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Dec. 19, 2025

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Arctic Warming Is Turning Alaska’s Rivers Red With Toxic Runoff NY Times, Dec. 16, 2025 A yearly checkup on the region documents a warmer, rainier Arctic and 200 Alaskan rivers “rusting” as melting tundra leaches minerals from the soil into waterways. Record-setting temperatures and rainfall in the Arctic over the past year sped up the melting of permafrost and washed toxic minerals into more than 200 rivers across northern Alaska, threatening vital salmon runs, according to a report card issued by federal scientists. The report, compiled by dozens of academic and government scientists and coordinated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, documented rapid environmental changes from Norway’s Svalbard Island to the Greenland ice sheet and the tundra of northern Canada and Alaska. Between October 2024 and September 2025, the period from when the ground begins to freeze until the end of summer, surface air temperatures were the warmest on record dating back 125 years, the report found. “The Arctic region has a powerful influence on Earth’s ecosystem as a whole,” said Steve Thur, NOAA’s assistant administrator for research and acting chief scientist. This year’s 153-page Arctic report card is coming out despite a shift at the agency, including a focus on commercial aspects of the ocean, such as deep-sea mining.	The NYC Subway Is Drowning: Here’s How to Save It Washington Post, Dec. 19, 2025 Subway systems around the world are struggling to cope with flooding as the planet warms. As the planet warms, subway systems in places such as London and Tokyo have struggled to cope with floods far beyond what they were originally designed to handle. Stormwater regularly seeps into the subterranean networks, cutting off the transit lines that are their cities’ lifeblood. At least 14 passengers were killed in the Chinese city of Zhengzhou four years ago when floodwaters filled their train tunnel. Few places are more susceptible than New York. The city’s sprawling, century-old subway system was built close to the surface and contains more than 40,000 openings through which water can reach the tracks below. Its vulnerabilities underground are exacerbated by surging moisture in the skies above, a Washington Post analysis shows. The strongest plumes of water vapor the region sees each year — which provide fuel for the most severe storms — are intensifying almost twice as much as the global average. Very heavy rainfall events (producing at least 1.4 inches of rain in a day) have increased about 60 percent since the subway was first built. Yet public transit is also crucial for the fight against rising temperatures, officials say, because it means riders aren’t using cars or trucks that spew planet-warming pollution.	Workers Were Exposed to Toxic Chemicals In Firefighting Foam BBC, Dec. 16, 2025 Dozens of factory workers were exposed to toxic chemicals within firefighting foam over decades, BBC File on 4 Investigates can reveal. Multi-billion-pound US manufacturer, 3M, failed to tell employees at its Swansea site they were using foam containing two forever chemicals, now classed as carcinogenic, despite knowing for decades of the health risks. The company said it would stop manufacturing the forever chemicals – so called because they persist in the environment – in 2002, but failed to remove them from the factory resulting in an environmental accident four years later. 3M said that the health and safety of its workers and their families were "critical priorities" for the company. The factory in Gorseinon, Swansea, opened in 1952 and for decades was 3M's largest outside of the US. It employed more than 1,000 people from across south Wales to manufacture nappy fastenings and video tape. In 2023, 3M made the decision to close the factory and applied for planning permission to redevelop the site. BBC File on 4 Investigates discovered a land contamination report amongst hundreds of documents 3M submitted to the local council - it said the site is polluted with two toxic forever chemicals, PFOS and PFOA.