By Boma Brown-West

Walmart made two big moves last week to reinforce its commitment to leadership on safer chemicals. In 2013 Walmart sent a major demand signal for safer chemicals through the supply chain – issuing its Sustainable Chemistry Policy that covered 700 suppliers and over 90,000 cleaning, personal care, and cosmetics products on its shelves. The policy called for greater ingredient transparency and the reduction and elimination of chemicals harmful to human and environmental health, starting with eight prevalent chemicals of concern. Last week, Walmart released its latest results following up on these commitments and became the first retailer to participate in the Chemical Footprint Project annual survey (and the second major retailer to become a CFP signatory).

Walmart’s participation in the Chemical Footprint Project is a new indicator of its continued commitment to safer products

The Chemical Footprint Project is an initiative to benchmark how effectively companies are managing the chemicals in their products and supply chains. As I mentioned in a previous blog, it’s a way for investors and large purchasers to assess which firms are carrying heavy chemical risk and which ones are demonstrating competitive leadership in response to growing demand for safer products. So far, 24 companies, including Walmart, participate in this program – sending a clear signal to their suppliers, investors, and consumers that chemicals management is material to business success. Leaders identified in the CFP survey show that adopting and enforcing policies and measuring progress are key to reducing chemicals of concern.

Walmart just made two big moves to reinforce its commitment to leadership on safer chemicals
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Progress on its ground-breaking policy

Also last week, Walmart quietly released its second annual Sustainable Chemistry Policy report, showing progress on its policy to eliminate priority chemicals. The chemicals of concern were drawn from 16 reputable regulatory and other authoritative lists – starting with eight High Priority Chemicals.

A chemical inventory is the first step in meeting a commitment to reduce your chemical footprint

Before jumping into the results, let's review why this public disclosure of results is important. If you can't measure something, you can't improve it effectively. Walmart’s public reporting of quantitative data shows that it is serious about measuring its chemical footprint and being transparent about it. Walmart uses aggregate chemical inventory information across and within the departments under the policy to track progress.

Clear, meaningful metrics to track progress are the next step

Walmart tracks progress by looking at both weight volume – pounds of chemicals going out the door – and ubiquity – number of suppliers using these chemicals and the number of products in which they are using them. Both are important indicators of the prevalence of these chemicals in our world. Last year, Walmart achieved a 95% reduction in its High Priority Chemicals (HPCs) at Walmart US stores, equivalent to 23 million lbs. Since then, another 372,230 lbs have been removed – a 30% drop compared to the 2015 weight volume and a 96% drop since the policy began in 2014. Similar reductions continue to happen at Walmart's Sam's Club stores:  another 75,629 lbs have been eliminated, a 53% drop compared to the 2015 weight volume and a 68% drop compared to 2014. The second year results also reaffirm that a concerted effort to reduce a select set of priority chemicals, i.e. HPCs, drives results faster. Overall usage of Walmart Priority Chemicals continues to decrease (at Walmart US stores), but not nearly at the rate of that of Walmart HPCs.

Figure 1: The cumulative weight volume reduction of High Priority Chemicals since 2014 has been over 23.6 million lbs and over 164,000 lbs for Walmart and Sam’s Club respectively.

Walmart’s public disclosure also shows that the company isn’t afraid to share where performance is lagging

Though overall weight volume of the HPCs continues to drop, their ubiquity continues to be a challenge. Both the number of products (i.e. UPCs) containing the HPCs and the number of suppliers using them continues to drop, at both Walmart US and Sam’s Club stores, but at a rate slower than the weight volume reduction.

Figure 2: Current percent of products (or UPCs) containing and suppliers who using High Priority Chemicals in products, along with the respective percentage point changes since 2014.

The tools for success

In the end, Walmart continues to make progress against its policy as demonstrated through real data. Beyond data, what else contributes to Walmart‘s success?

• Clear targets
• Driving action through the business (where relationships between buyers and suppliers stress the importance of the commitments)
• Public accountability

With new notable commitments popping up from other major retailers like Target and CVS, we hope to see similar tracking and reporting of meaningful results both directly and through the Chemical Footprint Project survey.

FURTHER READING: See EDF’s previous analysis of Walmart’s first year results here and here.

Boma Brown-West is Senior Manager of Consumer Health at EDF + Business. You can follow her on Twitter for insights and analysis on safer chemicals leadership in the supply chain and subscribe to her Behind the Label newsletter here.

By Boma Brown-West

Walmart made two big moves last week to reinforce its commitment to leadership on safer chemicals. In 2013 Walmart sent a major demand signal for safer chemicals through the supply chain – issuing its Sustainable Chemistry Policy that covered 700 suppliers and over 90,000 cleaning, personal care, and cosmetics products on its shelves. The policy called for greater ingredient transparency and the reduction and elimination of chemicals harmful to human and environmental health, starting with eight prevalent chemicals of concern. Last week, Walmart released its latest results following up on these commitments and became the first retailer to participate in the Chemical Footprint Project annual survey (and the second major retailer to become a CFP signatory).

Walmart’s participation in the Chemical Footprint Project is a new indicator of its continued commitment to safer products

The Chemical Footprint Project is an initiative to benchmark how effectively companies are managing the chemicals in their products and supply chains. As I mentioned in a previous blog, it’s a way for investors and large purchasers to assess which firms are carrying heavy chemical risk and which ones are demonstrating competitive leadership in response to growing demand for safer products. So far, 24 companies, including Walmart, participate in this program – sending a clear signal to their suppliers, investors, and consumers that chemicals management is material to business success. Leaders identified in the CFP survey show that adopting and enforcing policies and measuring progress are key to reducing chemicals of concern.

Walmart just made two big moves to reinforce its commitment to leadership on safer chemicals
Click To Tweet

Progress on its ground-breaking policy

Also last week, Walmart quietly released its second annual Sustainable Chemistry Policy report, showing progress on its policy to eliminate priority chemicals. The chemicals of concern were drawn from 16 reputable regulatory and other authoritative lists – starting with eight High Priority Chemicals.

A chemical inventory is the first step in meeting a commitment to reduce your chemical footprint

Before jumping into the results, let's review why this public disclosure of results is important. If you can't measure something, you can't improve it effectively. Walmart’s public reporting of quantitative data shows that it is serious about measuring its chemical footprint and being transparent about it. Walmart uses aggregate chemical inventory information across and within the departments under the policy to track progress.

Clear, meaningful metrics to track progress are the next step

Walmart tracks progress by looking at both weight volume – pounds of chemicals going out the door – and ubiquity – number of suppliers using these chemicals and the number of products in which they are using them. Both are important indicators of the prevalence of these chemicals in our world. Last year, Walmart achieved a 95% reduction in its High Priority Chemicals (HPCs) at Walmart US stores, equivalent to 23 million lbs. Since then, another 372,230 lbs have been removed – a 30% drop compared to the 2015 weight volume and a 96% drop since the policy began in 2014. Similar reductions continue to happen at Walmart's Sam's Club stores:  another 75,629 lbs have been eliminated, a 53% drop compared to the 2015 weight volume and a 68% drop compared to 2014. The second year results also reaffirm that a concerted effort to reduce a select set of priority chemicals, i.e. HPCs, drives results faster. Overall usage of Walmart Priority Chemicals continues to decrease (at Walmart US stores), but not nearly at the rate of that of Walmart HPCs.

Figure 1: The cumulative weight volume reduction of High Priority Chemicals since 2014 has been over 23.6 million lbs and over 164,000 lbs for Walmart and Sam’s Club respectively.

Walmart’s public disclosure also shows that the company isn’t afraid to share where performance is lagging

Though overall weight volume of the HPCs continues to drop, their ubiquity continues to be a challenge. Both the number of products (i.e. UPCs) containing the HPCs and the number of suppliers using them continues to drop, at both Walmart US and Sam’s Club stores, but at a rate slower than the weight volume reduction.

Figure 2: Current percent of products (or UPCs) containing and suppliers who using High Priority Chemicals in products, along with the respective percentage point changes since 2014.

The tools for success

In the end, Walmart continues to make progress against its policy as demonstrated through real data. Beyond data, what else contributes to Walmart‘s success?

• Clear targets
• Driving action through the business (where relationships between buyers and suppliers stress the importance of the commitments)
• Public accountability

With new notable commitments popping up from other major retailers like Target and CVS, we hope to see similar tracking and reporting of meaningful results both directly and through the Chemical Footprint Project survey.

FURTHER READING: See EDF’s previous analysis of Walmart’s first year results here and here.

Boma Brown-West is Senior Manager of Consumer Health at EDF + Business. You can follow her on Twitter for insights and analysis on safer chemicals leadership in the supply chain and subscribe to her Behind the Label newsletter here.

Walmart made two big moves last week to reinforce its commitment to leadership on safer chemicals. In 2013 Walmart sent a major demand signal for safer chemicals through the supply chain – issuing its Sustainable Chemistry Policy that covered 700 suppliers and over 90,000 cleaning, personal care, and cosmetics products on its shelves. The policy […]

Let us know you're interested in being a high-level activist, and we'll let you know when we launch a chapter in your area. C4. Regional.

Let us know you're interested in being a high-level activist, and we'll let you know when we launch a chapter in your area. C4. Regional.

Let us know you're interested in being a high-level activist, and we'll let you know when we launch a chapter in your area. C4. Regional.

By Richard Denison

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist.

[My colleague Ryan O’Connell assisted in the research described in this post.]

In a recent post I noted our initial findings from a review of published papers of Michael Dourson, the Trump Administration’s nominee to head the office at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) charged with implementing the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).  That review has shown that Dourson has been paid by dozens of companies and trade associations for work on dozens of their chemicals – including many of the same chemicals he will be charged with reviewing and regulating should he be confirmed.

Our review is uncovering additional curious features of Dourson’s published papers. 

We have looked at all papers listed on PubMed on which he was an author published since 1995 – the year Dourson left EPA and started his consulting firm, Toxicology Excellence in Risk Assessment (TERA).

There are 66 such papers.  The chart here shows the number of papers he published in various journals.  What is remarkable is that well over half of them – 37 – were published in a single journal:  Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology.  The journal with the next largest number ran only five of his papers.

Regulatory Toxicology an

d Pharmacology, it turns out, has a longstanding reputation of being the go-to journal for both tobacco and chemical industry-friendly paper publishing.  The journal has been the subject of numerous exposés over the past 15 years regarding its close ties to the chemical and tobacco industries.  Here are some of them:

• “Science for Sale: Brokers of junk science?” Center for Public Integrity, February 19, 2016. [This article also discusses the close ties to industry of a second journal, Critical Reviews in Toxicology.  Two more of Dourson’s papers were published in this journal.]
• “Contesting the Science of Smoking,” David Heath, The Atlantic, May 4, 2016.
• David Michaels (2008) Doubt is Their Product: How the Industry’s Assault on Science Threatens Your Health, Oxford University Press, pp. 53-54.
• “Inside the Academic Journal that Corporations Love,” Paul D. Thacker, Pacific Standard Magazine, March 28, 2017.
• “Correspondence about Publication Ethics and Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology,” International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health, 9:4, 386-391, 2003.
• “Scientific Journal Compromised by Industry Ties: Tobacco, Chemical, & Drug Companies’ Funding Goes Undisclosed, Say Critics,” Center for Science in the Public Interest, November 19, 2002.
• Associated letter from 45 academic scientists regarding the journal’s conflicts of interest and failure to require their disclosure. [In 2003, the journal finally instituted a disclosure policy for papers it publishes – which is part of how we were able to identify the industry funding sources for so many of Dourson’s papers.]

Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology is sponsored by The International Society of Regulatory Toxicology & Pharmacology (ISRTP), which sounds like a professional society.  It hands out annual achievement awards (Dourson got one in 2009).

My effort to see who funds ISRTP took some interesting twists.  On its website, ISRTP only has this to say about its sponsors:  “Sponsors to be announced soon.”  This struck me as odd for a society that dates back to at least 2003.

Luckily, however, the Internet is archived, and this same page is available for earlier points in time using the glorious Internet Archive Wayback Machine.

Here’s what that page looked like up until September 2006:

An impressive list, to say the least – so why is it now hidden from public view?

For more on ISRTP and its journal, including their role in a 2008 Congressional investigation involving bisphenol A, see this link.

To bring this back to Michael Dourson, I think my title says it all:  Dourson’s go-to journal for publishing his industry-funded papers is, well, also industry-funded.

In my next post, I’ll probe a little deeper into Dourson and Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology.

By Richard Denison

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist.

[My colleague Ryan O’Connell assisted in the research described in this post.]

[Use this link to see all of our posts on Dourson.]

In a recent post I noted our initial findings from a review of published papers of Michael Dourson, the Trump Administration’s nominee to head the office at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) charged with implementing the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).  That review has shown that Dourson has been paid by dozens of companies and trade associations for work on dozens of their chemicals – including many of the same chemicals he will be charged with reviewing and regulating should he be confirmed.

Our review is uncovering additional curious features of Dourson’s published papers. 

We have looked at all papers listed on PubMed on which he was an author published since 1995 – the year Dourson left EPA and started his consulting firm, Toxicology Excellence in Risk Assessment (TERA).

There are 66 such papers.  The chart here shows the number of papers he published in various journals.  What is remarkable is that well over half of them – 37 – were published in a single journal:  Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology.  The journal with the next largest number ran only five of his papers.

Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology, it turns out, has a longstanding reputation of being the go-to journal for both tobacco and chemical industry-friendly paper publishing.  The journal has been the subject of numerous exposés over the past 15 years regarding its close ties to the chemical and tobacco industries.  Here are some of them:

• “Science for Sale: Brokers of junk science?” Center for Public Integrity, February 19, 2016. [This article also discusses the close ties to industry of a second journal, Critical Reviews in Toxicology.  Two more of Dourson’s papers were published in this journal.]
• “Contesting the Science of Smoking,” David Heath, The Atlantic, May 4, 2016.
• David Michaels (2008) Doubt is Their Product: How the Industry’s Assault on Science Threatens Your Health, Oxford University Press, pp. 53-54.
• “Inside the Academic Journal that Corporations Love,” Paul D. Thacker, Pacific Standard Magazine, March 28, 2017.
• “Correspondence about Publication Ethics and Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology,” International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health, 9:4, 386-391, 2003.
• “Scientific Journal Compromised by Industry Ties: Tobacco, Chemical, & Drug Companies’ Funding Goes Undisclosed, Say Critics,” Center for Science in the Public Interest, November 19, 2002.
  • Associated letter from 45 academic scientists regarding the journal’s conflicts of interest and failure to require their disclosure. [In 2003, the journal finally instituted a disclosure policy for papers it publishes – which is part of how we were able to identify the industry funding sources for so many of Dourson’s papers.]

Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology is sponsored by The International Society of Regulatory Toxicology & Pharmacology (ISRTP), which sounds like a professional society.  It hands out annual achievement awards (Dourson got one in 2009).

My effort to see who funds ISRTP took some interesting twists.  On its website, ISRTP only has this to say about its sponsors:  “Sponsors to be announced soon.”  This struck me as odd for a society that dates back to at least 2003.

Luckily, however, the Internet is archived, and this same page is available for earlier points in time using the glorious Internet Archive Wayback Machine.

Here’s what that page looked like up until September 2006:

An impressive list, to say the least – so why is it now hidden from public view?

For more on ISRTP and its journal, including their role in a 2008 Congressional investigation involving bisphenol A, see this link.

To bring this back to Michael Dourson, I think my title says it all:  Dourson’s go-to journal for publishing his industry-funded papers is, well, also industry-funded.

In my next post, I’ll probe a little deeper into Dourson and Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology.

By Richard Denison

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist.

[My colleague Ryan O’Connell assisted in the research described in this post.]

[Use this link to see all of our posts on Dourson.]

In a recent post I noted our initial findings from a review of published papers of Michael Dourson, the Trump Administration’s nominee to head the office at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) charged with implementing the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).  That review has shown that Dourson has been paid by dozens of companies and trade associations for work on dozens of their chemicals – including many of the same chemicals he will be charged with reviewing and regulating should he be confirmed.

Our review is uncovering additional curious features of Dourson’s published papers. 

We have looked at all papers listed on PubMed on which he was an author published since 1995 – the year Dourson left EPA and started his consulting firm, Toxicology Excellence in Risk Assessment (TERA).

There are 66 such papers.  The chart here shows the number of papers he published in various journals.  What is remarkable is that well over half of them – 37 – were published in a single journal:  Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology.  The journal with the next largest number ran only five of his papers.

Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology, it turns out, has a longstanding reputation of being the go-to journal for both tobacco and chemical industry-friendly paper publishing.  The journal has been the subject of numerous exposés over the past 15 years regarding its close ties to the chemical and tobacco industries.  Here are some of them:

• “Science for Sale: Brokers of junk science?” Center for Public Integrity, February 19, 2016. [This article also discusses the close ties to industry of a second journal, Critical Reviews in Toxicology.  Two more of Dourson’s papers were published in this journal.]
• “Contesting the Science of Smoking,” David Heath, The Atlantic, May 4, 2016.
• David Michaels (2008) Doubt is Their Product: How the Industry’s Assault on Science Threatens Your Health, Oxford University Press, pp. 53-54.
• “Inside the Academic Journal that Corporations Love,” Paul D. Thacker, Pacific Standard Magazine, March 28, 2017.
• “Correspondence about Publication Ethics and Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology,” International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health, 9:4, 386-391, 2003.
• “Scientific Journal Compromised by Industry Ties: Tobacco, Chemical, & Drug Companies’ Funding Goes Undisclosed, Say Critics,” Center for Science in the Public Interest, November 19, 2002.
  • Associated letter from 45 academic scientists regarding the journal’s conflicts of interest and failure to require their disclosure. [In 2003, the journal finally instituted a disclosure policy for papers it publishes – which is part of how we were able to identify the industry funding sources for so many of Dourson’s papers.]

Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology is sponsored by The International Society of Regulatory Toxicology & Pharmacology (ISRTP), which sounds like a professional society.  It hands out annual achievement awards (Dourson got one in 2009).

My effort to see who funds ISRTP took some interesting twists.  On its website, ISRTP only has this to say about its sponsors:  “Sponsors to be announced soon.”  This struck me as odd for a society that dates back to at least 2003.

Luckily, however, the Internet is archived, and this same page is available for earlier points in time using the glorious Internet Archive Wayback Machine.

Here’s what that page looked like up until September 2006:

An impressive list, to say the least – so why is it now hidden from public view?

For more on ISRTP and its journal, including their role in a 2008 Congressional investigation involving bisphenol A, see this link.

To bring this back to Michael Dourson, I think my title says it all:  Dourson’s go-to journal for publishing his industry-funded papers is, well, also industry-funded.

In my next post, I’ll probe a little deeper into Dourson and Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology.

This summer, Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and The Nature Conservancy (TNC) collaborated with First Baptist Church in Mount Olive, North Carolina to host an event to explore the new opportunities solar energy is providing for the church and Wayne County. We spent most of the day together and heard how First Baptist Church is benefitting […]

By David Kelly

This summer, Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and The Nature Conservancy (TNC) collaborated with First Baptist Church in Mount Olive, North Carolina to host an event to explore the new opportunities solar energy is providing for the church and Wayne County.

We spent most of the day together and heard how First Baptist Church is benefitting from solar energy projects situated a couple of miles from the church. The church has provided land for two solar installations, built by Birdseye Renewable Energy and owned and operated by Strata Solar, a Chapel-Hill based solar developer. The solar farm we all toured generates more than 10,000 MWh of energy every year.

Speakers included Senior Pastor Dennis Atwood and Angelo San Fratello, President of Trustees.

"It's a matter of stewardship for us and we didn't want the land to be developed for some purpose that would be contrary to the mission of our church," Atwood said. "And solar farming is clean energy, and it's a good use of the earth and it essentially goes back to providing power for almost an entire town."

How solar helps this church community thrive
Click To Tweet

Financial creativity

Mount Olive is home to 4,740 people, more than 20 percent of whom live below the poverty line. In 2003, the church was gifted the 130 acres of land where the two solar farm now sit. When Birdseye Renewable Energy approached First Baptist in 2011 with interest in leasing the land for solar development, church trustees saw an opportunity to use some of the land as “a theological complement” that could pull them from financial quicksand.

"We were operating in the red, and this pulled God's house out of the red,” Fratello said. "It's been good for Wayne County, it's been good for Mount Olive, and it's been good for the church."

Now, Strata Solar pays over 400 percent more in rent than what First Baptist was making from traditional land leases. Strata Solar has contracted with First Baptist through 2044.

“Churches today have to be creative and innovative to supplement the decline in many cases in that traditional plate offering,” Atwood said, noting that First Baptist’s were the first two solar installations in Wayne County.

Encouraging innovation

Rural areas are crucial to meeting both state and national clean energy goals. No state knows this better than North Carolina, where 26 electric co-ops serve more than 950,000 homes and businesses.

“In a small town particularly, change just doesn’t happen real fast,” Atwood said. “So, again, it took a lot of conversation and just transparency and educating.” 

State and Federal energy policies help make new economic opportunities for local groups and institutions like Mount Olive Baptist Church possible.

State and Federal energy policies help make new economic opportunities for local groups and institutions like Mount Olive Baptist Church possible – including U.S. Department of Energy research and development programs that help drive innovation and commercialize new technologies; policies supporting competition among independent energy providers; and tax policies encouraging private investment in clean energy businesses and projects.

EDF and TNC plan to continue to grow the conversations we started that day, along with our new friends at Mount Olive Baptist Church.

Photo credit: Avery Lennard, The Nature Conservancy

By David Kelly

This summer, Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and The Nature Conservancy (TNC) collaborated with First Baptist Church in Mount Olive, North Carolina to host an event to explore the new opportunities solar energy is providing for the church and Wayne County.

We spent most of the day together and heard how First Baptist Church is benefitting from solar energy projects situated a couple of miles from the church. The church has provided land for two solar installations, built by Birdseye Renewable Energy and owned and operated by Strata Solar, a Chapel-Hill based solar developer. The solar farm we all toured generates more than 10,000 MWh of energy every year.

Speakers included Senior Pastor Dennis Atwood and Angelo San Fratello, President of Trustees.

"It's a matter of stewardship for us and we didn't want the land to be developed for some purpose that would be contrary to the mission of our church," Atwood said. "And solar farming is clean energy, and it's a good use of the earth and it essentially goes back to providing power for almost an entire town."

How solar helps this church community thrive
Click To Tweet

Financial creativity

Mount Olive is home to 4,740 people, more than 20 percent of whom live below the poverty line. In 2003, the church was gifted the 130 acres of land where the two solar farm now sit. When Birdseye Renewable Energy approached First Baptist in 2011 with interest in leasing the land for solar development, church trustees saw an opportunity to use some of the land as “a theological complement” that could pull them from financial quicksand.

"We were operating in the red, and this pulled God's house out of the red,” Fratello said. "It's been good for Wayne County, it's been good for Mount Olive, and it's been good for the church."

Now, Strata Solar pays over 400 percent more in rent than what First Baptist was making from traditional land leases. Strata Solar has contracted with First Baptist through 2044.

“Churches today have to be creative and innovative to supplement the decline in many cases in that traditional plate offering,” Atwood said, noting that First Baptist’s were the first two solar installations in Wayne County.

Encouraging innovation

Rural areas are crucial to meeting both state and national clean energy goals. No state knows this better than North Carolina, where 26 electric co-ops serve more than 950,000 homes and businesses.

“In a small town particularly, change just doesn’t happen real fast,” Atwood said. “So, again, it took a lot of conversation and just transparency and educating.” 

State and Federal energy policies help make new economic opportunities for local groups and institutions like Mount Olive Baptist Church possible.

State and Federal energy policies help make new economic opportunities for local groups and institutions like Mount Olive Baptist Church possible – including U.S. Department of Energy research and development programs that help drive innovation and commercialize new technologies; policies supporting competition among independent energy providers; and tax policies encouraging private investment in clean energy businesses and projects.

EDF and TNC plan to continue to grow the conversations we started that day, along with our new friends at Mount Olive Baptist Church.

Photo credit: Avery Lennard, The Nature Conservancy

This summer, Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and The Nature Conservancy (TNC) collaborated with First Baptist Church in Mount Olive, North Carolina to host an event to explore the new opportunities solar energy is providing for the church and Wayne County. We spent most of the day together and heard how First Baptist Church is benefitting […]

The post How solar helped a church pull out of the red and steward the community appeared first on Energy Exchange.

Streams are one of the most important sources of drinking water across the country. That’s why it is especially alarming that scientists have concerns about North Carolina’s streams and rivers, where I get much of my drinking water. But streams aren’t just for drinking. These waterways provide countless other benefits to local communities, including recreational […]

By Paxton Ramsdell

Will Harman at the Smith-Austin site explaining the restoration efforts that took place in this particular creek, such as re-meandering the channel and planting riparian vegetation.

Streams are one of the most important sources of drinking water across the country. That’s why it is especially alarming that scientists have concerns about North Carolina’s streams and rivers, where I get much of my drinking water.

But streams aren’t just for drinking. These waterways provide countless other benefits to local communities, including recreational opportunities, flood control, improved fish and wildlife habitat, and irrigation for agriculture, to name a few. That’s why it’s vitally important that impacts to streams are offset with effective restoration.

Earlier this month, I visited the site of a successfully restored stream not far from my home with Will Harman, stream mitigation expert at Stream Mechanics and partner to our stream work at EDF.

Will has been working with streams for over 25 years – first launching the stream restoration program at North Carolina State University, and then starting his own private company for stream restoration and mitigation. His three-pronged approach involves conducting applied research, teaching and completing projects.

During our site visit, I had the opportunity to ask Will several questions about the site, the tools he uses to design stream restoration projects, and next steps for protecting streams in North Carolina and beyond.

Can you tell us about the site we’re visiting? What were some of the challenges here?

An aerial view of the Smith-Austin site now bordered by houses with soccer fields between the two streams.

The site we are visiting today was restored about 13 years ago. There are two creeks – the Smith Creek and the Austin Creek – that meet here at the Smith-Austin site.

This is a very interesting area because there is a soccer field in between the two streams and housing developments on either side. A stereotypical stream restoration project usually takes place on old farm sites. That’s what made restoration for this particular site unique, and challenging, because it took place in an urbanizing watershed. It was originally a very rural area but the land use changed very quickly. Our restoration took place at the same time as the suburb was being developed, which has pros and cons.

Current challenges of the site include local and long-term stewardship. These streams are located right in people’s backyards, making it important that local community members are aware of how to be good stewards.

What are the greatest challenges of stream mitigation, in general?

The process of offsetting stream impacts through “debits” and “credits” is a huge challenge. Accounting for stream-functional loss is always complicated, because it’s hard to know exactly how much improved stream function needs to be created to truly offset the impacted stream.

Working with EDF, we have developed a new way to account for stream impacts and offsets through a Stream Quantification Tool that can better ensure restoration projects have the desired results.

The current accounting system in North Carolina is based off of the ratio method, which states that if you impact 100 feet of streams, for example, you must mitigate (restore or improve) 200 feet of streams. You can increase or decrease the ratio based off of the quality of the stream to be impacted, but the ratio is usually 2:1.

The process of crediting is based off of the geometry of the stream, which is broken into three parts: the dimension (width and depth), the pattern of the stream (if it curves), and the profile (slope). If all three parts are restored, then it is one credit per foot restored. If only two parts are restored, then it is two feet of restoration for one credit. If only one part is restored, then it is three feet of restoration for one credit. It’s a confusing process that does not account for losses to stream functions – only changes to the channel shape or form.

Working with EDF, we have developed a new way to account for stream impacts and offsets through a Stream Quantification Tool (SQT) that can better ensure restoration projects have the desired results. The SQT clearly shows the loss to stream functions on the impact side and the improvement to function on the mitigation side.

The Stream Function Pyramid, developed by Stream Mechanics (Harman et al., 2012), is the guiding framework for the Stream Quantification Tool. The SQT includes specific parameters for each of the five levels of the Stream Functions Pyramid. Each parameter includes one or more measurements that can serve to gauge a specific aspect of a stream’s health.

What does the Stream Quantification Tool (SQT) do?

The SQT is a measurement tool that evaluates the quantity and quality of streams using a unit called “functional feet.” This unit is based off of five different stream functions and can help to guide more effective restoration, as it will identify areas where restoration will provide the most benefit.

If you had the SQT 15 years ago, what would you have done differently at this particular site?

The SQT would have been useful to have for this site because it would have highlighted other functions that needed to be improved. We could have used additional restoration activities to improve these functions.

For example, we weren’t paying attention to the role of large woody debris on hydraulic and geomorphic functions, and the creation of habitat.  If I had the tool, I would have added more woody debris into this channel, since that helps provide fish habitat, helps to trap organic matter (food for aquatic insects), and encourages biological diversity.

How has stream mitigation changed over your career?

The SQT helps create effective stream mitigation projects, which in turn allows streams to provide better flood control, experience less erosion and increase resilience to storms.

In North Carolina, stream mitigation policy has changed very little, even though the science and technology have evolved. The SQT is a good example of how the science and technology have advanced. Here is a tool that will tell stream practitioners where restoration will be most effective and provide the greatest benefit to the stream. It breaks down the five different stream functions from our pyramid, measures where they currently stand, proposes parameters, and presents the data in one comprehensive table that shows where work was effective and where it wasn’t. This is a way of showing actual information about stream mitigation – not just data – and it’s incredibly useful to improving the way we restore impacted streams.

What is the greatest benefit of using the SQT?

The SQT offers many benefits because effective stream restoration greatly enhances the ecosystems and communities around streams. Streams are reconnected to their floodplains, the habitat is improved, the surrounding vegetation is healthier, and there is less erosion.

Another great benefit of the SQT is that the architecture is extremely flexible. It can be customized to any region or location using basic spreadsheet functions. North Carolina has been a leader in incorporating the latest science into efforts to improve stream mitigation policy. Tennessee, Wyoming and Colorado are currently working to adapt the SQT into their stream mitigation policies and practices as well.

The greatest reward that comes from using the SQT and stream restoration in general is seeing a stream come back to life. The site of a stream that had very little habitat and is now thriving with life is a testament to the ecological restoration industry.

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By Christina Wolfe

Before leaving for summer recess, the U.S. House of Representatives approved a bill, H.R. 806, that would sideline public health protections by changing the Clean Air Act fundamentally and delay important air quality protections. This so-called by changing the required review by EPA of standards from the current 5-year interval to 10 years.

In Texas, several of our metro areas already fail the health-based standards for ozone, including the Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth regions. Now, some legislators in Washington, D.C., have put forward legislation that would put even more Texans at risk, since the new 2015 health-based ozone standard would likely have identified the San Antonio region, as well as Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth, as areas requiring new clean air actions be taken. The 2015 ozone air quality standard was put forward after a lengthy scientific evaluation process that involved many in the public health, medical, and scientific communities. Delaying these standards to 2025 means delaying commonsense measures that safeguard the air we breathe.

It’s no surprise that this bill was opposed by more than a dozen organizations in the medical and public health community, including the National Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Public Health Association and the American Thoracic Society. Health effects from ground-level ozone can exacerbate respiratory conditions, such as asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. For some in Texas, like the 1.4 million adult and 617,000 children statewide affected by asthma, air quality standards that protect against harmful levels of ground-level ozone can protect against life-threatening asthma attacks.

Texas only stands to lose when lawmakers in Washington weaken and delay important health protections. The “Smoggy Skies” bill has passed the House of Representatives, but hopefully, its fate in the Senate will be dead on arrival.

No thank you, Washington, Texans prefer clean air to breathe.

Does partially diverting the flow of the Mississippi River help build land, or can it contribute to wetland erosion? It’s a question that has plagued Louisiana scientists for over a decade. This controversy developed in the years after Hurricane Katrina, when scientists noticed that there were large areas of wetland loss near the Caernarvon Freshwater Diversion. Some looked at this situation and thought that the problem was that freshwater marshes, which are a major type of wetlands created by river ...

Read The Full Story

The post Can We Build Stable Land in the Mississippi River Delta with River Sediments? appeared first on Restore the Mississippi River Delta.

Does partially diverting the flow of the Mississippi River help build land, or can it contribute to wetland erosion? It’s a question that has plagued Louisiana scientists for over a decade. This controversy developed in the years after Hurricane Katrina, when scientists noticed that there were large areas of wetland loss near the Caernarvon Freshwater Diversion. Some looked at this situation and thought that the problem was that freshwater marshes, which are a major type of wetlands created by river ...

Read The Full Story

The post Can We Build Stable Land in the Mississippi River Delta with River Sediments? appeared first on Restore the Mississippi River Delta.

Does partially diverting the flow of the Mississippi River help build land, or can it contribute to wetland erosion? It’s a question that has plagued Louisiana scientists for over a decade. This controversy developed in the years after Hurricane Katrina, when scientists noticed that there were large areas of wetland loss near the Caernarvon Freshwater Diversion. Some looked at this situation and thought that the problem was that freshwater marshes, which are a major type of wetlands created by river ...

Read The Full Story

The post Can We Build Stable Land in the Mississippi River Delta with River Sediments? appeared first on Restore the Mississippi River Delta.

This week, the oil and gas giant Shell took a positive step toward addressing methane emissions. The company announced a new technology trial at a wellsite in Alberta, Canada, where it is piloting a specially designed laser to continuously monitor emissions of methane, a powerful pollutant known to leak from oil and gas equipment. The […]

The post Shell becomes latest oil and gas company to test smart methane sensors appeared first on Energy Exchange.