Chemicals

"The British Bee Keepers' Association ... is receiving money from one of the main manufacturers of [an] allegedly bee-killing brew, Bayer Crop Sciences, and endorsing some of its products as 'bee-friendly'."

"A controversial alternative to the ozone-depleting pesticide methyl bromide could be in use in Pajaro Valley strawberry fields next year."

"Should the federal government store 17,000 tons of mercury at the Idaho National Laboratory? 'The answer is no,' said Gov. Butch Otter."

During the Bush administration and earlier, the Pentagon waged a war to keep EPA from regulating perchlorate, a rocket fuel that has widely contaminated drinking water, by fudging the science about its health effects. Now the defense industry is pushing the same case to the Obama Office of Management and Budget.

"A lawsuit filed by about 5,700 Baton Rouge residents against ExxonMobil Corp. over a 1993 fire crawled through federal court for almost 15 years and has finally come to an end -- the residents lost, lawyers said."

Some 50 chemicals which can potentially harm human health are contained in food packaging.

The state budget crisis has caused the Massachusetts legislature to eliminate all funding for the state's Toxics Use Reduction Institute.

Heart arrhythmias in females and permanent, deleterious modifications of a gene that plays a pivotal role in reproduction are two new problems being linked to bisphenol A. New findings about the toxicity of this chemical and data suggest human exposures may be higher than U.S. regulatory agencies have assumed.

"The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced Wednesday a proposed settlement of a lawsuit that could result in scrutiny of how dozens of dangerous pesticides affect threatened and endangered species living around San Francisco Bay."