"State officials threw a lifeline to four fossil fueled power plants along the Southern California coast, deciding the facilities are still needed to provide reliable electricity even as they contribute to the climate crisis."
"The Trump administration is seeking to fast track environmental reviews of dozens of major energy and infrastructure projects during the COVID-19 pandemic, including oil and gas drilling, hazardous fuel pipelines, wind farms and highway projects in multiple states, according to documents provided to The Associated Press."
"Federal, state and tribal officials are hailing the completion of a more than $1 billion cleanup of contaminated sediments in the Lower Fox River. The cleanup is considered one of the largest and most expensive in the nation."
"The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is being sued for the second time in a week over a rule that limits states’ ability to fight big projects such as pipelines, with tribes and environmental groups who fear damage to nearby waters taking the latest action in court."
"The Trump administration on Monday finalized a rule allowing itself to issue areawide and industrywide reductions on fees that companies pay to the government in exchange for the ability to extract certain minerals from public lands."
"Insurers, facing huge losses, have been pulling back from fire-prone areas across California. “The marketplace has largely collapsed,” an advocate for counties in the state said."
"Top Interior Department officials misled Congress when they claimed high office rent in Washington, D.C., was a factor in the need to move the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to a new headquarters in Colorado, the agency’s internal watchdog found."
"Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) has won his primary, successfully holding off a challenge from Rep. Joe Kennedy, a scion of the famous Massachusetts political family. Markey, a longtime US lawmaker, is known for being a stalwart champion of environmental policy including cosponsoring the Green New Deal, as well as landmark House legislation on cap and trade 11 years ago."
"It's not much — white exterior walls, a chair and office phone inside, behind a door the EPA administrator could close behind himself. A photo obtained by E&E News under the Freedom of Information Act shows the secure phone booth EPA installed for then-Administrator Scott Pruitt."
"The Trump administration plans to lift endangered species protections for gray wolves across most of the nation by the end of the year, the director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said Monday."
