"Akif Eskalen steps through the dense, damp leaves in a wooded neighborhood, scrutinizing the branches around him. He's looking for evidence of an attack: tiny wounds piercing the bark and sap dried around them like bloodstains."
"Federal safety regulators warned on Thursday that another disastrous offshore oil well blowout could happen despite regulatory improvements in the four years since a BP well explosion in the Gulf of Mexico killed 11 workers and dumped millions of gallons of oil into the sea."
From 1970 until 2010, 34.8 million more people decided to move towards the coast of the United States and that population is expected to grow just as sea-level rise and climate change continue to increase the risk of living there. Amy Wold, a reporter with The Advocate in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, covers change and adaptation; locks and floodgates; levees and marshes; communities at risk; insurance issues; and lessons learned. Photo (click to enlarge): In 2012, Wold took this shot of the rapidly disappearing Cat Island in Barataria Basin in south Louisiana. She returned there in 2014 to find barely any land left above water. © Amy Wold, The (Baton Rouge) Advocate.
"Kentucky may be well positioned to meet a carbon emission target for power plants set by federal regulators, even as U.S. Senate candidates there blast the plan, saying it will cripple the state's coal industry."
"Will Russian President Vladimir Putin get richer thanks to a sweetheart government coal deal in Montana? Last month the Treasury Department informed Congress that Mr. Putin personally held an interest in an international oil and gas investment fund called the Gunvor Group, run out of Geneva, Switzerland. Team Putin adamantly denied his involvement, but the Treasury Department insisted it was right."
"The United States is warming fastest at two of its “corners,” in the Northeast and the Southwest, an analysis of federal temperature records shows."
"Hundreds of scientists have signed a letter sent to Canada’s prime minister blasting a federal review recommending the approval of the Northern Gateway tar sands pipeline as biased, Canadian media reported."
"A new University of Waterloo report warns that natural gas seeping from 500,000 wellbores represent 'a threat to environment and public safety' due to groundwater contamination, greenhouse gas emissions and explosion risks wherever methane collects in unvented buildings and spaces."
"For months, a company that stores giant mounds of petroleum coke on Chicago's Southeast Side has maintained it had nothing to do with gritty clouds of dust blowing into surrounding neighborhoods or black residue staining the sides of nearby houses."
"Pregnant women exposed to lead had newborns who scored slightly lower on tests measuring reflexes and other skills tied to brain development, according to a new study from China."
