"As the hours tick down toward a potential government shutdown, the National Park Service (NPS) is gearing up to clear out its staff across all national parks, but the parks will keep their gates open."

"The partial shutdown paralyzing large portions of the federal government may last into January when Democrats retake control of the House, the White House acknowledged Sunday, as negotiations over funding for President Trump’s border wall sputtered to a near-standstill and congressional leaders abandoned Washington for Christmas."

"The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has quietly folded its Climate and Health Program into a branch that studies asthma and expunged the word climate from the name of the newly consolidated office, the agency confirmed on Thursday."

"State attorneys general from Maine to South Carolina joined a lawsuit filed by conservationists seeking to block the Trump administration from allowing seismic testing in the Atlantic Ocean that could harm marine mammals and lead to drilling off the Eastern Seaboard for the first time in decades."

"While big oil and gas companies provided the cash for anti-regulation campaigns, the farm lobby offered up a sympathetic face: the American farmer."

"The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency granted oil major Exxon Mobil Corp (XOM.N) a financial hardship waiver this year temporarily freeing its Montana refinery from U.S. biofuel laws, three sources familiar with the matter told Reuters."

"If the new Democratic House of Representatives brings back a panel to address global warming, the Tampa Bay area will have a prominent seat at the table. U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor is likely to chair the climate change committee if it materializes, giving the region a powerful voice in Congress' efforts to address this looming threat."

"By the middle of this century, climate change is likely to punch a hole through the busiest stretch of rail in North America. Parts of Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor route, which carries 12 million people each year between Boston and Washington, face “continual inundation.”"

"President Donald Trump on Friday teed up an expected Senate vote on a stopgap government spending measure that includes the funds he sought for his border wall — and pressured Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., to "use the Nuclear Option" to get the bill passed."

"A bucolic community was reduced to ash by a new kind of wildfire – the deadliest in California’s history. Survivors recall that horrible day".