Washington
Washington paper mills mum about chemical safety after Longview disaster
It’s been two weeks since Washington’s worst industrial accident in nearly a century. More than a half-million gallons of a caustic liquid known as white liquor flooded through the Nippon Dynawave pulp mill in Longview after a storage tank imploded. Eleven people were killed. As the investigations continue, KUOW’s environment reporter John Ryan has been looking into chemical safety at other Washington pulp mills.
This interview has been edited for clarity.
Kim Malcolm: You found three other paper mills in Washington that use the same white liquor chemical stew that killed workers at the Nippon Dynawave mill. Tell us about them.
John Ryan: There are two other mills in Longview. There’s the Smurfit Westrock mill and the North Pacific Paper Company (NORPAC) mill. Then there’s one in Port Townsend called the Port Townsend Paper Company mill. I asked each mill how much white liquor they have, how they store it, and what, if any, safety measures they’ve taken in the wake of the Nippon Dynawave disaster. The Smurfit Westrock mill in Longview declined to comment. The NORPAC and the Port Townsend mills didn’t reply to my requests at all.
How concerned should people living near these mills be about the chemicals there?
The main risk is to workers inside these plants. Even this Nippon Dynawave disaster, the worst in nearly a century, had minimal, I would say, environmental impacts beyond the boundaries of the plant.
There were some fish killed in a ditch outside the Longview plant, but the vast majority of those fish killed were actually introduced or invasive species, so, kind of a small environmental benefit, if you will. But it is hard to say how much of a risk these above-ground tanks of white liquor pose because there’s little information about them.
They’re not very tightly regulated, unlike underground tanks and unlike containers of other types of hazardous materials. I spoke with Marissa Baker, a professor of occupational health and hygiene at the University of Washington:
“The federal or state agencies would not have kind of purview on inspecting, maintaining the tank. Is it structurally sound? Is it being cleaned as it should? That’s going to really fall on the employer.”
While these tanks aren’t tightly regulated, Baker makes the point that our state constitution does require every worker to have a safe workplace, and that was clearly not the case at Nippon Dynawave when multiple workers were killed on the job.
Wouldn’t people in communities like Port Townsend and Longview have the right to know what is being done to keep people and workers safe?
Well, these mills are private businesses, and generally what they do is private information. But when you’re dealing with large amounts of hazardous materials, federal law says the public does have a right to know what’s going on there and what’s being done to keep the community safe.
Once a year, these mills are required to disclose how much hazardous material they have on-hand and how they store it, and they’re supposed to make that information publicly available. You might think this would end up on a website somewhere that anybody could just search for and find, but that’s not the case.
You have to file a public records request to get this information. I did that with the counties and the state to get this information. This morning, Cowlitz County told me they found the records I requested, but they couldn’t send them to me yet. They’re giving the mills two weeks to seek a court order to prohibit disclosure of these records, and that’s even though the federal Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act says those reports must be available to the public. Again, the public does have a right to know.
That Community Right-to-Know Act also requires the mills and local governments to have plans for what to do if they do have a hazardous material spill. The local emergency planning committees in the mill counties are having their first meetings since the Nippon Dynawave disaster coming up very soon. If people want to try to find out more in person, the emergency planning committee for Cowlitz and Wahkiakum counties is meeting tomorrow [Thursday] afternoon. For Port Townsend, in Jefferson County, there’s a meeting in July.
Listen to the interview by clicking the play button above.
Washington
Washington records world’s worst air quality for a city after 850,000 Fourth of July fireworks
Washington DC residents breathed in “unhealthy” air for hours after a 40-minute Independence Day fireworks show over the National Mall on Saturday night, with the country’s capital briefly recording the worst air quality of any major city in the world.
The highly emitting display, which the president called “spectacular”, came as the Trump administration rolls back an unprecedented number of pollution controls.
Hourly concentrations of particulate matter rose to 6.7 times their pre-fireworks levels, according to a Tuesday analysis from the company Clarity Movement based on its network of 26 air quality sensors throughout the city in partnership with the local department of energy and environment. Every one of those sensors reached air quality levels which the Environmental Protection Agency deems “unhealthy for sensitive groups” during the event, the researchers found, with some recording even worse levels of emissions.
Levels of particulate matter peaked at 4am on Sunday, approximately five hours after the display concluded, according to the new analysis. It remained elevated for approximately five hours after reaching its peak, the authors found, with city officials issuing a Code Red alert.
“Outdoor air quality is unhealthy for seniors, kids, people with medical conditions,” the alert said. “General public may experience health issues. Limit time outside.”
The south-west region of DC experienced the highest pollution levels, the report’s authors found, probably because of its proximity to one of the fireworks launch sites in West Potomac park, as well as overnight meteorological conditions that trapped smoke over the area.
That highly polluted air probably drifted into Arlington, Virginia, said David Lu, CEO and co-founder of Clarity Movement.
“Unfortunately, we don’t have sensors there to confirm it,” he said. “That’s exactly why expanding real-time air quality monitoring matters. Without comprehensive coverage, communities can be exposed to significant pollution events that go undetected.”
The air quality across the city could have been even worse in the aftermath of the display if it were not for thunderstorms that struck the city on Sunday evening.
“Despite the scale of the fireworks display, the city’s air quality avoided a worst-case scenario thanks to favorable weather conditions and the timing of the event,” said Lu.
The Fourth of July fireworks show, organized by the Trump-backed non-profit Freedom 250, began at 11pm on Saturday evening. It involved more than 850,000 fireworks launched from 10 sites across the capital, the organizers said. (A typical Independence Day show in DC involves just 17,000 shells.)
Trump on social media called the show “the Most Spectacular Fireworks Show I have ever seen, and I’ve seen them all”.
The fanfare came as the region was baking under an extreme heatwave, which brought triple-digit temperatures to the city hours earlier. For a time after the fireworks show, the city recorded the worst air quality of any major city in the world, according to AirNow, the Environmental Protection Agency website that reports air quality measurements from its monitoring stations.
Asked to comment, a White House spokesperson, Taylor Rogers, said: “It was the largest and greatest firework display in the history of our country to properly celebrate America’s 250th birthday! Every year, fireworks on the Fourth of July cause short-term spikes in air quality across the United States, including Washington, DC. This was not unique to the 250th fireworks celebrations in our nation’s capital.”
The Guardian has contacted Freedom 250 for comment.
Americans shoot nearly 300m lb of fireworks into the atmosphere every year, according to the American Lung Association, letting off lung-harming gases such as sulfur dioxide, carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide.
The Trump administration has, since re-entering office, engaged in a wide-ranging assault on pollution controls, exempting polluting facilities from emissions regulations, boosting coal power, and halting the consideration of the value of lives saved when restricting fine particulate matter and ozone. On 4 July, the president also pardoned nine individuals convicted of violations related to the Clean Air Act, including people found to have tampered with emissions control equipment in cars or selling parts to bypass air pollution standards.
The Washington Commanders are looking for a bounce back performance from their offense, and they’ll need their wide receivers to take a step up to do so.
Terry McLaurin is the clear No. 1 option at the position, but after him, there are several questions about how the rest of the room will shake out. The No. 2 spot is wide open, and there are several players who could fit the role and others in David Blough’s new scheme. Analysts Santana Moss, Logan Paulsen and Fred Smoot broke down the position on one of the most recent “Command Center” podcast episodes, and as one of the franchise’s all-time best receivers, Moss had a few thoughts on the group. Here’s his assessment on three wideouts and how they could fit into the offense.
“Knowing that he can play both outside and inside, I would think with some of the guys and their size and their experience, I would mainly probably see Antonio attack that middle. I think his route running ability is already to the level of some of these guys who have already played at this level. And just showing me that you don’t look like that this is new to you … He ain’t scared to go out and compete against these guys. To me — and we don’t know anything; we’re just sitting here speculating and assuming — I’d say he’s a slot guy out the gate.”
“I think if I had to just say if I look at that paper, and I asked any coach in this building by name how they think this guy played…if you tell me that Burks played well this offseason, he would be my No. 2 out the gate. He would be my No. 2 wide receiver because one: he brings size, he brings speed, he brings a gear at that size that a lot of people ain’t comfortable checking … You got a guy with size, leaping ability, the catch radius and can run.”
“They talk about how he was one of those guys from Day 1 that could play every position, and that’s stemming from him being a quarterback. Quarterbacks learn the game a little different from just a regular skill position guy. Luke came in here, and he knew X, he knew Z, he knew Gator. When you have those intangibles and you have that kind of mindset when it comes to playing that position, they can use him where they want to use him. That’s why I said he’s a great committee guy. He’s a guy that I know I’m gonna have on special teams as a returner, and guess what? If he’s not the starter, I’m okay with that because I know I’m going to ask more of him if somebody needs to take a breather.
WASHINGTON — The Great American State Fair in Washington, D.C., is featuring Georgia among its participating states. The fair had to close for several hours Friday because of the heat, but reopened to visitors.
Georgia’s booth showcases the state’s No. 1 industry: agriculture. The display focuses on peaches, peanuts, Vidalia onions and poultry.
One fairgoer said Georgia’s agricultural offerings were a surprise.
“I was not aware that you did eggs in Georgia. I should have figured that out since Waffle House is pretty much in every town, but that was a learning, and then, of course going along with eggs is chickens,” the attendee said.
All states are represented at the fair, though not all are participating directly.
Copyright 2026 WRDW/WAGT. All rights reserved.
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