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By Tom Neltner, Senior Director, Safer Chemicals, Klara Matouskova, PhD, Consultant, and Maricel Maffini, PhD, Consultant What Happened? In our new study, we evaluated Generally Recognized As Safe (GRAS) notices—a total of 403 between 2015-2020—that food manufacturers voluntarily submitted to FDA for review. Our goal was to determine whether industry was adhering to FDA’s Guidance on Best Practices for …

Results were released today for Washington’s third quarterly cap-and-invest auction, which was held on August 30th. The results from this sold-out auction continue to demonstrate strong demand for allowances in this program, which has brought in significant revenue for the state of Washington to reinvest in its communities. These results follow on two previous sold-out …

When a continent with 65% of the world’s arable land struggles to feed its 1.4 billion people, we know something is wrong. The African and global food systems need a rethink. The urgent and pressing need to address a more productive, transparent, equitable food system, poverty and the far-reaching effects of climate change requires us to forge alliances among diverse stakeholders and sectors.

Although Africa has contributed the least to the current climate crisis, it has been among the hardest hit by its impacts. But that's not the continent's only story in the global warming debate: The first Africa Climate Summit in Nairobi will focus on the continent's potential as a centre for climate solutions. It will be a moment to reflect on Africa's home-grown opportunities to lead on climate and further the ambitions of the African Union's Agenda 2063, 'The Africa We Want.

Groundwater professionals have long united around the desire to “make the invisible visible.” It’s a slogan that finds its way into most conversations, publications, and speeches on the global groundwater crisis. Last year’s United Nations World Water Development Report focused entirely on groundwater. It’s chosen title? Groundwater, making the invisible visible. One could be forgiven …

This blog was co-authored by Katelyn Roedner Sutter, California State Director at Environmental Defense Fund. Results of the August Western Climate Initiative auction were released today, and as expected we saw strong demand for allowances. At the same time, California Air Resources Board (CARB) is continuing its series of workshops exploring potential changes to the …

One of the Inflation Reduction Act’s key provisions is a powerful tax credit to spark the development and adoption of clean, low-carbon aviation fuels. Climate pollution from aircraft is often overlooked, but if aviation were a country, it would be among the top 10 greenhouse gas emitters. The Biden administration is about to make a …

Published in the scientific journal Earth's Future and supported in part by funding from Environmental Defense Fund, a new research agenda focuses on the intersection between the increased use of storm surge barriers and the resulting estuary impacts. These are three key takeaways from our research. The post The impact of storm surge barriers on estuaries and ecosystems first appeared on Growing Returns.

By Elizabeth Arenz Hosbein When I graduated from Harvard Business School with a resume in finance, it was perhaps unexpected that I joined Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), a leading environmental NGO, to spend a fellowship year investigating private equity (PE) from the outside. I had big questions to answer: to what extent are PE firms …

New Zealand is currently reconsidering how its forestry sector can contribute to meeting its long-term climate change targets, and what this means for its emissions trading scheme (NZ ETS). A recent paper from researchers at Motu Economic and Public Policy Research and the Environmental Defense Fund sheds light on New Zealand’s innovative treatment of forestry …

Yesterday, the Washington State Department of Ecology (Ecology) released the results from Washington’s first Allowance Price Containment Reserve (APCR) auction, held on August 9th. At this auction, all 1,054,000 of the available APCR allowances were sold at the two APCR tier prices of $51.90 and $66.68, with 527,000 allowances available at each price tier. This …

By Sofia Esquivel Elizondo Enthusiasm for hydrogen as a climate-friendly fuel of the future is everywhere. Hundreds of hydrogen energy projects worth more than $500 billion have been announced, and The International Energy Agency says hydrogen demand could increase sixfold by 2050. Scientists, though, are confident that this leak-prone gas can warm the climate when …

A year since the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) was signed into law, this historic climate legislation has already led to $278 billion in private investment that will support more than 170,000 clean energy jobs across the country. And the work is just getting started. Manufacturing incentives in the law, which encourage companies to build the …

Pennsylvania has a long history of energy production, stretching as far back as the late 1700s. A central role in fossil fuels, however, is rooted in Pennsylvania’s past, not its future. The state is poised to become a leader in our nation’s transition to a clean, resilient zero-pollution economy. Pennsylvania will take an important step …

What’s New? For the first time, FDA has provided guidance on how to evaluate whether metal cookware is prohibited due to lead leaching into food. As part of an investigation to find the source of elevated blood lead levels in some refugee children, the Hazardous Waste Management Program in King County, Washington [1] encountered high …

What’s New? EPA recently asked its Board of Scientific Counselors (BOSC), comprised of experts in the fields of toxicology and environmental chemistry, to make recommendations on implementing new approach methods (NAMs) for testing the safety of new chemicals. NAMs encompass a wide array of new evaluation strategies, including testing cell lines or invertebrates (rather than …

Where to find EDF +Business at New York Climate Week 2023 EDF +Business leaders and experts attending Climate Week: Lea Borkenhagen, Senior Vice President, EDF +Business Elaine Gowdy, AVP of EDF +Business Strategic Operations Victoria Mills, Managing Director, Climate Policy Leadership Elizabeth Sturcken, Managing Director, Net Zero Value Chains Andrew Howell, Senior Director, Sustainable Finance …

This blog was authored by Julia Ilhardt, former High Meadows Fellow, Global Climate Cooperation. It was originally published on EDF’s Climate411 blog channel. Read the full post here.  At the end of last year, 196 nations agreed to the historic Global Biodiversity Framework, which includes the goal to protect 30% of land and sea area …

This blog was authored by Julia Ilhardt, former High Meadows Fellow, Global Climate Cooperation.  At the end of last year, 196 nations agreed to the historic Global Biodiversity Framework, which includes the goal to protect 30% of land and sea area by 2030. Still, nature is woefully underfinanced, with investments in nature-based solutions needing to …

Seaweed is having a moment. I’ve been working on seaweed for 40 years, and I’ve never seen so many headlines about how seaweed can save the planet.  I can understand why. The need to save the planet is more pressing than ever. We must now dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions and, at the same time,

Mangrove forests not only act as barriers against natural disasters, they’re estimated to sequester 22.86 gigatonnes of CO2 globally, about half the yearly emissions of fossil fuels, land-use and industry.

By Adam Peltz and Meg Coleman Across the country, a million or more orphaned oil and gas wells threaten the climate, public health, groundwater and surface waters and hamper local economic development. Help is on the way thanks to a major federal effort to invest $4.7 billion in closing orphan wells under the Revive Economic …

New integrity guidance is shedding light on how companies can make the highest impact investments to complement their sustainability commitments.

Federal regulators should preserve rigorous environmental standards to reduce pollution and avoid wasting taxpayer money, explains EDF President Fred Krupp in The Wall Street Journal.