-
Public Health service act enacted, legislation allowed marine hospitals to care for merchant seamen. Expanded many times.
-
Established the National Park Service in the U.S with the purpose of preserving nature and wildlife for future generations.
-
Bald Eagle Protection Act is put in effect, making it a crime to hunt bald and golden eagles.
-
The Antarctic Treaty System regulated international relation in respect to Antarctica, and established Antarctica as a scientific preserve.
-
First form of the Clean Air Act passed, legtislation that intially research before working on solving air pollution problems.
-
Passed by Congress, this act permitted the listing of native U.S animal species as endangered and allowed for limited protections upon those animals.
-
The Endangered Species Preservation Act is passed, allowing the listing of native U.S. animal species as endangered and for limited protections
-
Rachel Carson's Silent Spring is published, which is credited with helping to launch the American Environmental movement.
-
National Environmental Protection Act is enacted, called for “productive harmony” with the environment.
-
Earth Day became the first opportunity people had to join in a nationwide demonstration to help preserve and protect the earth.
-
Clean Air Act is reauthorized and greatly expanded
-
Environmental Protection Agency is created to help protect the health of humans and the environment, and does so by creating and enforcing laws and regulations based on laws passed by congress.
-
UN Environment Program, which coordinates UN environmental activities and helps the UN to implement environmentally sound procedures in developing countries, is formed
-
Clean Water Act is passed with goals of eliminating high concentrations of toxic substances in the water.
-
DDT, a pestocide proven to have extreme adverse environmental effects, becomes banned after three years of government investigation.
-
Endangered Species Act, legislation to protect and prevent the extinction of species, is signed into law.
-
Prohibits the manufacture and importation of chemicals that are not on the TSCA inventory.
-
Gives the EPA the authority to regulate hazardous waste from "cradle to grave."
-
After years of the Hooker Chemical company dumping hazardous waste into the ground and burying it, the city bought the land for only one dollar, and after a good deal of time passed, many birth defects and health issues arrose.
-
A partial nuclear meltdown that occured in one of the U.S. Three Mile Island nuclear reactors in Pennsylvania.
-
Chernobyl nuclear reactor suffers a catastrophic meltdown.
-
Exxon Valdez, an oil tanker bound for Long Beach, California, struck Prince William Sound's Bligh Reef and spilled 260,000 to 750,000 barrels of crude oil.
-
US clean building council is formed to promote sustainability and energy effeciency in how buildings are built
-
The Food Quality Protection Act mandated a health based standard for the use of pestocides in food, as well as establish incentives for the creation of safer pestocides