More environmental evil from Trump and the GOP:
In its latest attack on clean air protections, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released its new proposal to weaken the Obama-era Mercury & Air Toxics Standards (MATS), putting public health at risk from more than 80 dangerous pollutants, some of which are known to cause brain damage in children.
"This is an unconscionable rollback to serve the coal industry at the expense of all Americans, especially our children," said John Walke, director of NRDC's Clean Air program. "And it says EPA's just fine with allowing brain poisons mercury and lead and toxic carcinogens to fill our skies."
The standards were the first national limits on air pollution from coal-fired power plants that release toxins like mercury, arsenic, lead and acid gases into the air. Among those, mercury is especially toxic, especially for pregnant women and their babies.
The stakes are high: Each year, the standards prevent up to 11,000 premature deaths, 13,000 asthma attacks and nearly 5,000 heart attacks. In fact, MATS delivers up to $90 billion in health benefits.
Nearly everyone supports the standards—including utilities that have already invested $18 billion for pollution-control equipment and are complying with the rules at nearly every coal- and oil-burning power plant in the country. Even Congress is showing bipartisan opposition to a rollback.
The standards' few opponents include coal and industry executives. In particular, coal tycoon Bob Murray, the head of Murray Energy, has long been pushing for a rollback—going so far as to include it in a wish list to the Trump administration soon after inauguration. Murray has financial ties to the Trump campaign and is a former client of the EPA's acting head Andrew Wheeler.
Most Diverse Butterfly Center in the U.S. to be Bulldozed for Trump’s Border Wall
The National Butterfly Center in Mission, Texas is the most diverse butterfly sanctuary in the U.S. Some 200 species of butterflies find a home there each year, including the Mexican bluewing, the black swallowtail and the increasingly imperiled monarch. And, as soon as February, almost 70 percent of it could be lost to President Donald Trump's border wall, The Guardian reported Thursday.
"It's going to cut right through here," Center Director Marianna Wright told The Guardian as she indicated where the wall's construction would cut off the center's access to its own land in the Rio Grande Valley at a point 1.2 miles from the border. Wright said the wall threatened to end the center entirely and harm the butterflies and other species like the Texas tortoise, Texas indigo snake and Texas horned lizard that also find refuge on its land.
