SAN ANTONIO, Texas—In Texas, suburbs have sprung up where oil pump jacks once bobbed. At the Preserve at Medina, a subdivision of brick-and-siding starter homes in southwest San Antonio, students filed off a school bus on a hot afternoon. One child turned down Vesper Branch, a street with a plugged oil well ringed by a […]

This reporting was supported by a Transatlantic Media Fellowship from the Heinrich Boll Foundation. Picture a buoyant triangular steel or concrete platform roughly the dimensions of a baseball field. Now place a wind turbine taller than the London Eye on top, connect mooring lines to the seabed and power cables to the grid, and you’ve […]

PARIS—By the time Cléo made it to Greek class, she had gone completely pale. It was a Wednesday in June during France’s second consecutive heat wave this year, and the 16-year-old was struggling to cope with the rising temperatures. She pushed through, thinking she was just tired. But the following day at her sweltering high […]

From our collaborating partner “Living on Earth,” public radio’s environmental news magazine, an interview by producer Aynsley O’Neill with Nathan Donley from the Center for Biological Diversity. Atrazine is the second-most widely used weed killer in the U.S. after glyphosate, which you might know as Roundup. Much like glyphosate, atrazine can disrupt hormones and has […]

Plenty of storms have hit Pensacola, Florida’s westernmost city, in the 450 years since its founding, but among the worst has been the storm over the toxic waste site nicknamed “Mount Dioxin.” Bureaucratic mismanagement led to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency relocating about 400 households from the neighborhoods around the site beginning in the mid-1990s. […]

The Arizona Department of Water Resources filed a motion Friday to join in a lawsuit against the federal government’s plan for Colorado River operations over the next 10 years. “Arizona believes the federal government’s new operating framework ignores basic elements of the law of the river and could result in cuts to the state apportionment […]

On a misty and breezy morning last fall, Marc Hamric, a North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries veteran, and two other technicians were conducting field work in Turnagain Bay, a remote area near Cedar Island. They had brought their boat ashore, but because the water was so rough, it came loose and floated away. One […]

This story is part of an investigation conducted by an international team of journalists based at The Outlaw Ocean Project. Read the other stories here. In August 2022, dozens of protesters spilled into the streets of Kayar, a fishing town on Senegal’s Atlantic coast, demanding the closure of a nearby fishmeal plant, Touba Protein Marine. […]

It’s not unusual for Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin to be on the road touting the Trump administration’s agenda, but his travel itinerary in the weeks before the midterm election looks like a trail of political hot spots. On Thursday, Zeldin traveled to an auto repair shop and a construction firm in central Pennsylvania […]

Border wall construction in the Big Bend region puts Republican Texas Land Commissioner Dawn Buckingham in a bind: back President Donald Trump’s immigration agenda or respond to growing bipartisan opposition to the wall. The Texas General Land Office manages 13 million acres across the state, much of it in far West Texas. Among its holdings […]

Blueberries, green beans, yellow squash, red onions, purple cabbage, oranges. At markets across Florida, colorful produce signals freshness and nutrition and attracts consumers. Here, as in other states, food’s journey from farm to table begins by removing evidence of the farm. Namely: scrubbing away the soil that forms the foundation of our food system. And […]

BIRMINGHAM, Ala.—It’s hard to forget Uncle Bobo. And on this humid October day, his nephew says it’s hard to remember him, too. Devolin “Bobo” Webster, 66, died unexpectedly in his home Saturday morning as the remnants of Hurricane Isaias passed through the Magic City, more than 200 miles from where the category 2 storm made […]

Incumbent New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and Republican challenger Bruce Blakeman clashed over high energy costs in the state’s only gubernatorial debate, offering sharply different visions for how to keep electricity affordable as demand rises. Average residential electricity bills in New York rose 10 percent from 2024 to 2025, outpacing the national average. The state […]

Coral-fringed tropical atolls are among the landforms most threatened by global warming, but many have a potential superpower: Healthy ecosystems may help them keep pace with rising seas. Atoll islands with native vegetation and thriving seabird populations are “naturally active systems that can change and adapt to their environmental conditions if they are allowed to […]

More than 1 billion people per year were exposed to heat waves and fire pollution at the same time from 2010-2019, a sharp jump from the decade before it, according to a new study that highlights the growing public health crisis caused by global warming. The research, published in Science Advances on Wednesday, is the […]

A new study in the journal Seismica presents the first comprehensive seismic analysis of what happened during the disastrous flood in Nepal on Aug. 26. But exactly what triggered the mountainside to give way remains unclear. A massive section of a Himalayan mountainside collapsed near the Nepal-China border, sending millions of cubic meters of rock […]

This story is part of an investigation conducted by an international team of journalists based at The Outlaw Ocean Project. Read the other stories here. In January 1966, a South African ship caught fire at sea. In port in Bristol, England, after firefighters pried open the smoking container, the conflagration spread and burned for five […]

Wyoming has shelved a state-funded project to measure water use in the Green River and Little Snake River basins after it could not get enough data to create a basin-wide estimate of water lost during irrigation. At a meeting in the Cowboy State capitol of Cheyenne last month, members of the Wyoming Water Development Commission […]

COLUMBUS, Ohio—A four-hour legislative committee hearing in June, punctuated by applause and anger, offered a window into the growing backlash against data centers. The prospect of unchecked development has galvanized a cross-section of Ohioans, urban and rural, Democrat and Republican, alarmed about the spread of the giant computing facilities. Residents are demanding that local governments […]

Three years ago, hydrogen seemed poised for a long-awaited breakthrough. The Biden administration announced $7 billion in federal funding for seven hubs to produce the fuel across the country, and Pennsylvania was set to be a major player in the emerging industry. Hydrogen has long been heralded as a potential skeleton key to emission reductions: […]

Welcome to Inside Climate, a podcast from the staff of Inside Climate News. Things get a little fishy in this episode as we discuss fish farming—aquaculture, an industry that now brings in $300 billion a year. Inside Climate News partnered with the Outlaw Ocean Project, a journalism nonprofit based in Washington, D.C., to investigate aquaculture’s […]

This story is a partnership between Dylan Baddour of Inside Climate News and Neena Satija of The Texas Newsroom. Eight years ago, at the height of the shale-oil boom, a committee of industry giants and public officials unveiled a bold plan to make Corpus Christi “drought proof.” With this plan, a consultant explained to city […]

This story is part of an investigation conducted by an international team of journalists based at The Outlaw Ocean Project. Read the other stories here. Inside a sprawling warehouse in northern France, millions of brown, inch-long mealworm larvae writhed in purple trays stacked 60 feet high. Grown by a company called Ynsect, these larvae were […]

This story is part of an investigation conducted by an international team of journalists based at The Outlaw Ocean Project. Read the other stories here. For two thousand years, the Ambracian Gulf in western Greece provided life to its Mediterranean neighbors. Today, it’s an industrial graveyard. Trace the Gulf’s northern coast, and you’ll uncover beaches […]

This investigation was reported in a collaboration between Inside Climate News and Columbia Journalism Investigations. CALIPATRIA, Calif.—On a border-town road surrounded by alfalfa and grain fields, William Cooper stopped before a dusty, vacant lot. Its owner, he said, is one of many investors drawn to the arid Imperial Valley by a critical mineral propelling the […]

Queen conch larvae drift for two to three weeks before settling into seagrass, where their first food grows on the thin green blades. This is where they spend most of their first year, buried in the sand. In the Exumas region of the Bahamas, just south of East Sampson Cay, Shedd Aquarium researchers recorded the […]

This story is part of an investigation conducted by an international team of journalists based at The Outlaw Ocean Project. Read the other stories here. In May, the Hellenic Aquaculture Producers Organization gathered in Athens to promote the industry as the future of sustainable food security. Flanked by industry titans, the European commissioner for fisheries […]

WHITTED, Fla.—When Ann Jones runs her kitchen faucet, the water flows clear only some of the time. Sometimes the water is brown. Fill a pitcher, and the water is the color of iced tea. Jones, 81, is a gentle woman who has lived most of her life in this unincorporated historically Black community of 52 […]

From our collaborating partner “Living on Earth,” public radio’s environmental news magazine, an interview by host Steve Curwood with veteran Maine journalist Kevin Miller. The closely watched race for U.S. Senate in Maine is pitting two environmentally concerned candidates against each other. Not only do they both have fairly similar green and climate views, they […]

MARTINEZ, Calif.—Scores of people tired of living near accident-prone refineries packed an elementary school auditorium to hear what their government officials were doing to protect them. Two local refineries, Marathon Martinez Renewables and Martinez Refining Co., have racked up hundreds of air quality violations over the past five years. MRC agreed in February to pay […]

Oil companies will no longer be required to conduct environmental reviews before exploring for fossil fuel reservoirs in the Western Arctic, the largest tract of federally managed public land in the United States. The Bureau of Land Management announced a categorical exclusion under the National Environmental Policy Act for winter oil and gas exploration in […]

A crude oil pipeline spill last month in the Detroit suburbs has prompted federal authorities to open an investigation into the safety of all 20,000 miles of hazardous liquids pipelines operated by Energy Transfer. The 600-gallon spill at a commercial intersection in Sterling Heights, Michigan, has received little media coverage. Local news reports at the […]

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission issued an unusual warning this week to the country’s largest asset managers and a climate-focused investor group over their roles in a 2021 campaign that replaced board directors at ExxonMobil. The commission published a letter saying it had concluded a probe into the entities, and while it found no […]

This story is part of an investigation conducted by an international team of journalists based at The Outlaw Ocean Project. Read the other stories here. Xinjiang is a land of unforgiving extremes. Across its 600,000 square miles on China’s far northwest frontier, barely six inches of rain falls each year. The region’s Taklamakan Desert has […]

Around 100 Baltimore residents packed a community hall in the Curtis Bay neighborhood on the evening of Oct. 1. One after another, they implored the Maryland Department of the Environment not to renew the air permit for the city’s largest trash incinerator. The speakers—young residents and retirees, longtime neighbors, doctors, students and environmental advocates—described the […]

A new report paints a dark picture of the state of global wildlife—but also highlights flickers of light where some populations are on the upswing. Over the past half-century, populations of thousands of vertebrate species across the globe have decreased in size by 73 percent on average, according to the “Living Planet” report published Wednesday […]

In Montgomery County, Indiana, utility-scale solar projects appear on an official list of undesirable land uses that also includes “adult-oriented businesses.” So it wasn’t surprising that the county Board of Commissioners unanimously rejected a 200-megawatt solar project on Sept. 28. But it still stings for renewable energy advocates. It shows a huge challenge lurking right […]

Maryland environmental regulators say jet fuel continues to seep into Piscataway Creek from Joint Base Andrews more than six months after the spill was reported, despite the base’s assurances that it has isolated the damaged fuel system and stopped the leak. “MDE remains deeply concerned about the ongoing environmental impacts and continues to observe signs […]

Environmental groups and citizens are urging Pennsylvania regulators to increase the minimum amount of protective buffer space between gas wells and homes, schools and water sources. The issue has taken on new urgency as the AI data center buildout spurs more demand for natural gas. On Wednesday, a coalition of environmental and community groups held […]

Ozone pollution from fires, along with extreme heat and drought, is further weakening the Amazon rainforest’s ability to absorb carbon dioxide, new research shows. The Amazon and other forests absorb more than a quarter of human-caused CO2 emissions each year, more than 11 billion metric tons. But in recent decades, increasingly larger areas of forests […]

In 1991, Random House published a picture book called “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: ABC’s for a Better Planet,” in which the masked cartoon turtles trade in their signature nunchucks for signs bearing environmental slogans. For “A,” the turtles explain the sources of acid rain. Under “B,” the concept of biodegradability. “Don’t Pollute Dudes!” the turtles […]

As Mainers prepare to choose a new governor in November, climate and energy issues may not be top of mind for every voter—but they are having big effects on residents’ lives. The average cost of heating oil recently soared to a record high of more than $6 per gallon, promising an expensive winter ahead for […]

MONTGOMERY, Ala.—The Alabama Public Service Commission approved a new set of rules for future data center projects Tuesday that require more transparency and disclosure from data center companies and public votes by the PSC for data center approval. But they leave in place what critics call a “disappointing” provision allowing for approval by default of […]

In the Southern Ocean, whales, penguins, seals and seabirds feast on massive swarms of krill that underpin much of the region’s marine food web. Meanwhile, a growing fishing industry in Antarctica is also targeting the tiny crustaceans, used to make Omega-3 supplements, pet food and feed for farm-raised salmon. Now, a coalition of more than […]

Europe’s fish stocks are in such dire straits that even the retailers who rely on them are now telling the fishing industry to slow down. Last week, the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea—an intergovernmental marine science organization whose data is used to determine annual catch limits—published its annual mackerel report. Following upward […]

Drinking water costs spiked faster than inflation, grocery prices and median household income, researchers at nonprofit Food & Water Watch outlined in a first-of-its-kind report released Tuesday. The average community water system increased household drinking water prices by 62 percent between 2015 and 2025—with costs in Louisiana, Maryland and New Hampshire having particularly steep rises, […]

NY-17: The third in a series on the environmental stakes behind one of the nation’s most fiercely contested congressional races. At 8, on her walk home from elementary school, Sylke Jackson would drop sticks, leaves and nut shells in Nyack Brook. They would soften and float along beside her, as if companions. At 10, as […]

Armed Border Patrol agents raided a protest camp in Lochiel, in southeast Arizona, making way for contractors to cut down the last standing cottonwood tree Monday morning for a double border wall, after protesters protected it for more than 70 days. Activists in Lochiel said at least 12 people had been arrested as of 8 […]

The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments from oil companies on Monday that could help decide the fate of more than two dozen lawsuits accusing the industry of deceiving the public about climate change. The claims seek potentially billions of dollars in damages to help pay the costs imposed by climate-related extreme weather. Yet the questions […]

New York City is running out of places to dump its trash. In the latest draft of the city’s once-a-decade solid waste management plan, the sanitation department warns that the landfills receiving much of the city’s garbage are filling up fast. More than two-thirds of the city’s municipal waste is transported to landfills hundreds of […]