State
County supervisors now decide when to reopen beaches during shelter in place
WLOX
Jackson County residents voice opinions on beach closures
WLOX
JACKSON COUNTY, Miss. (WLOX) - With a decision looming on the Jackson County beaches potentially re-opening, residents and beachgoers are ready to put their toes in the sand again while still practicing social distancing.
Councilman Stokes urges crews to repair ongoing sewage issue on Prosperity Street
WJTV
JACKSON, Miss. (WJTV)- Community members living on Prosperity Street in Jackson said they have dealt with raw sewage problems for a year and can no longer continue to smell the unpleasant odor.
Greenwood Recycling
Delta News TV
Recycling is no longer suspended in the Greenwood-Leflore area.
Curbside recycling suspended in Picayune
Picayune Item
Curbside recycling services provided to city of Picayune residents by Coastal Environmental Services are being suspended as a result of the COVID-19 impact.
Gulfport loses an environmental justice champion who was nationally recognized
Sun Herald
Champion of environmental justice Rose Fairley Johnson of North Gulfport has passed away.
Johnson, 73, died Thursday in Miramar, Fla., where she had spent recent years helping one of her sons raise three children after their mother passed away.
State Government
Gov. Reeves extends Mississippi’s shelter-in-place order. But there are a few changes.
Sun Herald
Gov. Tate Reeves said Mississippians need to shelter in place for one more week before he begins to reopen the state, despite the worst economic pain in history.
Coronavirus in Mississippi: Fishing restrictions relaxed as shelter-in-place order extended
Clarion Ledger
In his Friday press conference, Gov. Tate Reeves announced Mississippi's shelter-in-place order will be extended until 8 a.m. April 27. However, the announcement came with relaxed restrictions, including those applied to fishing and Coast beaches.
Oil Spill
10 years after oil spill, will BP funds help Mississippi make up losses from coronavirus?
Sun Herald
Ten years ago Monday, when an explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil platform killed 11 people, the effects of the resulting spill reached South Mississippi long before the oil.
Mississippi Audubon tracks restoration progress, new threats to Gulf of Mexico
Meridian Star
MOSS POINT – Captain Benny McCoy pulled the 24-foot, flat-bottomed river boat away from the dock and began pointing out wildlife as if identifying familiar friends.
‘This was something unprecedented:' IMMS reflects on 10-year BP Oil Spill anniversary
WLOX
GULFPORT, Miss. (WLOX) - It’s been 10 years since the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, an event remembered as one of the worst environmental disasters in the world.
Sparkling waters hide some lasting harm from 2010 oil spill
AP
Ten years after a well blew wild under a BP platform in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 men and touching off the nation’s worst offshore oil spill, gulf waters sparkle in the sunlight, its fish are safe to eat, and thick, black oil no longer visibly stains the beaches and estuaries. Brown pelicans, a symbol of the spill's ecological damage because so many dived after fish and came up coated with oil, are doing well.
BP and its partners have spent $71 billion over 10 years on Deepwater Horizon disaster
NOLA.com
The 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion and blowout set into motion what was easily the biggest waterborne oil spill in history. It also led to what has likely been the most expensive cleanup and natural resource restoration effort ever seen.
A decade after BP spill, Gulf of Mexico has rebounded, but wounds still visible
NOLA.com
It's been 10 years since the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded, killing 11 people and spewing about 134 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico over three months.
Its most visible impacts -- oil mats, birds covered in crude and dolphins washing up on shore -- are long gone, and the gulf is teeming with finfish, shellfish and large marine mammals. But the signs of normalcy belie a more complicated truth: Researchers say the Gulf still hasn't fully recovered, and it could still be years before the full extent of the damage is known.
Baseball to beaches: Coast is different 10 years after spill
AP
As millions of gallons of crude oil spewed into the blue water of the Gulf of Mexico from a blown-out BP well in 2010, coastal residents wondered whether their home would ever be the same. A decade later, it's not: The Deepwater Horizon disaster changed the five-state region dramatically, with a flood of post-spill spending and memories of the catastrophe altering landscapes and attitudes along bayous and beaches.
10 years after BP spill: Oil drilled deeper; rules relaxed
AP
Ten years after an oil rig explosion killed 11 workers and unleashed an environmental nightmare in the Gulf of Mexico, companies are drilling in deeper and deeper waters, where payoffs can be huge but risks are greater than ever.
National
White House moves to weaken EPA rule on toxic compounds
AP
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump White House has intervened to weaken one of the few public health protections pursued by its own administration, a rule to limit the use of a toxic industrial compound in consumer products, according to communications between the White House and Environmental Protection Agency.
EPA weighs lifting ethanol requirements for oil refiners
The Hill
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is weighing whether to let oil refineries skip on adding ethanol to their fuels, a move being requested by governors in oil-rich states who say the industry can’t afford the expense of blending in biofuels as oil prices plummet.
Young climate activists slowed by pandemic, but not defeated
AP
Jamie Margolin had not expected to be sitting in her bedroom right now.
The high school senior had prom and graduation coming up, but so much more: A multi-state bus campaign with fellow climate activists.
Press Releases
MDMR accepting applications for the 2011 Bonnet Carré Fisheries Disaster Recovery Program
BILOXI, Miss. – The Mississippi Department of Marine Resources is accepting applications from commercial oyster/crab fishermen and oyster/crab processors for the “2011 Mississippi Bonnet Carré Fisheries Disaster Recovery Program for the Oyster and Blue Crab Fisheries.”
EPA Announces Coronavirus (COVID-19) Resources for State, Local, and Tribal Governments
04/17/2020
WASHINGTON (April 17, 2020) — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is updating its coronavirus website to include new resources for state, local, and tribal agencies and intergovernmental associations.
NRCS Announces Emergency EQIP Sign-Update
Jackson, Miss. –The USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) has funds available for landowners in flooded and disaster impacted areas in Mississippi. This funding is provided through the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), a financial assistance program included in the Farm Bill.
