Jellyfish aren't the reason U.S. beaches are being closed — it's sewage, and legislation in the Senate and House seeks to ensure that people know when sewage is in their water.

According to a Sept. 5 Government Accountability Office (GAO) report, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) second program to test and clean building interiors contaminated by toxins from the World Trade Center (WTC) collapse was a virtual failure. The program's problems stemmed from EPA's inadequate public notification and refusal to listen to its own science experts. The GAO report also indicated that EPA was reluctant to accept cleanup responsibility according to expert recommendations. The result was a limited program grossly underutilized by the public.

The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee voted 10-9 to approve the Toxic Right-to-Know Protection Act (S. 595) on July 31. The act would reverse a December 2006 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency rule change to the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) that significantly reduced toxic release reporting requirements for polluting facilities.

Three documents released since July 26, and a recent public hearing, highlighted the difficulties of promoting promising new nanotechnologies, protecting public health and safety, and safely disposing of waste products from their use and manufacturing. Nanotechnology involves manipulating matter the size of one-billionth of a meter or 100,000 times smaller than the width of a human hair. In 2005, more than $30 billion in nanotechnology products were sold globally, according to the Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies (PEN) at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.