Welcome to Clean Water on the Move, your monthly update from Clean Water Action and Clean Water Fund. Take a look at what our amazing staff has been up to and what is coming in the month ahead. Thanks for your ongoing support for our work towards a healthy environment for all.
The Hidden Costs of Beauty
The beauty industry’s glossy exterior hides a troubling reality: Black women and other communities of color face disproportionate exposure to toxic chemicals in personal care products. Our Environmental Justice Organizer, X Braithwaite hosted The Hidden Costs of Beauty webinar, where experts and advocates broke down the environmental and health risks of beauty products marketed to marginalized communities. Watch the webinar here!
From harmful ingredients linked to breast cancer and hormone disruption to the deep ties between Eurocentric beauty standards and consumer behavior, this conversation exposed the urgent need for change.
With the U.S. banning only 11 toxic chemicals in cosmetics—compared to the EU’s 2,400—our communities are left unprotected. Advocacy groups like WE ACT for Environmental Justice and Black Women for Wellness are fighting for policies like the Protecting Against Forever Chemicals Act, demanding safer, more just beauty standards. As one speaker put it, “Safe beauty should be a right, not a luxury.”
Ready to take action? Clean Water Action is launching the Beauty with Impact Working Group to push for legislative change and amplify community voices. Join us in the fight for beauty justice—because protecting our health shouldn’t be optional. Learn more and get involved at Tea on Toxic Beauty.
New Jersey is One Step Closer to Reducing Toxic Packaging Waste
There is an excessive amount of packaging that customers cannot avoid. Packaging comes in many different forms and can be toxic from creation to disposal. Toxics can leach from packaging into our food and drink and micro and nanoparticles can end up in the air we breathe and pollute our environment.
Most packaging is made from paper or plastic, with paper products sometimes lined with plastic. Toxics from plastic have been linked to metabolic disorders and endocrine disruption leading to cancers, diabetes, reduced fertility, impaired brain development, birth defects, and mutations.
We need manufacturers to reduce our exposure to unnecessary poisons by reducing unnecessary packaging and eliminating toxins used in packaging.
According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), 40% of all municipal solid waste is from packaging, with 91% of that going directly to landfills, incinerators or polluting the environment. This waste creates a cost burden to towns, businesses and individuals.
With the help of Clean Water Action, on February 10, 2025, NJ Senate Environment and Energy Committee passed (3-2) the Packaging and Paper Product Stewardship Act or commonly known as Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR). S3398/A5009 is now one step closer to state law and needs your help to get your Senate and Assembly members' support. For more information, please contact Marta Young.
Climate Superfund Act
Scientists predict that New Jersey will bear the brunt of climate disasters as the Earth keeps warming and sea levels rise. This means that not only will our homes be on fire and underwater, but the people and towns of New Jersey will be the ones who shoulder the costs of this damage.
Under the Climate Superfund Act (S3545/A4696), the top oil and gas polluters who caused this climate crisis will be the ones to pay. S3545/A4696 is modeled after similar legislation passed in New York and Vermont. The bill applies the logic of the original Superfund Act, which requires polluters to pay to clean up their contaminated sites, to the climate crisis. While no dollar estimates are available for New Jersey, New York estimates it will generate $3 billion annually for the next 25 years to mitigate climate impacts.
The Climate Superfund Act ensures that only the top climate polluters (i.e. large oil and gas companies) pay, with the targets being those who have produced over 1 billion tons of greenhouse gas pollution since 1995. Even then, the costs would be proportionate instead of a flat fee for all offenders.
We have all heard the phrase "You break it, you buy it", why should the people and towns of New Jersey be burdened with the cost of a crisis they did not cause? Tell your state legislators TODAY that you think polluters and corporate wrongdoers pay! Take action here.
There is more that you can do! On February 13th, Clean Water Action secured a Red Bank municipal resolution in support of Climate Superfund. Many others have been passed or pending across the state. If you would like to help get a local resolution passed, contact Molly Cleary.
Join our fight for the Indirect Source Review Bill!
Air pollution associated with diesel trucks that serve New Jersey ports, warehouses and other aspects of our freight and goods movement has become a growing health concern. A recent study shows that at least 1 in 3 New Jersey residents live within a half mile of a warehouse. With over 70% of the people living closest to or downwind from these diesel hotspots being low income and BIPOC communities, studies demonstrate how these populations are chronically exposed to high levels of toxic diesel pollution compared to other groups.
Freight trucks make up 11% of on-road fleet but are responsible for emitting 56% of the transportation sector’s nitrogen oxides (NOx) and 33% of its fine particulate matter (known as PM2.5). Air pollutants deriving from diesel-fueled freight vehicles have led to 340 deaths, nearly 3,000 cancer cases, 164 heart attacks, 3,921 asthma flareups and 110 asthma emergency room visits in the state in 2023 alone!
That's why Clean Water Action is advocating for passage of the NJ Warehouse and Port pollution Reduction bill (A4679/S3546) which aims to curb pollution at warehouses, ports and other truck attracting facilities by requiring them to implement concrete emission reduction measures through an “indirect source review” program.
Take action today by urging your NJ State Senator and Assemblyperson to ADVANCE A4679/S3546 immediately! The lives of frontline and overburdened communities impacted by truck pollution from our ports and warehouses cannot wait any longer.
NJ Legislators MUST keep ACT on track!
The NJ Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) adopted the Advanced Clean Trucks (ACT) program in 2021 with an effective date of January 1, 2025. ACT requires manufacturers to sell gradually increasing percentages of zero-emission trucks. The program was developed as a life-saving measure to address the devastating truck pollution that is causing severe respiratory issues for frontline communities in addition to worsening the climate crisis.
Unfortunately, industry players are creating a false crisis claiming they can not comply with the regulations as written. They are pressuring state legislators to delay implementation of ACT by passing (A4679/S3546). The DEP and Governor have confirmed that the state is largely on track to meet the regulatory requirements and see no need for rollbacks. With the health and lives of so many New Jerseyans at stake, we can't afford to wait any longer.
Take Action! Join us and send a message NOW to your state legislators and urge them to Vote NO on (A4679/S3546) and not delay this life-saving program because of bad faith actors in the trucking industry!
