Alaska and Hawaii

"Environmentalists and Alaska natives are challenging the Trump administration’s decision to sell drilling rights in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, arguing the government gave short shrift to the impact on polar bears and the region’s other wildlife. The groups said they filed a pair of lawsuits Monday in a U.S. district court in Alaska, setting up an election-year battle over the controversial plan, even as the Interior Department prepares for a possible auction."

"The Trump administration will say Monday that it is not ready to grant a permit for a controversial gold and copper mine in Alaska, according to three individuals briefed on the decision, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, on the grounds that the firm must do more to address how it will harm the environment."

"Federal approval of a controversial gold and copper mine in Alaska that would be the largest in North America may be put on hold after a small group of influential Republicans — including the president’s son, Fox News host Tucker Carlson, a wealthy Trump donor and one of the vice president’s former top aides — launched a full-court press to block the project."

"Alaska’s highly prized salmon - a favorite of seafood lovers the world over - are getting smaller, and climate change is a suspected culprit, a new study reported, documenting a trend that may pose a risk to a valuable fishery, indigenous people and wildlife."

"The Trump administration’s effort to open up drilling across more than a million acres in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) faces significant legal hurdles, according to experts who are likely to assist in challenging the newly announced plan.

The Interior Department on Monday finalized plans to move ahead with a longstanding item on the GOP’s wishlist: allowing drilling in the Alaskan wilderness. The move could have dire consequences for polar bears, caribou, birds and other species that live in the coastal area in the northern part of ANWR.

"The Trump administration finalized plans Monday to open up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling, a move that will auction off oil and gas rights in the heart of one of the nation’s most iconic wild places. Achieving a goal Republicans have sought for 40 years, it marks a capstone for an administration that has ignored calls to reduce fossil fuel consumption in the face of climate change."

"Climate change is poised to thaw and undermine the soil beneath ConocoPhillips’ proposed Willow oil drilling project on Alaska’s North Slope, making its rigs and roads vulnerable to the same global warming the project will be aggravating."

"Pacific walruses have begun massing onshore in Alaska on a Chukchi Sea beach, one of the earliest of the now-annual congregations at that site yet recorded, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said.

Walruses were spotted on July 29 a beach near the Inupiat village of Point Lay and numbered about 5,000 as of Aug. 5, said Andrea Medeiros, a spokeswoman for the Fish and Wildlife Service.

"A Defense Department and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) watchdog will consider probing the Trump administration’s moves to advance the proposed Pebble Mine in Alaska following congressional requests on Monday."