Issues

Energy

Water is necessary for life. Streams, rivers, lakes, and estuaries must be protected from pollution discharged from cities and factories. Water quality is also a mirror of human actions on the land, such as logging, farming, grazing, irrigation, mining, and urban development. Protecting the quality of our water means recognizing the connection between all human activities and this precious resource.

Regulating Water Pollution

Types of Pollution

Specific Water Topics

The energy we depend upon to cook, illuminate and heat our homes, and move about comes at a cost to the environment and our health. The challenge is to choose energy sources that will not ruin life as we know it—whether through climate change, radiation-induced cancers, or habitat destruction—yet will be there when we need it. The most efficient and clean sources of energy are not necessarily those that will reap the greatest financial rewards for energy producers.

Energy Sources

Protecting the health of species—fish, birds, amphibians, mammals— and protecting human health from pollution are often synonymous. Toxic contaminants have the worst effects at the top of the food chain—on people, eagles, and orca whales, for example. But many of the most devastating effects of pollution can disrupt entire food webs—those carefully balanced worlds in which microscopic plants and animals are food for yet larger creatures that are the prey for small fish that are eaten by the iconic salmon—that underpin our environment and our lives.

Regulating Threats to Species

Pollution and Habitat Threats to Species

Related News

Shipping Industry Loses Legal Challenge to Ballast Water Discharge Permit

A federal appellate court in Washington, D.C. has rejected a legal challenge by the shipping industry to the permit issued by the Environmental Protection Agency for ships to discharge ballast water containing invasive species.  The permit, while issued by EPA, ...

Petition to Suspend Licensing at Nuclear Power Facilities Pending Fukushima Investigation

On April 14 and 18, NWEA joined with citizens groups across the country to file an Emergency Petition with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). The Petition is supported by a highly informative expert declaration by Dr. Arjun Makhijani of the Institute for ...

Oregon’s Sneak Effort to De-Regulate Unsafe Levels of Iron and Manganese

In Oregon’s recent rulemaking to make the state’s toxic criteria the most stringent in the country, the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) also sought to remove its water quality standards for iron and manganese. DEQ told its advisory committee repeatedly ...

Join Our Email List

I prefer not to become a member at this time, but I’d like to get NWEA emails.

You have Successfully Subscribed!

Share This