Minnesota Environmental Partnership

08/20/2026

We're hiring! MEP is seeking to fill a 6-month, part-time Community Outreach Organizer role that will be hybrid or remote. This role will focus on the rollout of Minnesota's new Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund Community Grants program.

Apply by August 31 for priority consideration! Learn more at https://www.mepartnership.org/jobs/communityoutreachorganizer/

08/18/2026

A great decision by Governor Walz, one that could protect the BWCA for many years to come! We will keep up the work to win permanent protection for the Boundary Waters and all vulnerable watersheds in Minnesota from sulfide mining.

The Boundary Waters just received the strongest statewide protection in its history!!

The Boundary Waters just received the strongest statewide protection in its history.

This morning, Governor Tim Walz signed an executive order to keep copper-sulfide mining out of the Rainy River Headwaters. The watershed that flows directly into the Boundary Waters.

Here's what it does:

🚫 DNR and the Pollution Control Agency must stop all environmental review and permitting work on sulfide mining proposals in the watershed
🚫 No new state mineral leases
🚫 No new surface leases for tailings or mine waste
🚫 No DNR cooperation with federal environmental reviews
✍️ And it directs the DNR to draft legislative language prohibiting copper-sulfide mining in the watershed

Read that last one again. Minnesota's governor just told his agency to write the ban.

It has been a hard year for the Boundary Waters. Congress stripped federal protection from 225,000 acres of public land surrounding the wilderness. Fire devastated country many of us have paddled our whole lives.

The mining industry and its political allies will fight this. They have the lawyers and the money, and we should expect them to use both. That fight is coming.

But today we're thankful for decisive action. Thankful for you. Thankful to have a place like the Boundary Waters worth defending. 💙

08/17/2026

This is why the state of Minnesota needs to pass more funding for lead service line replacement. Delaying means longer toxic lead exposure for Minnesota families, with health impacts that last a lifetime.

The city is prioritizing historically disenfranchised neighborhoods, daycare and childcare facilities, and streets due for utility work.

08/10/2026

Great news: key wind energy project reviews will resume! Wind is among our cheapest and most abundant sources of clean energy, and these projects will help both our climate and managing the cost of electricity.

A federal judge has ordered the Department of Defense to lift its blockade of wind energy projects and resume the permitting process that has ground to a halt during President Donald Trump’s second term.

07/31/2026

07/30/2026

Overview: Minnesota’s largest dairy entity, Riverview LLP, has proposed the state’s first livestock operation exceeding 26,000 animal units—an unprecedented concentrated…

07/23/2026

We agree: "Minnesotans have shouldered enough of the burden. It’s time for the largest fossil fuel polluters to pay their fair share."

It’s time for the largest fossil fuel polluters to pay to clean up the mess they knowingly caused, Rochester's mayor writes.

07/20/2026

Speeding in your car to work, to pick up your children from school, or go from one errand to the next not only wastes money in gas and sends harmful emissions into the air, it barely saves you time, new research says.

While drivers say that speeding saves them precious time, University of Minnesota researchers found that is not really the case.

07/16/2026

Our friends in and around Ely are at ground zero for Minnesota's fires - find out how you can help!

The ongoing fires affecting the Ely area have impacted far more than the forests.

07/14/2026

"We are, however, fortunate that the technology to dramatically reduce climate warming pollution already exists, is cheap and is getting steadily cheaper."

The faster we go, the greater the benefit, both to our wallets and to the world we inhabit.