pollution

For your lungs, some good news and some let's-hope-it's-better-this-time news. 

Rhode Island is one of eight states that are petitioning the Environmental Protection Agency for protection from out-of-state polluters.

The multi-state action is directed at Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky Michigan, North Carolina, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia. 

The petition cites decades of inaction by these so-called ‘upwind’ states and asks the EPA to require them to join a compact of states committed to reducing pollution.

Environmentalists are hailing a decision to shut down the Brayton Point Power Station in Somerset, Massachusetts.  Owners of the coal-fired plant filed papers Monday indicating the plant will no longer provide power to the grid by 2017.

Federal regulators have called it the heaviest polluter in Massachusetts. Environmentalists have decried the carcinogens that pour from its smokestacks. Now, the Brayton Point Power Station on the Massachusetts/Rhode Island border is closing, according to papers filed by its owner, Energy Capital Partners.

Shell fishermen are banned from fishing in the Upper Narragansett Bay. The Department of Environmental Management has found high levels of bacteria in the water.

DEM’s Chief of Surface Water Protection, Angelo Liberti, says it’s due to a portion of the Bucklin Point Wastewater Treatment plant in East Providence being taken offline. "And with the last rain event, they had some trouble balancing their treatment flow through their system which resulted in the release of partially treated wastewater.”

RI's former Attorney General is in Brazil helping law enforcement looking into a deadly nightclub fire.  RI and MA are working out how to best regulate centers which dispense  medical marijuana.  These stories and more on the RIPR Morning News Podcast.  Also a special interview by Ian Donnis with US Attorney Peter Neronha.

Do you have insight or expertise on this topic? Please email us, we'd like to hear from you.  news@ripr.org

The Rhode Island Department of Health is reminding residents with private wells to take precautions. The melting snow could make the well water dangerous to drink.

The regional cap on carbon dioxide emissions could be lowered by nearly half next year.  New England’s regional greenhouse gas emissions are already lower than expected.