There is a lot to like in the Northam administration’s new Virginia Energy Plan, starting with what is not in it.The plan doesn’t throw so much as a bone to the coal industry, and the only plug for fracked gas comes in the discussion of alternatives to petroleum...
Nitrogen pollution from fertilizer runoff is one of the main sources of low oxygen "dead zones" in the Chesapeake Bay. And it's a problem throughout the world, as the modern agriculture that sustains human life is itself dependent on commercially-produced nitrogen fertilizers."Humans have nearly doubled Earth’s natural flow of...
A federal appeals court has rejected a request from an environmental group to revisit a ruling that determined arsenic leaking from Dominion Energy coal ash storage sites isn't violating federal law, The Associated Press reported.The Sierra Club said in a lawsuit that arsenic seeping from coal ash ponds at...
The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality and the State Water Control Board have filed a lawsuit against the developer of a luxury golf course in Richmond County for repeat environmental violations after DEQ referred the case to Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring's office.The Virginia True Corporation cleared 13.5 acres of...
When Hurricane Florence slammed into North Carolina in September, some of the state's coal ash ponds breached and overflowed into nearby rivers and lakes.Now Virginia lawmakers are citing the hurricane — and the threat of another coming up the East Coast — as a reason to act now and...
A chemical plant in Hopewell has violated air pollution rules twice in the past year, according to the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, adding to a long history of violations.AdvanSix, formerly Honeywell, is one of the world’s largest producers of caprolactam, according to the company’s website, which is used...
A report released by a new California nonprofit that advises on modernizing electric systems takes a generally dim view of Dominion Energy's plans to upgrade Virginia's grid under the expansive and expensive regulatory overhaul the utility pushed through the General Assembly this year: the Grid Transformation and Security Act."Grid...
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has suspended a permit allowing the Mountain Valley Pipeline to cross hundreds of Virginia streams and wetlands, The Roanoke Times reports.The action comes three days after a similar permit for West Virginia water crossings was vacated by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of...
So far this year there have been 38 cases of West Nile virus in Virginia, a new record for the state.On average, Virginia reports only about nine cases per year, according to the Department of Health.The cases have been spotted in 17 health districts across the state, with Fairfax...
Gov. Ralph Northam announced the creation of a "Governor's Conservation Cabinet" Thursday intended to better protect the state's natural resources and improve environmental quality.But there's one thing that the group likely won't deal with: the two major pipeline projects that have become the most contentious environmental issues in Virginia."I...
