The drinking water for more than 11.3 million people could be at risk of radioactive contamination from a leak or accident at the Indian Point Nuclear Facility, says a new study released today by Environment New York.

The report also shows that Indian Point Nuclear Plant threatens drinking water supplies for more than twice as many people compared to any other nuclear facility in the nation. New York City Is the largest city in the country with water supplies at risk of a nuclear accident.

EHHI has released a new report calling for tougher standards to regulate cellular technologies—especially for children and pregnant women.

This report is the first part of a project researching the health effects of cell phone use. John Wargo, Ph.D., professor of Environmental Risk and Policy at Yale and lead author of the report, said, “The scientific evidence is sufficiently robust showing that cellular devices pose significant health risks to children and pregnant women….” Click on this environmental headline for more of this story.

Switzerland leads the world in managing pollution and natural resources, according to the 2012 Environmental Performance Index, which is produced by researchers at Yale and Columbia universities, in collaboration with the World Economic Forum, ranks 132 countries based on 22 indicators in 10 major policy categories, including air and water pollution, climate change, biodiversity and forest management. The United States places 49th. Click on this environmental headline for more on this story.

According to NOAA scientists, 2011 was a record-breaking year for climate extremes, as much of the United States faced historic levels of heat, precipitation, flooding and severe weather, while La Niña events at both ends of the year impacted weather patterns at home and around the world.

NOAA’s annual analysis of U.S. and global conditions, conducted by scientists at NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center, reports that the average temperature for the contiguous U.S. was 53.8 degrees F, 1.0 degree F above the 20th century average, making it the 23rd warmest year on record.

350 Connecticut, a statewide grassroots climate action organization, has announced that it has formed a sub-group to oppose the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline.

The new Connecticut Tar Sands Working Group intends to get the members of Connecticut’s congressional delegation, as well as Gov. Dannel Malloy, to put pressure on President Obama to reject the project.

“We are ready to work tirelessly to do our part to stop this catastrophe,” said Westbrook resident Colin Bennett, one of the leaders of the Connecticut Tar Sands Working Group.

To promote wetland conservation, the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) is initiating a contest where artists can enter an original piece of artwork that depicts a waterfowl species (duck, goose, or brant) that occurs in Connecticut.

The winning entry will be featured on the 2013 Connecticut Migratory Bird Conservation Stamp. Note: This is not a postage stamp.

Click on this environmental headline for more on this story from CT Environmental Headlines.

Save the Sound gives Connecticut, New York and the U.S. government “barely passing” grades in several key areas in a year-end 2011 “State of the Sound” report that marks the first attempt to assign grades to efforts to protect Long Island Sound.

The report, released Wednesday, gave an “A” to overall efforts to preserve coastal habitat, an “A-” to efforts to preserve and improve migratory habitat through such innovative projects as new “fish ladders,” and a “B-” to efforts to combat beach litter. The New Haven Register reports.

EPA’s new Mercury and Air Toxics Standards will improve people’s health by requiring power plants that contribute to air pollution in Connecticut to use widely available, proven pollution control technologies to protect families from pollutants like mercury, arsenic, chromium, nickel and acid gases.

These new standards will prevent up to 90 premature deaths in Connecticut while creating up to $750 million in health benefits in 2016. Click on this environmental headline for more on this story.

In its most recent report to the Connecticut Energy Advisory Board, a group chartered by the Connecticut legislature to advise state government and industry “in the application of science and engineering to the economic and social welfare,” suggests that state officials look seriously at expanding nuclear power plants in Connecticut. The Norwich Bulletin agrees.

The advisory board requested the academy examine advances in nuclear power technology last year as part of its overall review of the state’s energy policies.

Connecticut’s state parks and forests offer numerous outdoor recreation activities that are part of what makes Connecticut a special place to live – and a new study concludes they are also good for the economy.

The DEEP has released an extensive analysis conducted by UConn’s Connecticut Center for Economic Analysis showing that outdoor activities on state lands have an economic impact of more than $1 billion a year. The $1 billion represents the amount spent by state residents and visitors on a variety of outdoor activities including camping, boating, fishing and hunting.

Consider it a taste of the future: the fire, smoke, drought, dust, and heat that have made life unpleasant, if not dangerous, from Louisiana to Los Angeles. New records tell the tale: biggest wildfire ever recorded in Arizona (538,049 acres), biggest fire ever in New Mexico (156,600 acres), all-time worst fire year in Texas history (3,697,000 acres).

The fires were a function of drought. As of summer’s end, 2011 was the driest year in 117 years of record keeping for New Mexico, Texas, and Louisiana, and the second driest for Oklahoma.

The disparities persist despite an effort launched by the state in 2000 to level and reduce the disease burden.

The State Asthma Program works with local health departments to help people with asthma manage their disease, mainly by sending asthma specialists into homes to do environmental assessments and identify asthma triggers.

Climate change is likely to cause more storms, floods, droughts, heatwaves and other extreme weather events, according to the most authoritative review yet of the effects of global warming.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change will publish on Friday its first special report on extreme weather, and its relationship to rising greenhouse gas emissions.

Signers of the August proposal—including 11 aldermen, one former alderman turned state rep, and an alderman-elect—called on the city to make the project more amenable to walkers and cyclists and less focused on the needs of motorists.

Contentious public hearings on the proposal ensued, as well as behind-the-scenes negotiations, resulting in a new design agreed to last week.

“Hey, Obama, we don’t want no climate drama.” That was one of the rallying cries from the estimated 12,000-person crowd protesting outside the White House against the Keystone XL pipeline yesterday afternoon.

After a series of high-energy speeches from James Hansen, Naomi Klein, Bill McKibben, Mark Ruffalo and many others, demonstrators poured onto Pennsylvania Avenue and created a human chain around the White House, chanting, “two, four, six, eight, stop XL, it’s not too late.”

More than 100 citizens from Connecticut will return to Washington, DC, Sunday, Nov. 6, 2011, to call on President Obama to stop the Keystone XL “Tar Sands” Pipeline and keep his promises from 2008.

Connecticut residents will join thousands of others from across the country to encircle the White House and call on President Obama to keep his campaign promises to end fossil fuel addiction and fight climate change, and to stop the Keystone XL “Tar Sands” pipeline.

Click on this environmental headline for more on this story.

While lobsters are thriving in Maine, production is down from a peak in the late 1990s in other areas. Scientists can’t explain the decline, but overfishing, a 1996 Rhode Island oil spill and a disease that disfigures lobster shells are possibilities.

They also believe it may be partly explained by warmer water temperatures that have driven lobsters to cooler, deeper waters — away from prime spawning grounds and to places where more predators lurk. Michael Melia of The Associated Press reports.

Most of the 7 billion are not endangering the earth. The majority of the world’s people don’t destroy forests, don’t wipe out endangered species, don’t pollute rivers and oceans, and emit essentially no greenhouse gases, Ian Angus writes in Grist.

While populationist groups focus attention on the 7 billion, the Occupy movement has identified the real source of environmental destruction: the 1%, the handful of millionaires and billionaires who own more, consume more, control more, and destroy more than all the rest of us put together. Click on this environmental headline for more on this story.

Since BP’s catastrophic Macondo Blowout in the Gulf of Mexico last year, the Obama Administration has granted nearly 300 new drilling permits and shirked plans to plug 3,600 of more than 28,000 abandoned wells, which pose significant threats to the severely damaged sea.

Among those granted new permits for drilling in the Gulf, on Friday Obama granted BP permission to explore for oil in the Gulf, allowing it to bid on new leases that will be sold at auction in December. GlobalResearch.ca reports.

Scientists at Columbia University say that the energy potential in non-recycled plastic is at least enough to fuel 6 million cars or power 5.2 million homes each year.

According to a study by the Earth Engineering Center at Columbia University, while mechanical recycling of plastics has continued to grow in the U.S., with 2.1 million tons of plastics recycled in 2009, less than 15% of the U.S. post-consumer plastics are being diverted from landfills by means of recycling and energy recovery.