Last year, the Louisiana legislature effectively banned community groups from using their own air monitoring to warn residents about...
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Why Trump’s “Drill, Baby, Drill” Agenda is Backfiring, with Less Drilling but Pricier Gas
President Trump won election to his second term promising an “American Energy Dominance” agenda that would stimulate more oil drilling and cut the price of energy in half for consumers. Despite pledges of dramatic regulatory cuts, after his first quarter in office, neither is happening. Drilling…
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The Role of Minerals and Oil in President Trump’s Desire to Seize Greenland
Although he did not mention it during his campaign, since taking office, President Donald Trump has repeatedly suggested the U.S. should buy or seize Greenland – the largest island in the world, and part of the Kingdom of Denmark. A U.S. Geological Survey study estimates that there are 31 billion...
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Oil Veteran is Skeptical of Republican Plans to Produce More Oil by Fast-Tracking Permit Approvals
When President Trump takes office, one of the first things he is expected to do is to accelerate the approval of permits to drill for oil and gas on federal land. But this is likely to have little to no impact on the production of fuel from federal lands. Why? Because there are already more than...
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Billions of Dollars in Taxpayer Subsidies Support Carbon Capture. Is it a Massive Waste?
One of President Biden’s signature achievements to combat climate change has been the approval of billions of dollars in federal subsidies to encourage carbon capture and storage. It sounds good: capturing carbon dioxide from industry, then piping it underground so it can’t heat the planet. But...
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Why Drilling For Oil in the Alaskan Arctic is So Controversial
Last year, environmentalists criticized the Biden Administration’s decision to approve the Willow Project, a proposal by ConocoPhillips to produce up to 600 million barrels of oil on the North Slope over 30 years. Not far away, Australian company Santos is planning a similar proposal called the...
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Debunking Trump’s Claims That “Drill Baby Drill” Will Lower Consumer Prices
President Trump won election this month in part by convincing voters that he could bring down consumer prices for groceries, gasoline, and other products by expanding oil production. We interview an expert on the oil industry and climate change, Professor Robert Kaufmann of Boston University, who...
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What will the Supreme Court’s Rulings Mean for the Environment?
The U.S. Supreme Court has issued several earth-shaking decisions recently – including one that overturned decades of precedent about the authority of the EPA to make decisions about pollution. What will the court’s rejection of the 40-year-old “Chevron deference” mean for organizations fighting...
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North Carolina farming couple fight back against massive LNG storage site
Jeff Hammarquist and Oci Canadas moved to Person County, North Carolina, last year, seeking fertile land to grow vegetables and raise livestock. But after learning about plans for a new Dominion Energy liquefied natural gas (LNG) storage site currently under construction nearby, they joined their...
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Abandoned oil and gas wells pose threat to carbon storage projects
Louisiana is one of the hotspots in the U.S. for sequestration projects that trap carbon dioxide (CO2) underground to protect the climate. Companies are planning 58 storage wells at 24 sites across the state. However, experts say a century of oil and gas drilling has left thousands of pathways…
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Investigation reveals billions in taxpayer subsidies to U.S. plastics manufacturers
Few people know it, but taxpayer dollars are going to help pay for the manufacture of the single-use plastic that is trashing our planet. A new report by the Environmental Integrity Project, “Feeding the Plastics Industrial Complex: Taking Public Subsidies, Breaking Pollution Laws,” reveals that...
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Despite lack of permit, federal authorities allow LNG terminal in Puerto Rico to continue operating
When New York-based company New Fortress Energy upgraded the largest power plant in San Juan, Puerto Rico, to run on natural gas, the decision was supposed to bring relief to an island that struggles with energy security and whose electric grid experiences frequent outages after storms and...
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Biden Administration proposes to allow disposal of carbon waste beneath national forests
Last month, the Biden Administration’s U.S. Forest Service proposed a regulatory change that would allow companies to bury in national forests carbon dioxide waste captured from petrochemical plants and other industries to keep the greenhouse gas out of the atmosphere. Critics say the proposal...
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What is Chemical Plastics Recycling? It’s a Dangerous Deception, a New Report Reveals
This week we interview Judith Enck, President of Beyond Plastics, to learn more about the organization's new report, “Chemical Recycling: A Dangerous Deception,” that takes aim at a growing form of plastics reprocessing called “advanced recycling.” While often portrayed as a climate-smart…
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Taxpayer subsidies for natural gas-fired power plants on the ballot in Texas
Next week, Texas voters will be voting on a constitutional amendment that would provide $10 billion in taxpayer funding to build more natural gas-fired power plants in the Lone Star State. The proposal, called “Proposition 7,” would mean a new public subsidy for fossil fuels at a time of climate...
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Offshore Drilling in the Gulf of Mexico vs. an Endangered Species of Whale
The Biden Administration recently offered leases for sale to oil and gas companies to allow drilling on 67 million acres in the Gulf of Mexico. One might think that the oil and gas industry would be thrilled to win access to a vast swath of the Gulf from Texas to Florida. But the industry sued...
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The Aluminum Paradox
Aluminum is a key component in solar panels, wind turbines, electric vehicles, and other projects essential for combating climate change. As demand for low-carbon products grows, aluminum demand is projected to soar 40 percent by 2030. But production of this lightweight metal is energy-intensive...
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Oil Company Receives Taxpayer Funding to Pipe Carbon Waste Beneath Gulf of Mexico
A Dallas based company called Cox Oil and partners have received federal taxpayer funding to build a 110-mile carbon dioxide pipeline and dumping ground beneath the floor of the Gulf of Mexico. Scott Eustice, Community Science Director of the nonprofit organization Healthy Gulf, and Justin Solet…
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Suing EPA Over Petrochemical Water Pollution
On April 11, 2023, the Environmental Integrity Project (EIP) and 12 allied organizations sued EPA over its failure to regulate billions of gallons of water pollution pouring out of oil refineries and petrochemical industry factories across the U.S., as required by the federal Clean Water Act.…
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The Civil Rights Fight Against Deadly Air Pollution
John Beard is a former Exxon Mobil oil refinery operator and firefighter from Port Arthur, Texas. Like his father before him, he labored his whole life in the refineries that surround this struggling city on the Gulf Coast east of Houston. When Beard finally retired after 38 years in 2017, he...
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Frequent Pollution Violations by Maryland’s Poultry Industry, But Few Penalties
Bruce Ivins is no snowflake. He’s a 62-year-old welder and lifelong farmer who grew up amid the cattle, chickens, and tractors on his family’s farm near Centreville on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. But then his neighbor built two industrial-sized chicken houses next door, and he filed a complaint…
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Talking Trash About Climate Change
When most people think about greenhouse gas emissions, they think about gas-guzzling vehicles and coal-fired power plants. They don’t talk trash. That’s not the case with Environmental Integrity Project attorneys Ryan Maher and Leah Kelly. They recently authored a ground-breaking investigative...
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A Look at Biden's Pick to Run EPA, Michael Regan, and the Challenges he Faces
President-Elect Joe Biden has picked North Carolina’s top environmental regulator, Michael Regan, as his choice to run the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. How has Regan performed in his job as Secretary of the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality? And what challenges will he...
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Talking Covid and the Future of Environmental Justice with Dr. Mustafa Santiago Ali
As the incoming Biden Administration makes plans for its environmental agenda over the next four years, we interview a national leader in the environmental justice movement about how the White House can prioritize protecting minority and lower-income communities that have long been neglected. Dr....
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A Family's Battle for Life Against an Oil Refinery
Charlie Reeves grew up in public housing in South Philadelphia near the oldest and largest oil refinery on the East Coast, the Point Breeze Refinery, later owned by Sunoco and then Philadelphia Energy Solutions. Back in the 1970s, his father led public protests at City Hall and Sunoco…
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Sailor Turns Sleuth In War For Nation's River
Brent Walls, the Upper Potomac Riverkeeper in Western Maryland, dedicated his life to fighting for clean water in the Nation’s River after he experienced a moment of clarity. He was serving in the U.S. Navy aboard the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Constellation when he witnessed a routine procedure...
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Terrorism Charges Against Protester Part Of A National Pattern
Anne Rolfes is the Founding Director of the Louisiana Bucket Brigade, a nonprofit group that, for the last two decades, has been campaigning for public health protections for mostly lower-income families living just beyond the fences of chemical factories. Her advocacy for air pollution controls...
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Fleeing From The March Of Industrial Agriculture
The poultry industry is growing in the Chesapeake Bay region, with a new generation of mega-sized chicken houses and more ammonia air pollution. On Virginia’s Eastern Shore, Carlene Zach, a 60-year-old retired postmaster, and her husband Peter Zach, 62, a lineman for an electric company, were in...
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Living with Chemical Plant Death. One Family's Story.
Juan Flores grew up near Houston, the son of a refinery worker who repeatedly warned his children of the risks of going into his profession...and then died on the job. Juan became a community coordinator for nonprofit Air Alliance Houston, and now works to protect the people of Baytown and other...
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What's in the Water? We Take a Deep Look
For years, fishing guide Rod Bates has been taking families out on the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania and letting kids swim and play in the water. Then he learned about something disturbing being piped into the river from the Governor's Mansion and State Office Complex in Harrisburg, the state...
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Livestock Fencing and Water Pollution
One of the biggest sources of water pollution in the U.S. is runoff pollution from farms and livestock operations. But a new Environmental Integrity Project study found that only 19 percent of livestock farmers in Virginia's two largest agricultural counties are fencing their animals out of...
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Coal's Poisonous Legacy
Coal's Poisonous Legacy by Environmental Integrity Podcast
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Environmental Enforcement Under the Trump Administration
The Environmental Integrity Project examined two decades of EPA data and concluded that environmental enforcement under the Trump Administration in 2018 set record lows for civil penalties against polluters, inspections, and people charged with environmental crimes. In our report, “Less...
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Water Pollution from Slaughterhouses
What is the environmental impact of the food you eat? We investigate the water pollution produced by the meat processing industry. The nonprofit, nonpartisan Environmental Integrity Project examined federal records for 98 large slaughterhouses across the U.S. that discharge into rivers and…
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
We discuss important environmental issues in the news and investigative reports by the nonprofit, nonpartisan Environmental Integrity Project.
HOSTED BY
Environmental Integrity Podcast
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Environmental Integrity Project currently has 39 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
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We discuss important environmental issues in the news and investigative reports by the nonprofit, nonpartisan Environmental Integrity Project.
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Environmental Integrity Project has 39 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
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