"The Arizona city already logs more days over 100 degrees than any U.S. city, and climate researchers predict Phoenix will grow hotter still in the coming decades. Planners are taking the projections seriously, and are looking for ways to adapt the city and its residents to a hotter, drier reality."

"DALLAS - Suffering from the nation's deadliest outbreak of West Nile virus this year, Dallas County authorized aerial spraying of insecticide on Friday for the first time in nearly five decades to help fight the mosquito-born illness."

"Faced with a booming population and a disappearing water supply, the city of San Antonio responded by dramatically cutting consumption, pioneering new storage techniques and investing in water recycling and desalination projects. It now boasts that it is 'Water's Most Resourceful City.'"

"FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. -- The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has issued its final rule aimed at cleaning up the largest single source of haze-causing pollutants in the country."

"Work was scarce for architect David Mullican and many Galveston Island builders after hurricane Ike. As damages were assessed, insurance claims disputed and homes were repaired piecemeal, Mullican was out of work for more than a year."

"OKLAHOMA CITY -- Some Oklahoma residents have returned to emergency shelters despite evacuation orders in many areas of the state being lifted, as wildfires continued to burn."

"OKLAHOMA CITY -- More than 64 temperature records were broken in Oklahoma during a scorching July, and additional ones fell across the state Wednesday on the first day of August, according to the National Climatic Data Center."

"GALVESTON - With the world focused on a BP rig explosion in the spring of 2010 that caused the worst oil spill in U.S. history, a massive release of pollutants from the company's Texas City refinery went largely unnoticed."

"PRAGUE, Okla. -- Jerri Loveland sees a connection between the oil drilling that surrounds her home and the earthquake last November that upended her life."