The EPA issued a proposed legal finding yesterday that it is “appropriate and necessary” to regulate mercury and other harmful air pollutants from the power sector under the Clean Air Act, a life-or-death matter for people who live near power plants.
The E.P.A. will resume enforcing limits on the release of mercury, a neurotoxin linked to developmental damage in children, from coal-burning power plants.
If there was any respite to be found, it was here on the Russian River. Yet everywhere were signs of the West's ever-intensifying drought, with the Russian River taking the early hit.
The federal government will require testing for lead contamination in schools and day care facilities and will compel utilities to inventory all lead service lines. But it will allow many of the nation's estimated 6 million or more lead pipes to remain in the ground.
