"Blaming “wealthy plantation owners” and outside “special interest groups,” Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry decried the abrupt decision late Tuesday to cancel a massive grain elevator proposed for a small predominantly Black community along the Mississippi River fighting to preserve its history and landmarks."

"Despite aging pipes and vulnerable children, schools face no national requirement to test for lead"

"A pair of liquefied natural gas projects in Texas suffered a major legal setback Tuesday after a federal appeals court tossed out their authorizations."

"The Navajo Nation took the unusual step of using its police force to try to impede uranium shipments across its land last week—a preview of legal environmental battles to come if other uranium mines open in the southwest."

"Peru’s reclusive Mashco Piro ethnic group recently used bows and arrows to attack loggers suspected of encroaching on their territory in the Amazon, according to a regional Indigenous organization."

"Summers in New York City are difficult for Anthony Gay and his family. A small, portable air conditioner in his bedroom is the only relief they have from soaring temperatures in their Brooklyn rental."

"After wildland firefighter Ben McLane fought California’s deadliest fire, he started second-guessing his line of work. The November 2018 Camp Fire near Paradise had killed 85 and leveled 18,000 homes. McLane was used to hiking steep terrain and digging endless fire breaks. He was accustomed to the spectacle of entire hillsides of pine and fir aflame. He wasn’t used to this scale of devastation — or feeling he’d worked in vain. Meanwhile, he rarely saw his family, and couldn’t fathom affording a house. Was firefighting worth it?"

"When Hurricane Idalia struck Florida last summer, a tree fell straight through a trailer occupied by a migrant-farmworker family in Hamilton County. They couldn’t afford to move, even temporarily, so the family of six just picked up the things they could salvage and continued to live around the rotting tree."

"Brian Harrington entered the Illinois Department of Corrections system in 2007 at age 14, sentenced to 25 years in prison. ... He remembers the toilet water being brown—and sometimes the drinking water, too. He recalls the tap water’s sewer smell and the black specks swirling, then settling, in his cup."