Environment & Science

Nowadays, there's a day to celebrate everything. Tuesday January 21 is no exception. On that day, squirrel enthusiasts can celebrate all things squirrels. Why? Because it's National Squirrel Appreciation Day! A day to learn, celebrate, and acknowledge the furry friends that you likely cross paths with on a regular basis. 

Michigan Congressional representatives have introduced a resolution to oppose storing nuclear waste near the Great Lakes.

The resolution was introduced by Representatives Dan Kildee and John Moolenaar, along with Senators Debbie Stabenow and Gary Peters.

It’s not the first time a resolution like it has been introduced in Congress.

The Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) has contacted two companies regarding a collapsed dock site on the Detroit River, calling their response "inadequate." The dock originally collapsed in November, and potentially contaminated soil has been eroding into the river. 

Congresswoman Debbie Dingell (D-12th District) held a community meeting last night to address concerns about the contamination of Ann Arbor’s groundwater by a dioxane plume.

Gelman Sciences, a now defunct company, is responsible for the contamination of the groundwater with a chemical called 1,4 dioxane. Gelman had been assisting with cleanup through extraction wells in 2019, but the plume continues to spread closer and closer to the Huron River, the source of Ann Arbor’s drinking water.

Democratic US Representative Rashida Tlaib of Detroit is asking the U.S. EPA to help clean up another contaminated property owned by Gary Sayers. Sayers owns a warehouse in Detroit as well as Electro-Plating Services in Madison Heights.

On December 20, a neon green slime was discovered leaking onto I-696 in Madison Heights. 

Contaminated water is still migrating off the property of Electro-Plating Services, despite pumps installed inside the building. 

That's according to Tracy Kecszemeti, the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy's district supervisor of materials management.

Read more: First day of trial: regulators paint grim picture of conditions at Electro-Plating Services

Environmental regulators painted a grim picture of conditions inside Electro-Plating Services on the first day of a trial on Monday. 

State environmental officials say Detroit fire inspectors have found a number of liquid filled pits in the basement of a Detroit warehouse owned by Gary Sayers.

Sayers was recently imprisoned for violations of environmental laws at his company, Electro-Plating Services in Madison Heights.

State environmental regulators say they'll reassess if Electro-Plating Services qualifies for Superfund status. 

The company is the source of the contaminated green liquid that spilled onto a roadway in Madison Heights in December. 

The U.S. EPA did what's called a "critical removal" of hazardous materials from Electroplating Services in 2017: hauling away anything that seemed like an imminent threat to public health. 

The Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) says it's investigating potentially hazardous chemicals discovered at a Detroit property owned by Gary Sayers, who was recently imprisoned for violations of environmental laws at his company, Electro-Plating Services in Madison Heights.

Detroit Fire Department inspectors identified potentially hazardous liquids at the location, 5900 Commonwealth Street, on Friday.

Update, Thursday, January 9:

The baby black rhino is nameless no more!

The votes have been tallied and Jaali (pronounced like "jolly") is the winner. The name means “powerful” in Swahili. It is also a fitting name for a Christmas Eve baby.

Gary Sayers, the owner of Electroplating Services, is now in federal prison.

Sayers' company is the source of the green toxic liquid that poured onto a roadway in Madison Heights in late December.  

Sayers will serve about 11 months -- after nearly two decades of flouting state and federal disposal laws for hazardous materials, including digging a pit in the basement of his factory where he dumped chemicals. 

He leaves behind a building and property contaminated with chromium 6, arsenic and other toxic chemicals. 

The U.S. EPA has begun drilling into the soil surrounding a shuttered factory in Oakland County in an effort to figure out just how much toxic chemicals left there have contaminated the surrounding area.

The former Electro-Plating Services facility in Madison Heights was responsible for the green ooze that seeped onto the shoulder of I-696 last month.

Ann Arbor will shut down eleven of its city parks and nature areas after 3:00 p.m. every day from January 2-26, to permit sharpshooters to cull its abundant population of deer.

The ground is getting warmer at one of the state’s most contaminated sites.

The Environmental Protection Agency is using a process called thermal remediation to heat the soil and remove harmful chemicals at the Velsicol Chemical Corp. Superfund site in the town of St. Louis.

State environmental regulators say there's no risk to drinking water from contaminated water that spilled onto Interstate 696 last week.  

The green liquid that gushed onto the highway in Madison Heights on December 20th came from a closed factory, Electro-Plating Services. 

Good news for the city of Ann Arbor's drinking water - and the residents who drink it.

The city's Drinking Water Quality Manager, Sarah Page, says tests have detected no PFOS and PFOA compounds in the past five months.  PFOS and PFOA are two of the most worrisome PFAS compounds.

Some Detroit lawmakers and residents are keeping up the fight against the proposed expansion of a hazardous waste facility.

A state permit to allow U.S. Ecology to expand its Detroit operation ten-fold has been pending for years. The facility has stored and processed hazardous waste there for decades.

A popular state campground in West Michigan has put a hold on reservations for next year, over fears the campground could be flooded.

The Channel Campground sits on Muskegon Lake in Muskegon State Park.

Greg Sherburn is the supervisor of the park. He says normally, the campground would open up for Memorial Day weekend reservations about now. But he says the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is forecasting high Great Lakes water levels into the spring.

Wolves on Isle Royale have begun to hunt and travel as a group. 

It’s part of a process park officials say could eventually lead to the formation of the island’s first new pack.

The partial collapse of a dock once contaminated with uranium into the Detroit River did not put dangerous levels of chemicals into the waterway, according to new test results from a southeast Michigan water utility.

The Great Lakes Water Authority tested both raw and tap water from its intake site near where the dock collapsed.

This week, the state began collecting PFAS-containing firefighting foam, known as Class B AFFF, that has been held in inventory by fire departments and commercial airports across Michigan.

According to Scott Dean, the spokesman for the Michigan PFAS Action Response Team (MPART), the effort is part of the state's $1.4 million plan to collect and dispose of about 35,000 gallons of the foam.

Wolverine Worldwide says it will pay nearly $70 million to build municipal water systems in two communities affected by PFAS contamination. 

The company used the chemicals to waterproof its shoes for years. The harmful chemicals contaminated the ground and entered into local wells.  The company says it will now pay to build the water systems to connect more than 1,000 properties to municipal water in Algoma and Plainfield Townships. It says the plan is part of a tentative agreement to resolve lawsuits involving the state and townships.

Congress has reached a final agreement on the annual national defense bill, the National Defense Authorization Act. This year’s bill includes a number of provisions to regulate the chemical family PFAS.

A new study out of the University of Michigan finds the bodies of migratory birds are shrinking - and it could be due to climate change.

The data was collected in Chicago over roughly 40 years. Researchers collected the bodies of birds that collided with buildings. The study uses some 70,000 birds covering 52 species as its data set.

State environmental regulators say tests done Friday show below-background levels of radiation at the site of a partial shoreline collapse into the Detroit River.