Poison Spring: The Secret History of Pollution and the EPA - Softcover

Vallianatos, E.G.; Jenkins, McKay

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1608199266 ISBN 13: 9781608199266

Publisher: Bloomsbury Press, 2015

Synopsis

When you order a meal in a restaurant, you won't find malathion, kelthane or arsenic listed on the menu as an ingredient of your entrée, but these and scores of other pesticides and dangerous chemicals are in the food we eat. They are dumped into the environment where they seep into our water supply and float in the air we breathe. The use of these poisons is approved-or in some cases, simply ignored--by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Poison Spring documents, in devastating detail, the EPA's corruption and misuse of science and public trust. In its half-century of existence, the agency has repeatedly reinforced the chemical-industrial complex by endorsing deadly chemicals, botching field investigations, turning a blind eye to toxic disasters, and swallowing the self-serving claims of industry. E. G. Vallianatos, who saw the EPA from the inside for more than two decades with rising dismay, reveals in Poison Spring how the agency has allowed our lands and waters to be poisoned with more toxic chemicals than ever. No one who cares for the natural world, or for the health of future generations, can ignore this powerful exposé.

About this title

About the Author:

E. G. Vallianatos worked for the Environmental Protection Agency for twenty-five years, and is the author of six books, including Harvest of Devastation and This Land is Their Land. He has written for Alternet.org, Truth-Out.org, and the Huffington Post. He now lives in Claremont, California. McKay Jenkins is an acclaimed environmental journalist and the author of What's Gotten Into Us? Staying Healthy in a Toxic World. Jenkins is the Cornelius Professor of English, Journalism, and Environmental Humanities at the University of Delaware.

From Booklist:

*Starred Review* Two outstanding environmental writers team up to tell the excoriating story of catastrophic collusion between the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the chemical industry. Vallianatos worked for the EPA from 1979 to 2004 and witnessed the systematic undermining of the agency’s mission to set standards for environmental and health safety by major chemical manufacturers whose ruthless lobbying strategies were as insidious as the ecologically disastrous pesticides they aggressively promoted and brazenly misused. The title of this jaw-dropping exposé is a riff on Rachel Carson’s 1963 landmark protest of the use of DDT, Silent Spring. The carefully documented crimes and betrayals Poison Spring reveals unfold on two fronts. Most alarming are the harrowing facts about the thousands of deadly synthetic chemicals that have for decades been released into the biosphere and which we continually absorb, from dioxin to agrochemical nerve gas to the weed killer Roundup. Vallianatos and Jenkins explain the science behind these poisons and their many dire effects, from cancer to the death of honeybee colonies. Equally appalling is the silencing of heroic EPA whistle-­blowers, fraudulent scientific studies, and the hijacking of the democratic process. In this riveting indictment, Vallianatos and Jenkins valiantly divulge the blinding greed and unfathomable stupidity behind these unconscionable lies and travesties—assaults against the very fabric of life. A resounding call for genuine and sustained environmental responsibility. --Donna Seaman

About this edition

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Press
• Publication date: 2015
• ISBN 10: 1608199266
• ISBN 13: 9781608199266
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 304