Minnesota Environmental News - Now Improved, with RSS Format! (tm)

* Minnesota Public Radio is worried that a proposed light rail line running right by its Saint Paul offices would be noisy. Read more from MinnPost.

image from MinnPost

* Nationwide - Obama's "green team" not so progressive? Read more from BeyondChron.

* 3M asks to throw out a lawsuit brought by 4 residents over leached PFCs found in groundwater. Perfluorocarbons were used in products like Scotchgard and Teflon. There is precedent: DuPont in Ohio was ordered to pay $300 million in damages in 2005 on a PFC case. Questions this case will attempt to figure out: When the company dumped leftover materials into landfills (legally), did it know that PFCs are toxic and bioaccumulate? Did it know the chemicals would leach into the groundwater? Do the 4 residents have a substantial enough claim of "subcellular" harm? Are PFCs as toxic to humans as they are to mice? Read more from the Pioneer Press.

* Minneapolis adopts environmentally preferable purchasing policy. Read more from MinnPost.

Government Goes Green

Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty unveiled the "Green Jobs Investment Initiative" to the 2009 state legislature yesterday. It's a group of tax exemptions, mostly for business, to invest in green jobs and renewable energy. In total, the initiative would spend $90.25 million in the next six years.

Image from Minnesota Politics blog.

Pawlenty has suspicious timing. He did not support a Green JOBZ initiative in 2008, and his proposal comes while a task force of department officials and other experts were in the midst of creating a similar proposal. JOBZ is Pawlenty's job creation effort. Said Rep. Tim Mahoney, DFL - Saint Paul, "I didn't know JOBZ was (a) chameleon – apparently if it isn't working, it just changes color."

Read more from the Pioneer Press, the Star Tribune, MSNBC, the Governor's Office, Politics in Minnesota, and a related article on Pawlenty and climate change from MinnPost.