In this week's Beyond the Headlines segment, Environmental Health News Editor Peter Dykstra and Host Steve Curwood learn about a group of rescued Bornean orangutans that were released back into the wild via helicopter to minimalize COVID risk. Next, they unravel an unexpected link between glyphosate use on banana plantations and the release of another pesticide stored in the soils. Finally, they travel back to the tragic 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill, and the twenty-year legal battle that ensued between the State of Alaska and Exxon executives.

Consumers in China and the U.S. prize American ginseng, most of which is grown in just one Wisconsin county, as a health food and traditional medicine. But demand has dried up in the midst of America’s ongoing trade war with China, economic impacts from the COVID-19 pandemic and anti-Asian rhetoric. Living on Earth’s Aaron Mok wrote about the crisis for Civil Eats and joins Host Bobby Bascomb to share the stories of ginseng farmers he interviewed.

From the chirp of a Katydid to the screech of a parrot, the sounds of nature are all around us and now can be used to help humans make music. Living on Earth’s Bobby Bascomb reports on Beast Box, a website that allows users to create their own unique songs using catchy beats and animal calls as the instruments.

Almost six years after a tsunami caused a meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, the facility’s operator, Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) faces overwhelming problems to clean up the site. Tepco now reports radiation in reactor 2 that would kill a worker in thirty seconds, and even destroys robots. Arjun Makhijani, the President of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research and host Steve Curwood discuss the implications of this new report and the challenges of cleanup.

Ten years after the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant disaster, millions of gallons of radioactive cooling water are about to overflow storage tanks. Japanese authorities are looking at the option of releasing it into the Pacific Ocean. Arjun Makhijani, President of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research, joins Host Bobby Bascomb to mark the tenth anniversary of the reactor core meltdowns and what the release of the contaminated water into the ocean could mean for marine and human health.

Despite rising global temperatures and an increase in climate change-related natural disasters, climate denial still runs rampant. As renowned climatologist Michael Mann describes in his latest book, The New Climate War: The Fight to Take Back Our Planet, key major fossil fuel companies have spent decades deflecting blame and responsibility in order to delay action on climate change. As part of our LOE Book Club series, Professor Mann joins Host Steve Curwood to talk about the fight against climate denialism and inaction in all its forms.