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‘Rivers you think are pristine are not’: how drug pollution flooded England’s national parks – and put human health at risk

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Friday, September 27, 2024

Nestled within the Peak District national park, the stream known as Brook Head Beck meanders between undulating green hills. It is mossy and dank by the river, surrounded by the gentle trickling sound of water, the smell of leaves starting to rot underfoot, and a weave of branches overhead with leaves turning golden in the autumn chill. This place is renowned for its quaint English beauty, and the government has designated it an ecological site of special scientific interest, meaning it holds some of the country’s most precious wildlife.Yet within this pristine-looking stream flows a concoction of chemicals that could pose a threat to the freshwater organisms and humans who come into contact with it. Recent testing found it had the second highest levels of chemical pollution in the UK – after a site in Glasgow – with concentrations of pharmaceuticals higher than inner-city rivers in London, Belfast, Leeds and York.New research, published in August in the journal Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, revealed that England’s most protected rivers – those that run through its national parks – were also heavily contaminated by pharmaceuticals. The findings demonstrated how drug pollution now flows into even the most apparently untouched waterways, with transformative, potentially dangerous results for ecosystems and people.“I don’t think anyone had really looked for pharmaceuticals in national parks,” says Prof Alistair Boxall, from the University of York and lead author of the paper. “The big new thing we’ve shown is that environments you think are pristine are not.”The River Derwent near Chatsworth House in the Derbyshire Peak DistrictAntibiotics and the ‘silent pandemic’Antidepressants, antibiotics, diabetes treatments and anti-inflammatory drugs are among the chemicals flowing in the water – probably flushed down the toilet by someone in the nearby village of Tideswell. Brook Head Beck had 28 out of 54 pharmaceuticals that Boxall’s team tested for, but the greatest immediate risk to humans is posed by the concentration of antibiotics.In this stream, antibiotic levels tested higher than those thought to promote antimicrobial resistance (AMR), where bacteria develop resistance to life-saving medicines. “If kids played in here, or animals drank it, it’s possible that they could consume bacteria that have acquired resistance,” says Boxall.AMR has been called a “silent pandemic” by the World Health Organization. Despite low levels of awareness outside specialist circles, AMR kills more than a million people a year, with numbers expected to increase to 10m deaths a year by 2050, according to the UN Environment Programme.It is usually not possible to locate the source of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and many people will not know they have it in their gut. But there is growing evidence that microbes living in waterways and coastal areas may be developing AMR.In 2018, the University of Exeter’s Beach Bums study was the first to identify water as a source. It found surfers were three times more likely to have antibiotic-resistant bacteria in their gut than people who didn’t spend time in the water.We urgently need to know more about how humans are exposed to these bacteria and how they colonise our gutsThe study looked at 300 regular surfers and bodyboarders (who are particularly vulnerable because they swallow up to 10 times more water than sea swimmers) and found 9% had AMR bacteria, compared with 3% of the general population. The university’s Poo-Sticks project is now recruiting wild swimmers to see if they have the same issues.Dr Anne Leonard, from the University of Exeter medical school and lead author of the initial study, said there was an increasing focus on how resistance could be spread through the natural environment. “Antimicrobial resistance has been globally recognised as one of the greatest health challenges of our time … We urgently need to know more about how humans are exposed to these bacteria and how they colonise our guts.”It is not just swallowing water that puts people at risk; you could ingest AMR bacteria via an open cut, or through contact with ears or eyes.Prof Trisha Greenhalgh, from the University of Oxford, is a regular wild swimmer. She swims with a full wetsuit all year round because she tends to get scratches that get infected. One in 2022 affected the skin on her lower leg.“I tried some antibiotic cream I had in the cupboard, then another cream, then saw my GP who prescribed first one antibiotic then a different one. So, all in all, four antibiotics before the infection cleared,” she says. Greenhalgh was never formally tested for antibiotic resistance as it is uncommon to test for it outside hospitals, but says: “It was striking how long it took for the infection to heal.”Tideswell village in the Peak District is a popular destination for visitorsHow do drugs end up in waterways?Sewage spills often dominate headlines – they are visible and they smell bad – but invisible microchemicals, including pharmaceuticals, are having an equally serious impact on the ecology of our rivers, says Boxall.Pharmaceutical pollution from human drugs typically ends up in waterways through the sewage system. When people take a medication, not all of it is absorbed by the body. Between 30% and 90% is excreted from the body then flushed down the toilet to be treated at a sewage plant.In the UK and many other countries, there is no process to test for pharmaceutical pollution, or to remove it from sewage during treatment. Sewage treatment works are designed to deal with organic waste and are much less effective with chemicals. Boxall says: “Some will be very well removed, some will be removed to some degree, and some will be hardly removed at all. It’s really down to how degradable the pharmaceuticals are.”We know little about the true extent of drug pollution, and humans are not the only source. More than half of the world’s antibiotics are used on farms and there are significantly fewer studies on their effects, but researchers say intensive agriculture “ploughs the way” for AMR because it involves putting so many chemicals in the soil and into livestock. These pollutants leach into the wider environment, often ending up in rivers. For example, a study in Wisconsin found that seasonal spreading of manure on the fields was linked to the presence of antibiotic resistance genes in rivers.Previous research by Boxall in 2019 showed that concentrations of antibiotics in some of the world’s rivers exceeded safe levels by up to 300 times, with the most polluted sites found in Asia and Africa.Antibiotic contamination poses one of the most immediate risks to human health, but many other drugs are flowing out into rivers and seas, where scientists warn they pose a growing threat to wildlife, causing changes to their behaviour and anatomy. In one study, scientists found that European perch lost their fear of predators when exposed to waterborne depression medication. In another, contamination from contraceptive pills caused sex reversal in some fish populations. The problem is widespread: Boxall’s recent study, published in collaboration with the Rivers Trust, found pharmaceuticals at 52 out of 54 locations monitored across England’s 10 national parks.Prof Alistair Boxall taking a water sample from the River Derwent at Calver overlooking Froggat Edge in the Peak District national parkWhy are national parks so contaminated?While drug pollution is a national and international problem, in England, rivers in national parks are among the most contaminated. It’s a counterintuitive result – and an alarming one, given that these waterways are commonly used by wild swimmers, paddlers and holidaymakers.The reason Brook Head Beck came to register such high levels of contaminant lies a mile up the road in the village of Tideswell.Wonky lines of stone houses with small windows, hanging baskets and colourful doors line the streets of Tideswell. The village has been here for more than 1,300 years – names such as harvest cottage, the old wool shop and cobbler’s cottage recall the trades that once flourished here.The way we monitor and regulate chemicals is stuck in the dark ages … we need to think more about where the chemicals go“What goes down the drain is telling you about the population,” says Boxall. The drugs in the sample collected downstream from Tideswell included diabetes and blood pressure treatments, typically taken by older people, who generally take more pills. This is one of the reasons national park samples contain so many pharmaceuticals – the average age in England is 39, but people in national parks are on average at least 10 years older.Another reason is that they are tourist hotspots, and the population swells during weekends in the summer. England’s national parks have a population of about 320,000 permanent residents, but they get an estimated 90 million visitors a year. This puts a strain on wastewater treatment infrastructure, potentially leading to increased levels of pharmaceutical discharge.Older sewage plants, which are more likely to be serving isolated rural communities, are generally even less efficient. National parks also often have “low flow” rivers, meaning there is less water to dilute the pollutants coming from wastewater treatment plants.The combination of these factors in remote and fragile places makes national parks particularly vulnerable to waterway pollution.“The way we monitor and regulate chemicals is stuck in the dark ages,” says Boxall, who says authorities should set “safe levels” for some pharmaceuticals, such as antibiotics. The Environment Agency can’t do anything because the chemicals are not regulated. More intense monitoring is also needed at sites such as Tideswell. “As a society we need to think more about where all the chemicals go,” he says.The Peak District village of Tideswell attracts tourists who are unlikely to realise the nearby becks and rivers are heavily pollutedChange is under way in Europe. Switzerland is the only country which has updated its sewage works to filter out these chemicals, and following the Swiss example, EU member states and the European parliament have approved the final text requiring sewage treatment works serving 10,000 people or more to have micropollutant treatment in place by 2045. Pharmaceutical and cosmetic producers will largely fund the upgrades in line with the “polluter pays” principle, but the UK government says it has no plans to do the same.I ask Boxall if he’d swim in any of the rivers in England’s national parks, and he quickly shakes his head. “I wouldn’t go swimming in any UK river, knowing what rubbish is in there,” he says.Find more age of extinction coverage here, and follow biodiversity reporters Phoebe Weston and Patrick Greenfield on X for all the latest news and features

High levels of antibiotics and other drugs have been found in water in the country’s most treasured and protected landscapes, raising concerns over antimicrobial resistancePhotographs by Christopher ThomondNestled within the Peak District national park, the stream known as Brook Head Beck meanders between undulating green hills. It is mossy and dank by the river, surrounded by the gentle trickling sound of water, the smell of leaves starting to rot underfoot, and a weave of branches overhead with leaves turning golden in the autumn chill. This place is renowned for its quaint English beauty, and the government has designated it an ecological site of special scientific interest, meaning it holds some of the country’s most precious wildlife.Yet within this pristine-looking stream flows a concoction of chemicals that could pose a threat to the freshwater organisms and humans who come into contact with it. Recent testing found it had the second highest levels of chemical pollution in the UK – after a site in Glasgow – with concentrations of pharmaceuticals higher than inner-city rivers in London, Belfast, Leeds and York. Continue reading...

Nestled within the Peak District national park, the stream known as Brook Head Beck meanders between undulating green hills. It is mossy and dank by the river, surrounded by the gentle trickling sound of water, the smell of leaves starting to rot underfoot, and a weave of branches overhead with leaves turning golden in the autumn chill. This place is renowned for its quaint English beauty, and the government has designated it an ecological site of special scientific interest, meaning it holds some of the country’s most precious wildlife.

Yet within this pristine-looking stream flows a concoction of chemicals that could pose a threat to the freshwater organisms and humans who come into contact with it. Recent testing found it had the second highest levels of chemical pollution in the UK – after a site in Glasgow – with concentrations of pharmaceuticals higher than inner-city rivers in London, Belfast, Leeds and York.

New research, published in August in the journal Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, revealed that England’s most protected rivers – those that run through its national parks – were also heavily contaminated by pharmaceuticals. The findings demonstrated how drug pollution now flows into even the most apparently untouched waterways, with transformative, potentially dangerous results for ecosystems and people.

“I don’t think anyone had really looked for pharmaceuticals in national parks,” says Prof Alistair Boxall, from the University of York and lead author of the paper. “The big new thing we’ve shown is that environments you think are pristine are not.”

The River Derwent near Chatsworth House in the Derbyshire Peak District

Antibiotics and the ‘silent pandemic’

Antidepressants, antibiotics, diabetes treatments and anti-inflammatory drugs are among the chemicals flowing in the water – probably flushed down the toilet by someone in the nearby village of Tideswell. Brook Head Beck had 28 out of 54 pharmaceuticals that Boxall’s team tested for, but the greatest immediate risk to humans is posed by the concentration of antibiotics.

In this stream, antibiotic levels tested higher than those thought to promote antimicrobial resistance (AMR), where bacteria develop resistance to life-saving medicines. “If kids played in here, or animals drank it, it’s possible that they could consume bacteria that have acquired resistance,” says Boxall.

AMR has been called a “silent pandemic” by the World Health Organization. Despite low levels of awareness outside specialist circles, AMR kills more than a million people a year, with numbers expected to increase to 10m deaths a year by 2050, according to the UN Environment Programme.

It is usually not possible to locate the source of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and many people will not know they have it in their gut. But there is growing evidence that microbes living in waterways and coastal areas may be developing AMR.

In 2018, the University of Exeter’s Beach Bums study was the first to identify water as a source. It found surfers were three times more likely to have antibiotic-resistant bacteria in their gut than people who didn’t spend time in the water.

The study looked at 300 regular surfers and bodyboarders (who are particularly vulnerable because they swallow up to 10 times more water than sea swimmers) and found 9% had AMR bacteria, compared with 3% of the general population. The university’s Poo-Sticks project is now recruiting wild swimmers to see if they have the same issues.

Dr Anne Leonard, from the University of Exeter medical school and lead author of the initial study, said there was an increasing focus on how resistance could be spread through the natural environment. “Antimicrobial resistance has been globally recognised as one of the greatest health challenges of our time … We urgently need to know more about how humans are exposed to these bacteria and how they colonise our guts.”

It is not just swallowing water that puts people at risk; you could ingest AMR bacteria via an open cut, or through contact with ears or eyes.

Prof Trisha Greenhalgh, from the University of Oxford, is a regular wild swimmer. She swims with a full wetsuit all year round because she tends to get scratches that get infected. One in 2022 affected the skin on her lower leg.

“I tried some antibiotic cream I had in the cupboard, then another cream, then saw my GP who prescribed first one antibiotic then a different one. So, all in all, four antibiotics before the infection cleared,” she says. Greenhalgh was never formally tested for antibiotic resistance as it is uncommon to test for it outside hospitals, but says: “It was striking how long it took for the infection to heal.”

Tideswell village in the Peak District is a popular destination for visitors

How do drugs end up in waterways?

Sewage spills often dominate headlines – they are visible and they smell bad – but invisible microchemicals, including pharmaceuticals, are having an equally serious impact on the ecology of our rivers, says Boxall.

Pharmaceutical pollution from human drugs typically ends up in waterways through the sewage system. When people take a medication, not all of it is absorbed by the body. Between 30% and 90% is excreted from the body then flushed down the toilet to be treated at a sewage plant.

In the UK and many other countries, there is no process to test for pharmaceutical pollution, or to remove it from sewage during treatment. Sewage treatment works are designed to deal with organic waste and are much less effective with chemicals. Boxall says: “Some will be very well removed, some will be removed to some degree, and some will be hardly removed at all. It’s really down to how degradable the pharmaceuticals are.”

We know little about the true extent of drug pollution, and humans are not the only source. More than half of the world’s antibiotics are used on farms and there are significantly fewer studies on their effects, but researchers say intensive agriculture “ploughs the way” for AMR because it involves putting so many chemicals in the soil and into livestock. These pollutants leach into the wider environment, often ending up in rivers. For example, a study in Wisconsin found that seasonal spreading of manure on the fields was linked to the presence of antibiotic resistance genes in rivers.

Previous research by Boxall in 2019 showed that concentrations of antibiotics in some of the world’s rivers exceeded safe levels by up to 300 times, with the most polluted sites found in Asia and Africa.

Antibiotic contamination poses one of the most immediate risks to human health, but many other drugs are flowing out into rivers and seas, where scientists warn they pose a growing threat to wildlife, causing changes to their behaviour and anatomy. In one study, scientists found that European perch lost their fear of predators when exposed to waterborne depression medication. In another, contamination from contraceptive pills caused sex reversal in some fish populations. The problem is widespread: Boxall’s recent study, published in collaboration with the Rivers Trust, found pharmaceuticals at 52 out of 54 locations monitored across England’s 10 national parks.

Prof Alistair Boxall taking a water sample from the River Derwent at Calver overlooking Froggat Edge in the Peak District national park

Why are national parks so contaminated?

While drug pollution is a national and international problem, in England, rivers in national parks are among the most contaminated. It’s a counterintuitive result – and an alarming one, given that these waterways are commonly used by wild swimmers, paddlers and holidaymakers.

The reason Brook Head Beck came to register such high levels of contaminant lies a mile up the road in the village of Tideswell.

Wonky lines of stone houses with small windows, hanging baskets and colourful doors line the streets of Tideswell. The village has been here for more than 1,300 years – names such as harvest cottage, the old wool shop and cobbler’s cottage recall the trades that once flourished here.

“What goes down the drain is telling you about the population,” says Boxall. The drugs in the sample collected downstream from Tideswell included diabetes and blood pressure treatments, typically taken by older people, who generally take more pills. This is one of the reasons national park samples contain so many pharmaceuticals – the average age in England is 39, but people in national parks are on average at least 10 years older.

Another reason is that they are tourist hotspots, and the population swells during weekends in the summer. England’s national parks have a population of about 320,000 permanent residents, but they get an estimated 90 million visitors a year. This puts a strain on wastewater treatment infrastructure, potentially leading to increased levels of pharmaceutical discharge.

Older sewage plants, which are more likely to be serving isolated rural communities, are generally even less efficient. National parks also often have “low flow” rivers, meaning there is less water to dilute the pollutants coming from wastewater treatment plants.

The combination of these factors in remote and fragile places makes national parks particularly vulnerable to waterway pollution.

“The way we monitor and regulate chemicals is stuck in the dark ages,” says Boxall, who says authorities should set “safe levels” for some pharmaceuticals, such as antibiotics. The Environment Agency can’t do anything because the chemicals are not regulated. More intense monitoring is also needed at sites such as Tideswell. “As a society we need to think more about where all the chemicals go,” he says.

The Peak District village of Tideswell attracts tourists who are unlikely to realise the nearby becks and rivers are heavily polluted

Change is under way in Europe. Switzerland is the only country which has updated its sewage works to filter out these chemicals, and following the Swiss example, EU member states and the European parliament have approved the final text requiring sewage treatment works serving 10,000 people or more to have micropollutant treatment in place by 2045. Pharmaceutical and cosmetic producers will largely fund the upgrades in line with the “polluter pays” principle, but the UK government says it has no plans to do the same.

I ask Boxall if he’d swim in any of the rivers in England’s national parks, and he quickly shakes his head. “I wouldn’t go swimming in any UK river, knowing what rubbish is in there,” he says.

Find more age of extinction coverage here, and follow biodiversity reporters Phoebe Weston and Patrick Greenfield on X for all the latest news and features

Read the full story here.
Photos courtesy of

Environmental Agency Denies Petition to Designate Big Hole River as Impaired by Nutrient Pollution

Montana’s environmental regulator has denied a petition to designate the Big Hole River as impaired by nitrogen and phosphorus

Montana’s environmental regulator has denied a petition to designate the Big Hole River as impaired by nitrogen and phosphorus, throwing a wrench in environmentalists’ efforts to put the blue-ribbon fishery on a “pollution diet.”Upper Missouri Waterkeeper and the Big Hole River Foundation contend that excess nutrients are creating regular summertime algal blooms that can stretch for more than a mile, robbing fish and the macroinvertebrate bugs they eat of the oxygen they need to thrive. The groups argue in the petition they sent to the Montana Department of Environmental Quality last month that an impairment designation would direct the agency to identify and work to reduce the river’s pollution sources in an effort to rebalance the river’s aquatic ecosystem.On April 14, about a month after receiving the 32-page petition, DEQ wrote that it “cannot grant” the group’s petition. The agency’s letter doesn’t quibble with the groups’ findings, which were detailed in a five-year data collection effort. Instead, the agency suggested that legislation passed in 2021 has tied its hands. “As a result of Senate Bill 358, passed during the 2021 Legislative Session … DEQ is unable to base nutrient assessment upon the numeric nutrient criteria,” the letter, signed by DEQ Director Sonja Nowakowski, reads. In an April 23 conversation with Montana Free Press, Upper Missouri Waterkeeper Executive Director Guy Alsentzer criticized the agency’s decision, arguing that it did not use the best available science and applied “illogical and disingenuous” reasoning in its denial. “EPA already took action and struck down Senate Bill 358 from the 2021 session,” Alsentzer said, referencing federal regulators’ oversight of state laws and rules governing water quality. “Numeric criteria are applicable.”A spokesperson for the EPA confirmed Alsentzer’s assertion, writing in an April 24 email to MTFP that numeric nutrient standards for nitrogen and phosphorus the agency approved a decade ago “remain in effect for Clean Water Act purposes” and will remain so “unless or until the EPA approves the removal of the currently applicable numeric nutrient criteria and approves revised water quality standards.”A DEQ spokesperson did not directly answer MTFP’s questions about what water quality standards DEQ is using to assess Montana waterways and determine whether permittees are complying with state and federal regulations.The agency wrote in an email that no permitted pollution sources under its regulatory oversight are discharging into the Big Hole, suggesting that its enforcement role is limited. The agency also wrote that an impairment designation is not required to implement water quality improvement projects such as creating riparian buffers, improving forest roads, or creating shaded areas. “Watershed partners may begin actively working on nonpoint source pollution reduction projects at any time,” DEQ spokesperson Madison McGeffers wrote to MTFP. “There is nothing standing in the way of starting work on these types of projects to improve water quality. In fact, the Big Hole River Watershed Committee is actively implementing its Watershed Restoration Plan with funds and support from DEQ Nonpoint Source & Wetland Section’s 319 program.”Alsentzer countered that a science-based cleanup plan and greater accountability will benefit the Big Hole regardless of whether nutrients are flowing into the river from a pipe or entering via more diffuse and harder-to-regulate channels.“You can’t get to that if you don’t recognize that you’ve got a problem we need to solve,” he said, adding that an impairment designation “unlocks pass-through funding to the tune of millions of dollars.”Addressing manmade threats to the Big Hole should be a priority for DEQ, given local communities’ economic reliance on a healthy river, he added.“It’s just a real tragic state of affairs when you have a blue-ribbon trout fishery in a very rural county that’s essentially having its livelihood flushed down the drain because we can’t get our agencies to actually implement baseline river protections (and) use science-based standards,” Alsentzer said. “When people try to do the work for the agency and help them, they’re getting told to go pound sand. I think that’s wrong.”Two years ago, Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks biologists recorded historically low numbers of brown trout along some stretches of the Big Hole. Anglers and conservationists floated a number of possible contributing factors, ranging from pathogens and drought conditions to angling pressure and unmitigated pollution. Save Wild Trout, a nonprofit formed in 2023 to understand which factors merit further investigation, described the 2023 southwestern Montana fishery “collapse” as a “canary in the coal mine moment.”In response to the 2023 population slump, Gov. Greg Gianforte announced the launch of a multiyear research effort on Jefferson Basin rivers that FWP is coordinating with Montana State University. Narrative Standards For ‘Undesirable Aquatic Life’ DEQ’s letter to Upper Missouri Waterkeeper and the Big Hole River Foundation leaves open the possibility of a future impairment designation based on narrative water quality standards. After mentioning the 2021 legislation, Nowakowski wrote that the agency reviewed the submitted data “along with other readily available data, in consideration of the state’s established narrative criteria.”The letter goes on to outline the additional material petitioners would need to submit for the agency to evaluate an impairment designation using narrative criteria, which establish that surface waters must be “free from substances” that “create conditions which produce undesirable aquatic life.”In an April 22 letter, Upper Missouri Waterkeeper and the Big Hole River Foundation addressed the petition denial in two parts. First, the groups argued that numeric nutrient standards apply. Second, they resubmitted material — photos, emails, a macroinvertebrate report, and “Aquatic Plant Visual Assessment Forms” — to support an impairment designation under the looser narrative standards. “We encourage DEQ to do the right thing, use all available science to determine the Big Hole River impaired for nutrients, and commit to working with petitioners and other (stakeholders) in addressing the pollution sources undermining this world-class waterway and harming the diverse uses it supports,” the letter says. Alsentzer noted that he has set up a meeting with the EPA to discuss DEQ’s treatment of the petition and its description of applicable water quality standards.The dispute over numeric nutrient standards comes shortly after the Legislature passed another bill seeking to repeal them. Any day now, Gianforte is expected to sign House Bill 664, which bears a striking similarity to 2021’s Senate Bill 358. HB 664 has garnered support from Nowakowski, who described it as a “time travel” bill that will return the state to “individual, site-by-site” regulations in lieu of more broadly applicable numeric standards. This story was originally published by Montana Free Press and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See - Feb. 2025

Supreme Court justices consider reviving industry bid to ax California clean car rule

The Supreme Court on Wednesday heard oral arguments in a case that could revive a bid by fuel producers to ax California’s clean car standards. The court was not considering the legality of the standards themselves, which ​​require car companies to sell new vehicles in the state that produce less pollution — including by mandating...

The Supreme Court on Wednesday heard oral arguments in a case that could revive a bid by fuel producers to ax California’s clean car standards. The court was not considering the legality of the standards themselves, which ​​require car companies to sell new vehicles in the state that produce less pollution — including by mandating a significant share of cars sold to be electric or hybrid.  Instead, the Supreme Court was considering whether the fuel industry had the authority to bring the lawsuit at all. A lower court determined that the producers, which include numerous biofuel companies and trade groups representing both them and the makers of gasoline, did not have standing to bring the case. Some of the justices were quiet, so it’s difficult to predict what the ultimate outcome of the case will be. However, others appeared critical of the federal government and California’s arguments that the fuel producers do not have the right to bring a suit. Justice Brett Kavanaugh in particular noted that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) itself did not initially try to have the case tossed on that basis.  “Isn't that a tell here? I mean, EPA, as you, of course, know, routinely raises standing objections when there's even — even a hint of a question about it,” Kavanaugh said.  The fuel producers argued that while it was technically the auto industry that was being regulated, the market was being “tilted” against them as well by California’s rule, which was also adopted by other states. The EPA and California have argued that the fuel producers are arguing on the basis of outdated facts and a market that has shifted since the rule was first approved by the EPA in 2013.  The EPA needs to grant approval to California to issue such rules. The approval was revoked by the Trump administration and later reinstated in the Biden administration.  If the justices revive the currently dismissed case, lower courts would then have to decide whether to uphold the California rule — though the underlying case could eventually make its way to the high court as well.  Meanwhile, California has since passed subsequent standards that go even further — banning the sale of gas-powered cars in the state by 2035. That rule was approved by the Biden administration — though Congress may try to repeal it.

EPA fires or reassigns hundreds of staffers

The Environmental Protection Agency plans to fire or reassign more than 450 staffers working on environmental justice issues, it said Tuesday.Why it matters: The large-scale changes could effectively end much of the EPA's work tackling pollution in historically disadvantaged communities.It's part of the Trump administration's effort to vastly shrink the federal workforce. EPA has around 15,000 employees.Driving the news: EPA notified roughly 280 employees that they will be fired in a "reduction in force." Another 175 who perform "statutory functions" will be reassigned.The employees come from the Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights, the Office of Inclusive Excellence, and EPA regional offices."EPA is taking the next step to terminate the Biden-Harris Administration's Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and Environmental Justice arms of the agency," a spokesperson said.Between the lines: The firings will likely see challenges from congressional Democrats and the employees themselves.EPA had previously put many environmental justice staffers on administrative leave.Administrator Lee Zeldin, during a Monday news conference, defended the agency's broader efforts to cut environmental justice grant programs, arguing the money is ill-spent."The problem is that, in the name of environmental justice, a dollar will get secured and not get spent on remediating that environmental issue," he said.

The Environmental Protection Agency plans to fire or reassign more than 450 staffers working on environmental justice issues, it said Tuesday.Why it matters: The large-scale changes could effectively end much of the EPA's work tackling pollution in historically disadvantaged communities.It's part of the Trump administration's effort to vastly shrink the federal workforce. EPA has around 15,000 employees.Driving the news: EPA notified roughly 280 employees that they will be fired in a "reduction in force." Another 175 who perform "statutory functions" will be reassigned.The employees come from the Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights, the Office of Inclusive Excellence, and EPA regional offices."EPA is taking the next step to terminate the Biden-Harris Administration's Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and Environmental Justice arms of the agency," a spokesperson said.Between the lines: The firings will likely see challenges from congressional Democrats and the employees themselves.EPA had previously put many environmental justice staffers on administrative leave.Administrator Lee Zeldin, during a Monday news conference, defended the agency's broader efforts to cut environmental justice grant programs, arguing the money is ill-spent."The problem is that, in the name of environmental justice, a dollar will get secured and not get spent on remediating that environmental issue," he said.

EPA firing 280 staffers who fought pollution in overburdened neighborhoods

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will fire 280 staffers who worked on tackling pollution in overburdened and underserved communities and will reassign another 175. These staffers worked in an area known as “environmental justice,” which helps communities that face a disproportionate amount of pollution exposure, especially minority or low-income communities.  The EPA has framed its...

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will fire 280 staffers who worked on tackling pollution in overburdened and underserved communities and will reassign another 175. These staffers worked in an area known as “environmental justice,” which helps communities that face a disproportionate amount of pollution exposure, especially minority or low-income communities.  The EPA has framed its efforts to cut these programs — including its previous closure of environmental justice offices — as part of a push to end diversity programming in the government. Supporters of the agency's environmental justice work have pointed out that Black communities face particularly high pollution levels and that the programs also help white Americans, especially if they are poor.  “EPA is taking the next step to terminate the Biden-Harris Administration’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and Environmental Justice arms of the agency,” an EPA spokesperson said in a written statement.   “Today, EPA notified diversity, equity, and inclusion and environmental justice employees that EPA will be conducting a Reduction in Force,” the spokesperson said. “The agency also notified certain statutory and mission essential employees that they are being reassigned to other offices through the ‘transfer of function’ procedure also outlined in [the Office of Personnel Management’s] Handbook and federal regulations” The firings will be effective July 31, according to E&E News, which first reported that they were occurring. The news comes as the Trump administration has broadly sought to cut the federal workforce. The administration has previously indicated that it planned to cut 65 percent of the EPA’s overall budget. It’s not clear how much of this will be staff, though according to a plan reviewed by Democrat House staff, the EPA is considering the termination of as many as about 1,100 employees from its scientific research arm.  Meanwhile, as part of their reductions in force, other agencies including the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Veterans Affairs have fired tens of thousands of staffers. The EPA is smaller than these agencies, with a total of more than 15,000 employees as of January.  Nearly 170 environmental justice staffers were previously placed on paid leave while the agency was “in the process of evaluating new structure and organization.”

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