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Articles by Sarah Laskow

Sarah Laskow is a reporter based in New York City who covers environment, energy, and sustainability issues, among other things.

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  • Documents show Exxon downplayed time it took to seal Yellowstone spill

    ExxonMobil told federal officials and Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer that they had sealed the pipeline leaking oil into the Yellowstone River within 30 minutes. But federal documents show that sealing the pipe took 56 minutes -- almost twice as long as the company originally said.

    The company told the AP that the error came about because the Exxon representative who briefed officials was providing information without the benefit of notes. In other words, not really intended to be a factual statement.

    Sarah Laskow Health

  • Critical List: Republicans plan to defund the environment; no one likes the EPA

    House Republicans want to defund all kinds of environmental activity -- the EPA, the Department of the Interior, the Forest Service. You know, just anything having to do with the outside.

    And the USDA thinks that bioengineered bluegrass doesn't fall within its regulatory sphere, which means companies could grow the stuff without any regulation.

    Exposing mice to air pollution makes them dumber and more depressed.

    So it's probably good for everyone that the EPA is putting new regulations on coal-fired power plants that should reduced emissions of sulfur dioxide by 73 percent and nitrogen oxides by 54 percent from 2005 levels. Should Republicans succeed in cutting the agency’s budget yet again, this action could be little more than an empty gesture, though.

    Sarah Laskow Health

  • Ranchers are clearing the Amazon rainforest with Agent Orange

    In Brazil, ranchers are opting to use Agent Orange -- one of the most toxic herbicides ever concocted, infamous for its use as a defoliant and de facto weapon during the Vietnam War -- to clear acres of rainforest. It's illegal to clear the forest, but by spraying swaths of trees with Agent Orange, deployed by helicopter, ranchers stand less chance of detection than if they cleared the land by bulldozing or cutting down trees.

    Sarah Laskow Health

  • ExxonMobil, historic flooding join forces to spread oil through Yellowstone River

    The oil leaking from an ExxonMobil pipe into the Yellowstone River in Montana spread farther than the company said it anticipated. The reason, according to ExxonMobil’s spokespeople, is historic levels of flooding on the river. By Tuesday, Exxon had 280 people on the case, but still hadn’t managed to fight through floodwaters to reach the break in the pipeline. Exxon says the river is preventing its clean-up crews from going out on foot or in boats to look for oil on the river's banks.

    Exxon did shut down the busted pipeline, but not before spilling more than 40,000 gallons of oil that they say it’s not yet safe to clean up, due to the floods. The company had been warned twice that it needed to check the pipeline for corrosion and update its emergency plans -- but now that there is actually a broken pipeline and an emergency, it’s obviously all the river’s fault.

    Sarah Laskow Health