A Chemours chemical plant in West Virginia is polluting nearby waters with toxic PFAS “forever chemicals,” according to a new lawsuit brought by the West Virginia Rivers Coalition.

The complaint is the most recent in a fight that has been ongoing since 2001 over pollution from the Washington Works plant, reported The Guardian.

The PFAS-contaminated waste is polluting the Ohio River in the town of Parkersburg, home to approximately 50,000 Appalachian residents. The federal complaint claims that waste produced by the factory contains PFAS at levels much higher than allowed by a 2023 discharge permit.

West Virginia Rivers Coalition is seeking enforcement of the agreement from 2023, as well as $66,000 a day in civil penalties for each violation, plus court costs, West Virginia Public Broadcasting reported.

The Chemours plant was the subject of the 2019 film Dark Waters, which told the story of illnesses suffered by Parkersburg residents due to the PFAS pollution, as well as the lawsuit brought against Chemours, formerly a subsidiary of DuPont, reported The Guardian.

A study that arose from the case exposed the health risks of forever chemicals and cost DuPont roughly $700 million.

Local advocates say the recent lawsuit is part of additional legal actions against the plant that have been brought to fill a void left by ineffective regulatory action.

“We have put up with this for 24 years, and [Chemours] is still polluting, they’re still putting this stuff in the water,” said Parkersburg resident Joe Kiger, one of the original plaintiffs, as The Guardian reported.

Among the contaminants listed in the lawsuit are PFAS, PFOA and GenX, all highly toxic chemical compounds that have been found to cause health problems.

The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has ordered the chemical plant to take steps to correct its actions, but the lawsuit states that it has not. The complaint alleges residents are prevented from enjoying the river for recreation due to the ongoing pollution.

Chemours said in a statement that the “concerns are being addressed” and that it was working with regulators “to navigate both the consent order and the permit renewal process.”

Residents who spoke with The Guardian said most were not aware of continuing hazards from the PFAS pollution.

“They do what they can to make money,” said West Virginia attorney Harry Deitzler, who helped lead previous lawsuits. “The officers in the corporation sometimes don’t care about what’s right and wrong – they need to make money for shareholders and the lawsuits make everyone play by the same rules.”

A large local employer, Chemours invests heavily in charitable giving, and Kiger said many people support the company despite the pollution.

“That’s the kind of stuff you’re up against,” Kiger said. “It could be snowing out and Chemours would tell everyone it’s 80F [27C] and sunny, and everyone will grab their tan lotion.”

A class action lawsuit in 2004 resulted in approximately $70 million for local residents, but the suit failed to prove that PFAS pollution from DuPont was the cause of widespread health problems — including cancer, high cholesterol and kidney disease — in the region.

Rather than dividing the settlement among tens of thousands of the area’s residents, the money was put toward developing the epidemiological study to verify that the local health issues had been caused by pollution from the factory.

The study of roughly 70,000 people in 2012 showed PFOA was the likely cause of the health problems, and later studies demonstrated links between the chemical and other serious health issues affecting local residents.

In 2017 DuPont and Chemours settled roughly 3,500 injury lawsuits for $671 million, and have since paid for the installation of water filtration systems in the region. Chemours also settled an Ohio state suit in 2023 for $110 million over pollution produced primarily by the Washington Works plant.

Rob Bilott, original leader of the class-action suit, said that at times litigation has been the sole way to see meaningful change, since state regulatory agencies, including the EPA, have been periodically staffed with former managers of DuPont or industry allies.

“It’s infuriating,” Bilott said, as reported by The Guardian. “It took decades of making DuPont documents and internal data public, and getting the story out through movies, news articles, books and public engagement, and that’s what finally pushed the needle here. This is the impact of citizens forcing it through decades of litigation.”

The current complaint is a Clean Water Act citizen’s lawsuit, which gives people the power to request the enforcement of federal law in cases where a polluter is in violation and regulators fail to take action.

The EPA has acknowledged the violation by Chemours, but has “taken no further enforcement action regarding Chemours’s violations as of the date of this complaint,” the lawsuit said.

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In a new study, scientists analyzed UK crops and how the country’s agriculture could be affected by climate change and predicted what could be the top crops by 2080.

Led by the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (UKCEH) in collaboration with the University of East Anglia (UEA), the study determined that a changing climate could mean that the UK will become more suitable for growing crops like soy, chickpeas, grapes, oranges and okra.

“Our climate is expected to change substantially over coming decades at a time when there will be rising demand for food due to population growth,” John Redhead, a spatial ecologist at UKCEH, said in a statement. “It is therefore essential that arable farming becomes more resilient; one possible solution is growing different crops that are more suited to the new local conditions.”

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At the same time, the region could become less suitable to growing its current crops, including oats, wheat, onions and strawberries, meaning agriculture could face significant challenges and high costs to adapt to growing different crops.

Scientists explored how suitable 160 different crops — both currently grown in the UK and ones that would be new to the area — could be under two different scenarios: 2 degrees Celsius warming and 4 degrees Celsius warming compared to pre-industrial levels.

Under the 2-degree scenario, strawberries and onions would become less suitable to growing in the UK, while in the 4-degree scenario, strawberries, onions, wheat, oats, and apples could see declining suitability for growing in various parts of the UK.

Some current UK crops would become more suitable in both scenarios, including maize and broad beans. New crops that could become more suitable for growing include sorghum, okra, horseradish, chickpeas, soy beans and even avocado (in a 4-degree scenario). The scientists published their findings in the journal Climate Resilience and Sustainability.

As the study pointed out, introducing more crops and diversifying local agriculture could improve soil health and lead to improved natural pest and disease control; plus, high suitability for proteins like soy beans and chickpeas could reduce meat consumption and related emissions. 

However, the team explained that introducing non-native crops could also lead to reverse effects, meaning these new plantings could lead to risks of new pests, disease outbreaks and negative impacts to pollinators. Transitioning to planting different crops would also come with high economic costs.

“Clearly, it’s unlikely to be feasible just to switch large-scale food production from Britain’s agricultural heartlands of southeastern England to Scotland, for example,” Redhead explained. “However, climate change is happening now, and its impacts will increase by 2080, so whatever action is taken will involve big challenges in terms of where our food comes from and the way our agricultural landscapes are managed.”

Already, extreme weather events linked to climate change are affecting agriculture in the UK and around the world. From October 2022 to March 2024, the UK recorded the wettest 18 months on record, as reported by Yale Climate Connections. According to UK’s House of Parliament, extreme levels of rainfall and flooding over the past two years could lead to decreased crop yields, including for staples like broccoli, cauliflower, potatoes and carrots, in 2025.

In February 2023, major supermarkets in the UK had to ration some produce, including tomatoes, lettuce and peppers, due to low supplies from extreme weather. The weather included higher-than-usual snow and rainfall in countries that UK sources some of its fruits and vegetables from in the winter months.

In fall 2024, the UK reported its second-worst harvest season ever recorded, with crops like wine grapes, wheat, barley, oats and oilseed rape all experiencing declining yields because of periods of flooding and drought throughout the year.

It’s uncertain what the future of farming in the UK will look like, but with impacts from climate change already affecting crops, the agriculture industry will need to consider ways to build resiliency in the face of these changes.

“Major changes to agricultural systems and diets can take decades to implement and so our long-term projections provide important information well ahead of time for farmers, supermarkets, researchers, policymakers and the public on the opportunities, challenges and trade-offs involved in adapting to the impacts of climate change,” said Rachel Warren, co-author of the study and professor at UEA’s Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research.

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The two European countries with the most forested land — Sweden and Finland — are not making enough effort to protect their old-growth and primary forests, according to a new report released by World Wildlife Fund (WWF) on Thursday.

The report, Primary and Old-Growth Forests at Risk in Finland and Sweden, said the two northern European countries are putting these unique ecosystems at risk while falling short of pledges made under the European Union’s Green Deal and Biodiversity Strategy.

“Publicly available evidence shows both Finland and Sweden are deviating from EU policies,” said forest expert Mai Suiminen with WWF Finland, in a press release from WWF. “This cannot continue if we are serious about tackling the climate and biodiversity crises.”

The objective of the EU Green Deal is to strictly protect old-growth and primary forests in Europe.

However, the Swedish and Finnish governments are exploiting loopholes and allowing logging in forests that must be safeguarded. Every year, thousands of acres of forests that have high conservation value are cut down, despite being essential for biodiversity, climate stability and long-term ecological health.

WWF emphasized that the protection of these forests is not only important for achieving Europe’s biodiversity and climate goals, but for maintaining the political credibility of the EU.

“Forest protection isn’t just a nice-to-have; it’s fundamental to the success of a sustainable and circular bioeconomy,” said Peter Roberntz, WWF Sweden forest expert, in the press release.

According to the Swedish Forest Industries Federation, forestry supports roughly 140,000 jobs in the Nordic country, reported AFP.

Forests are the planet’s second-largest carbon sink after oceans, helping to mitigate climate change.

The EU’s Nature Restoration Law stipulates that by 2030 one-fifth of natural areas — including marshes and all forests, not only protected areas — must be restored to the same state they were in 75 years ago.

“The current government has shown a low ambition to strictly protect primary and old-growth forests on private lands,” WWF said. “Consequently, Sweden has an ongoing loss of primary and old-growth forests due to clear-cutting.”

Peter Kullgren, Sweden’s rural affairs minister, said the criticism was unfounded.

“Sweden is a leader in forest protection,” Kullgren told AFP in a written statement. “Over 25 percent of Sweden’s forests have already been taken out of production, and over 10 percent are already strictly protected. This makes Sweden one of the EU countries closest to achieving the biodiversity goal.”

An article published last year by the Swedish Species Information Centre at Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) said the country’s forests are not in the same shape they were in in 1950.

The article argued that much of Sweden’s forest biodiversity was not faring well.

“Logging of high nature-value forests is one of the main reasons why forest species” are threatened, the SLU article said.

SLU added that sufficiently ancient forests in Sweden have become “rare,” as “only a few percent of productive forest land can be qualified as old in the biological sense,” reported AFP.

WWF listed several recommendations in its report, including respecting the rights of the Indigenous Samí People and imposing a moratorium on logging of delineated old-growth and primary forests in Sweden.

WWF called upon the European Commission to track implementation of the EU’s Biodiversity Strategy.

“The consequences of inaction would be severe. Continued logging of primary and old-growth forests will not only undermine Europe’s environmental goals but also erode public trust in national governments and the EU itself,” said Anke Schulmeister-Oldenhove, manager of forests at the WWF European Policy Office, in the press release. “The EU Commission’s workshop in Helsinki must be a turning point. We urge decision-makers to put words into action and ensure Europe’s last great forests are protected before it’s too late.”

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Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, have taken on the nickname “forever chemicals” for their inability to break down in the environment. These chemicals, which are found in everything from food packaging to camping gear, are popular for their stain-, moisture- and grease-resistant properties, but they have been found to accumulate in the environment and in human bodies. 

But now, researchers may have cracked a way to break down these chemicals and even some of their byproducts, which can be toxic, by using strains of bacteria.

A team of scientists led by University of Buffalo researchers found that the bacteria Labrys portucalensis F11 was effective at breaking down at least three types of PFAS, including the most common forever chemical, perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS), as well as 5:3 fluorotelomer carboxylic acid (FTCA) and 6:2 fluorotelomer sulfonate (FTS).

Professor Diana Aga, the study’s corresponding author, says the bacteria could one day be deployed to break down PFAS in wastewater treatment plants. Meredith Forrest Kulwicki / University at Buffalo

The bacteria was the most effective at breaking down PFOS, a chemical that was designated as hazardous by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 2024. It degraded more than 90% of the compound over a 100-day exposure and removed up to 96% of the PFOS after 194 days. During the first 100 days, the bacteria broke down as much as 58% of FTCA and 21% of FTS. The scientists published their findings in the journal Science of The Total Environment.

“The bond between carbon and fluorine atoms in PFAS is very strong, so most microbes cannot use it as an energy source,” Diana Aga, corresponding author of the study, said in a statement. “The F11 bacterial strain developed the ability to chop away the fluorine and eat the carbon.”

In addition to breaking down the PFAS, the bacteria also broke down the metabolites that occur after the PFAS degradation, with Labrys portucalensis F11 even breaking down or fully removing fluorine in some of the study results. 

“Many previous studies have only reported the degradation of PFAS, but not the formation of metabolites. We not only accounted for PFAS byproducts but found some of them continued to be further degraded by the bacteria,” explained Mindula Wijayahena, first author of the study and a Ph.D. student in Aga’s lab.

Mindula Wijayahena, the study’s first author, analyzed the samples containing PFAS and the bacteria following incubation in Portugal. Meredith Forrest Kulwicki / University at Buffalo

This particular bacteria strain has been previously revealed to degrade fluorobenzene, a flammable and hazardous compound sometimes found in insecticides.

The discovery offers a novel method for cleaning up PFAS; other methods have primarily focused on adsorbing and removing the PFAS, but the bacteria could help break down these chemicals and minimize the amount of time they spend in the environment.

A 2024 study uncovered a way to track PFAS contamination to the source, and a separate study published in 2023 a potential water treatment that would use adsorbing materials and electro- and photochemical processes to destroy PFAS contaminants in drinking water supplies. Yet another separate study published in 2022 found a plant-based material that could help adsorb PFAS, which would then be digested by fungus.

The study authors using Labrys portucalensis F11 for PFAS metabolization will continue their research, noting that although the bacteria did break down the PFAS, it took nearly 200 days, and that was without other food sources present.

“We want to investigate the impact of placing alternative carbon sources alongside the PFAS. However, if that carbon source is too abundant and easy to degrade, the bacteria may not need to touch the PFAS at all,” Aga said. “We need to give the F11 colonies enough food to grow, but not enough food that they lose the incentive to convert PFAS into a usable energy source.”

The post Scientists Identify Bacteria That Can Break Down Some PFAS and Their Byproducts appeared first on EcoWatch.

For the first time, solar power surpassed coal as a source of electricity in the European Union (EU) last year, according to a new report by thinktank Ember released on Thursday.

Ember’s European Electricity Review 2025 found that solar generated 11 percent of the bloc’s electricity, while coal-fired power plants supplied 10 percent. Meanwhile, the use of fossil gas dropped to 16 percent of the energy mix, falling for the fifth straight year.

“This is a milestone,” said co-author of the report Beatrice Petrovich, senior energy analyst at Ember, as The Guardian reported. “Coal is the oldest way of producing electricity, but also the dirtiest. Solar is the rising star.”

The burning of coal for power in the EU saw its peak in 2003 and has since plummeted by 68 percent.

Along with coal’s decline has come the rise of clean energy, with solar and wind making up 29 percent of the EU’s electricity generation last year.

“The transition of the EU electricity sector maintained momentum in 2024, despite challenging political and economic conditions,” Ember’s executive summary of the report said. “Another year of coal and gas decline – the fifth year in a row for gas – cut EU power sector emissions to below half their 2007 peak and further reduced reliance on imported fossil fuels.”

Solar stayed on top as the fastest growing source of power in the EU in 2024. Wind was the second largest source of power, below nuclear energy and above gas.

The report attributed solar’s growth to a record number of new panels, even though there was less sunshine in the region than in 2023.

“It’s good news that the increase in solar build is actually translating to a reduction in fossil fuel burn,” said Jenny Chase, BloombergNEF solar analyst, who did not participate in the research, as reported by The Guardian.

According to the report, coal use dropped in all but one of the 17 nations that continue to use it, with the fuel becoming “marginal or absent in most systems.”

Germany and Poland are the top two coal users in the EU, with coal making up 17 percent of Germany’s electricity output and eight percent in Poland’s in 2024.

Fossil gas underwent a “structural decline” last year, with its use falling in 14 out of the 26 nations that use it.

“Fossil fuels are losing their grip on EU energy. At the start of the European Green Deal in 2019, few thought the EU’s energy transition could be where it is today; wind and solar are pushing coal to the margins and forcing gas into structural decline,” said Dr. Chris Rosslowe, senior energy analyst at Ember, in the executive summary. “While the EU’s electricity transition has moved faster than anyone expected in the last five years, further progress cannot be taken for granted. Delivery needs to be accelerated particularly in the wind sector, which has faced unique challenges and a widening delivery gap. However, the achievements of the past five years should instill confidence that, with continued drive and commitment, challenges can be overcome and a more secure energy future be achieved.”

The EU experienced a small increase in the demand for electricity following two years of significant decline caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, The Guardian reported. To combat this, an energy-saving plan was introduced in the EU, which also found new suppliers of fossil fuels and increased the pace of its clean energy shift.

“Wind and solar are growing in all large economies, but coal has continued to grow in China and natural gas has grown in the U.S.,” said Gregory Nemet, a University of Wisconsin-Madison energy researcher and co-author of a report for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, as reported by The Guardian. “Europe is taking advantage of the full swath of affordability, security, and clean air benefits that renewables provide.”

The report found that the EU was on course to meet its 400 gigawatt (GW) target of installed solar capacity this year. Last year it reached 338 GW, with Ember saying its target of 750 GW by 2030 would be “within reach” if its current growth rate was maintained.

“The significant progress has brought benefits beyond reducing emissions. Structural growth in wind and solar power has reduced the EU’s fossil import bill and the bloc’s vulnerability to imported gas. While the progress made in the first half of this decade is impressive, an acceleration is needed between now and 2030,” Ember said in its executive summary.

The authors of the report called for forms of “clean flexibility” like smart meters and batteries that can help align renewable energy supply — which fluctuates — with demand.

“[S]olar is growing in every EU country, while coal is becoming increasingly marginal. More than half of EU countries either have no coal power or a share below 5% in their power mix. Accelerated clean flexibility and smart electrification are needed to sustain solar growth,” the report said.

Ember pointed out that, while wind power additions were poised to grow, they were not enough to meet EU targets. The thinktank said closing the gap would require continued political support and policy implementation, with the additions rate between now and 2030 needing to be more than twice that of recent years.

Ember added that, by accelerating its electricity transition, the EU would “enhance energy security” while bringing down energy costs for consumers.

“The EU is striding closer towards a clean energy future powered by homegrown wind and solar. This new energy system will reduce the bloc’s vulnerability to fossil price shocks, tackle the climate crisis and deliver affordable energy for its households and companies. Timely policy action that sustains wind and solar growth, accelerates the deployment of clean flexibility and promotes electrification, will help to secure the future of EU competitiveness,” Petrovich said in the executive summary.

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