Category: Research

EPA was recently featured in the year end issue of Art in America Magazine with a piece written by Stephen Zacks called Other Voices, Other Worlds exploring emerging ideas about ecology and the Anthropocene. Read article here

EPA is featured in the first episode of the podcast Data Remediations co-organized by Bethany Wiggin and Patricia Kim and others at The Penn Program in the Environmental Humanities! Data Remediations is a podcast meant to get you to think about how we can “remediate” quantitative measures of our rapidly changing planet, translating them into stories and art to stir hearts and minds—and to promote #ClimateAction.

Listen to the Episode Here

The EPA team went to Philadelphia this past week to begin research for our Ecotopian Fellowship project at UPenn in collaboration with Professor Bethany Wiggins. Starting at the banks of the Fairmount Waterworks we began to explore several sites including a small park at Forgotten Bottom, and a new park area south of Bertram Gardens. Thanks to collaborator Thomas Choinacky for all the tour guiding!

Dearest friends,

We write to you in the wake of the resignation of US EPA administrator Scott Pruitt. While the plant experts at the Department of Weedy Affairs welcome Pruitt’s departure, they are equally concerned with the interim appointment of Andrew Wheeler. A former coal lobbyist for Murray Energy who has spent his career representing the fossil fuel industry, Wheeler also worked directly with James Inhofe (R-Okla), arguably one of the biggest climate change deniers in the Senate’s history. Wheeler is expected to not only continue the unprecedented rollbacks and reversals of environmental protections that began under Pruitt (see what’s changed since 2017) but may also prove even more dangerous (see resources below).

In this time of transition we look to the wisdom of the weeds. As we write, Mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris), who’s been nominated to the Science Advisory Board, is taking root in the front lawn of the US EPA Headquarters in Washington DC. Since June 15th they’ve been extending rhizomatic networks and cultivating interspecies alliances to resist the dangerous changes underway (Watch the EPA meets EPA Video). Like Wheeler, The Department of Weedy Affair’s Herbicide Branch Chief, Horseweed (Erigeron canadensis) is also prepared — strong, grounded, rising and making decisions in its vertical dimension with clarity and precision despite compacted soils.

We have also reactivated the web platform OnBehalfOf.Life to encourage the submission of public comments on behalf of local plant experts in the Bronx in response to a newly proposed rule, “Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science.” Despite the deceptively benign title, this new rule will prevent vital forms of public research from being carried out by US EPA officials, weaken the role of science in the development of environmental policy, and open the door for corporate and private interests to conduct misleading research with severe consequences for human and more than human health.

We invite you to draft a comment by listening to a local plant expert. Go for a walk to find the plant. Listen, move, and allow your writing to be truly imaginative, poetic and scientific by entangling the plant’s voice with your voice. Consider what a plant would say about this new rule.

Finally, while we expect things at the US EPA to worsen, the Environmental Performance Agency continues to find strength, gratitude and inspiration from weedy plants and multispecies networks all around us. Every hour of every day, the weeds remain persistent, scratchy, sensual and they continue to show up. If you want to truly resist, listen to the weeds, let them be your guide, and we’ll see you in streets.

In weedy solidarity,
The EPA team

Resources and Info about Andrew Wheeler

• EPA Press Release on Andrew Wheeler
• New Yorker: Scott Pruitt Is Gone, But The Trump Administration’s Climate Negligence Remains
• The Verge: The EPA’s deputy chief may be an even bigger threat to the environment than Scott Pruitt
• NY Times: How Andrew Wheeler, the New Acting E.P.A. Chief, Differs From Scott Pruitt
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• The Hill: Andrew Wheeler has the potential to be even more dangerous than Scott Pruitt
• Chicago Tribune: EPA’s acting administrator has long lobbying record on issues before the agency

The EPA’s exhibition at Transformer in Washington DC was recently featured in a Vice Article by Claire Voon. To read the full article click here.

Thanks to the Washington City Paper for featuring the EPA’s latest project The Department of Weedy Affairs.

“Of course, the point is to say that ours is the timeline that’s gone crazy, where elected officials have deleted all reference of climate change from official government platforms and rolled back dozens of common-sense standards for safeguarding our water and air. A good protest show might have made the point through biting satire. But Department of Weedy Affairs is rather joyful—or rather, it feels normal. The project imagines a nation that values and protects marginal ecosystems, which is to say, one that prioritizes environmental justice. A country in which this work is not just performed, but one in which it is boring—another given, like death and taxes.”

To read the full article visit:
At Transformer, a Solid Artistic Argument That We Should Replace EPA Leaders With Actual Weeds, by Kriston Capps. Washington City Paper (May 24, 2018).

The Environmental Performance Agency is excited to work with The Penn Program in Environmental Humanities (PPEH) on their Ecotopian Toolkit initiative to explore the complexity of urban waters and “what it might mean to face contemporary ecological challenges with critically attuned and creatively oriented tools.” As 2018 fellows, EPA will be developing a project called, Embodied Scientist Parkour: A series of site-specific scores for practicing multi-species research and being in a world beyond human. Stay tuned for more details and updates on upcoming workshops and events in Philadelphia!

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