Water & Oceans

"Big is beautiful in the public vote for the brown bear piling on the most pounds before hibernation in Alaska’s Katmai national park".

"The Trump administration’s plan to drill off the Atlantic Coast for the first time in more than half a century is on the brink of collapse because of a court development Thursday that blocked the first steps to offshore oil and gas exploration, as well as the president’s recent actions that undermine his own proposal."

"The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) mishandled the distribution of aid in Puerto Rico after two devastating 2017 hurricanes, the agency’s Office of Inspector General said in a report released Thursday."

"Louisiana will get nearly $215 million in BP oil spill money for two projects planned to restore more than 4,600 acres of marsh and other habitat in the New Orleans area, Gov. John Bel Edwards said."

"The Greenland ice sheet is on track to lose mass at about four times the fastest rate observed over the past 12,000 years. At its current trajectory, such melting would dump huge quantities of freshwater into the sea, raising global sea levels and disrupting ocean currents, scientists concluded in new research Wednesday."

"Environmental officials in Texas have lifted a warning for a final Houston-area community to stop using tap water because it might be tainted with a deadly brain-eating microbe, but with a warning that the water should be boiled before being consumed."

"The “blob” of hotter ocean water that killed sea lions and other marine life in 2014 and 2015 may become permanent."

"Facing opposition from six states that rely on the Colorado River for water for their cities and farms, Utah asked the federal government to delay a fast-track approval process for building an underground pipeline that would transport billions of gallons of water to the southwest part of the state."

"A path across nearly 1,000 streams and wetlands was cleared Friday for the Mountain Valley Pipeline. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reissued three permits for the natural gas pipeline being built in Virginia and West Virginia, nearly two years after they were invalidated by a federal appeals court."