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GoGreenNation news

Harris vs. Trump on the economy: Comparing their policies

News Feed
Wednesday, September 11, 2024

Sorry, a summary is not available for this article at this time. Please try again later.Social Security, Medicare and the retirement ageQ: Do you support raising the retirement age? What should the retirement age be? What, if anything, needs to be done to control the costs of entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare?A: Harris wants to strengthen Social Security and Medicare, according to her campaign, but she has yet to release detailed policy proposals. She has taken the Biden administration stance on Social Security, supporting a measure to reinstate the payroll tax on earned income above $400,000. She has also said she would as president allow Medicare to accelerate negotiations on prescription drug prices, which are part of the administration’s existing efforts to lower drug costs. In 2019, she co-sponsored a bill to expand Social Security by extending the payroll tax. She proposed a Medicare-for-All plan during her 2020 presidential bid, but she is not pursuing such a policy now. A: Trump has promised to protect Social Security and Medicare, which are the biggest drivers of the national debt. “Under no circumstances should Republicans vote to cut a single penny from Medicare or Social Security,” Trump said in a January 2023 video message distributed by his campaign. The national debt increased by $7.8 trillion during Trump’s presidency, the third-biggest increase relative to the U.S. economy’s size, ProPublica reported.Tax policyQ: What should the top federal personal income tax rate be and at what income level should it hit? What should the top corporate tax rate be?A: Harris wants to raise taxes on corporations and the highest earners, following Biden’s budget. But she broke with Biden on raising the capital gains tax rate, saying she supports a rate of 28 percent, compared with 44.6 percent for Biden, for those earning more than $1 million (the current rate is 23.6 percent). She also proposed expanding tax deductions for small businesses. She backs increasing the corporate tax rate to 28 percent from 21 percent and has promised not to raise taxes on people making less than $400,000 per year. She wants to restore and expand the earned income tax credit and the child tax credit, including a $6,000 child tax credit for the first year of a newborn's life. A: The 2017 Trump tax law lowered the top personal tax rate rate from 39.6 percent to 37 percent and the top corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent.Student loansQ: Should anything be done by the federal government to defray the costs of student loans?A: Harris backs the Biden administration’s student-loan forgiveness plan for tens of millions of borrowers. She previously pledged that she and Biden would “do much more to build on” their debt forgiveness policies. She has not elaborated on what her policies would be if elected. A: Trump has opposed widespread student loan debt cancelation but backed measures to consolidate income-driven repayment plans.Defense spendingQ: Do you support cutting the defense budget from its current levels?A: The Biden-Harris administration has proposed an $849.8 billion defense budget for fiscal year 2025, which represents a 4.1 percent increase from fiscal 2023 levels that were enacted, according to the Brookings Institute.A: As president in 2018, Trump signed the largest Pentagon budget ever at $700 billion, a 15.5 percent increase from the previous year There’s no public evidence he would support a decrease in military spending even as he has called for deep cuts to domestic outlays because the government is “spending money like drunken sailors.” Investing in infrastructureQ: Do you support continued public investment in American infrastructure such as was covered under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law of 2021?A: Harris touted the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act as vice president and has spoken about her support for investment in infrastructure, from bridges to high-speed internet.A: Trump campaigned on major infrastructure spending multiple times during in 2016. However, negotiations with congressional Democrats broke down while he was in office and he was never able to sign a bill that matches the scale of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law passed under President Biden.Environmental, social and governance investingQ: Do you support a ban on ESG (environmental, social and governance investing) for retirement funds?A: Trump’s administration took several actions to limit ESGs while he was president.About this projectWe collected the positions of the 2024 presidential candidates on abortion, climate, crime and guns, the economy, education, elections, foreign policy and immigration. We used a variety of sources for our reporting, including publicly available information, campaign websites, voting records, news articles and the campaigns themselves. Feedback? Email us at policypages@washpost.com.Candidate illustrations by Ben Kirchner for The Washington Post. Icons by Tim Boelaars for The Washington Post. Editing by Rachel Van Dongen, Candace Mitchell and Megan Griffith-Greene. Design and development by Agnes Lee, Jake Crump and Tyler Remmel. Design editing by Madison Walls and Virginia Singarayar.

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Sorry, a summary is not available for this article at this time. Please try again later.

Social Security, Medicare and the retirement age

Q: Do you support raising the retirement age? What should the retirement age be? What, if anything, needs to be done to control the costs of entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare?

A: Harris wants to strengthen Social Security and Medicare, according to her campaign, but she has yet to release detailed policy proposals. She has taken the Biden administration stance on Social Security, supporting a measure to reinstate the payroll tax on earned income above $400,000. She has also said she would as president allow Medicare to accelerate negotiations on prescription drug prices, which are part of the administration’s existing efforts to lower drug costs. In 2019, she co-sponsored a bill to expand Social Security by extending the payroll tax. She proposed a Medicare-for-All plan during her 2020 presidential bid, but she is not pursuing such a policy now.

A: Trump has promised to protect Social Security and Medicare, which are the biggest drivers of the national debt. “Under no circumstances should Republicans vote to cut a single penny from Medicare or Social Security,” Trump said in a January 2023 video message distributed by his campaign. The national debt increased by $7.8 trillion during Trump’s presidency, the third-biggest increase relative to the U.S. economy’s size, ProPublica reported.

Tax policy

Q: What should the top federal personal income tax rate be and at what income level should it hit? What should the top corporate tax rate be?

A: Harris wants to raise taxes on corporations and the highest earners, following Biden’s budget. But she broke with Biden on raising the capital gains tax rate, saying she supports a rate of 28 percent, compared with 44.6 percent for Biden, for those earning more than $1 million (the current rate is 23.6 percent). She also proposed expanding tax deductions for small businesses. She backs increasing the corporate tax rate to 28 percent from 21 percent and has promised not to raise taxes on people making less than $400,000 per year. She wants to restore and expand the earned income tax credit and the child tax credit, including a $6,000 child tax credit for the first year of a newborn's life.

A: The 2017 Trump tax law lowered the top personal tax rate rate from 39.6 percent to 37 percent and the top corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent.

Student loans

Q: Should anything be done by the federal government to defray the costs of student loans?

A: Harris backs the Biden administration’s student-loan forgiveness plan for tens of millions of borrowers. She previously pledged that she and Biden would “do much more to build on” their debt forgiveness policies. She has not elaborated on what her policies would be if elected.

A: Trump has opposed widespread student loan debt cancelation but backed measures to consolidate income-driven repayment plans.

Defense spending

Q: Do you support cutting the defense budget from its current levels?

A: The Biden-Harris administration has proposed an $849.8 billion defense budget for fiscal year 2025, which represents a 4.1 percent increase from fiscal 2023 levels that were enacted, according to the Brookings Institute.

A: As president in 2018, Trump signed the largest Pentagon budget ever at $700 billion, a 15.5 percent increase from the previous year There’s no public evidence he would support a decrease in military spending even as he has called for deep cuts to domestic outlays because the government is “spending money like drunken sailors.”

Investing in infrastructure

Q: Do you support continued public investment in American infrastructure such as was covered under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law of 2021?

A: Harris touted the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act as vice president and has spoken about her support for investment in infrastructure, from bridges to high-speed internet.

A: Trump campaigned on major infrastructure spending multiple times during in 2016. However, negotiations with congressional Democrats broke down while he was in office and he was never able to sign a bill that matches the scale of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law passed under President Biden.

Environmental, social and governance investing

Q: Do you support a ban on ESG (environmental, social and governance investing) for retirement funds?

A: Trump’s administration took several actions to limit ESGs while he was president.

About this project

We collected the positions of the 2024 presidential candidates on abortion, climate, crime and guns, the economy, education, elections, foreign policy and immigration. We used a variety of sources for our reporting, including publicly available information, campaign websites, voting records, news articles and the campaigns themselves. Feedback? Email us at policypages@washpost.com.

Candidate illustrations by Ben Kirchner for The Washington Post. Icons by Tim Boelaars for The Washington Post. Editing by Rachel Van Dongen, Candace Mitchell and Megan Griffith-Greene. Design and development by Agnes Lee, Jake Crump and Tyler Remmel. Design editing by Madison Walls and Virginia Singarayar.

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Photos courtesy of

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The country’s largest magnesium supplier shut down. Now what?

What US Magnesium's bankruptcy means for the U.S. supply of a critical mineral -- and the environment.

Only a few years ago, if you popped open a can of soda anywhere in the United States, the container you held more likely than not contained bits of magnesium harvested from the Great Salt Lake. Now, the country’s supply of the critical mineral looks uncertain. The largest producer, US Magnesium, filed for bankruptcy in September. Its half-century-old Rowley smelting plant on the west shore of Utah’s famed lake could shutter for good. The news comes as a relief for many environmental and Great Salt Lake advocates, but it also stokes broader anxieties over the supply chain for a material used in all kinds of products from car parts to wind turbines to solar-panel scaffolding and missiles. “If we remove any [magnesium production] capacity we have here, that means that we’re wholly dependent, essentially, on imports,” said Simon Jowitt, Nevada’s state geologist and the director of the Nevada Bureau of Mines and Geology. Other industry insiders say losing US Magnesium isn’t necessarily a cause for alarm. “They haven’t been producing, really, for about three years,” said John Haack, president of Tennessee-based MagPro LLC, a magnesium metal recycling company. “The marketplace has pretty much adjusted.” Commercial magnesium comes from evaporating salty brine or seawater, mining dolomite rock, or recycling scrap metal. Until its production plant shut down in late 2021 due to equipment failures, US Magnesium asserted that it was the largest source of primary, non-recycled magnesium in North America. “There is no other significant producer of primary magnesium in the United States,” said Ron Thayer, the company’s president, in a sworn declaration filed in federal bankruptcy court on September 10, “and primary magnesium is a critical component to United States defense contractors.” It will take a $40 million investment for magnesium production to resume at the Rowley plant, Thayer later testified in a deposition. Just how much magnesium the company produced each year before it shut down is a carefully guarded trade secret. The U.S. Geological Survey reported this year, however, that the United States has the capacity to produce 64,000 metric tons of primary magnesium metal, compared to China’s 1.8 million tons. The magnesium market experienced some hiccups when US Magnesium mothballed its plant. In 2022, prices for the mineral doubled in some regions, and a factory that produced aluminum cans in Indiana temporarily shut down because of US Magnesium’s lack of production, according to the USGS. But by 2023, companies had found alternative magnesium providers and prices began to fall. The retrofitted waste pond at US Magnesium, which has ceased operations at the magnesium plant on the western edge of the Great Salt Lake, is pictured on December 12, 2024. Francisco Kjolseth / The Salt Lake Tribune The federal agency’s reports cited MagPro as a source of secondary domestic magnesium, which it produces from recycling. But Haack said his company produces primary magnesium as well, mostly for alloy products. He said his company is prepared to ramp up production to meet demand. “We haven’t really advertised [it] as much,” Haack said. “But we definitely produce primary, and we’re excited to expand more into the marketplace.” The federal government doesn’t appear to be taking any chances on the dip in domestic magnesium production, however. And while the current market might have adjusted to US Magnesium’s mothballing, experts worry about what the future — and foreign competition — might hold. Especially because magnesium is used in so many products. “It may not make things more expensive initially,” Jowitt said, “but certainly in the long term, it would mean that China would control the price of magnesium for anybody in the U.S. who wants to use it.” The U.S. Department of Defense awarded a $19.6 million grant to a Bay Area startup, Magrathea Metals Inc., in 2023, just two years after US Magnesium’s production plant shut down, to “establish domestic production of magnesium.” Jowitt pointed to the investment as a sign the federal government views a slowdown in production of the metal as a national security risk. Magrathea, which is scouting Utah as a potential site for a pilot demonstrating its technology, currently produces magnesium metal from seawater salt. Alex Grant, a chemical engineer and Magrathea’s founder, said his company aims to replace the production lost by US Magnesium’s closure by the end of the decade. The biggest challenge, he said, is finding a local workforce that understands the production process. “Building these large capital projects,” Grant said, “it’s a muscle that the U.S. has lost because we didn’t flex it enough.” The United States needs to continue producing and investing in domestic magnesium production, Grant added, if it wants to avoid crippling geopolitical consequences. That’s especially the case if China implements an export control — a type of tariff, ban or forced licensing — on the material, like it recently did for several rare-earth minerals. “Putting an export control on magnesium would provoke a war, plain and simple,” Grant said. Thayer, US Magnesium’s president, declined to answer questions about potentially losing market share to MagPro or Magrathea. But he disagreed with the assertion that the market has adjusted to his plant’s lack of production. “The suspended … production of magnesium has been replaced by Chinese/foreign imports,” Thayer wrote in an email, “not additional U.S.-based volume. Not ideal for U.S. supply chain independence.” The federal government took measures over the years to protect US Magnesium in order to keep its plant in business and a national supply of a critical mineral flowing. The Department of Commerce approved antidumping measures against magnesium from China starting in 1995, although it declined to adopt similar duties against Israel — which produces magnesium from Dead Sea salts — in 2019. Still, US Magnesium partly blamed foreign competition for its bankruptcies filed in 2001 and September of this year. Utah has long grappled with the environmental toll of the US Magnesium plant, which polluted the air along the Wasatch Front, Utah’s urban core, and contaminated land and groundwater near the Great Salt Lake. “It may be that [building] a newer plant, especially supported by the federal government, is a better way forward than trying to get something that’s problematic up and running again,” Jowitt said. US Magnesium seen across the Great Salt Lake from Stansbury Island on March 26, 2022. Trent Nelson / The Salt Lake Tribune In Utah, royalties from US Magnesium’s mineral sales funneled just under $1 million each year over the past five years to the state, officials confirmed. Still, state resource managers have moved to revoke the company’s mineral lease and shut down its operations for good. The Division of Forestry, Fire, and State Lands cited unauthorized storage of hazardous waste on and around the bed of the Great Salt Lake as grounds for the lease revocation, among other violations. State regulatory actions are on pause as the company works through its current bankruptcy proceedings. “Historically, US Mag has always been a challenge to work with,” said Lynn de Freitas, executive director of Friends of Great Salt Lake, an environmental advocacy and watchdog group. “There’s a hell of a lot to clean up and address.” Efforts to manage US Magnesium’s Superfund status and shore up waste ponds under a consent decree with the Environmental Protection Agency appear in limbo as well. It also isn’t clear what the permanent closure of the plant would mean for the Wasatch Front’s air. A widely publicized 2023 report by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration found that US Magnesium contributed up to 25 percent of the Wasatch Front’s wintertime particulate smog. Governor Spencer Cox, a Republican, asked the Environmental Protection Agency soon after to include the plant as a reason the region was not in compliance with the Clean Air Act. But US Magnesium’s plant had been switched off for more than two years by the time the report was published. Thayer denied magnesium production had any impact on the region’s smog in emailed statements. He added that inversion pollution stayed the same after the plant shut down in late 2021. The EPA removed Utah’s Wasatch Front from its dirty air list for wintertime inversion smog last month. It’s the first time the region found itself in compliance with Clean Air Act standards in 15 years. In an email, Carrie Womack, a NOAA scientist and lead author of the US Magnesium pollution study, said the findings were based on modeling a single pollution event in 2017. Figuring out the impact of US Magnesium’s shutdown on Utah’s air would require modeling multiple years, Womack said. “Wintertime pollution has a lot of factors, only one of which is anthropogenic [human-caused] emissions,” she wrote. Regardless, magnesium production doesn’t necessarily have to take a heavy environmental toll, said Grant, Magrathea’s founder. “Everything US Mag did on the environmental front that was a problem, was a choice,” Grant said. “And they did it that way because they’re owned by a firm that does not care about anything besides making as much money as possible.” This story was originally published by Grist with the headline The country’s largest magnesium supplier shut down. Now what? on Dec 23, 2025.

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Chemicals
Forests

MIT in the media: 2025 in review

MIT community members made headlines with key research advances and their efforts to tackle pressing challenges.

“At MIT, innovation ranges from awe-inspiring technology to down-to-Earth creativity,” noted Chronicle, during a campus visit this year for an episode of the program. In 2025, MIT researchers made headlines across print publications, podcasts, and video platforms for key scientific advances, from breakthroughs in quantum and artificial intelligence to new efforts aimed at improving pediatric health care and cancer diagnosis.MIT faculty, researchers, students, alumni and staff helped demystify new technologies, highlighted the practical hands-on learning the Institute is known for, and shared what inspires their research with viewers, readers and listeners around the world. Below is a sampling of news moments to revisit.Let’s take a closer look at MIT: It’s alarming to see such a complex, important institution subject to the whims of today’s politicsWashington Post columnist George F. Will reflects on MIT and his view of “the damage that can be done to America’s meritocracy by policies motivated by hostility toward institutions vital to it.” Will notes that MIT has an “astonishing economic multiplier effect: MIT graduates have founded companies that have generated almost $1.9 trillion in annual revenue (a sum almost equal to Russia’s GDP) and 4.6 million jobs.”Full story via The Washington PostAt MIT, groundbreaking ideas blend science and breast cancer detection innovationChronicle visited MIT this spring to learn more about how the Institute “nurtures groundbreaking efforts, reminding us that creativity and science thrive together, inspiring future advancements in engineering, medicine, and beyond.”Full story via ChronicleNew MIT provost looks to build more bridges with CEOsProvost Anantha Chandrakasan shares his energy and enthusiasm for MIT, and his goals for the Institute.Full story via The Boston GlobeFive things New England researchers helped develop with federal fundingProfessors John Guttag and David Mindell discuss MIT’s long history of developing foundational technologies — including the internet and the first widely used electronic navigation system — with the support of federal funding.Full story via The Boston GlobeBostonians of the Year 2025: First responders, university presidents, and others who exemplified couragePresident Sally Kornbluth is honored by The Boston Globe as one of the Bostonians of the Year, a list that spotlights individuals across the region who, in choosing the difficult path, “showed us what strength looks like.” Kornbluth was recognized for her work being of the “most prominent voices rallying to protect academic freedom.”Full story via The Boston GlobePractical education and workforce preparationCollege students flock to a new major: AIMIT’s new Artificial Intelligence and Decision Making major is aimed at teaching students to “develop AI systems and study how technologies like robots interact with humans and the environment.”Full story via New York Times50 colleges with the best ROIMIT has been named among the top colleges in the country for return on investment. MIT “is need-blind and full-need for undergraduate students. Six out of 10 students receive financial aid, and almost 88% of the Class of 2025 graduated debt-free.”Full story via Boston 25Desirée Plata: Chemist, oceanographer, engineer, entrepreneurProfessor Desirée Plata explains that she is most proud of her work as an educator. “The faculty of the world are training the next generation of researchers,” says Plata. “We need a trained workforce. We need patient chemists who want to solve important problems.”Full story via Chemical & Engineering NewsTaking a quantum leapMIT launches quantum initiative to tackle challenges in science, health care, national securityMIT is “taking a quantum leap with the launch of the new MIT Quantum Initiative (QMIT). “There isn't a more important technological field right now than quantum with its enormous potential for impact on both fundamental research and practical problems,” said President Sally Kornbluth.Full story via State House News ServicePeter Shor on how quantum tech can help climateProfessor Peter Shor helps disentangle quantum technologies.Full story via The Quantum KidMIT researchers develop device to enable direct communication between multiple quantum processorsMIT researchers made a key advance in the creation of a practical quantum computer.Full story via Military & Aerospace ElectronicsFortifying national security and aiding disaster responseNano-material breakthrough could revolutionize night visionMIT researchers developed “a new way to make large ultrathin infrared sensors that don’t need cryogenic cooling and could radically change night vision for the military.”Full story via Defense OneMIT researchers develop robot designed to help first-responders in disaster situationsResearchers at MIT engineered SPROUT (Soft Pathfinding Robotic Observation Unit), a robot aimed at assisting first-responders.Full story via WHDHMIT scientists make “smart” clothes that warn you when you’re sickAs part of an effort to help keep service members safe, MIT scientists created a programmable fiber that can be stitched into clothing to help monitor the wearer’s health.Full story via FOX 28MIT Lincoln Lab develops ocean-mapping technologyMIT Lincoln Laboratory researchers are developing “automated electric vessels to map the ocean floor and improve search and rescue missions.”Full story via ChronicleTransformative techThis MIT scientist is rewiring robots to keep the humanity in techProfessor Daniela Rus, director of the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab, discusses her work revolutionizing the field of robotics by bringing “empathy into engineering and proving that responsibility is as radical and as commercially attractive as unguarded innovation.”Full story via ForbesWatch this tiny robot somersault through the air like an insectProfessor Kevin Chen designed a tiny, insect-sized aerial microrobot.Full story via ScienceIt's actually really hard to make a robot, guysProfessor Pulkit Agrawal delves into his work engineering a simulator that can be used to train robots.Full story via NPRShape-shifting fabrics and programmable materials redefine design at MITAssociate Professor Skylar Tibbits is embedding intelligence into the materials around us, while Professor Caitlin Mueller and Sandy Curth PhD ’25 are digging into eco-friendly construction.Full story via ChronicleBuilding a healthier futureMIT launches pediatric research hub to address access gapsThe Hood Pediatric Innovation Hub is addressing “underinvestment in pediatric healthcare innovations.”Full story via Boston Business JournalBionic knee helps amputees walk naturally againProfessor Hugh Herr developed a prosthetic that could increase mobility for above-the-knee amputees. “The bionic knee developed by MIT doesn’t just restore function, it redefines it.”Full story via Fox NewsMIT drug hunters are using AI to design completely new antibioticsProfessor James Collins is using AI to develop new compounds to combat antibiotic resistance.Full story via Fast CompanyInnovative once-weekly capsule helps quell schizophrenia symptomsA new pill from the lab of Associate Professor Giovanni Traverso “can greatly simplify the drug schedule faced by schizophrenia patients.”Full story via NewsmaxRenewing American manufacturingUS manufacturing is in “pretty bad shape.” MIT hopes to change that.MIT launched the Initiative for New Manufacturing to help “build the tools and talent to shape a more productive and sustainable future for manufacturing.”Full story via Manufacturing DiveGiving US manufacturing a boostBen Armstrong of the MIT Industrial Performance Center discusses how to reinvigorate manufacturing in America.Full story via MarketplaceNew England companies are sparking an industrial revolution. Here’s how to harness it.Professor David Mindell spotlights how “a new wave of industrial companies, many in New England, are leveraging new technologies to create jobs and empower workers.”Full story via The Boston Globe Improving agingMy day as an 80-year-old. What an age-simulation suit taught me.To get a better sense of the experience of aging, Wall Street Journal reporter Amy Dockser Marcus donned the MIT AgeLab’s age-simulation suit and embarked on multiple activities.Full story via The Wall Street JournalNew mobile robot helps seniors walk safely and prevent fallsA mobile robot created by MIT engineers is designed to help prevent falls. “It's easy to see how something like this could make a big difference for seniors wanting to stay independent.”Full story via Fox NewsThe senior population is booming. Caregiving is struggling to keep upProfessor Jonathan Gruber discusses the labor shortages impacting senior care.Full story via CNBCUpping our energy resilienceNew MIT collaboration with GE Vernova aims to accelerate energy transition“A great amount of innovation happens in academia. We have a longer view into the future,” says Provost Anantha Chandrakasan of the MIT-GE Vernova Energy and Climate Alliance.Full story via The Boston GlobeThe environmental impacts of generative AINoman Bashir, a fellow with MIT’s Climate and Sustainability Consortium, explores the environmental impacts of generative AI.Full story via Fox 13Is the clean energy economy doomed?Professor Christopher Knittel discusses how the U.S. can be in the best position for global energy dominance.Full story via MarketplaceAdvancing American workersWTH can we do to prevent a second China shock? Professor David Autor explainsProfessor David Autor shares his research examining the long-term impact of China entering the World Trade Organization, how the U.S. can protect vital industries from unfair trade practices, and the potential impacts of AI on workers.Full story via American Enterprise InstituteThe fight over robots threatening American jobsProfessor Daron Acemoglu highlights the economic and societal implications of integrating automation in the workforce, advocating for policies aimed at assisting workers.Full story via Financial TimesMoving toward automationResearch Scientist Eva Ponce of the MIT Center for Transportation and Logistics notes that robotics and AI technologies are “replacing some jobs — particularly more manual tasks including heavy lifting — but have also offered new opportunities within warehouse operations.”Full story via Financial TimesPlanetary defense and out-of-this world explorationMIT researchers create new asteroid detection methods to help protect EarthAssociate Professor Julien de Wit and Research Scientist Artem Burdanov discuss their work developing a new method to track asteroids that could impact Earth.Full story via WBZ RadioWhat happens to the bodies of NASA astronauts returning to Earth?Professor Dava Newman speaks about how long-duration stays in space can affect the human body.Full story via News NationLunar lander Athena is packed and ready to explore the moon. Here’s what on boardMIT engineers sent three payloads into space on a course set for the moon’s south polar region.Full story via USA TodayScanning the heavens at the Vatican ObservatoryBr. Guy Consolmagno '74, SM '75, director of the Vatican Observatory, and graduate student Isabella Macias share their experiences studying astronomy and planetary formation at the Vatican Observatory. “The Vatican has such a deep, rich history of working with astronomers,” says Macias. “It shows that science is not only for global superpowers around the world, but it's for students, it's for humanity.”Full story via CBS News Sunday MorningThe story of real-life rocket scientistsProfessor Kerri Cahoy takes viewers on an out-of-this-world journey into how a college internship inspired her research on space and satellites.Full story via Bloomberg Television On the air While digital currency initiatives expand, we ask: What’s the future of cash?Neha Narula, director of the MIT Digital Currency Initiative, examines the future of cash as the use of digital currencies expands.Full story via USA TodayThe high stakes of the AI economyProfessor Asu Ozdaglar, head of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and deputy dean of the MIT Schwarzman College of Computing, explores AI’s opportunities and risks — and whether it can be regulated without stifling progress.Full story via Is Business Broken? The LIGO Lab is pushing the boundaries of gravitational-wave researchAssociate Professor Matt Evans explores the future of gravitational wave research and how Cosmic Explorer, the next-generation gravitational wave observatory, will help unearth secrets of the early universe.Full story via Scientific AmericanSpace junk: The impact of global warming on satellitesGraduate student Will Parker discusses his research examining the impact of climate change on satellites.Full story via USA TodayEndometriosis is common. Why is getting diagnosed so hard?Professor Linda Griffith shares her work studying endometriosis and her efforts to improve healthcare for women.Full story via Science FridayThere’s nothing small about this nanoscale researchProfessor Vladimir Bulović takes listeners on a tour of MIT.nano, MIT’s “clean laboratory facility that is critical to nanoscale research, from microelectronics to medical nanotechnology.”Full story via Scientific AmericanMarrying science and athleticsThe MIT scientist behind the “torpedo bats” that are blowing up baseballAaron Leanhardt PhD ’03 went from an MIT graduate student who was part of a research team that “cooled sodium gas to the lowest temperature ever recorded in human history” to inventor of the torpedo baseball bat, “perhaps the most significant development in bat technology in decades.”Full story via The Wall Street JournalEngineering athletes redefine routineAfter suffering a concussion during her sophomore year, Emiko Pope ’25 was inspired to explore the effectiveness of concussion headbands.Full story via American Society of Mechanical Engineers“I missed talking math with people”: why John Urschel left the NFL for MITAssistant Professor John Urschel shares his decision to call an audible and leave his NFL career to focus on his love for math at MIT.Full story via The GuardianMaking a statement, MIT’s football team dons extra head padding for safetyIt’s a piece of equipment that may become more widely used as research continues into its effectiveness — including from at least one of the players on the current team.Full story via GBH Morning EditionAgricultural efficiencyNew MIT breakthrough could save farmers billions on pesticidesMIT engineers developed a system that helps pesticides adhere more effectively to plant leaves, allowing farmers to use fewer chemicals.Full story via Michigan Farm NewsBug-sized robots could help pollination on future farmsInsect-sized robots crafted by MIT researchers could one day be used to help with farming practices like artificial pollination.Full story via ReutersSee how MIT researchers harvest water from the airAn ultrasonic device created by MIT engineers can extract clean drinking water from atmospheric moisture.Full story via CNNAppreciating artMeet the engineer using deep learning to restore Renaissance artGraduate student Alex Kachkine talks about his work applying AI to develop a restoration method for damaged artwork.Full story via NatureMIT’s Linde Music Building opens with a free festival“The extent of art-making on the MIT campus is equal to that of a major city,” says Institute Professor Marcus Thompson. “It’s a miracle that it’s all right here, by people in science and technology who are absorbed in creating a new world and who also value the past, present and future of music and the arts.”Full story via Cambridge Day“Remembering the Future” on display at the MIT MuseumThe “Remembering the Future” exhibit at the MIT Museum features a sculptural installation that uses “climate data from the last ice age to the present, as well as projected future environments, to create a geometric design.”Full story via The New York Times 

Business
Chemicals
Climate

4 generations have celebrated holidays at this Oregon family’s midcentury beach house

An Oregon beach house that remains virtually unchanged since 1964 has a secret staircase and bedroom with floating bunk beds.

For four generations, a timeless midcentury modern house on Oregon’s central coast has been the holiday gathering spot for the family of environmental philanthropists John and Betty Gray.Vintage photos neatly sorted into photo albums show the Grays’ adult children and their spouses working at Formica counters preparing Christmas and Hanukkah meals. “Cooks in the kitchen,” John Gray wrote on the album page.Another photograph captures family members relaxing near the Christmas tree, with kids and wrapping paper on the living room carpet. Gray captioned this scene “utter chaos.” And a 50th wedding anniversary portrait of the late John and Betty, taken in 1995 as they posed in front of a stone fireplace wall at the beach house, has Gray’s remark that they celebrated weeks early, “at Christmas, when all were there.”While John and Betty had a year-round house south of Portland as well as residences at recreational resorts he developed, including Sunriver near Bend, John considered the discreet dwelling in Gleneden Beach his family’s “homestead.”Windows in the two-story house frame the natural landscape, but the furniture intentionally faces away from the view.Kristin Walrod, who married John and Betty Gray’s oldest grandson, Nick Walrod, 27 years ago at the beach house, said the focus here is on family.She said the 61-year-old beach house, still in near-original condition, and passed on to John and Betty’s children, has been “a continuously loved family haven.” John and Betty, both raised in Oregon, had five children and 12 grandchildren. There are now 13 great-grandkids between the ages of 2 and 23, with one more expected in January.“We used to have a combined family Christmas here every other year,” Kristin said, while standing in the kitchen and looking at the expandable dining table. “But now our family branches are so big, families rotate through the holidays of Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s.” In November, Kristin and Nick, who live in Portland and have three children, hosted a holiday party at the beach house for more than 60 friends and neighbors. The wood-burning fireplace in the living room was glowing, and guests who wandered out to the glass-walled sunporch were warmed by the fire pit; some continued to the stone terrace overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The five-bedroom home can feel cozy or expansive, said Kristin, a fiction writer and educator who sometimes uses the place as a quiet writing retreat.The family’s beach house “can handle a big group with lots of energy, but it doesn’t feel echo-y when there’s just one or two people,” she said. “The home adapts. It always feels just right.”Respect for the landJohn and Betty Gray's grandson Gray Hoffman took this photo of his wife, Maddie West, and their son, Louie, 2, on the same beach where a photo of Hoffman was taken 30 years ago.Gray HoffmanJohn Gray said his modest rural upbringing in Oregon instilled in him a respect for the environment. Later in life, his recreational resort developments were purposefully designed to preserve much of the natural landscape.In the 1960s, he developed the residential and resort communities Salishan Coastal Lodge and Resort in Gleneden Beach between the Pacific Ocean and Siletz Bay and Sunriver Resort south of Bend in central Oregon.In the 1990s, he was a leading force in developing the Skamania Lodge on the Washington side of the Columbia River Gorge. Gray also guided the redevelopment of Southwest Portland’s industrial riverfront in the 1970s at John’s Landing, named for the B.P. John Furniture Co. He said he and his family saw the area as a gateway to downtown Portland that should not have empty warehouses, but be an inviting residential and commercial district.In a 1969 Sports Illustrated interview, Gray said he was determined “to create a commercial enterprise that blends into the environment without insult.” The magazine called Gray “Oregon’s visionary land lover.” Before he became a developer, Gray started working for chipper chain inventor Joseph Buford Cox at the Oregon Saw Chain Manufacturing Corporation in 1948, after serving in the U.S. Army. Later, as president, Gray grew the company that is now the brand Oregon Tool, a global leader in wood cutting tools and other equipment.In 1984, he sold the business that revolutionized the timber industry.It is only fitting that homes in his resort developments, like the family’s beach house, were designed in the Northwest modern style and constructed of local timber like fir and cedar and other materials that blend into the landscape.Land leases at Salishan require homeowners to maintain the setting and “enhance the scenic values of a location unusually blessed with natural beauty.” Early champions of the Northwest modern style, architects Pietro Belluschi, John Yeon and Van Evera Bailey, used stone from the Cascade mountains and river rock, and glass panels to bring the outdoors inside.The Grays hired Portland-born Bailey to design their 1949 Lake Oswego house on land Betty’s parents gifted them as newlyweds. In 1956, Bailey designed the couple’s second home in Dunthorpe, where the family lived for 23 years. And in 1964, Bailey designed the beach house. The preservation organization Restore Oregon said Bailey created highly livable and unpretentious homes focused on the placement of the structure on the site, the view from the house and an emphasis on gathering spaces.Bailey’s design for the beach house followed the natural contours of the landscape. Plate-glass panels secured in wood frames rise from the floor to vaulted ceilings with exposed oak beams. The living room, which Bailey saw as the social center of the home, is positioned beyond the entrance, kitchen and dining area, and against a backdrop of the Pacific Ocean. The primary bedroom and the so-called “honeymoon suite” are on the main level. The staircase to the second story can be closed off by hall doors that match the amber-colored hemlock on the walls. For larger gatherings, the family opens the doors, transforming the upstairs rumpus room’s kitchenette into a beverage station and the downstairs laundry into a coat room.Traditionally, the second story is used as the kids’ space. There are three bedrooms. A long bunk room has four single beds on the floor and above them, four cantilevering beds anchored to a wall. Each bed has a reading light and built-in closet. In 1964, a Sunset magazine photographer captured images of the bunk room as well as the hidden spiral staircase that connects the kids’ top floor to the lower-level laundry room exit. For three generations, John and Betty Gray’s children, grandchildren and now great grandchildren have stepped down the secret staircase. Once outside, they pass a rope swing that seems always to have been there. They move by native hemlock and spruce trees and coastal shrubs that provide a natural privacy screen, and eventually they take a path to the shore. One 30-year-old family photo shows grandson Gray Hoffman as a second-grader, hands on hips, feet in the water and facing down oncoming waves. John Gray captioned this photo in his album simply: “Gray in the surf on a sunny Christmas Day.”Hoffman, now 37, has a photo of his son, Louie, who will soon be 3, in the same spot.To Hoffman, the beach house is “the only physical location that has been consistent in my life.” The home is not only nostalgic to him, but he and his wife, Maddie West, have celebrated every other Thanksgiving at the long dining table with their friends.The house, he said, is ”a fun combination of time with family, but also making our own traditions."Preserving the houseMidcentury beach houseThe front of the beach house has inch-thick cedar siding that has weathered to a natural silver-gray patina and is shrouded by trees. “It is unassuming and humble,” Kristin Walrod said, “which was very much John and Betty’s personality.” Natural landscaping and native trees in the back of the lot allow the house to be inconspicuous to people strolling along on the sand. Kristin said this was another founding principle of the design of the house and the entire Salishan community. Broad, extended roof overhangs, which are another feature of modern design, shade interiors from summer sun, protect outdoor spaces from rain and create an indoor-outdoor connection. Inside, original midcentury furnishings retain their sleek appeal. George Nelson Saucer Bubble pendants dangle from angled ceilings clad in rough fir planks. Two iconic Eames lounge chairs with molded wood shells and matching black-cushioned ottomans are in the living room. Minimalistic Scandinavian stained-wood chairs along with two sofas provide more seating.A large handmade drum is used as a coffee table; smaller drums are end tables.“Kids love to beat on the drums,” said Kristin. The drum tops are also used as surfaces to play board and card games.John Manca of Blue Mountain Contractors in Gleneden Beach worked with John Gray for more than two decades to make repairs or improvements to the beach house while preserving original materials.The house is a timeless, simple design, Manca said. “John and Betty were very understated people. It wasn’t about making something flashy; they liked subtle.”Together, John Gray and Manca designed a small dwelling where John Gray lived after Betty’s death in 2003 at age 81. John gave the beach house to his children. A short walking bridge links the two dwellings.The exterior front door to the small house was carved by renowned Oregon wood sculptor Leroy Setziol. He also created elegant door panels from black walnut for the Salishan Lodge. Manca remembers once discussing construction details about the small house with John Gray, who was surrounded by his grandchildren. “I was impressed because I thought, you know, he’s a powerful person and yet here, he’s grandpa, and the kids are running around wanting attention for this or that.“I admired that,” said Manca. “John was a real quiet person and he and Betty were quite a couple.”John died at age 93 in 2012.The Gray Family Foundation was founded by John and Betty, who believed time spent outdoors could improve lives and communities. The couple directed their philanthropy to environmental education programs that bring young people to the region’s forests and beaches.A page in one of the Gray family photo albums has a black-and-white photograph of John and Betty’s first home, built on land her parents gave them. Bailey was the architect of the 1,250-square-foot house. After the Grays’ third child was born, a room addition created a second bathroom and enlarged the kids’ two bedrooms.“We did a lot of the work ourselves including landscaping,” John wrote next to the photo. He described dragging a plank of wood to level the ground to grow a lawn and break up dirt clods.“Betty wove on her loom all the drapes from Oregon linen yarn,” he wrote. Betty and her mother laid out the yardage, cut it and sewed it into finished draperies, “a very time-consuming effort.” The midcentury modern house, the first one the couple shared, was shaded by towering old trees undisturbed during construction. House & Garden magazine profiled the property in its August 1952 issue. The theme: “Large living in small spaces.”

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Bit by Bit, Small US Groups Chip Away at Historic Levels of Social Isolation

Americans are disconnected from each other at historic levels, buffeted by what a former surgeon general calls an “epidemic of loneliness.”

Across the country, small groups are working to rebuild social connection amid rising loneliness in their own modest ways.It sounds simple — building relationships. But they’re up against powerful cultural forces.By many measures, Americans are socially disconnected at historic levels.About one in six adults feels lonely all or most of the time. It’s the same for about one in four young adults.No one has a simple solution. But small groups with diverse missions and makeups are recognizing that social disconnection is a big part of the problems they’re trying to address, and reconnection is part of the solution.There’s a Baltimore neighborhood trying to build a culture of giving and mutual support, and a Pittsburgh ministry focused on healing those wounded by poverty and violence. In Kentucky, a cooperative is supporting small farmers in hopes of strengthening their rural communities, while groups in Ohio are restoring neighborhoods and neighborliness. “We need to build a movement centered around connection,” former Surgeon General Vivek Murthy told The Associated Press. “The good news is that that movement is already starting to build. … What we have to do now is accelerate that movement.”In 2023, Murthy issued a report on an “epidemic of loneliness and isolation,” similar to previous surgeon generals’ reports on smoking and obesity. Social isolation and loneliness “are independent risk factors for several major health conditions, including cardiovascular disease, dementia, depression, and premature mortality,” it said. Finding ‘personal connections’ in Akron Murthy recently met with groups working toward community repair in Akron, Ohio, as part of his new Together Project, supported by the Knight Foundation.In one meeting, leaders of the Well Community Development Corp. told of fostering affordable housing and small businesses in a marginalized neighborhood and cultivating social gatherings, whether at the local elementary school or the coffee shop it launched in the former church that houses its offices.One encouraging development: Families have resumed trick-or-treating after years of largely dormant Halloweens in the neighborhood.“Those types of things make a big difference,” said Zac Kohl, executive director of The Well. “It’s not just a safe, dry roof over your head. It’s the personal connections.”Across town, more local leaders met in a community room overlooking Summit Lake.The urban lakefront, once obscured by overgrowth, now draws joggers, fishers, boaters, people grilling. Summit Lake Nature Center provides educational programs and urban garden plots. The lakefront adjoins a public housing development and a recreational trail.“It’s strategically located to try to get people in the space to talk and interact with one another,” said Erin Myers, director of real estate development for the Akron Metropolitan Housing Authority.“I love that you’ve worked on creating spaces where people can gather and connecting them with nature,” Murthy told the gathering. Neighbors 'responsible for each other' in Baltimore On an October afternoon on Baltimore's outskirts, neighbors set out trays heaped with vegan jambalaya, beet salad, fresh-roasted goat meat and more. A rooster crowed insistently from a nearby backyard.Before the neighborhood feast, dozens of visitors gathered for a walking tour. Ulysses Archie described how this short block of Collins Avenue became a hub of backyard farming, environmental cleanup and neighborly connection.Visitors saw hens and rabbits raised by neighbors, and they explored a “Peace Park” created out of an abandoned lot, which now hosts food distributions and summer camps for neighborhood kids. “The core of what we do is building relationships, and building relationships with nature,” Archie said.Neighbors described helping to clear overgrowth and create footpaths in an adjacent urban forest. They described their “intentional” community — not a formal program, but a commitment to caring for each other and the wider community, sharing anything from potlucks to rides to child care.Michael Sarbanes and his late wife, Jill Wrigley, moved to the neighborhood three decades ago. They spent long hours of youth mentoring and other services.“We were burning out,” Sarbanes recalled. They recognized, “We need to be doing this in community.”They reached out to other families involved in social justice work. Though not everyone on the block is an active participant, several moved in or got involved over the years.Some belong to a local Catholic Worker group. Others are Protestants, Muslims, those with no religion, “but believing we are responsible for each other,” said resident Suzanne Fontanesi.Participants include Ulysses and Chrysalinn Archie, who founded the Baltimore Gift Economy, a small nonprofit.Years earlier, Ulysses Archie suffered an injury that left him struggling financially and in spirit.He joined an urban farming program, “put my hands in the soil, and my life was kind of normal again,” he said. That healing work helped inspire the backyard farming.While the Archies appreciated the charities that supported their family during his long recovery, they often felt treated impersonally.With the Baltimore Gift Economy, they’re seeking a more personal approach. A couple times a week, for example, they place food donated by nearby organic stores at the Peace Park. Participants take what suits their diet and needs.Participants are respectful and don’t hoard, Ulysses Archie said.The food isn’t labeled “free.”“‘Free’ is really transactional,” Archie said. “When we present it as a gift, it’s really relational.” The group encourages recipients “to realize that they have something to give.”Myk Lewis, 56, who returned to Baltimore after years in California, tends chickens and rabbits in his backyard. Neighbors support him as he cares for his aging mother.“I probably wouldn’t have been able to move back and start my life over if it wasn’t for them,” he said. Connecting to the land and each other in Kentucky On another October day in the small Kentucky town of New Castle, a guitarist played folk-rock classics as patrons lined up beneath a tent pavilion.Area chefs served them smoked brisket with salsa, beef Wellington bites, Thai beef salad and other specialties.But this “Beef Bash” was about much more than beef.Its sponsor, a cooperative of local farmers who raise grass-fed cattle, coordinates the processing and marketing of their beef to area restaurants and individuals. The program aims to provide a dependable income — helping small farmers stay on the farm and, in turn, strengthening rural communities.“With just a little help, people and land can heal,” said Mary Berry, executive director of the Berry Center of New Castle, which launched the cooperative.The cooperative adapts methods from a former tobacco quota system that provided some stability for small farmers. After that program’s demise in 2004, “people lost what they held in common, which was an agricultural economy and calendar,” Berry said. “We also needed each other.”The surrounding community remains rural, but less tight-knit, she said, as many commute elsewhere or farm at a larger scale.The center promotes the agrarian principles of her father, the novelist and essayist Wendell Berry.At the end of the Beef Bash, farmers cheerfully gathered for a group photo, trading stories of tractor mishaps and middle of the night calving.They were finding community and mutual support.“If we keep our farms going, we’re all winning,” said one farmer, Ashley Pyles.Another, Kylen Douglas, underscored the effects of strained social bonds.“Everything’s so digital, and everything’s with the phone,” Douglas said. “We’re disconnected not only from where our food comes from, but just the center of life. Fewer people are going to church. Rural communities are having a hard time.”Stronger farms can strengthen these communities, he said. “Everybody should be able to have the opportunity to live here.” Healing ‘block by block’ in Pittsburgh On a recent weekday at the Neighborhood Resilience Project in Pittsburgh, some residents were upstairs, training for a project to get more people qualified to perform CPR in marginalized neighborhoods.Downstairs amid the fragrant incense of St. Moses the Black Orthodox Church, worshippers were concluding a prayer liturgy. Afterward, they set out folding tables for a light meal of soup, hummus and conversation.The parish is closely fused with the Neighborhood Resilience Project, an Orthodox social service agency.They share a modest brick building in Pittsburgh’s Hill District, a historically Black neighborhood just blocks from downtown but a world away — long suffering from crime, gun violence, racism and displacement.The project’s mission is “trauma-informed community development.” It hosts a food pantry and free health clinic. It deploys community health deputies and provides emotional support at violent crime scenes.“In our work, community building is absolutely the core intervention,” said the Rev. Paul Abernathy, its founder and CEO.Social isolation “is no longer simply the experience of marginalized communities,” he observed. “Now it seems as though the infection of isolation has spread across society.”The center serves people regardless of faith. Not everyone on staff belongs to the church, though the church is attracting members.“It felt like real community, and people my age who want to actually do some things and not just talk about doing something,” said Cecelia Olson, a recent college graduate. “We’re going to feed people because they’re hungry, and it’s not that complicated.”Fidelia Gaba, a University of Pittsburgh medical student who grew up in another church tradition, recently was confirmed at St. Moses.One Sunday, she felt emotionally distanced and couldn’t even sing. “I remember being carried by the church,” she said. “What was broken in me was healed.”Project workers are reaching the isolated. Kim Lowe, a community health deputy, helps residents get to a food bank, address a child’s conflict at school, “whatever the need is,” she said.One recent afternoon, Lowe visited Tricia Berger in the small apartment she shares with her daughter and grandson. Berger said she has multiple sclerosis and struggles with depression and anxiety. Lowe provides practical help, and the two enjoy conversing and watching comedy routines.“We connect well, with common interests, as well as her helping me get beyond my loneliness and conquering my fear,” Berger said.For Abernathy, such efforts exemplify community healing.“It has to be healed person by person, relationship by relationship, block by block,” he said. “Honestly, neighborhood by neighborhood, it can be healed.”AP videojournalist Jessie Wardarski contributed.Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See – December 2025

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The country’s biggest magnesium producer went bankrupt. Who’s going to clean up the $100M mess?

US Magnesium, on the shores of Utah’s Great Salt Lake, left a legacy of environmental problems.

Bill Johnson has witnessed the extent of US Magnesium’s pollution up close. He’s seen the wastewater pond that was so acidic it bubbled like a cauldron. He noted where the corrosive liquid had eaten through the soil beneath, and where it burned through earthen barriers and spilled into the neighboring public lands near Utah’s Great Salt Lake. When staff at the company’s facility gave him a safety lecture, Johnson said he was told to remove any corrective lenses. “The chlorine emissions” from the nearby plant, he explained in an interview — “if the wind direction changes and brings that down to ground level, it could melt your contacts.” Johnson, a geology professor at the University of Utah who has done extensive work studying the Great Salt Lake, was brought on as a technical advisor in 2013 to help oversee the Superfund cleanup process at the company’s Rowley plant. That work began in 2009 but it hasn’t progressed much beyond collecting samples and drafting plans to address the pollution. Bill Johnson researches the freshwater aquifer beneath the Great Salt Lake in June. Rick Egan / The Salt Lake Tribune In the five years since Johnson’s last visit to the site, however, US Magnesium’s equipment failed. It stopped producing magnesium metal in late 2021, although it still makes road ice and dust suppression salts. The plant along the Great Salt Lake’s western shore was once the largest producer of magnesium metal in the United States — a so-called “critical mineral” found in a wide array of modern products, including car parts, wind turbines, and solar panels. It was also ramping up to produce lithium, an important component for electric vehicle batteries. But producing those materials took a big environmental toll on Utah. The Environmental Protection Agency and the Utah Department of Environmental Quality cited the plant with additional violations of air quality, water monitoring, environmental cleanup, and wildlife safety nearly every year that followed its mothballing. The company declared bankruptcy in September after pressure from years of insolvency and decades’ worth of regulatory actions came to a head. Now officials in Utah want to evict US Magnesium for good. Utah sued the company last December, attempting to compel it to clean up its mess. At the same time, the state moved to revoke US Magnesium’s mineral lease and end its operations on the state-owned bed of the Great Salt Lake. In an email, US Magnesium president Ron Thayer called discussing legal matters with the press “inappropriate.” He disputed the state and federal governments’ contention that little work has been done to clean up the site, asserting that “significant remediation” was conducted in areas around the plant. In court documents, the company contends that because it is no longer producing magnesium, it cannot afford to pay for further environmental cleanup it is responsible for, nor should it have to until operations resume. The EPA argues that the plant’s obligations are not optional. US Magnesium “has not been a good steward of the land on which it formerly operated,” the Utah Division of Forestry, Fire, and State Lands wrote in its own court filings. The state agency pointed to the unpermitted toxic waste lagoon that pollutes the state-owned lakebed and lies a “stone’s throw” from the water of the Great Salt Lake. Regulators particularly took issue with a berm meant to prevent acidic waste from oozing into the Great Salt Lake that sits unfinished. Smut and gypsum piles at US Magnesium last year. Francisco Kjolseth / The Salt Lake Tribune The EPA told The Salt Lake Tribune that it will take “well over” $100 million to clean up the plant’s decades of environmental problems. And a long list of creditors — from contractors and customers to local, state, and federal governments — claim they have stacks of unpaid bills. And while the mothballed facility’s smokestacks no longer emit chlorine gas, and its unlined canals and ponds no longer flow with acidic waste, Johnson said environmental concerns remain. Based on factors such as the volume of past wastewater releases and what he considers a low number of monitoring wells, he suspects a dangerous, acidic groundwater plume may be inching its way toward the Great Salt Lake — if it’s not impacting the saline ecosystem already — while bankruptcy proceedings drag on through court. In an emailed statement, the EPA said it is working to fully characterize the extent of the site’s groundwater pollution, but “components” of that work are “impacted” by the company’s current bankruptcy status. The EPA declined to say who would be obligated to pay cleanup costs if US Magnesium ultimately doesn’t have the cash. State regulators also didn’t have a direct answer. “The state will take all measures to hold US Magnesium and any other liable party responsible,” a spokesperson for the Utah Division of Forestry, Fire, and State Lands wrote in an email.  Under Superfund law, the federal government aggressively pursues parties responsible for pollution, including current and past operators and potentially their parent companies. Owners of the land where the contamination occurred can also be held liable before the federal government shells out taxpayer funds. But in the US Magnesium case, Superfund law and bankruptcy law are in conflict, said Brigham Daniels, an environmental law professor at the University of Utah. Whether the company’s remaining resources will pay off its many creditors or whether the court will prioritize the environment remains unknown. “It ends up being a little messy,” Daniels said. For state regulators and environmental watchdogs, the bankruptcy and pause on cleanup hit like a frustrating case of deja vu. “It’s a contaminated blot on the landscape,” said Lynn de Freitas, executive director of FRIENDS of Great Salt Lake, “and it’s on a landscape that belongs to all Utahns.” US Magnesium’s Rowley plant, which covers an area roughly the same size as South Salt Lake, produced magnesium metal by concentrating water from the Great Salt Lake in evaporation ponds in a process that created chlorine and other hazardous byproducts. In addition to the EPA’s $100 million estimate for cleanup costs, US Magnesium noted in court filings that it owes at least $95.4 million in debt to its top 20 creditors. That includes nearly $7 million in unpaid property taxes to Tooele County and nearly $1 million to the EPA for administrative costs. It does not include the $67 million in debt owed to Wells Fargo, or the $464,732 the Division of Forestry, Fire, and State Lands claims the company owes in unpaid royalties from extracting minerals from the Great Salt Lake. The retrofitted waste pond at US Magnesium. Francisco Kjolseth / The Salt Lake Tribune In his email, Thayer denied that his company owes the state unpaid royalties and disputed the EPA’s estimates for cleanup costs. US Magnesium contracted Colorado-based Forgen to build a barrier wall meant to prevent pollution from seeping underground into the Great Salt Lake. Construction began in May 2023, but the contractor stopped work after six months. A Forgen spokesperson said US Magnesium has not paid a single invoice, and the barrier wall sits half finished. The berm is required under a 2021 court-ordered agreement with the EPA called a consent decree. It will take around $10 million to complete the barrier, court documents show. “We believe it should be finished,” said Mike Kirchner, executive vice president of Forgen. “We believe finishing the wall provides some degree of protection.” As part of the state’s lawsuit against US Magnesium, a district judge appointed a receiver on December 13 last year to oversee the company’s affairs. US Magnesium pushed back, and the court reined in the receiver’s scope a week later, assigning him to monitor the facility’s environmental status instead. In court filings, US Magnesium argued that the state’s receiver has only visited its plant once, and questioned whether the additional oversight was necessary. It asserted that it has made “good faith efforts” to comply with environmental requirements and objected to the state’s characterization of its operations as “environmentally irresponsible.” The court recently granted the state’s request to allow the receiver to continue monitoring the plant. Regulators cited the company’s violation of the consent decree, its failure to provide required water monitoring reports, and potential ongoing impacts to the environment from US Magnesium’s current “limited” operations in making their case. Johnson has echoed the state’s concerns. The 4-mile-long boundary along the facility’s waste pond only has a “handful” of wells monitoring groundwater, he said, making any plumes moving toward the Great Salt Lake easy to miss. And based on the facility’s own reports and plans to retrofit and expand the pond area, Johnson suspects that at least two-thirds of the 630 million gallons it discharged every year has seeped underground. The buildup of liquid beneath the facility sometimes caused the ground surface to mound, he said. “Everything was focused on this containment barrier (wall),” Johnson said, “with no focus on, well, what’s downgradient of that?” He prepared a monitoring plan for the site’s potential plume, with an estimated cost of $213,000, at FRIENDS of Great Salt Lake’s request this fall. The nonprofit said it plans to pass the proposal along to state regulators and the receiver. “We can’t allow this sleeping monster,” de Freitas said, “just continue to be out there.” Thayer asserted that site sampling has not shown any evidence of a groundwater plume. In its bankruptcy filings, US Magnesium has put forth a plan to dig itself out of its financial hole. On September 15, days after it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in Delaware, US Magnesium proposed auctioning off its assets. It offered the court a “stalking horse” bidder, or a party that makes an initial offer and sets a base price for the goods. The proposed bidder is LiMag Holdings, LLC — a new affiliate of Renco, US Magnesium’s New York-based parent company, which is owned by the billionaire Ira Rennert. LiMag was created the same day US Magnesium filed for bankruptcy, Delaware records show. State and federal regulators balked at the proposal. They questioned whether LiMag has a valid business plan that would prevent the plant from winding up in bankruptcy court once again. Federal regulators claimed in court filings that the company is trying to use the bankruptcy as “thinly veiled” leverage to avoid its environmental obligations. In a deposition as part of the bankruptcy proceedings, Thayer noted that the company hasn’t been profitable since at least 2016. Rebuilding the Rowley plant and restarting magnesium production would cost $40 million, Thayer testified. The company also wants to resume producing lithium from its waste piles, which will take another $30 million to $100 million, he added. Lithium saw a surge in demand due to the rise of electric vehicle sales in the U.S., and the company maintains it will be a profitable ongoing source of revenue. But Utah is actively working to revoke US Magnesium’s minerals lease and evict it from state lands. The company also lost its approval to produce lithium from the Great Salt Lake after negotiations with the Utah Division of Forestry, Fire, and State Lands broke down this year, the agency confirmed. US Magnesium in June 2024. Trent Nelson / The Salt Lake Tribune The U.S. government, meanwhile, told the court it wants to protect the environment by holding the company accountable for its obligations. It noted that US Magnesium has further proposed renegotiating its previous cleanup commitments as a condition of sale to LiMag. Specifically, the company asked the court to allow the new subsidiary to modify its agreement with the EPA. It requested to pause environmental cleanup until magnesium production restarts; to release EPA funds meant to ensure taxpayers aren’t on the hook for future cleanup costs so the company can fund current remedial efforts; and to extend the court-ordered schedule for barrier wall construction and waste pond improvements. The federal government pushed back against that proposal, saying it “demonstrates that US Magnesium is attempting to use this case … inappropriately,” according to court documents. The proposal would also get rid of the state’s court-appointed receiver. Instead, the federal and state governments, along with US Magnesium’s many unsecured creditors, asked the court to convert the bankruptcy case to Chapter 7 so that US Magnesium could be liquidated rather than reorganized under a new subsidiary. “Creditors and parties in interest must not be forced to accept a sale,” the U.S. government wrote, “… to a new company that is primed to fail in the same way as two other Renco subsidiaries that operated this same facility.” The Division of Forestry, Fire, and State Lands filed its own motion supporting the liquidation proposal. “Given the plethora of environmental problems with the land which [US Magnesium] has heavily polluted over the past many years,” the division wrote in its filing, ”it is highly unlikely any potential buyer would purchase its business other than” LiMag and the parent company, Renco. The state and federal governments also noted that US Magnesium and Renco are trying to repeat history by leaving their many creditors in the red and kicking environmental obligations further down the road. “The Debtor has gone through this charade previously,” attorneys for the Division of Forestry, Fire, and State Lands wrote in their objection, “when it filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy 24 years ago in the Southern District of New York, and used this same playbook: file bankruptcy as far away as possible from its Utah operations (or now, former operations), cleanse the company’s assets through a Bankruptcy … [sell] to its owner, and thus escape payment of its debts.” The Rowley plant has released toxic materials like highly acidic wastewater and cancer-causing chemicals like chlorinated dioxins, polychlorinated biphenyls known as PCBs, and hexachlorobenzene in the soils and surface water near the Great Salt Lake since at least the 1990s. Back then, it operated under another Renco subsidiary called Magnesium Corporation of America, or MagCorp. An inspection by the EPA in January 2001 found an array of environmental issues at the MagCorp site. The agency sued MagCorp, threatening $900 million in penalties after it claimed the company misrepresented the extent of its contamination. The EPA described an unlined, 2,000-foot-long and 20-foot-deep canal flowing through the site that workers called the “Red River” because of its color. Sampling found its contents highly acidic and corrosive, and the canal flowed into the facility’s equally acidic and corrosive waste lagoon. MagCorp also dumped unpermitted sludge and solid waste, which contained toxic chemicals like lead, arsenic, and chromium, directly onto the ground. The company declared bankruptcy months after the inspection, in August 2001. Soon after, the company sold off its assets to Renco’s new subsidiary — US Magnesium — despite objections from the U.S. government. That allowed the plant to continue magnesium production even as its multitude of environmental problems sat unresolved. The playa of the Great Salt Lake near US Magnesium’s facility in December 2024. Francisco Kjolseth / The Salt Lake Tribune In 2009, the EPA listed historical pollution under MagCorp’s operation on the National Priorities List and declared it a Superfund site. In 2014, the facility’s reorganized operators spilled 8,000 pounds of hydrochloric acid onto neighboring Bureau of Land Management lands, putting hunters, livestock, and wildlife at risk, according to the EPA. The company finally settled with the EPA in January 2021. It signed the consent decree with the federal agency a few months later. The bankruptcy case closed that June. But just three years later, US Magnesium was back in hot water. In July 2024, the EPA notified the company that it had violated the consent decree. And this fall, the plant operators filed in bankruptcy court once again. In his email, Thayer asserted that the company is not currently generating any waste or emissions regulated by the consent decree. Johnson, the geologist and Superfund advisor, said environmental concerns remain at the US Magnesium site, even though it’s in a remote location. “There’s no doubt that there is a toxic risk,” he said. In August, the EPA issued another letter to the company, asserting that the waste ponds posed a “significant” hazard to birds. While they’re not currently in use or full of acidic water, the ponds include “now-exposed, highly contaminated sediments,” the agency wrote, and birds are using them as habitat. “EPA has been working to ensure US Magnesium, regardless of its operating status, complies with its obligations,” a spokesperson wrote in an email. US Magnesium was required to set aside $16.5 million in financial assurance as part of the cleanup agreement with the EPA, and add funds to those accounts as needed based on updated cost estimates. The federal agency used money from the first bankruptcy settlement to set up the initial tranche — funds US Magnesium now wants released as part of its proposed sale to LiMag. The company failed to hand over $1.5 million the EPA required in supplemental funds last year, according to court filings by the agency. While the bankruptcy court decides how to settle US Magnesium’s debts, it’s unclear who will pick up the tab to complete cleanup at the site, especially if it permanently shutters. “The Division is working with our legal counsel to ensure the state’s interests in the bankruptcy proceedings are fully represented and protected,” a spokesperson for the Utah Division of Forestry, Fire, and State Lands wrote in an email. Whether Renco and US Magnesium are able to get the same results from their previous bankruptcy — shifting their assets free of liens to a new corporation, discharging their debts and paying creditors just a fraction of what’s owed, as the state asserts — is now in the hands of a judge. “It depends on whether or not the court will think it’s what’s best for society,” said Brook Gotberg, a law professor at Brigham Young University. “It almost creates an odd tension where we need this plant to continue so that it will remediate these environmental harms.” Liquidating the company could mean that workers’ pensions go unpaid, the country permanently loses its largest producer of a vital mineral, and the state and the EPA are stuck figuring out how to pay for the mess. Still, Gotberg said, there’s a case to be made for the court to shut down US Magnesium’s operations for good. “Especially if those environmental claims carry over,” she said, “I don’t know how they can make it profitable.” This story was originally published by Grist with the headline The country’s biggest magnesium producer went bankrupt. Who’s going to clean up the $100M mess? on Dec 16, 2025.

Business
Chemicals
Forests

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