Maria Martinez and her husband and three sons live in a colorful stucco home in a subsidized housing development near San Diego Bay. But as soon as she steps outside, Martinez and her neighbors are confronted with an onslaught of environmental health hazards.
Journalist Kari Lydersen examines the environmental health impacts of a large oil refinery's expansion to process tar sands oil.
BP owns the century-old Standard Oil refinery, the largest in the United States. Residents of the Whiting, Ind., area are especially concerned about their health now that the refinery is undergoing a large expansion to process more Canadian tar sands oil by 2013.
When the Chicago City Council last week passed an ordinance to reduce emissions from construction equipment working on city jobs, it touched on a larger problem: harmful amounts of diesel exhaust in the city. Journalist Kari Lydersen found troubling emission levels in some neighborhoods.