The Environmental Protection Agency said Wednesday that it would uphold drinking water standards for two harmful “forever chemicals,” present in the tap water of millions of Americans. But it said it would delay deadlines to meet those standards and roll back limits on four other related chemicals. Known as forever chemicals because of their virtually indestructible nature, PFAS are a class of thousands of chemicals used widely in everyday products like nonstick cookware, water-repellent clothing and stain-resistant carpets, as well as in firefighting foams. Exposure to PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, has been associated with metabolic disorders, decreased fertility in women, developmental delays in children and increased risk of some prostate, kidney and testicular cancers, according to the E.P.A. President Joseph R. Biden Jr. had, for the first time, required water utilities to start bringing down levels of six types of PFAS chemicals to near zero. He set a particularly stringent limit of four parts per trillion for two of those chemicals, called PFOA and PFOS, which are most commonly found in drinking water systems. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT The Trump administration said it would uphold the limits for those two types of PFAS, but would delay a deadline for water utilities to meet those limits by two years, to 2031. The E.P.A. said it would rescind the limits for the other four chemicals. “We are on a path to uphold the agency’s nationwide standards to protect Americans from PFOA and PFOS in their water,” Lee Zeldin, the E.P.A. administrator, said in a statement. “At the same time, we will work to provide common-sense flexibility in the form of additional time for compliance,” he said. “EPA will also continue to use its regulatory and enforcement tools to hold polluters accountable.” The move to weaken some PFAS limits came after trade groups representing the chemicals industry, as well as water utilities, had challenged the Biden-era limits, saying they created an impossible standard that would cost municipal water agencies billions of dollars to meet. The chemicals are so ubiquitous that they can be found in the blood of almost every person in the United States. Government studies of private wells and public water systems have detected PFAS chemicals in nearly half the tap water in the country. In 2022, the E.P.A. found the chemicals could cause harm at levels “much lower than previously understood” and that almost no level of exposure is safe. In 2022, the E.P.A. found the chemicals could cause harm at levels “much lower than previously understood” and that almost no level of exposure is safe.

Consumer prices climbed last month at the slowest pace since February 2021, as the inflationary effects of President Donald Trump's tariffs had yet to hit Americans' wallets. The Consumer Price Index, which tracks a variety of costs throughout the economy, rose 2.3% year on year in April, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Tuesday, down from 2.4% in March. Analysts said the slower price growth may still not prompt the Federal Reserve, which is tasked with managing inflation, from lowering interest rates. Trump has repeatedly called for the central bank to do so, bashing its decision last week to hold rates steady. The latest inflation reading is "likely a welcome reprieve for the Fed; however, the larger tariff-related price adjustments are likely to come over the next few months," Goldman Sachs analysts said in a note to clients Tuesday. "Consequently, we still anticipate them remaining on the sidelines in the near term." Even as the pace of price growth has slowed, consumers now report unprecedented levels of uncertainty amid fast-changing headlines about how Trump’s tariffs will affect the economy. “Tariffs are now on top of consumers’ minds, with mentions of tariffs reaching an all-time high,” the Conference Board, which releases a closely watched monthly consumer-sentiment survey, said late last month. “Consumers explicitly mentioned concerns about tariffs increasing prices and having negative impacts on the economy.” The White House's back-and-forth tariff announcements are likely to have a whipsawing effect on inflation readings for months to come, said Seema Shah, chief strategist at Principal Asset Management financial group. "A clear read on the inflation trend won’t be visible for several months yet," she wrote in a note Tuesday. "This prolonged inflation uncertainty likely implies a prolonged Fed pause." Stock markets appeared to shrug off the inflation report, with the three major U.S. indexes largely flat in Tuesday morning trading. Trump has asserted that there is "virtually no inflation," and some major consumer categories are indeed seeing price declines. Today, regular unleaded fuel costs about $3.16 per gallon, down from $3.62 a year ago, according to AAA. Overall energy costs are also slightly lower, government data show, though some analysts have warned the decreases could reflect slower energy demand — a trend that could reverse during the summer months.Grocery price growth also saw its sharpest slowdown since 2023 last month, largely driven by falling egg costs. Prices for that staple have settled at a much higher level than just months ago, however, and economists expect Trump's trade war to ripple across supermarket shelves in sometimes hard-to-predict ways over the coming months. Inflation, at any rate, is still hotter than many households would like and has hovered just above the Fed's 2% target level for nearly the past year. The “core” inflation measure, which strips out food and energy, was up 2.8% in April, the same as in March. Housing continues to be a major culprit: Shelter costs are one-third of the CPI report, and they've have continued to rise, although not as quickly as during the Biden administration. While 12-month rent growth has slowed, at 4% it is about equal to pre-pandemic highs. The BLS’ official measure of overall housing costs is also at 4%, higher than pre-Covid levels. In general, uncertainty continues to reign from Main Street shops to executive boardrooms, spanning fireworks distributors, border towns and travel agencies. “It is currently hard to judge the underlying pace of growth of the U.S. economy,” Federal Reserve Governor Adriana Kugler said in remarks Monday, because Trump’s tariffs continue to distort economic data. Her comments were prepared before the 90-day U.S.-China tariff pause unveiled Monday, but even the reduced 30% effective import tax on Chinese goods is still expected to put pressure on what Americans pay for many items. The Yale Budget Lab estimated Monday that consumers will continue to face an average effective tariff of 17.8%, the highest since 1934. “Given these expected price increases, real incomes will fall, and operating costs will rise, which will lead consumers to demand fewer final goods and services and firms to demand fewer inputs,” Kugler said. “Ultimately, I see the U.S. as likely to experience lower growth and higher inflation

After much teasing and speculation, ESPN has finally unveiled the details of its new flagship streaming service. While the streamer long had the working title “Flagship,” the Disney-owned sports network revealed the platform, slated to launch in the fall, will be called something even simpler: ESPN. “As we explored options, we kept coming back to our four letters ESPN,” network chairman James Pitaro explained during a press event on Tuesday morning. “There’s power in our name, and there’s trust in our name.” The direct-to-consumer platform will feature two subscription tiers at launch, said Roz Durant, ESPN’s executive vice president of programming and acquisitions. The unlimited plan will cost $29.99 per month (or $45.99 when bundled with Disney+ and Hulu) and will give users access to all things ESPN — including ESPNs 2 and 3, along with ESPNU, ESPN Deportes and a slate of college sports-focused networks. “That’s 47,000 live events, studio shows and more every year,” Durant said. The other plan, titled “select,” will cost $11.99 per month and will include all content currently available on the ESPN+ over-the-top service. Since the platform was first announced, Disney executives have touted the streamer as an immersive new experience for sports fans. During a sit-down with CNBC last year, Disney chief executive Bob Iger hailed the streaming service as “very user-friendly because it’s more app-based.” The streamer reveal comes as Disney looks to shore up its subscriber numbers, as its linear networks have been challenged by the same cord-cutting habits as the rest of the industry. However, live sporting events have proved relatively impervious to the viewership declines felt across traditional television. That’s why Disney was willing to spend big to ensure ESPN would retain its NBA rights, especially among an overcrowded streaming sector, with heavyweights like Netflix, Amazon’s Prime Video and WBD’s Max carving up access to sporting events. During its quarterly report last week, Disney posted strong earnings despite the economic headwinds from President Donald Trump’s tariff chaos. Revenue at ESPN was up 5% to $4.53 billion, even as operating income dropped 16%. Disney attributed that drop to increased programming and production costs from three additional college football playoff games and an added NFL game during the quarter, though these helped increase domestic advertising revenue 29%. To ensure a smooth launch, Iger said on the earnings call that linear ESPN subscribers will automatically get the ESPN flagship streamer. ESPN’s streamer reveal comes just over four months after the collapse of Venu Sports, the joint sports streaming venture among Warner Bros. Discovery, Disney, and Fox. In Venu’s final months, Disney began touting its own streaming platform, hedging its bets as it became increasingly clear there was no path for Venu to launch. (WBD is CNN’s parent company.) The trio’s decision not to launch the JV came after they ended a months-long lawsuit from Fubo four days earlier. Despite that, reports had emerged that satellite TV providers DirecTV and Dish had asked a judge to reconsider dismissing Fubo’s case, signaling further delays in the platform’s launch.

Sprawling wind farms in Wyoming. A huge solar factory expansion in Georgia. Lithium mines in Nevada. Vacuums that suck carbon from the air in Louisiana. Over the past three years, companies have made plans to invest more than $843 billion across the United States in projects aimed at reducing planet-warming emissions, driven by lucrative tax credits for clean energy provided by the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. But only about $321 billion of that money has actually been spent, with many projects still on the drawing board, according to data made public on Tuesday by the Clean Investment Monitor, a joint project of the Rhodium Group and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Now, much of the rest, about $522 billion, will depend on action playing out on Capitol Hill. Starting on Tuesday, Republicans in Congress will begin a contentious debate over proposals to roll back tax credits for low-carbon energy as they search for ways to pay for a roughly $4 trillion tax cut package favored by President Trump. A draft bill issued on Monday by Republicans on the House Ways and Means Committee would effectively end most of the Inflation Reduction Act’s tax incentives. A tax credit for low-carbon electricity sources like wind, solar, nuclear or geothermal power would be phased out over the next few years. Rebates for consumers to buy electric vehicles would mostly disappear by the end of 2025. Tax breaks for domestic factories that make batteries or solar panels would end by 2031 and would contain new restrictions that could make them extremely difficult to access. Incentives for producing hydrogen fuels would end this year. While shrinking those tax credits could help Republicans save hundreds of billions of dollars, it could also cause companies to abandon plans for new nuclear reactors or battery factories. More than three-quarters of pending investments were planned in Republican-held congressional districts. “It’s jobs, it’s tax revenue into local communities,” said Ben King, an associate director at the Rhodium Group, a research firm that tracks investment data with M.I.T.’s Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research. “It does represent a meaningful economic change in some of these places.” The prospect of repeal has set off a furious lobbying battle in Washington, with energy companies pleading with lawmakers to preserve the tax breaks. At least three dozen Republicans have asked their colleagues to keep at least some tax credits to protect jobs in their districts and reduce electricity prices. But a nearly equal number of conservative House members are pushing publicly to kill the climate law altogether. One Republican supporter is Representative Juan Ciscomani of Arizona, whose district includes an electric vehicle factory and several solar projects under construction. “When I looked initially at the energy tax credits and how they were benefiting Arizona, a lot of those projects were underway, the jobs had been created, the ball was more than rolling at that point,” Mr. Ciscomani, who was elected in 2022, said. “So it made sense for me to stand up for that.” If the tax credits are completely rescinded, it would sharply reduce future demand for electric vehicles, batteries, solar panels and wind turbines, according to projections by the Rhodium Group. The effect would be compounded if the Trump administration moved forward as planned with undoing Biden-era tailpipe pollution limits for cars and trucks, which would have pushed automakers to sell more electric vehicles. The uncertainty around the tax credits, as well as confusion over Mr. Trump’s tariffs, has led many low-carbon energy companies to put their investment plans on hold. In the Midwest, Heliene, a solar manufacturer, has paused plans to build a $350 million factory that would produce cells for solar panels, which today mostly come from China. Martin Pochtaruk, Heliene’s chief executive, said it was too risky to finance the plant without clarity on whether Congress would maintain tax credits for domestic energy manufacturing. “Right now, we see a lot of folks just waiting,” said Jason Grumet, chief executive of the American Clean Power Association, a renewable industry trade group. “People are not canceling things, but they’re also not breaking ground.” “There is a remarkable tension right now, between probably the best fundamentals for investment in the energy sector that we’ve seen in a generation and the greatest amount of uncertainty that we’ve seen in the generation,” Mr. Grumet said. “That is a collision that all manufacturing now is trying to navigate.” The Fate of Low-Carbon Electricity The biggest tax breaks in the Inflation Reduction Act were for companies that build power plants that generate electricity without emitting any planet-warming greenhouse gases. Those credits were set to remain in place for many years to come, until emissions from the U.S. electricity sector fell 75 percent from 2022 levels. So far, power companies have mainly taken advantage of these credits to propose new solar, wind and battery plants in places like Texas, California, Wyoming and Arizona, since those technologies are ready today. But the credit was designed to also spur a wave of innovative nuclear reactors, advanced geothermal plants, fusion plants, hydroelectric dams and novel types of batteries over the next decade. The credits have already allowed developers to install solar panels on sites as varied as a carport in New Mexico and a shuttered coal plant in Illinois, said Russ Bates, chief executive of NXTGEN Clean Energy Solutions, a low-carbon energy developer. Yet those credits may wind down much faster than many companies expected. Under the House bill issued on Monday, the full clean-electricity credits would only apply to new power plants that are “in service” by 2028, which would exclude a large array of wind, solar, nuclear and geothermal plants that are under development but won’t be completed by then. The credits would then phase down and disappear after 2031. In South Carolina, Gov. Henry McMaster, a Republican, recently warned that, without the tax credits, efforts to expand nuclear power in his state “are dead.” What Congress decides could reshape the nation’s power grids. If the credits are repealed entirely or severely restricted, one study found, wind and solar installations would likely fall by half over the next decade, while electric utilities would burn more fossil fuels like coal and gas instead. That could lead to higher electricity prices, since renewables are often the quickest and easiest source of power for utilities to build. Emissions would also rise. Risks for Domestic Supply Chains Perhaps the most visible effect of the Inflation Reduction Act so far has been a surge of domestic manufacturing. Four years ago, the United States had hardly any capacity to build solar panels, wind turbines or lithium-ion batteries. Most of that happened in China and elsewhere. That’s quickly changing. The law gave hefty tax breaks to wind and solar developers if they used components made in the United States. It also doled out additional tax credits for domestic clean-energy factories. In addition, billions of dollars in funding from a 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law allowed the Biden administration to support domestic supply chains, including mining for key elements like lithium. That has had a major effect in places like Dalton, Ga., once known as the nation’s carpet manufacturing capital. In 2023, Hanwha Qcells, a Korean solar company, announced it would invest $2.5 billion to expand its factory in Dalton, creating the largest solar panel manufacturing facility in the Western Hemisphere. “It’s a newer technology for us, but it’s one we’re excited to be making right here,” said Jason Mock, president of the Greater Dalton Chamber of Commerce. If all the solar factories currently planned in the United States get built, the country would have the capacity to produce three times as many solar panel modules as were installed in 2024, according to an analysis by the Rhodium Group and M.I.T. Yet the solar industry is still reliant on countries like China for many underlying components, such as the polysilicon wafers. It’s a similar story for batteries: The number of U.S. factories that are currently planned would build enough lithium-ion modules and cells to satisfy future demand for electric vehicles, although progress has been much slower in building up domestic supplies of raw ingredients like graphite and lithium. It’s not clear if those supply chains will survive. In the House draft bill, Republicans proposed sharp new restrictions on the use of materials from China, which could make it difficult for many U.S. factories to qualify. The bill would also end by next year a $7,500 consumer tax credit for electric cars that is available for buyers of cars largely produced in the United States. That would reduce demand for electric vehicles, which would in turn affect a broad swath of battery manufacturing and demand for critical minerals like lithium. At least 24 factories have been set up in the United States to produce electric cars that qualify for the credit, including a Ford plant making plug-in hybrids in Louisville, Ky., and a General Motors battery plant in Ohio, according to a study from Atlas Public Policy, a research firm. Near Savannah, Ga., Hyundai invested in a $7.5 billion factory to build some of its most popular electric vehicle models, which qualify for the consumer credit. Local politicians, who spent years persuading Hyundai to come to the site, are concerned about possible changes to law. “It’s difficult for a company to invest somewhere and then conditions change,” said Bert Brantley, chief executive of the Savannah Area Chamber of Commerce. “So our take is that some consistency is helpful for companies as they make large investments.” Still, Mr. Brantley said he hoped that Georgia could continue to be a leader in electric vehicle production regardless of what happens to the tax credits. “This is a long-term play, we hope to be at it for a long time,” he said. Other Energy Technologies in Limbo Over the past three years, the federal government has also been supporting a broad array of emerging energy technologies that are less mature, including low-carbon hydrogen fuels that could power trucks, new processes to make cement and steel without emissions, as well as technologies to pull carbon dioxide out of the air. Many of these projects could potentially qualify for tax breaks in the Inflation Reduction Act. Others have been supported by billions of dollars in grants and loans from the Department of Energy. In Western Minnesota, DG Fuels plans a $5 billion plant to produce aviation fuel from agricultural waste. In Indiana, Heidelberg Materials, a cement maker, wants to capture the carbon dioxide it emits and bury it underground. In Louisiana, a company is planning to make a low-carbon ammonia that could be used for fertilizer. New Orleans, which has become a major hub for exporting natural gas, has seen a boom in new industries like carbon capture and hydrogen that could help cut emissions in the future. “We’re becoming very diversified,” said Michael Hecht, president of Greater New Orleans, Inc., the economic development agency for southeast Louisiana. But as part of the tax bill, House Republicans on the Energy and Commerce committee have proposed ending a tax credit for hydrogen fuels by the end of this year. At the same time, the Trump administration has proposed deep cuts and encouraged widespread layoffs at the Energy Department, which historically has played a leading role in nurturing new technologies. The debate in Congress over the future of federal energy spending could affect the direction of entire industries. “Other countries are rapidly scaling up investments in green steel, green cement, low-carbon manufacturing,” said Lindsey Baxter Griffith, chief executive of Clean Tomorrow, a nonprofit organization focused on technological innovation in energy. “Without a clear strategy here, we risk falling behind.”

3M is set to pay New Jersey up to $450 million over the next quarter-century to settle claims it contaminated the state with harmful “forever chemicals,” or PFAS, affecting drinking water. The Minnesota-based chemicals giant manufactured the PFAS, which were used for decades at the Chambers Works facility in Deepwater, N.J., a nearly 1,500-acre complex on the banks of the Delaware River. The site was owned by DuPont, a rival company. It is the largest single clean-water settlement in New Jersey’s history, the state said. New Jersey sued 3M, DuPont and other PFAS manufacturers in 2019, saying the facility had contaminated drinking water. PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, is used in a range of everyday products like nonstick cookware, water-repellent clothing and stain-resistant carpets. Exposure to the chemicals has been linked to metabolic disorders, decreased fertility in women and developmental delays in children, as well as increased risk of some prostate, kidney and testicular cancers. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT Under the settlement announced Tuesday, 3M will pay New Jersey between $400 million to $450 million over 25 years to pay for damages, as well as cleanup and drinking water treatment. DuPont and its chemical spinoff Chemours, which now owns the Chambers Works facility, were not part of the settlement, New Jersey said. The remaining parties are expected to proceed to trial in the case. DuPont declined to comment. “Corporate polluters must be held accountable when they contaminate our state’s water supply,” New Jersey Attorney General Matthew J. Platkin said in a statement. “For decades, 3M knew that their PFAS chemicals were forever contaminating the New Jersey environment. But they continued to pollute the environment and escape accountability,” he said. “That ends now.” According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the Chambers Works facility once manufactured gunpowder as well as radiological material, and contributed to the development of the atomic bomb. It more recently manufactured a variety of chemicals, including PFAS. Shawn M. LaTourette, New Jersey’s Commissioner of Environmental Protection, said contamination in the state went well beyond drinking water. “We find PFAS everywhere in the state of New Jersey, leeching from landfills, and even in the soils of distant remote New Jersey forests that should be pristine,” he said. New Jersey is the second known state to settle with 3M over PFAS drinking water contamination claims. In 2018, 3M agreed to pay Minnesota $850 million for contaminating drinking water and natural resources in the Twin Cities metropolitan area. In 2023, 3M also reached a nationwide settlement with public water suppliers for up to $12.5 billion to address PFAS contamination in drinking water. 3M said the agreement was an “important step toward reducing risk and uncertainty” around historical PFAS contamination. The company said in 2000 that it was voluntarily phasing out the production of two major types of PFAS, and it has said it is on track to discontinue all PFAS manufacturing by 2025. The company said the settlement did not amount to an admission of guilt. It is taking a pretax charge of $285 million in the second quarter. Editors’ Picks In Her Follow-Up to ‘American Dirt,’ Jeanine Cummins Turns to Puerto Rico Is All of This Self-Monitoring Making Us Paranoid? What Travelers Should Know About This Messy Memorial Day Weekend The E.P.A. had been expected to indicate this week whether it intends to stick to strict PFAS drinking water standards set by the Biden administration last year, which would require water utilities to all but remove six different types of PFAS from their water supply. Chemical companies and utilities sued the agency over the move. The Trump administration had been due to say on Monday whether it would continue to defend the standards in court. Instead, it asked for a 21-day extension to decide on its planned course of action.

“Indefensible.” “It’s a bribe.” “Such a stain” on the administration. Some of President Donald Trump’s staunchest supporters are among the loudest critics of his plan to accept a jet from Qatar for use as Air Force One. In a rare break from the cheerleading that typifies MAGA media outlets, some commentators are using their platforms to urge Trump to change his mind about the highly unusual gift. Others are encouraging Trump voters to consider how they’d react if a Democratic president hatched the same plan. “I think if we switched the names to Hunter Biden and Joe Biden, we’d all be freaking out on the right,” Daily Wire co-founder Ben Shapiro said Monday on his podcast. Shapiro also linked the potential Qatari deal with other reports of “influence peddling,” like Trump’s cryptocurrency sweepstakes. “The administration’s policy is too important for this sort of activity,” Shapiro said, emphasizing that he wants Trump to succeed. “President Trump promised to drain the swamp. This is not, in fact, draining the swamp.” Some Trump-aligned commentators and social media stars are echoing the president’s talking points about the luxury jet, including his insistence that only “stupid people” would turn down such a gift. Some MAGA media outlets are deflecting the criticism by sowing doubt about the media coverage of the controversy However, a striking number of Trump boosters sound almost as outraged as the Democratic lawmakers who say accepting the plane would be profoundly unethical and possibly illegal. Many of these right-wing critics, like Laura Loomer, predicated their objections on Qatar’s relationship with the militant group Hamas. Senior members of Hamas have long been based in the Qatari capital of Doha, though Qatar reportedly agreed to expel Hamas officials last November. Loomer criticized Trump’s potential jet deal on Sunday and Monday by writing a series of anti-Qatar posts on X. “This is really going to be such a stain on the admin if this is true,” she wrote. “And I say that as someone who would take a bullet for Trump. I’m so disappointed.” Fox News host Mark Levin shared her post and wrote, “Ditto.” For now, most of the conservative criticism has been leveled in social media spaces, not on the TV shows Trump is known to enjoy. The jet controversy has been very lightly covered on Fox News, the country’s dominant right-wing TV channel. The main story on Fox’s website about the matter on Monday was titled, “Trump rips ABC reporter for asking about accepting luxury jet from Qatar,” as if ABC was the problem. But “Fox & Friends” host Brian Kilmeade did ask White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt about the matter on Monday morning. Leavitt positioned it as a government-to-government transaction that would be done “in full compliance with the law,” sidestepping reports that Trump’s presidential library will take possession of the plane shortly before he leaves office, ensuring he can still use it. The “Fox & Friends” host then asked Leavitt, “Do you worry that if they give us something like this, they want something in return?” The press secretary said no because Trump “only works with the interest of the American public in mind.” Kilmeade then moved on and asked Leavitt about Mother’s Day. Other conservative media figures seem less inclined to move on. “This is not a gift” from Qatar, it’s “a bribe,” Batya Ungar-Sargon, who has championed the MAGA movement on CNN and other channels, told Newsmax on Monday afternoon. National Review contributing editor Andrew McCarthy wrote Monday that accepting the plane is “indefensible,” arguing that “the president and his flacks again demonstrate that they don’t grasp the concepts of constitutional duty and conflicts of interest.” He cited the “Trump family crypto venture” as another example. Talk radio host Erick Erickson, who, like the National Review, has often criticized Trump from a conservative perspective, didn’t mince his condemnation of the potential jet gift. On his Monday show, Erickson argued that Qatar is not a US ally (though the US government disagrees) and pointed out that Attorney General Pam Bondi, who reportedly signed off on the legality of the gift, was previously a paid lobbyist for Qatar. “I think she’s opening Donald Trump up to legal trouble later,” Erickson said. On X later in the day, Erickson observed that “even a lot of Trump supporters were not thrilled about the Qatar plane gift” when the initial reports surfaced on Sunday. “Now,” he wrote, suggesting bots are flooding X with pro-Trump propaganda, “a lot of small accounts I’ve never interacted with before are flooding my timeline insisting it is a great idea.”

Robert B. Shapiro, a former law professor turned corporate executive who performed a marketing miracle by brashly branding aspartame as the sugar substitute NutraSweet and making it a household name that consumers demanded in thousands of products, died on May 2 at his home in Chicago. He was 86. The cause was pancreatic cancer, his son James Shapiro said. Aspartame was invented by chemists at the pharmaceutical company G.D. Searle in Illinois in 1965 and approved by the Food and Drug Administration for use in soft drinks in 1983, a year after Mr. Shapiro became chief executive and chairman of what the company was already calling its NutraSweet subsidiary. Unlike its chief rival, saccharin, which had dominated the market in the 25 years since it was approved, aspartame leaves no bitter aftertaste and wasn’t suspected of being linked to cancer. (In 2023, however, the World Health Organization identified aspartame, on the basis of “limited evidence,” as “possibly carcinogenic.”) It has virtually no calories and, despite its brand name, virtually no essential nutritional value. In 1985, Searle sold $700 million worth of aspartame, identified as NutraSweet by the tiny but distinctive red-and-white swirl logo that appeared on the packaging of food and drink products that appealed to dieters and other consumers who wanted to avoid sugar. “Shapiro built a marketing campaign around that trademark, convincing consumers that NutraSweet (and no other company’s version of the very same sweetener) was the key to losing weight,” Daniel Charles wrote in “Lords of the Harvest: Biotech, Big Money, and the Future of Food” (2001). Mr. Shapiro’s role in branding and marketing NutraSweet, which costs more than saccharin, earned him a place in the “business history books,” Jesse Meyers, the publisher of the industry newsletter Beverage Digest, told The New York Times in 1989. Products had been branded routinely, but a single ingredient that they contained rarely had been. The federal authorities approved Simplesse, a fat substitute developed by NutraSweet, as an ingredient in frozen desserts in 1988 and, later, in other products. Searle was bought by Monsanto in 1985. Mr. Shapiro was named president of the parent company in 1993 and chief executive in 1995, as Monsanto transitioned from mostly manufacturing chemicals to making drugs and genetically modified seeds, fertilizer and food additives. Mr. Shapiro and his colleagues insisted that biotechnology products created by the company reduced the need for pesticides and weed control, expanded the food supply and reduced the amount of land needed to farm. When Mr. Shapiro became Monsanto’s chief executive, “he carried the company’s already serious commitment to biotechnology to a whole new level, both psychologically and financially,” Rachel Schurman and William A. Munro wrote in “Fighting for the Future of Food: Activists Versus Agribusiness in the Struggle Over Biotechnology” (2010). “Shapiro was by all accounts a persuasive, inspiring and motivational leader,” the authors added. “Indeed, Monsanto employees described him as a ‘visionary’ who swept people up with his larger sense of purpose and broad perspective on the technology.” But environmental critics accused Monsanto of tampering with nature by concocting potentially dangerous vegetation and monopolizing the market for seeds. The company soon found itself struggling in the face of legal challenges, regulatory rulings and adverse public opinion in the United States and Europe. In a video address to the environmental advocacy group Greenpeace in 1999, Mr. Shapiro acknowledged: “Our confidence in this technology and our enthusiasm for it has, I think, widely been seen, and understandably so, as condescension or indeed arrogance. Because we thought it was our job to persuade, too often we forgot to listen.” William C. Miller acknowledged in his book “Flash of Brilliance: Inspiring Creativity Where You Work” (1998) that “some of Monsanto’s products are controversial.” But, he added, “What you can’t argue about Bob Shapiro is that within his belief system, he’s absolutely sincere about doing what he thinks is the way to go to address hunger and address nutrition, as the world population explodes from six billion to 10 billion.” Robert Bernard Shapiro was born on Aug. 4, 1938, in Manhattan. His father, Moses Shapiro, was the chairman and chief executive of the electronics company General Instrument. His mother, Lilly (Langsam) Shapiro, had worked for ASCAP, the music licensing organization. Robert attended the Horace Mann School in the Bronx before earning a bachelor’s degree in 1959 from Harvard College, where he studied English and history. He received a law degree in 1962 from Columbia Law School. Mr. Shapiro practiced law in New York (he represented rent strikers in East Harlem and the poet Allen Ginsberg, among others, without fee) and taught at the law schools of Columbia, the University of Wisconsin and Northeastern University. He was a lawyer for the U.S. Transportation Department during the Johnson administration before joining General Instrument, where he was vice president and counsel from 1972 to 1979, the year he joined Searle. After Monsanto merged with Pharmacia & Upjohn in 1999, he served as chairman of the combined company, Pharmacia Corporation, until early 2001. A liberal Democrat who had no formal training in science, Mr. Shapiro was more comfortable playing the casual college professor than the high-powered lawyer. He offered his employees free silent meditation retreats and performed as a folk guitarist. (His children Nina and James were in the alternative rock band Veruca Salt in the 1990s.) After stepping down as chairman of Pharmacia Corporation, he was a founder of Sandbox Industries, a venture capital firm. He was also an early board member of Theranos, the blood-testing company established by Elizabeth Holmes, who was later convicted of fraud. In addition to his son James and his daughter Nina Gordon, both from an earlier marriage, to Berta Gordon, he is survived by his wife, Ginger Farley; two children, Kai and Gabe Shapiro, from another earlier marriage, to Kemery Bloom; his stepchildren, Harley Mac Cionaodha and Lydia Link; his sister, Susan Garfield; his brother, Bill Shapiro; and four grandchildren. “We did proceed on the basis of our confidence in the technology,” Mr. Shapiro said of Monsanto in an interview with The Wall Street Journal in 1999. “And we saw our products as great boons both to farmers and to the environment. I guess we naïvely thought that the rest of the world would look at the information and come to the same conclusion.”

The Energy Department said on Monday that it was preparing to roll back energy and water conservation standards for a long list of electric and gas appliances, targeting 47 regulations that it said were “driving up costs and lowering quality of life for the American people.” The moves follow an executive order last week from President Trump directing the Energy Department to “eliminate restrictive water pressure and efficiency rules that make household appliances less effective and more expensive.” But energy-efficiency experts and climate advocates said the Energy Department’s moves would increase the cost of running household appliances like dehumidifiers and portable air-conditioners as well as air compressors used in industry. “If this attack on consumers succeeds, President Trump would be raising costs dramatically for families as manufacturers dump energy- and water-wasting products into the market,” said Andrew deLaski, executive director of the Appliance Standards Awareness Project, a coalition of environmental and consumer groups, utilities and government agencies. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT Mr. deLaski also said that the effort violated an anti-backsliding provision in a decades-old underlying statute, which prohibits the federal government from adopting standards that are more lenient than ones already on the books. “It’s patently illegal, so hold your horses,” he said in a statement. Like many other countries, the United States has for decades adopted standards that govern how much energy or water that appliances — including lightbulbs, dishwashers, water heaters and washing machines — can use. By government scientists’ own accounting, efficiency standards saved the average American household about $576 in 2024 on water and gas bills while cutting the nation’s annual energy consumption by 6.5 percent and public water use by 12 percent. Thanks in part to those measures, the total amount of energy and water used by American households has not grown nearly as fast as the population. But the Trump administration has framed the standards as an example of governmental overreach. Mr. Trump has also made a habit of complaining about shower heads with weak water pressure, or toilets that don’t flush properly, and has blamed efficiency standards for those issues. Conservative groups have also argued that efficiency standards hurt the performance of appliances like dishwashers. The Energy Department’s list of appliance regulations it has targeted includes air cleaners, battery chargers, compressors, cooking tops, dehumidifiers, external power supplies, microwave ovens, dishwashers and faucets. Getting rid of the standards would “cut more than 125,000 words from the Code of Federal Regulations,” the department said. Still, rolling back the standards would require a new rule-making process thatcould take months or longer. The rollback is also likely to face legal challenges. The Environmental Protection Agency, meanwhile, is planning to eliminate Energy Star, the popular energy-efficiency certification for dishwashers, refrigerators, dryers and other home appliances. In the past, manufacturers have been supportive of government efficiency standards, but now they are moving to take advantage of Mr. Trump’s deregulatory drive. The Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers, which represents 150 manufacturers behind 95 percent of the household appliances shipped for sale within the United States, said it was still evaluating Monday’s announcements. But Jill A. Notini, a spokeswoman for the association, pointed to a statement in which the association said that the standards had “helped achieve decades of successful improvements in appliance efficiency.” The association added, “With most appliances operating near peak efficiency, additional meaningful savings are unlikely for some products” without some loss of performance. In addition to repealing efficiency measures, the Energy Department is planning to eliminate several clean energy and climate change programs. It will rescind reporting requirements for a voluntary program under which companies can report their greenhouse gas emissions, and end a program that provides payments for electricity produced with renewable power. The Energy Department is also getting rid of what it calls “unscientific” diversity, equity and inclusion requirements for grant recipients. Specifically, it is proposing to repeal regulations to ensure grant recipients are not discriminated against on the basis of sex, race or age. Some proposals seem to have little to do with the department’s purview. One proposed repeal, for example, is for “Ending Requirements for Members of One Sex to Be Able to Try Out for Sports Teams of the Opposite Sex.”

The Agriculture Department will restore information about climate change that was scrubbed from its website when President Trump took office, according to court documents filed on Monday in a lawsuit over the deletion. The deleted data included pages on federal funding and loans, forest conservation and rural clean energy projects. It also included sections of the U.S. Forest Service and Natural Resources Conservation Service sites, and the U.S. Forest Service’s “Climate Risk Viewer,” which included detailed maps showing how climate change might affect national forests and grasslands. The lawsuit, filed in February, said the purge denied farmers information to make time-sensitive decisions while facing business risks linked to climate change, such as heat waves, droughts, floods and wildfires.The suit was brought by the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York along with two environmental organizations, the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Environmental Working Group. The plaintiffs had sought a court order requiring the department to restore the deleted pages. On Monday, the government said it would oblige. Jay Clayton, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, wrote to Judge Margaret M. Garnett that he was representing the Agriculture Department in the lawsuit, and that the department had already begun restoring the pages and interactive tools described in the lawsuit. He said the department “expects to substantially complete the restoration process in approximately two weeks.” Mr. Clayton asked the judge to adjourn a hearing scheduled for May 21. He said the department proposed to submit a report on its progress restoring the data after three weeks, and sought to address “appropriate next steps in this litigation.” Jeffrey Stein, associate attorney at Earthjustice, an environmental law nonprofit that represented the plaintiffs, along with the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, said, “We’re glad that U.S.D.A. recognized that its blatantly unlawful purge of climate-change-related information is harming farmers and communities across the country.”

Mother’s Day is busy season for American florists. But this year, there’s an added source of stress: President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs, which are raising the prices of some flowers and causing some wary shoppers to pull back on spending. “We have to charge more, and it’s definitely affecting sales — which I totally get,” Allison Krivachek of Hydrangea Bloom in Tiffin, Iowa, told CNN. “People just don’t have the disposable income they used to.” Eighty percent of all cut flowers sold in the United States are imported from Colombia, Canada or Ecuador, according to the US Department of Agriculture. The majority of those flowers come from Colombia and Ecuador, where year-round growing climates support the floral industry. Those countries now face tariffs making it more expensive for their products to enter the United States. And Mother’s Day spending has dropped 14% among US shoppers as many are scaling back due to tariffs and economic concerns, according to a LendingTree survey. America imported approximately $2.26 billion worth of fresh-cut flowers in 2024, with Colombia accounting for 60% of the market and Ecuador following with 25%, according to US Census Bureau data. Debra Prinzing, founder of the Slow Flowers Society and a leading advocate for American-grown flowers, said the US floral industry was built to rely on imports. “Don’t like it, but that’s just the reality,” Prinzing told CNN. “Ridiculously different,” is how Krivachek describes this year’s price hike. Flowers such as lisianthus have doubled in price, Krivachek said, and roses are up anywhere from 10% to 50% compared to last year. She believes the price hikes are higher than what would be reflected in a 10% tariff. “It’s just really weird that there’s been such a jump because the tariffs aren’t that much. And I don’t know if they’re raising their prices because of supply and demand,” she said. As a result, she’s raised the price of her most popular Mother’s Day arrangement from $100 to $125 this year. And despite efforts to be transparent with customers, demand has taken a hit. “We’re down quite a bit,” Krivachek said. “We’re down about 30% year-over-year on this Mother’s Day compared to other Mother’s Days.” Many customers are now buying flowers to craft their own arrangements, according to Krivachek. The Society of American Florists told CNN florists and wholesalers across the country are adapting to the new financial pressures — much like they did during the pandemic and other supply chain disruptions. “While tariffs and cost increases are not welcome developments, the floral industry is remarkably resilient,” the society told CNN in a statement. Florists are ordering products earlier, strengthening relationships with growers and wholesalers and planning further in advance to manage costs, the society said. While Krivachek has felt the pressure, she’s found ways to adjust, such as by sourcing from local flower farmers. “I’m still going to have to import flowers,” she said. “I’m in Iowa, so there’s not a lot of variety, especially with weddings. There’s certain flowers that only you can get from Ecuador and Colombia.”