Recent News from the Ecology Center

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Press ReleaseLocal Advocates Respond to DTE Energy Waste Reduction Plans

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       DETROIT, MI. -- Today, DTE Energy filed its electric and gas energy efficiency (referred to in Michigan as “energy waste reduction”) plans with the Michigan Public...
            

Anniversaries Can Wait: The Ecology Center in the Pandemic Year

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       At the outset of 2020, we looked forward to celebrating our 50 years of accomplishments, and to lifting up our work today for healthy people...
            

Happy Birthday to Us! Remembering Elvis Impersonators, Hair Curlers, and Mary Beth Doyle

By Tracey Easthope and Elizabeth Harlow

Avoid Buying Sewage Sludge In Your Garden Products

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       Ever since an adult bear and her cubs destroyed my backyard plastic composter, I’ve made buying compost an annual Mother’s Day tradition. Last year, I...
            

Press ReleaseNew Report Reveals PFAS in Home Fertilizers Made From Sewage Waste

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       WASHINGTON, D.C. -- A new report released today details concerning levels of toxic PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are found in home garden fertilizer products...
            

Opinion: Michigan should lead clean transformation of trucks and buses

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       By Charles Griffith

A school bus drops children off on the corner. A semi-truck brings car parts to the assembly factory.  A garbage truck picks up...

Press ReleaseNew study finds nearly 70% of companies surveyed have improved toxic chemical safety programs

                                                                                                    More than 65,000 stores worldwide pledge to eliminate or reduce toxic PFAS “forever chemicals” in food packaging

WASHINGTON, D.C.

Governor Whitmer Moves Forward with Climate Action Plans, Appoints Ecology Center Staff and Board to Key Panel

                                                                                                    Governor Gretchen Whitmer took the first critical steps this week toward meeting the state’s carbon reduction goals, which she’d established in a 2020 executive order.
            

Press ReleaseMichigan joins 27 states considering toxic chemical policies in 2021

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       Toxic PFAS regulation and clean-up driving the majority of more than 180 expected policies for this year

(Lansing, MI)—Safer States today released its annual analysis of anticipated state-level...

From Resistance to Persistence

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       22 year-old National Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman emerged as the breakout star of the recent Presidential Inauguration with her powerful delivery of “The Hill...
            

Green and Healthy Affordable Housing: Modeling a Solution for Environment and Economic Justice

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       Everyone deserves a healthy place to live. That’s what the Ecology Center’s motto of “healthy people, healthy planet” is about. It’s about promoting environments where...
            

PFAS in Cookware and Bakeware and Healthier Choices: An EcoLive Event

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       During this event, our Healthy Stuff team shared the results of the soon to be released study of toxic per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in...
            

Press ReleaseUndisclosed PFAS coatings common on cookware, research shows

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       (Ann Arbor, MI)--New findings from the Ecology Center on nonstick cookware show that despite growing concern about the toxicity of “forever chemicals” known as PFAS,...
            

Prop C Win Advances Climate and Economic Justice

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       The world’s eyes have been laser-focused on the aftermath of the U.S. presidential election this month, but we want to make sure that you didn’t...
            

Ann Arbor poised to pass state’s first comprehensive EV Readiness ordinance

                                                                                                    Electric cars are coming. We need to be ready for them with adequate charging capacity, or else face costly infrastructure retrofits later.

by Elizabeth Harlow