BUSINESS

Two chemical industry groups are asking President Trump for a complete exemption to free their factories from new limits on hazardous air pollution. Under a new rule finalized by the Biden administration last year, chemical plants would soon be required to monitor and reduce emissions of toxic pollutants, like ethylene oxide, a cancer-causing ingredient used … Read more

The sweeping tariffs that President Trump announced on Wednesday could hobble the use of giant batteries that energy companies are increasingly installing to help them tap more wind and solar power and make the broader electric grid more reliable. Over the past five years, grid batteries have become one of the biggest growth industries in … Read more

Oil prices plunged Thursday on fears that President Trump’s latest round of tariffs would slow economic growth around the world, curbing demand for gasoline, diesel, jet fuel and other forms of energy. The U.S. oil price was down more than 7 percent Thursday morning, trading below $67 a barrel, or around mid-March levels. Prices for … Read more

The nation’s most polluting coal-burning power plant has asked President Trump to exempt it from stricter limits on hazardous air pollution after the administration recently invited companies to apply for presidential pollution waivers by email. The aging Colstrip power plant in Colstrip, Mont., emits more harmful fine particulate matter pollution, or soot, than any other … Read more

The Trump administration has abruptly laid off the entire staff running a $4.1 billion program to help low-income households across the United States pay their heating and cooling bills. The firings threaten to paralyze the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, which was created by Congress in 1981 and helps to offset high utility bills … Read more

When the environmental group Greenpeace lost a nearly $670 million verdict this month over its role in oil pipeline protests, a quarter-billion dollars of the damages were awarded not for the actual demonstrations, but for defaming the pipeline’s owner. The costly verdict has raised alarm among activist organizations as well as some First Amendment experts, … Read more

The City of Fort Worth, Texas, is ending its contract with Synagro, the Goldman Sachs-backed provider of fertilizer made from sewage sludge, over concerns that “forever chemicals” in the fertilizer are contaminating local farmland and groundwater. Fort Worth this month also sued several manufacturers of the chemicals, also called per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances or PFAS, … Read more

The silent season is drawing to a close. All winter, there was little birdsong to lift my heart. The occasional caw of a crow, the chickadee-dee-dee of a chickadee, the big song of the little Carolina wren that now stays on our Pennsylvania farm all winter. But no courtship call of great horned owls, no … Read more