Must-read recap: The New Lede's top stories

Environmental fears mount as hydrogen projects accelerate; historic 3M PFAS settlement gets preliminary court approval; justices ring death knell for isolated US wetlands.

As hydrogen projects accelerate, fears mount about environmental impacts

On a recent hot August evening, residents of the tiny rural community of Universal, Indiana packed into a public meeting to barrage operators of a proposed fertilizer plant with questions about what risks the project may pose for their health and the surrounding environment.

One after the other, worried residents quizzed officials with Wabash Valley Resources about their plans to construct what would not just be a fertilizer plant, but also one of the nation’s largest carbon sequestration projects, near their town of less than 400 people.

Wabash proposes to produce hydrogen and anhydrous ammonia for fertilizer through a process that will capture and store the resulting carbon dioxide created by the plant underground. When the plant is fully operational, Wabash Valley Resources expects to inject and store 1.65 million tons of carbon dioxide into the ground.

The Wabash Valley Resources proposed facility is one of scores of similar projects planned or getting underway around the country after last year’s passage of the Inflation Reduction Act created new incentives for hydrogen-related projects. Under the IRA, hydrogen operations can receive generous tax credits, depending on the carbon intensity of the production process. (Read the rest of the story.)

Historic 3M PFAS settlement gets preliminary court approval

A federal court on Tuesday granted preliminary approval for a “landmark” $12.5 billion payout by chemical conglomerate 3M to resolve claims in a class action lawsuit and help public drinking water providers remove toxic per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) from communities around the United States.

The court approval comes a week after DuPont and related companies received preliminary approval for a $1.185 billion settlement that similarly addresses class action claims over toxic PFAS contamination in US water systems. Together, the deals mark the largest drinking water settlement in history.

Both settlements relate to water system contamination by PFAS in aqueous film-forming foam (AFFF), used as a firefighting agent and widely used by military and civilian airports as well as municipal fire departments.

The AFFF litigation is one aspect of more extensive and ongoing litigation against 3M and DuPont that blame the companies for knowingly contaminating the environment with PFAS for decades despite evidence that the substances pose a risk to human health. Lawyers representing plaintiffs in the litigation have uncovered internal corporate records dating back to the 1960s revealing corporate concerns about PFAS that were not shared with the public or regulators. (Read the rest of the story.)

Justices ring death knell for isolated US wetlands

(Opinion columns published in The New Lede represent the views of the individual(s) authoring the columns and not necessarily the perspectives of TNL editors.)

A recent decision by the US Supreme Court strips away protections from our nation’s remaining treasure of isolated wetlands. The court has reverted to the dark days when wetlands were viewed as dirty swamps to be drained — habitats with no value.

There’s a convoluted legislative and regulatory history which gave the US Army Corps authority to oversee the nation’s navigable waters. The Corps protects waters that have a significant nexus, or connection, to a navigable water like a river. On that basis, the court removed isolated wetlands as Waters of the United States. Yet scientists have documented that most waters — including isolated wetlands — are connected, even when they don’t have an obvious nexus.

As a result, the justices have rung a death knell for these unique, watery environments.

Permanent and semi-permanent wetlands support an amazing diversity of underwater life: mayflies, dragonflies, small algae-eating crustaceans, and other quietly beneficial species. Isolated wetlands also provide physical services, such as holding water on the landscape and settling silt and pollutants. 

Biologists like me who care about our watery environments are in shock. (Read the rest of the opinion column by Judy Helgen, a retired scientist for the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency.)