This article discusses how the Environmental Justice Movement’s approaches to identifying and addressing disparities within the fossil fuel economy can help inform a more just transition to a sustainable economy. This article describes environmental justice and the Environmental Justice Movement, how the fossil fuel economy has disproportionately impacted low-income communities and communities of color, and the principles of environmental justice as articulated by advocates and President Clinton’s Executive Order on Environmental Justice. This article then uses two cases studies taken from the author’s work at the Center on Race, Poverty & the Environment (CRPE) to explore how environmental justice approaches can influence whether or not we achieve a just transition to a green economy.
News
Worried that back-to-school traffic and hot temperatures will create a brew of toxic pollution over the San Joaquin Valley, air quality officials have called an “Air Alert” for Monday and Tuesday.
It’s already too late to eliminate a $29 million air pollution penalty after 2013, as officials had hoped…
Months after researchers concluded farming is responsible for a sea of underground water contamination in the Valley, the state is poised with new rules with an advertised $100 million cost to farmers.
A hazardous waste landfill near Kettleman City will get the permits to expand, company representatives said this week in a statement.
“We are confident,” said Lily Quiroa, a spokeswoman with Chem Waste. “Our Kettleman Hills facility has been subjected to the most extensive monitoring, evaluations, health risk assessments and regulatory inspections of any treatment and waste disposal facility in the country.”
The California Environmental Protection Agency is required by law to conduct its programs, policies and activities in a manner that ensures the fair treatment of people of all races, cultures and income levels. The term “environmental justice” was attached to this governing philosophy. There is not much to argue about treating people in a balanced and sensible manner.
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As California’s climate warms, some people will have more difficulty adapting than others. Depending on your income, your personal resources, and the configuration of your neighborhood, a warmer world could be a significant annoyance or a serious danger.
A new interactive map by the Oakland-based Pacific Institute charts vulnerability to climate change in each of the state’s 7,049 Census districts — and the results are bad news for Californians living in Los Angeles, in the Low Desert, and in the San Joaquin Valley.
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On June 19, 2012, a California Court of Appeal issued its long-awaited decision in Association of Irritated Residents v. California Air Resources Board.
The hazardous waste landfill near Kettleman City could be the key to funding the town’s water treatment project.
Kings County supervisors voted Monday to approve a plan that would use revenue from the Chem Waste hazardous waste landfill for a $2.1 million reserve fund.
The state Department of Public Health is requiring the reserve as a condition for an $8 million state grant to fund the bulk of the water project, which would put purified California Aqueduct water in the taps of Kettleman City residents.
It’s mid-August. The San Joaquin Valley’s murky air has violated the federal ozone standard 25 of the past 26 days. Soon the annual debate about the pollution plume from back-to-school driving will resume.
I’ve begun calling this the end-of-summer air crisis.
In the village of Easton, where summer temperatures regularly reach beyond 100 degrees, some lawns are unusually green for this time of year, and people think twice before drinking from the tap.