Environmental Law
Environmental Health Legislation Database
The National Conference of State Legislatures offers a free database for finding legislation and current law on environmental health issues from all 50 states. Coverage extends back to 2000 and topics include indoor air quality, pesticides, lead, asbestos and others. You can search by keyword or other criteria. The information provided includes the state, bill number, sponsor, status, date of last action and description.
The Environmental Protection Agency reports on the status of air quality and air pollutant emissions. This Web page indexes air trends reports from 1994 to present. Reports are annual and consist of a summary, as well as various specialty reports. Special coverage varies from year to year. Some of the reports are available in PDF.
AIRData provides air pollution summaries from three EPA databases -- Aerometric Information Retrieval System (air monitoring data), National Emission Trends (estimates of annual emissions of criteria air pollutants), and National Toxics Inventory (estimates of annual emissions of hazardous air pollutants).
American Planning Association (APA) is a non-profit public interest and research organization committed to urban, suburban, regional and rural planning. The Web site provides extensive information about the organization and its affiliate, the American Institute of Certified Planners. You will find news, including articles and reports on its role in natural disaster recovery, an education center for information about degrees and standards, jobs, conferences and workshops.
Researchers and legal professionals will find much substantive free information here. There are APA amicus briefs, articles, a bimonthly e-newsletter on federal legislative and public policy issues, policy guides, news and information on eminent domain legislation, article abstracts from professional publications and more.
Cambridge Scientific Abstracts
Esteemed abstracting and indexing service Cambridge Scientific Abstracts (CSA) offers its database of bibliographic citations of scientific literature as well as several reports on various "hot topics." CSA's hot topics series covers several issues relating to biomedical, environmental, life, and materials sciences. Each report offers information about current issues as well as key abstracted citations and Web sites. This portion of the service appears to be free.
Access to CAS's Internet Database Service requires a subscription. CAS, however, makes an older portion of the database available for searching free of charge. This requires registration.
The fee-based service includes access to databases like AGRICOLA (agricultural sciences), Conference Papers Index, Environmental Sciences & Pollution Management, GeoRef (geological sciences), International Pharmaceutical Sciences, NTIS (technical reports), PsycINFO, WasteInfo (waste management), and more. It also provides access to electronic journals published by CAS.
Searchers may query more than one database simultaneously, deliver search results electronically, set up email alerts for ongoing research, and request full-text articles via interlibrary loan. The later may require membership with participating libraries.
Canadian Institute for Environmental Law and Policy
An independent, not-for-profit research and educational organization, the Canadian Institute for Environmental Law and Policy provides information about Canadian environmental legislation and legal issues. Find guides and other publications on topics like biotechnology, the National Pollutant Release Inventory, environmental mining law, drinking water standards and more. Many of the materials are available in English and French.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) pulls together information on environmental health issues from its Web site. Find featured reports and events, collections of documents by subject and statistical resources. Topics include air quality, bioterrorism, cancer clusters, chemical weapons, food safety, hazardous waste, lead poisoning, water quality and more. The information is arranged so that it is easy to browse.
Clean Water Act Jurisdictional Handbook
The Environmental Law Institute (ELI) has published a new handbook that explains the Clean Water Act in light of the recent Supreme Court ruling in Rapanos v. United States.
From the publisher: "The ELI Handbook lays out the various tests for Clean Water Act coverage under current law. Additionally, the Handbook brings science to bear on the question of determining CWA coverage for certain categories of wetlands and streams, in a way that no other publication to date has attempted."
It is available as a free PDF download.
Use the navigational menu on the left to find this section of the EPA Office of Pesticide Program's Web site. It contains indexes of cleared science reviews. Cleared science reviews contain information about pesticide studies, including toxicology, environmental fate and groundwater, ecological effects, and product chemistry. They are "cleared" of confidential business information. Select a chemical name to find an index of documents available under the Freedom of Information Act.
The Technology Innovation Office of the Environmental Protection Agency offers this site about hazardous waste clean-up. It features information about treatment technologies as well as technologies for characterizing contaminated soil and monitoring clean-up efforts. It provides educational, policy and guidance materials, regulatory information, and publications including videos, Internet seminars, and Webcasts.
County of Sacramento (California) Food Safety Inspections
The County of Sacramento, California, offers a food safety inspections database. Search by facility name or location to find the inspection reports. The database supports partial name searching. Information provided includes the name and address of the food facility, identification of any major violations, date of the last inspection or re-inspection and the period of closure (if applicable.) In addition, the food inspection report itself is available (in Adobe Acrobat format) for most inspections since July 1, 2002.
CROETweb: Workplace Safety and Health Resources
The Center for Research on Occupational and Environmental Toxicology at Oregon Health & Science University offers this portal to substantive information about occupational health and safety. Drill down by subject, or search the site, to find educational materials, articles, fact sheets, Q & A's, and more. Subjects include certain occupations and industries, chemicals, specific safety issues, and more.
Digest of Federal Resource Laws
The Digest provides a comprehensive list and description of all federal laws under which the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service functions; including Administrative Laws, Treaties, Executive Orders, Interstate Compacts and Memoranda of Agreement
Operated jointly by the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), ECOLEX provides access to environmental law documents worldwide. Find treaties, international soft-law and other non-binding policy and technical guidance documents, national legislation, judicial decisions and law and policy literature. Search results provide abstracted bibliographic information about these documents.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) provides this database containing single chemical toxicity information for aquatic and terrestrial life. Data comes primarily from primary source materials and consists of information on the species, chemical, test methods, and results presented by the author. The database also contains test results compiled by U.S. and international government agencies.
A quick query feature enables searching by species, chemical, or toxicological effect. It provides laboratory data and bibliographic references. An advanced query feature lets you narrow your query by data compiled by certain government entities, publication year, test conditions, or other factors.
EHP (Environmental Health Perspectives) Online
The Public Health Service, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health and National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) publish this peer-reviewed open access journal on environmental health issues. Find abstracts and full-text articles as well as mini-monographs or small collections of manuscripts that address a specific topic. The manuscripts sometimes include original research. Full-text articles are available in HTML or PDF.
The Environmental Law Alliance Worldwide provides training and resources for lawyers and scientists in 60 countries, who advocate for a healthier environment. Find news about eLAW partners, including E-Bulletin, which consists of electronic notices of breaking news, and E-LAW Advocate, a quarterly newsletter about the organization's work. Also find an extensive collection of resources arranged by subject or region. The collection includes full-text case law from countries around the world, statutes and regulations, publications and more. Topics include agriculture, air pollution, animal welfare, biotechnology, cleanup of contaminated sites, climate change, food safety, groundwater, industrial pollution, international treaties, procedural issues, recycling, and more.
The Department of Energy, in conjunction with other agencies and the U.S. Government Printing Office, offers this database of bibliographic information about energy and energy-related articles, reports, conference papers, books, dissertations and other publications. Database coverage extends back to 1948. The advanced search template offers numerous ways in which to query the database, including by keyword, author, title and research or sponsoring organization. If the full-text of a document is available on the Web, the database provides location information.
Enforcement and Compliance History Online (ECHO)
The Environmental Protection Agency offers this utility for finding federal or state enforcement actions, inspections and violations. Search by facility name or location to find permits and identifiers, information about the facility, inspection and enforcement data, inspection and compliance history, formal enforcement actions, and more.
Envirofacts: Information Collection Rule
This EPA site reports on data collected "as part of a national research project to support development of national drinking water standards." It offers information about pathogens in drinking water sources, indicators of fecal contamination, disinfectants and disinfection byproducts and the effectiveness of treatment technologies.
The Environment News Service covers environment-related news stories worldwide. The site maintains a three-month index and permits simple keyword searching. For more in-depth research, search the Environment News Service via Dow Jones/Factiva.
Environmental Contaminants Encyclopedia
Summarized and compiled by the National Parks Service, this resource provides information about environmental contaminants. Covering 118 chemical substances, the encyclopedia offers classification information, general toxicity information, carcinogenicity and genotoxicity information, bioconcentration and environmental fate data, synonyms, associated chemicals and more. This resource has a search engine, but it's difficult to find.
The Environmental Fate Database, hosted by Syracuse Research Corporation -- a non-profit independent research and development firm) providing science and technology consulting services to government agencies -- serves as a gateway to several chemistry and toxicology databases. DATALOG contains environmental fate data (from Chemical Abstract Service (CAS)) for over over 16,800 chemicals. CHEMFATE contains environmental fate and physical/chemical property information on commercially important chemical compounds. BIOLOG provides sources of microbial toxicity and biodegradation data on over 8,000 chemicals. Like CHEMFATE, BIODEG contains experimental values, but for biodegradation subjects. The project receives funding from the EPA, DuPont, and Proctor & Gamble.
Environmental Law and Policy Center (ELPC), The
A Midwest environmental advocacy organization, ELPC provides news and information about land use, clean air and other environmental issues. It sponsors a number of listservs on issues of particular interest to residents of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio and Wisconsin. It also provides full-text publications, as well as tips on ecology issues.
Attorney David S. Blackmar created this resource on environmental law, which is now maintained by the law firm Murtha Cullina LLP. Find daily news covering environmental legal issues, articles, and collections of links to environmental laws and regulations, court and agency decisions, agency databases, compliance resources, and more.
EPA Applicability Determination Index
The EPA Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurances (OECA) maintains this database containing guidance memoranda on applicability and compliance issues. Determinations involve the New Source Performance Standards (NSPS), National Emissions Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants, chlorofluorocarbons, asbestos and woodstoves. You can search by a variety of criteria including keywords. The results display the full-text of the determination.
EPA Report an Environmental Violation
2 March 2006. This online form facilitates filing a complaint about an alleged environmental violation. An accompanying brochure highlights signs of environmental trouble and environmental crimes. Complaints may be filed anonymously.
EPA Substance Registry System (SRS)
Replacing the Chemical Registry System (CRS), this EPA database provides information on chemical substances and how they are represented in EPA regulations and data systems. Search by chemical name Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) registry number, Taxonomic Serial Number (TSN), International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV) database identifier, or other identifier, to find basic chemical information, synonyms, applicable regulations, and more. You can also download chemical data sheets.
The Environmental Protection Agency provides this interface for accessing the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI). The TRI contains data on releases and transfers of certain toxic chemicals from industrial facilities. The TRI Explorer enables searching the most current data for information about chemical disposals or releases in certain geographic areas or industries. Another feature provides state fact sheets, which offer an overview of the current data as it pertains to specific states.
Energy Technology Data Exchange, of the International Energy Agency, offers a database of over 700,000 bibliographic records and full-text documents pertaining to "the environmental impact of energy production and use." Coverage includes scientific journal articles and conference reports and other gray literature from 1995.
Users must register to access the database, but registration is free. It is NOT immediate, though. In the U.S., allow about 24 hours for activation. The database offers both simple and advanced search features. The advanced feature provides for searching ALL the fields of a record as well as limiting and sorting by publication date.
European Environmental Law Cases Database
European Environmental Law offers a database containing "the full text of the most relevant decisions, including those delivered by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) and the Court of First Instance (CFI), the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the World Trade Organisation (WTO), the International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea (ITLOS), and some national courts." You can search the database by keyword, case number, parties, decision date, or environmental sector. The cases I retrieved appeared in full-text in English and with a note indicating the original language of the case.
European Pollutant Emission Register
The European Commission offers this database of information about the biggest industrial polluters. The database covers the 15 member states as well as Norway and Hungary, and includes information current through 2001. You can search by a variety of criteria, but unless you use wildcards (*), searching is exact. Site documentation recommends right- and left-side truncation (e.g., *bayer*). Record details include company name, location, pollutants, emissions and satellite images (select records at this time).
Several academic institutions join to provide information pertaining to pesticide toxicology and environmental chemistry. Visitors will find a newsletter (published irregularly by the University of California, Davis), pesticide information profiles, toxicology information briefs, factsheets, news, and other information. The site offers a search engine for finding references within each of these resources.
Tall Timbers Research Station in Tallahassee, Florida offers a database of literature pertaining to wildfires. It contains bibliographic references to a broad range of publications from countries around the world. The majority of literature, however, comes from North American, and in particular, the southeastern United States. Many references include abstracts. The site also offers a thesaurus that you can browse to find references by subject. By installing additional software, you can download the results of a query.
Fire Research Information Services
The Building and Fire Research Laboratory (BFRL) of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) offers a collection of fire resources -- including a bibliographic database dubbed FIREDOC -- for fire protection engineers, scientists, and fire service personnel. FIREDOC contains bibliographic information about the resources available from the Fire Research Information Services. These include published reports, journal articles, conference proceedings, books, and audiovisual materials. After registering (by phone) to use the database, searchers may also order documents it references. Registration is not required to search the database.
Other resources at this Web site include a collection of online documents (free) published roughly from 1993 forward, a collection of links to related external resources, and links to other BFRL information sources.
Geographic Names Information System (GNIS)
The U.S. Geological Survey offers two GNIS databases: one for the United States and one for Antarctica. It provides geographic information about places. Discover the federally recognized name of a feature or location, its elevation, state and county, longitude and latitude, and more.
Hazardous Substances Data Bank
A subset of the National Library of Medicine's Toxicology Data Network (TOXNET), the database contains information about the toxicology of potentially hazardous chemicals. It includes information on human exposure, industrial hygiene, emergency handling procedures, environmental fate, regulatory requirements, and more. Search by keyword, chemical name or CAS number.
Written by Dr. Jay A. Brown, Haz-Map provides occupational health information for health and safety professionals, as well as for consumers. You may search the publication, or browse it by hazardous agent, occupational disease or type of high risk job. It provides information about chemicals and their health effects. Many entries have cross-references to related information. You can also highlight a term and search it in TOXNET, the National Library of Medicine's collection of databases on toxicology and hazardous chemicals. Haz-Map is also available in CD-ROM.
The National Library of Medicine (NLM) provides a collection of resources on indoor air quality. It covers sources providing an overview of issues and concerns, sources offering regulatory information, sources for specific chemicals, automatic PubMed queries, links to related organizations and links to sources providing information in Spanish. One of the attractions of NLM collections is the focus on government and other authoritative sources.
International Environmental Law and Policy
Designed to supplement the multi-volume West publication by the same name, this site provides annotated resources by book chapter, links to treaties, links to major United Nations institutions, agencies, programs, and organizations, links to news stories for current information, and more.
IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, The
The International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources-The World Conservation Union offers it Red List of "taxonomic, conservation status and distribution information on taxa that have been evaluated using the IUCN Red List Categories" as a database. Search by keyword, Red List category, country, region, or marine-region.
Justia Environmental Law Overview
Provides an overview of environmental law, including links to other web resources on the topic.
Appearing in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's MMWR, this report provides information on how to limit exposure to mold and how to identify and prevent mold-related health effects. It offers a detailed definition of mold as well as guidelines for assessing exposure, clean-up and prevention.
National Geologic Map Database
The U.S. Geological Survey offers a database of bibliographic information about paper and digital geologic maps, a search tool for lithologic and geochronologic unit names (GEOLEX), and a database of Geologic Mapping in Progress. Information includes where to find or order the text of citations appearing in the database. Searchers may query the first database using a number of search criteria.
The Web site for this interagency program offers much information of potential value to legal and environmental researchers. Find information about the status of chemical agents tested by the NTP, chemical health and safety, abstracts of toxicology and carcinogenesis studies, and more.
NRC Oil and Chemical Spills Database
The National Response Center (NRC) enables searching for information about oil and chemical spills nationwide. Coverage appears to be from the mid-1980s to present, although site documentation indicates that you can download annual data beginning in 1982 for off line viewing. Search by a variety of criteria, including the incident date, location or responsible company, to find matching reports. Reports include a description of the incident, the party suspected as responsible for the incident, the location, the materials released and more. Two separate report options exist--standard and drill--with no clear distinction between the two. Sample searches generated different results.
The National Water Information System (NWIS) by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) offers 100 years of historical and real-time water data. Create your own data tables in order to evaluate current water supplies or water quality. Coverage includes surface water, ground water and water quality.
The Office of Compliance and Enforcement of the Environmental Protection Agency makes available news summaries about recent enforcement or compliance cases or settlements. In addition to the summaries, you will find related documents, such as press releases, consent decrees and complaints. You may search the documents by keyword, or sort the list by date or relevant statute.
Official Federal Land Patent Records Site, The
The Bureau of Land Management provides information about public land transfers. The database covers federal land title records for eastern Public Land States issued between 1820 and 1908 as well as land titles issued between 1908 and the mid-1960's. It does not cover the thirteen colonies, territories and a few other states. Search by state and name, or by a number of other criteria. The database returns the land accession or serial patent number, state, patentee name, tribe (if Indian land), issue date, U.S. or mineral reservations, authority (law under which the government issued the land), number of acres, land office and other information. It also provides a legal land description, images of the land patent in various formats and certified copies.
ESRI, maker of geographic information system (GIS) and mapping software, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) team to provide maps that show hazard areas. Select a city/state and type of hazard (e.g., flood, earthquake, tornado, etc.) to retrieve a hazard map.
Find a report by the Climate Change Science Program and the Subcommittee on Global Change Research. Issued as a Supplement to the President's Fiscal Year 2004 and 2005 budgets and submitted to Congress, it "highlights recent research accomplishments and plans for future research necessary to manage the risks and opportunities of changes in climate and related environmental systems."
Reed Business, the business to business division of Reed Elsevier Group PLC, sponsors this Web site, which complements the print magazine, Packaging Digest. It provides full-text articles and full-text archives back to January 1996 as well as a free full-text news feed on packaging issues from LexisNexis. The home page contains a lot of clutter, but those looking for product reviews and information about packaging or recycling will find useful information here.
The Pesticide Action Network North America offers this database of toxicity, ecotoxicity, and regulatory information for about 5,100 pesticides. Search by chemical name, CAS number, EPA PC Code or CA DPR Chem Code. You can then narrow a search by use type (e.g., insecticide, herbicide, etc.), human toxicity (e.g., bad actor chemical, carcinogen, etc.), regulatory category (e.g., EPA registered, etc.), or chemical classification. You may also query the later categories separately to find, for example, all known carcinogens registered by the EPA.
The database returns a chart containing all matches. The chart includes all the above information about matching chemicals. Click on a chemical name in the search results to find additional data including synonyms, links to information about the chemical in other resources including ChemFinder, TOXNET, Scorecard (Environmental Defense Fund), International Chemical Safety Cards (National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health), and Hazardous Substance Fact Sheets (New Jersey Dept. of Health and Senior Services), detailed human toxicity information, regulatory information, aquatic ecotoxicity, and a list of related chemicals.
Site documentation promises soon to improve the database to enable searching by product name, registration status, or manufacturer, and to add pesticide use information for California by crop, chemical, and geographic region.
The EPA Office of Solid Waste (OSW) offers this database of letters, memoranda, publications, and other commentary. The documents represent EPA "interpretations of the RCRA regulations governing the management of solid, hazardous, and medical waste." Document sources include OSW correspondence letters and memoranda, RCRA Permit Policy Compendium guidance documents, and Monthly Call Center Report Q&As. Search by pre-established topic or a variety of other criteria. Bibliographic records link to full-text documents.
Regulatory Environmental Modeling
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) offers a database and draft guidance on the use of research models. The "Draft Guidance on the Development, Evaluation, and Application of Regulatory Environmental Models" recommends best practices to determine when a model can best be employed to inform environmental decision making. The Models Knowledge Base contains information on the use, development, validation and assessment of agency models. You can browse the database or search it by keyword. There is also a modeling glossary and library of related documents.
Right to Know Hazardous Substance Fact Sheets
The New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services offers hazardous substance fact sheets for numerous chemicals. The "summar[ies describe] the possible routes of entry of the chemical into the body and the major health effects that may result from exposure. Hazardous Substance Fact Sheets are primarily prepared for workers who handle a specific substance."
The Right-to-Know Network provides access to numerous environmental and other databases. Most recently, it offers access to summary risk management plans as reported by companies to the EPA. Also available are the Toxics Release Inventory, CERCLIS, docket information from civil cases filed by the Department of Justice on environmental matters, accidental releases, and more.
Safe Drinking Water Information System (SDWIS)
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) provides this database containing information about public water systems and violations of EPA drinking water regulations. The violation history covers 1993 to present. Search by location or water system identification number. General information provided includes the name of the water system, county served, population served, water source, system status and identification number. Violation details include the type of violation (health or reporting violation), significance, occurrence dates, contaminant and violation code.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) offers a database of scientific and technical documents, including risk assessments, technical studies and guidance. It covers topics like aging initiative, contaminated sediments, ecological assessment tools, genomics, tribal science, children's health, cumulative risk, environmental justice and non-indigenous species. Search by keyword to find descriptions of research activities and documents. Each description includes contact information for someone at the EPA associated with the project. You can also browse the database by EPA region.
Elsevier offers this search engine devoted to finding scientific information. Powered by FAST (alltheweb.com), Scirus collects, indexes, and retrieves information pertaining to agricultural and biological sciences, biosciences, chemistry, Earth and planetary sciences, environmental sciences, life sciences, medicine, pharmacology, social and behavioral sciences, and more.
Using the simple search feature on the home page, searchers may enter a phrase, or string several words together with the Boolean "and," and limit the search to a particular field of science. The advanced search page offers more options including the ability to limit a query so that it retrieves articles only. From the results list, searchers also may select "more like this result" to retrieve items similar to one on the hit list.
Because the engine also indexes information from fee-based subscription services, searchers will find peer-reviewed journal articles. Retrieving these articles (called Membership Sources) requires a subscription to Science Direct.
The Environmental Defense Fund offers this resource for discovering major pollutants by geographic location or company name.
Sector Facility Indexing Project
This EPA database offers environmental data on several industries including petroleum refining, iron and steel, primary smelting and refining of nonferrous metals, pulp manufacturing, and automobile assembly. Within the database are statistics and other data about specific companies.
Superfund 20th Anniversary Report
Subtitled "20 Years of Protecting Human Health and the Environment," this EPA report provides an historic overview of the Superfund program and highlights its achievements. The report includes summaries of the responsibilities of federal agencies that work with the EPA as well as a timeline that marks major events from 1976 to 2000.
Find out which companies appear on the National Priorities List (NPL). Locate current CERCLIS or RODS information. Obtain site reports and more.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) offers a dictionary of definitions of environmental terms. Also available is a list of abbreviations and acronyms.
The Microsoft TerraServer provides interactive maps and aerial photographs from the U.S. Geological Survey. Search for a place (e.g., philadelphia, pa) to retrieve a list of initial maps and photos for your interactive session. You can refine the maps and photos by clicking them. When you do this, the service may retrieve another map or photo. You will know when the image source changes because TerraServer provides this information at the top of the map or photo.
Search for USGS topographic maps by place name (warning: do not abbreviate and search broadly; e.g., search philadelphia rather than philadelphia, pennsylvania) or latitude and longitude. The site offers some interactive features that enable re-positioning or enlarging maps.
Toxicological Profile Information Sheet
The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) offers toxicological profiles for hazardous substances found at National Priorities List (NPL) sites. Profiles appear in draft and final form. They provide a public health statement and include health effects and chemical and physical information, as well as, information about production, import, use, and disposal, potential for human exposure, analytical methods, regulations and advisories, and more.
The National Library of Medicine maintains this interactive Web site, which reveals the location and amount of certain toxic chemicals released into the environment. TOXMAP shows the geographic distribution of chemical releases, their relative amounts and trends over time. The release data comes from industrial facilities around the United States, as reported annually to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
The National Library of Medicine offers this group of databases devoted to toxicology, hazardous chemicals and related information.
U.S. Global Change Research Program
"The U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) supports research on the interactions of natural and human-induced changes in the global environment and their implications for society. The USGCRP began as a presidential initiative in 1989 and was codified by Congress in the Global Change Research Act of 1990 (P.L. 101-606), which mandates development of a coordinated interagency research program." The Web site provides information about topics relevant to global changes, such as atmospheric composition, climate variability, the global carbon cycle, the global water cycle, ecosystems, land use, and human contributions.
The Border 2012 Program is a binational 10-year initiative focused on making measurable improvements in environmental quality and health along the U.S.-Mexico border. The Web site offers information about the program, related news and events as well as publications and progress reports. There is also a program directory of contact information.
Virginia Department of Health Restaurant Inspection Website
Virginia Department of Health provides a link page for finding inspection reports pertaining to restaurants, fast food operations, delis, cafeterias, and other types of food service establishments inspected by local health departments. First, select the relevant county from the left-hand menu. Then drill down the alphabet to find the food service of interest.
Virtual Technical Reports Center
Hosted by the University of Maryland, the Virtual Technical Reports Center provides links to technical reports available either in full-text or as searchable abstracts. Documents available via this extensive index include technical reports, preprints, reprints, dissertations, theses, and research reports. Topics vary, and include the sciences, conservation and environmental law, business, and economics.
Washington Local Restaurant Inspections
Washington State Department of Health provides a page of links to county food safety/restaurant inspection databases. Restaurant health inspection reports are public record in Washington. The Web site explains that the public may review inspection reports on-site at the relevant local county office. But a handful of Washington counties also make the reports available online.
Water Quality Information Center
The Water Quality Information Center at the National Agricultural Library offers several databases and resources pertaining to water and agriculture. Find, for example, the Database of Online Documents Covering Water and Agriculture (electronic publications of several federal agencies), AgNIC (Internet-accessible resources selected by the National Agricultural Library), Selected Water-Resources Abstracts (abstracts of about 10,000 water resources published since 1977), Water Expert Directory (water professionals), and more.
Where To Find Material Safety Data Sheets on the Internet
Interactive Learning Paradigms, Incorporated, a company offering web-based distance learning and certification, sponsors this comprehensive research guide on material safety data sheets (MSDS).
The guide not only points to more than 60 Internet sites offering free access to MSDS, it provides information about resources not available via Internet.
Wildlife and Contaminants Online
Formerly a single database sponsored by the U.S. Geological Survey and entitled Contaminant Exposure and Effects (CEETV), this resource now comprises the database and two utilities. CEETV provides information about contaminant exposure and effects for terrestrial vertebrates (birds, mammals, amphibians and reptiles) that reside in estuarine and coastal habitats along the Atlantic, Gulf, Pacific, Alaskan and Hawaiian coastal regions. A second component of the site offers information about biological and ecotoxicological characteristics of birds, reptiles, mammals and amphibians. Another section lets you rank terrestrial vertebrates by their susceptibility to specific contaminants.
The EPA offers this interactive tool, current in beta, for finding federal, state, and local information about environmental conditions in your area. The beta release covers EPA Region 3, or Delaware, District of Columbia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia.
To begin, enter your zip code or city/state. The site then presents you with a map you can manipulate as well as local and environmental information. Find local information like zip codes, population, and congressional districts and environmental information like watersheds and number of facilities reporting to the EPA. Clicking the Your Environment tab presents easy links to information about the area's air quality, facilities that handle hazardous waste, superfund sites, and drinking water quality.
