Michael Hawthorne – Page 27

Chlorinated tris, a flame retardanrt. The Consumer Product Safety Commission voted on Sept. 20, 2017, to immediately warn the public about the dangers of chemicals known as organohalogens in baby and toddler products, mattresses, upholstered furniture and electronics enclosures.

Federal panel votes to warn public about flame retardants in baby products, furniture

June 14, 2024 at 6:45 p.m.

For the first time a federal agency is moving to outlaw an entire class of toxic flame retardants, a policy change intended to protect Americans from chemicals linked to cancer,...

Chemist Heather Stapleton seals bottles with a liquid sample of foam before testing them for harmful flame retardants at Duke University on April 30, 2012, in Durham, N.C.

Will federal safety panel ban toxic flame retardants in household products?

June 14, 2024 at 6:45 p.m.

Manufacturers long ago stopped adding a cancer-causing flame retardant to children's pajamas, but federal officials failed to ban the chemical during the late 1970s and as recently as five years...

The S.H. Bell Co.

storage terminal on the Southeast Side recorded multiple violations of federal health standards, involving high levels of manganese, between March

and June

, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

High manganese levels lead EPA to crack down on Southeast Side polluter

May 22, 2019 at 11:47 p.m.

Federal environmental regulators are cracking down on a Southeast Side company after finding high levels of brain-damaging manganese in a low-income, predominantly Latino neighborhood. Air quality monitors posted around the...

Smog follows Chicagoans on vacation to Wisconsin, Michigan

May 22, 2019 at 11:46 p.m.

Scores of Chicagoans and suburbanites retreat from the dog days of summer by heading to bucolic vacation spots around Lake Michigan. But there is no escape from city pollution. During...

Inspectors from the Chicago office of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency have documented hundreds of violations of federal air pollution standards at the Indiana Harbor Coke Co. in East Chicago. It bakes coal into high-carbon coke for steel mills on a man-made peninsula jutting from the southwest shore of Lake Michigan.

Crackdown on East Chicago air polluter stalls under Trump EPA

May 22, 2019 at 11:41 p.m.

During a stop in East Chicago three months ago, Scott Pruitt vowed that cleaning up the low-income, predominantly African-American and Latino city would be one of his top priorities as...

A silver carp was caught in the Illinois Waterway below T.J. O'Brien Lock and Dam, approximately nine miles away from Lake Michigan on June 22, 2017.

Asian carp discovered close to Lake Michigan as Trump pushes budget cuts

August 21, 2019 at 11:52 p.m.

A commercial fisherman pulled a live Asian carp out of the Calumet River this week about 9 miles from Lake Michigan, prompting a furious dragnet to determine if more of...

Chicago River still teems with bacteria flushed from sewers after storms

May 22, 2019 at 11:35 p.m.

The thunderstorms that swept across the city on a sultry July evening last year weren't unusual for a typical Chicago summer. But rain still quickly saturated the city's aging sewers,...

Karen Murchie, a Shedd Aquarium biologist who is studying how climate change affects fish in Lake Michigan, from left, Liz Ettelson, who coordinates volunteers for the Highland Park District’s Natural Areas Program, and Rebecca Grill, natural areas manager for the district meet at Rosewood Beach on March 29, 2017, hoping to observe white sucker fish.

Spying on suckers: Volunteers track migrations of native Great Lakes fish

June 4, 2018 at 10:54 p.m.

Great Lakes fish stories can be downright scary. Pollution dumped by industries and cities make some fish unsafe to eat. Invasive species spread by cargo ships decimate yellow perch, lake...

A crew working with the EPA replaces lead-contaminated soil at a residential building in the Pilsen neighborhood April 25, 2017.

EPA employees targeted by Trump defend their role: ‘We’re here to protect public health’

August 21, 2019 at 11:08 p.m.

Most employees at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency shy away from the public spotlight, focusing instead on the behind-the-scenes work of enforcing laws intended to protect public health and wildlife....

The Portage Lakefront and Riverwalk in Portage, Ind., shown here on April 12, 2017, was closed after a spill of hexavalent chromium by the U.S. Steel Midwest Plant.

Chromium spill near Lake Michigan brings new attention to cancer-causing pollutant

June 5, 2018 at 5:34 a.m.

While federal environmental officials scrambled to protect Lake Michigan from a cancer-causing metal spilled into a northwest Indiana tributary, their political bosses in President Donald Trump's administration are pushing a...

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