In more ways than one, no one should really like Styrofoam. It has the half-life of most nuclear substances; it doesn't really keep your coffee that hot; it litters the streets of our beloved city; and, most importantly, it indirectly costs you money. How? Landfills.

Last week, the Sanitation Department requested a citywide ban on the material all together solely for the final reason. Besides the environmental aspects, the Department argued that the spongey substance is costing them bills to keep in landfills; all of which are filled to the brim. The legislation would target businesses that sell Styrofoam like hot cakes (read: Dunkin' Donuts) and put the responsibility of paying for its waste removal in the hands of the owners.

Also, it's not the first of its kind. The ban has been proposed to the City Council before but to no avail -- mostly because of the apparent economic strain it would potentially have on businesses.

However, the other day, the ban received a huge boost from a man who's never shy about his agenda: Mr. Michael R. Bloomberg.

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Eric Walton

Opponents have tried both legal challenges to the pipeline and less legal challenges, like this protester who climbed onto digging equipment to halt construction last autumn.

The juggernaut that is the NJ-NY Expansion Project, familiarly known as the Spectra Pipeline, has crushed another obstacle, bringing the operation of a 30-inch-diameter transmission line full of highly-pressurized explosive natural gas in the heart of the West Village one step closer to reality.

Opponents of the pipeline had challenged the legality of the pipeline in state court, alleging that the trustees of the Hudson River Park Trust broke the law when they allowed the Spectra energy giant to run the pipeline through the park.

But in a recently released ruling, New York Supreme Court Judge Eileen Rakower threw the suit out, finding that whatever state laws might be involved are trumped by the authority of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to approve pipeline construction.

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George Pingeon chained himself to construction equipment Wednesday, temporarily halting construction on the Spectra pipeline.

Eric Walton

Construction on a pipeline that will bring fracked natural gas under the Hudson and into the West Village was halted for two hours Wednesday when George Pingeon, a member of the opposition group Occupy the Pipeline, chained himself to a backhoe on the construction site.

Opponents have been fighting the pipeline since it received approval from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in May, escalating their tactics once construction on the Manhattan side of the 16-mile pipeline began this summer.

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Stacy Lanyon

Protesters painted themselves a toxic green to protest the construction of a new pipeline for fracked natural gas in Manhattan.

Activists protesting the construction of a new natural gas pipeline into the heart of Manhattan stepped up their efforts to draw attention to the issue this weekend by getting naked, painting their bodies green, and dancing along the West Side Highway.

See More: Naked Green People Fight Pipeline Construction (NSFW)

The NJ-NY Expansion Project, known familiarly as the Spectra Pipeline after the Texas-based energy company behind it, runs about 16 miles from Staten Island, through New Jersey, and under the Hudson before surfacing in the West Village.

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If you've ever wondered what goes on above the city -- on New York's rooftops -- this new video series has some answers for you.

Mother Jones' James West and Tim McDonnell ascended the heights of NYC's buildings to track changes in the skyscape. What they found was that the Big Apple's roofs weren't just going green: They were going white and solar-paneled, too.

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And now it's time for another fracking story!

At the Voice, we have been keeping up with hydraulic fracturing developments in New York and the rest of the U.S. As the Empire State weighs whether to lift a drilling moratorium, part of that process was the public commentary period.

A few months back, you see, concerned citizens had the opportunity to give the Department of Environmental Conservation their two cents; by law, the DEP must review and respond to all of those comments before telling Gov. Andrew Cuomo whether the practice should take place.

Though we pointed out that the DEP does not necessarily have to listen to public opinion, we still wanted to know: Can the Department realistically handle almost 80,000 comments?Compounding our curiosity are reports that the DEP is poised to released recs to Cuomo soon. (The DEC is officially mum on those rumors.)

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If you have been following the fracking controversy clusterfuck at all, you will know this: hydraulic fracturing, still under consideration by Gov. Andrew Cuomo, has gotten a lot of flack for reportedly polluting water, as well as posing other potential health risks.

So when a peer-reviewed, university-backed study comes out promoting fracking -- and suggests that it's getting safer -- it's huge news.

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As fracking spreads across the Marcellus shale formation and the rest of America with the White House's support, a government researcher has announced today that sand dust emitted during hydraulic fracturing might be one "of the most dangerous threats to workers."

Citing a National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health scientist, Bloomberg Businessweek reports that "four out of five" air samples from wells "in five states in the past two years exceeded recommended limits for silica particles."

These particles can get stuck in the lungs, and can lead to "potentially fatal silicosis."

It's still unclear whether the silica particles spread to the communities near these wells.

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Andrew Cuomo really doesn't like unused office furniture -- or office furniture he thinks is unused, that is.

So, the Times Union reports, his administration instructed staffers to go into the Department of Environmental Conservation offices on the weekend and overnight to transfer furniture and set up offices for the Office of Parks Recreation and Historic Preservation. The idea is that this department will share previously empty office space with the DEC.

One problem: Much of this furniture was still being used by DEC staffers for meetings or for visitors at their cubicles. And they were not told about the removal ahead of time.

The move has caused so much uproar that it prompted the publication of "a satirical memo, complete with official DEC letterhead."

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The Prez has hardly made it a secret that he supports fracking as part of his push for domestic oil and natural gas development, with the Obama administration announcing last week that it plans on setting environmental standards for hydraulic fracturing.

And what happens in D.C. does not stay in D.C. -- states other than those sitting atop the gas-rich Marcellus shale are eager to get on the bandwagon, though environmental and public health concerns have yet to be resolved.

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