Innovative project turns Illinois River sediment into Chicago lakefront park EAST PEORIA–(ENEWSPF)–October 10, 2012. Governor Pat Quinn today visited the East Peoria riverfront to announce the innovative Mud-to-Parks program, which makes use of soil dredged from the silt-choked Illinois River to build a new park on Lake Michigan.   Sixty[Read More…]

Washington, DC–(ENEWSPF)–October 10, 2012.   U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)-certified organic growers in the United States sold more than $3.5 billion organically grown agricultural commodities in 2011, according to the results of the 2011 Certified Organic Production Survey, released by USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS). The data shows a[Read More…]

WASHINGTON, DC –(ENEWSPF)–October 9, 2012.  Advancing President Obama’s all-of-the-above strategy for expanding domestic energy resources, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar today announced that the Department has reached the President’s goal of authorizing 10,000 megawatts of renewable power on public lands with the approval of the Chokecherry and Sierra Madre[Read More…]

Crane and Wagner Coal Plants could cause air quality violations at more than 100 schools in Baltimore and Anne Arundel Baltimore, MD–(ENEWSPF)–October 9, 2012.  Today the Sierra Club released a report with maps showing the potential pollution impacts from two area coal plants along with a billboard near the Crane[Read More…]

 Boulder, Colorado–(ENEWSPF)–October 9, 2012.    Arctic sea ice extent for September 2012 was 3.61 million square kilometers (1.39 million square miles). The magenta line shows the 1979 to 2000 median extent for that month. The black cross indicates the geographic North Pole. —Credit: NSIDC This September, sea ice covering the Arctic[Read More…]

Nuclear watchdogs press for legal hearings on reactors’ future DANA POINT, Calif.–(ENEWSPF)–October 9, 2012.  Tonight’s “roundtable discussion” on the current shutdown of the San Onofre nuclear reactor site is a disappointing and unacceptable effort by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to make a show of public participation while denying the public[Read More…]

  Taurus molecular cloud EU–(ENEWSPF)–9 October 2012 ESA’s Herschel space observatory has discovered enough water vapour to fill Earth’s oceans more than 2000 times over, in a gas and dust cloud that is on the verge of collapsing into a new Sun-like star.  Stars form within cold, dark clouds of[Read More…]

Washington, DC–(ENEWSPF)–October 9, 2012.  Sewage sludge is big business in Channahon, IL, but many residents who live near fields treated with the fertilizer believe they’re the ones paying the price. Farms in the area began applying the “biosolids” in 2010, and residents say that’s when their health issues began, according[Read More…]

  The Swedish icebreaker Oden off the coast of Antarctica, with an emperor penguin in the foreground. Photo by J. Wegelius.   ANN ARBOR–(ENEWSPF)–October 8, 2012.  An international team of scientists, including a University of Michigan graduate student, has demonstrated that a clear difference exists between the marine microbial communities[Read More…]

  Algal bloom off Ireland EU–(ENEWSPF)–8 October 2012 A new ESA project led by Irish industry is putting satellite data to use for monitoring the quality of coastal water. The Irish minister for Research and Innovation is supporting this initiative, in line with the country’s job creation priorities.  The project,[Read More…]