Health and Public Safety
May 5, 2016 -
After local residents began raising concerns about cancer clusters near Duke Energy coal ash waste pits, the state cancer registry conducted a study that it claims shows there's no cause for worry — but a epidemiologist who reviewed the state's analysis says it does nothing of the sort.
April 20, 2016 -
A look at what we've learned about the long-term health effects of the 2010 BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico on the sixth anniversary of the disaster.
April 15, 2016 -
As pressure grows on power companies to move toxic coal ash out of leaky, wet impoundments and into dry, lined landfills, the experience of an African-American community near one such landfill in rural Alabama highlights the potential problems with that approach.
March 9, 2016 -
Community advocates say settlement talks with North Carolina's environmental agency fell apart after state officials invited the hog industry into what were supposed to be confidential mediation proceedings in a federal case charging the state's regulation of the industry disproportionately harms communities of color.
February 4, 2016 -
Since environmentalists forced a cleanup of coal ash from a SCE&G power plant along South Carolina's Wateree River, test results show a dramatic decrease in groundwater contamination at the site, pointing to what's possible when utilities take responsibility for their pollution. Is North Carolina paying attention?
January 8, 2016 -
People living near the utility's leaking coal ash ponds say they're appalled by the decision by North Carolina's environmental agency to downgrade risk ratings determined by staff — an action that underscores concerns about the close relationship between the company and the McCrory administration.
January 6, 2016 -
By the time President Obama announced a series of executive actions to restrict firearms this week, 147 Americans had already lost their lives to gun violence in the new year, with the first fatal shooting taking place in Florida just 15 minutes into 2016. But the ongoing carnage didn't stop the gun lobby and politicians it backs from threatening to block the plan.