conservation

After the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced Monday it is redefining the scope of the nation’s bedrock clean water law to limit the wetlands it protects from pollution and destruction, environmental groups are urging Illinois legislators to establish safeguards. The state has already lost 90% of its original wetlands to urban development and agriculture. The Trump administration’s action builds […]

Illinois Environmental Council policy manager Cate Caldwell explains how the rollback weakens the Clean Water Act and why advocates are pushing for new state-level protections. A live look at what happened today, what’s happening now, and what’s coming tonight—no script, just real news Watch to the full video here.

Illinois is home to more than 220 data centers, but each one needs a lot of water to operate and cool its systems. Illinois has been a leader in the data center boom, but those centers use up tons of water from sources local communities rely on for drinking water. Advocate groups that work on

Computing facilities require lots of water to operate, putting the burden of allocating resources on municipalities. “We are concerned about the planning of the explosion of data centers, and if these far-out suburbs are actually accounting for that,” said Iyana Simba, city government affairs director for the Illinois Environmental Council. “How much of that was