LITTLE ROCK, Ark. -- The Environmental Protection Agency says it plans to leave current limits on air pollution unchanged, but critics say the particle pollution standards aren't strict enough and put human health at risk.

John Bachmann is a former associate director for science policy at the EPA's Office of Air Quality Planning and Standards and current member of the Environmental Protection Network. He said there is mounting evidence particulate matter can cause serious harm - even in small amounts.

"What EPA has found over the years is there is a causal relationship between fine particles, mortality, hospital admissions - especially for people who are elderly, who have pre-existing conditions, especially cardiovascular disease," Bachmann said.

The EPA has argued the current science doesn't prove that reducing particulate matter can improve public health. The agency is holding a public hearing via teleconference on the proposal to retain the National Ambient Air Quality Standards for Particulate Matter on Wednesday.

Bachmann said the decision is a departure from the norm, noting the agency historically has tightened air-quality standards every time they were up for review.

"Starting in 1997, if you want to look at it that way, the data got stronger, and in each year, either new or more stringent standards were set," he said.

He said the decision potentially could lead to more chronic health conditions and premature deaths in communities with higher levels of air-pollution exposure, and said preliminary research indicates survivors of serious COVID-19 illness may be more susceptible to air pollution.

"So in both directions, you have COVID making people more susceptible, air pollution - if you've been exposed to it for several years - making people more likely to die of COVID," he said. "It's a terrible combination."

The deadline to submit public comments on the EPA's proposal to maintain current air-pollution standards is June 29.


get more stories like this via email

By Rebecca R. Randall for Yes! Magazine.
Broadcast version by Trimmel Gomes for Florida News Connection reporting for the YES! Media-Public News Service Collaboration

This past spring, a colorful poster displayed a ring of emojis at a student table outside the cafeteria at Maritime and Science Technical Academy, a 6–12 school in Miami. Called the climate emotions wheel, the circle was divided into a rainbow of wedges for various emotions: anger in red, sadness in purple, fear in green, positivity in blue. The poster also included a QR code for students to complete a survey about their feelings related to climate. 

Sophomore Sophia Bugarim remembers taking the survey. To the first question—“Do you experience any of these climate emotions?”—Bugarim answered “fear.” The next question narrowed down the four core emotions into more specifics. This time Bugarim selected “worry.” 

“I feel worried that one day I’ll be in a situation where I have to leave my house, and I’ll come back and have no idea what it will look like,” says Bugarim, who recalled her survey answers on an October day when school had been canceled due to the possibility of storm water surge and high winds. While Miami was not in Hurricane Milton’s path, Bugarim wonders how soon the city will be in the path of another storm. “These storms are getting worse. There was a hurricane last week in Tallahassee. Next week gets me worried. It’s very unpredictable.”

Sebastian Navarro, who manned the table as sustainability ambassador during his senior year, thinks students at Maritime and Science Technical Academy probably learn about climate change more than others in the district due to the school’s focus on maritime sciences. He says students visit the reefs just offshore from the beachside school. But that classwork is focused on cognitive learning, not discussion about feelings. 

On the climate emotions survey, when given options for what worries them most about climate change, about one-third of students said sea level rise. Another third said biodiversity loss and coral bleaching. 

Sarah Newman, executive director of the Climate Mental Health Network, says climate change adds another layer of mental health risk for youth and can deepen existing inequities. In 2021, Newman founded the Network to provide solutions beyond traditional therapy, which can be cost-prohibitive and faces ongoing provider shortages. 

She sees the climate emotions wheel as a supplement to mental health therapy and believes schools are a key place to address mental health amid a changing climate. This is a stark contrast with the conservative Project 2025, which aims to erase climate change from public education and the federal government entirely. Newman sees the importance in grassroots solutions to support individuals and communities impacted by the changing climate, regardless of what’s happening in Washington, D.C. 

“Having climate anxiety is a normal response to the climate crisis, so if you respond to what is a societal issue with an individual approach, you’re isolating someone’s experience to a clinical setting,” she says. “Because it’s a collective experience, the process of navigating our climate emotions, managing them, and healing needs to be done in community with others.” 

A New Tool

Multiple reports suggest there is plenty of room for improvement to deepen climate content across subjects and add more social and emotional learning in public schools in the United States. On the National Center for Science Education’s 2020 report card, Florida received a D for its lack of climate change content in state science standards. The center graded 20 states at no higher than a C+, while 21 states, which all use the Next Generation Science Standards, received a B+.

Then in 2022, the North American Association for Environmental Education found only 37% of states included climate change in one subject in addition to science (usually social studies), and only 10% of climate change content addressed the socio-emotional learning dimensions of the crisis.

A 2023 report led by the American Psychological Association and others concurs that more school-based and health-system solutions are needed. Newman sees the climate emotions wheel as a tool that educators everywhere can begin using now. It’s a bottom-up approach that can skirt the obstacles being thrown up in institutions and governments at all levels.

Finnish environmental theologian Panu Pihkala, who popularized the idea that “climate emotions” is a more useful term than “climate anxiety,” consulted with the Climate Mental Health Network to create the climate emotions wheel. It is now available in 30 languages, including Spanish, Kiswahili, and Bengali, and used in a variety of settings.

“Everything about the school day is a learning experience. It’s not just the curriculum being directed by the teacher,” said Michele Drucker, who heads the Miami-Dade County Council Parent Teacher Association environmental committee.

Drucker also ran a sustainability ambassador program in local high schools, which Navarro completed during his lunch hours. Navarro invited students to enter a drawing for completing climate actions such as bringing a reusable water bottle, using share tables for uneaten food at lunch, and eliminating single-use plastics. This is also where Navarro shared the climate emotions wheel, which he says received a lot of engagement and seemed to bump up participation in the weeks that followed.

Navarro says the wheel helped generate hallway conversations about climate, too, as peers asked each other: “Which emoji are you?”

Climate Emotions in the Classroom

In other schools, teachers are adding the climate emotions wheel to their coursework.

“One of the biggest problems with climate education is not a lack of knowledge,” says Kimberly Williams, a science teacher at Smithtown High School West on Long Island in New York. She began integrating emotional support into her climate change units a few years ago. She says her classes would start the year “discouraged and apathetic,” and that “it’s easy for the students to feel ‘there’s nothing I can do, so I should do nothing.’”

Williams tasked her students with using the paint tool on a tablet to shade portions in a circle representing the degree to which they were feeling a climate emotion. A guide then helped them describe their emotions and evaluate their own strengths and possible contributions to climate solutions.

Williams concedes that most science teachers do not include this kind of social and emotional learning into their lessons: “They don’t see the two as interwoven, and I don’t see the two as something you can separate.”

Williams says in her district, most teachers only “dance around the subject” in an effort to avoid the politics of climate change. To her, that indicates that teachers aren’t connecting it to students’ lives. “They’re showing a graph,” not saying, “‘Why do you think that is?’ or ‘What we can do about it?’”

In nearby New York City, 52% of teachers in a survey said they teach about climate change, but most only dedicate a few hours per year. A recent state bill, which died at the end of the 2024 legislative session, would have mandated that all grades and subject matters include climate.

This bill would have addressed mental health, as well, said Elissa Teles Muñoz, the K–12 programming manager for the Climate Mental Health Network, at a recent Climate Week NYC panel. 

“When there is climate education … it does need to include safeguards for youth mental health,” said Muñoz, who helped write the bill with the National Wildlife Federation. “It’s not responsible to drop a bomb on a child’s brain.”

Growing Support From the Grassroots

The climate emotions wheel relies on grassroots leaders—teachers, parents, or others—to find ways to implement it, which may limit its reach and impact.

Some teachers may not feel supported to include the exercise. Susan Clayton, a conservation psychologist who studies K–12 climate education, considered teacher surveys alongside local politics. She found that teachers from states where school or government leaders oppose climate education felt more anxious. For example, the 7% of teachers in Clayton’s sample who were from Florida reported significantly higher levels of climate anxiety.

But Clayton found that when teachers perceived parental support for climate education, they were more likely to talk to students about climate emotions. 

In Miami-Dade public schools, Drucker is bolstered by how the PTA can bypass some state or district politics with grassroots action at schools. She advocated for years for systems-level climate action, though Florida schools lack state support for fully embracing climate action. And that obstacle is only getting worse: Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill this spring that strikes the phrase “climate change” from state law entirely.

Newman also believes there’s power in hyperlocal action. One of the climate emotions wheel’s strengths may be that it empowers students. 

For Williams’ part, she includes the climate emotions exercise to help students move toward action. At the end of her courses, she asks students to complete the survey again and asks what they would modify from their earlier responses. One student updated the colors in the wheel and said she felt a little more empowered to take her own actions once she wrote them down.

Navarro says he is still working through climate emotions, but he feels encouraged by peer support in the environmental clubs at his school. “You have the opportunity to advocate for different causes,” he says. Recently, students acted on their concerns by advocating for and landing the district electric buses. Navarro says it feels good to know that “you’re actually making a difference.”


Rebecca R. Randall wrote this article for Yes! Magazine.


get more stories like this via email

Michigan has poured $1 billion into electric-vehicle battery projects, with another billion pledged, but delays have stalled hiring for most of the 11,000 promised jobs. Now, some critics are raising concerns over the subsidies for the projects.

Economic experts say delays are common in large-scale projects, and it's too early to call this effort a bust.

Brad Hershbein, a senior economist for the W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, cited slower EV demand and opposition from residents who don't want large factories in their neighborhoods. He said limited job postings are another key factor.

"Where there have been some job postings, [they] are typically for engineers and for doing design, and managers," he said, "and there's still a lot of uncertainty coming ahead with the new presidential administration - where some of the incentives that have been slated to be given out may not be given out in the end."

A 2024 poll revealed that while 55% of Michigan voters believe it's important for the state to compete in electric-vehicle manufacturing, only about one in four would consider purchasing an EV as their next vehicle.

Despite delays, Michigan continues to prepare for EV battery job growth. In western Michigan, educators are training a workforce for Ford's 2026 factory, and Western Michigan University announced a $700,000 plan to boost training for battery and semiconductor jobs.

Hershbein noted that developers often overpromise.

"It may turn out that, years from now, this was a good investment to try to spur greater production of electronic vehicles, electric vehicles and jobs for them," he said. "We just don't know yet. It's going to depend on how the next several years play out."

In December 2023, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed a plan to make all of Michigan's state vehicles zero-emission by 2040.


get more stories like this via email

A law signed by New York Gov. Kathy Hochul takes effect this week to penalize polluters for emissions.

The Climate Change Superfund Act puts a fine on the largest contributors to greenhouse gas emissions between 2000 and 2018, specifically those responsible for more than 1 billion tons of global greenhouse gas emissions. The collected money will be put into a special fund to pay for climate change resilience measures starting in 2028.

Rich Schrader, northeast senior government affairs director for the Natural Resources Defense Council, said the law will greatly benefit New York State.

"Each budget would be put into the state budget to do work like upgrading roads and bridges that have been damaged and do work in terms of installing new water systems," Schrader outlined. "Part of the money would go into things like, since we're having hotter summers or hotter springs, really, how to get better air conditioning in public housing, but also in public schools."

He noted it does not account for projects funded by federal dollars. The law faced opposition from oil and gas companies, threatening to raise prices statewide if it were enacted. Reports show each region faces millions of dollars in climate costs, totaling more than $2 billion.

New York's law is the second in the nation, after Vermont approved a similar bill in mid-2024. Both states have seen record climate change effects such as flooding and storm damage and are facing emerging threats like poor air quality from wildfires. Schrader pointed out the companies paying into the two states' funds are some of the highest global greenhouse gas emitters.

"Those seven, eight companies at the top end of this that mostly produce oil and gas, some coal; they represent two-thirds of all the total tons emitted, the billion or so tons that have been emitted," Schrader reported.

Some companies potentially facing fines include Chevron, B-P, ExxonMobil, Saudi Aramco and the National Iranian Oil Company. Reports show companies such as Exxon knew as far back as the 1950s fossil fuels were causing climate change.


get more stories like this via email