The Allegheny Front

The story of a volunteer whose conservation efforts were thwarted by construction of the Mariner East pipeline. We talk with the researcher who found deer infected with the coronavirus. The Maryland Air National Guard wants to lower the altitude for combat training over a rural part of Pennsylvania, but residents and local businesses have questions.

New documents reveal the decrepit conditions at the Clairton Coke Works that led to a massive fire in 2018. A coach for activists says it’s normal to have anxiety over environmental destruction. Aspiring Pennsylvania farmers are struggling to find land. Plus, a new vegan cookbook for regional comfort food.

Susan Scott Peterson had been living in Pittsburgh for just a few weeks when she smelled it for the first time. The air was a little thick, a little hazy—and it smelled like a ripe porta-potty.

It didn’t take long to figure out it was hydrogen sulfide, a sulfur-smelling gas emitted by U.S. Steel’s Clairton Coke Works, about fifteen miles south of her house. The plant manufactures coke, a fuel used in steelmaking—and it’s notorious for violating local pollution regulations.

But what could she do about it?

This is a story about the air we breathe, the risks we live with, and what it means to become a citizen of a place.

This story is adapted from an episode produced for Outside/In, a podcast by New Hampshire Public Radio.

The Allegheny Front and Environmental Health News investigated the mental health impacts of air and water pollution and climate change in western Pennsylvania. 

We found alarming evidence that residents throughout the region are likely suffering changes to their brains due to pollution in the surrounding environment. Reporting also uncovered the growing gap in mental health care as more people are traumatized by worsening climate change.

More at https://www.alleghenyfront.org/mentalhealth

A new collaboration hopes to get people in Central Pennsylvania talking about climate change. We also examine the mental health struggles of farmers, and how an aging farming population in Pennsylvania means that the future of small family farming is changing. 

Some people along the coast of New Jersey are saying no to offshore wind power. They worry about preserving the character and natural beauty of NJ beaches. We talk with the new leader of a clean air watchdog group in Pittsburgh. A professor wants to create a corridor throughout the Appalachians for elk. Our reporter escapes to the Laurel Highlands Hiking Trail.

Climate change is making it harder to hunt and fish. An advocacy group wants hunters and anglers to speak out. Pennsylvania Senate passed a resolution disapproving of the state joining the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. Taking down dams to create a free-flowing Mahoning River is not without controversy. Consumer choices are hard when you want to do good for the environment. One expert says don't sweat the small stuff.

Metalico, a metal recycler on Neville Island in Allegheny County, is now the target of EPA. It has been a nuisance to the community for years. Pittsburgh has a new light pollution ordinance. An astronomer advocates for dark skies. Criminal charges against a pipeline company do little to spark action in the Pa. legislature.

Researchers say too many deer and invasive plants are threatening the long-term survival of Pa.'s forests. A filmmaker of a new documentary about a massive effort to clean up a Western Pa. river says it's a hopeful story. The author of a book about individual liberty and private property rights argues that signing a gas lease shouldn't be one of those rights.

More wind turbines in the ocean mean more renewable energy on the grid. But what's the impact on fisheries? Pennsylvania's attorney general files criminal charges for the Mariner East pipeline.  A new group is encouraging people to retire their lawnmowers and leafblowers and plant native species.