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"Human-caused global warming helped increase dry conditions on every continent, scientists said in a new report, as talks on halting desertification were underway in Saudi Arabia."
"A legal fight over an 88-mile proposed railway in Utah has set the stage for the U.S. Supreme Court to decide how federal agencies evaluate the environmental impacts of projects requiring their approval, a decision with the potential to drastically shift how projects are permitted across the nation."
"Global accord lets oil firms sue over green policies. Pact signatories agree to reforms. Eleven European countries have quit treaty."
"A huge poplar tree stands proud in Maribel Ek’s courtyard, adorned with a sign that reads: “Florece desde adentro” (“It blooms from within”). Deep underground, the tree’s long roots search for the water that makes this land special: a sinkhole lake, known as a cenote."
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"The explosion of crisp, commercial apple varieties in the last century doomed many other breeds into obscurity. But in a field in Kent in the UK, some of them live on."
"The U.S. government on Friday ordered testing of the nation’s milk supply for bird flu to better monitor the spread of the virus in dairy cows."
"The Environmental Protection Agency on Monday banned two solvents found in everyday products that can cause cancer and other serious diseases. It was a move long sought by environmental and health advocates, even as they braced for what could be a wave of deregulation by the incoming Trump administration."
"For decades, a little-known company now owned by a Goldman Sachs fund has been making millions of dollars from the unlikely dregs of American life: sewage sludge."
"As sea levels rise and natural disasters become more intense, homes in low-lying coastal areas or tinder-dry mountains are starting to lose value. That’s a problem for the finances of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored enterprises that back half of the nation’s outstanding mortgages — and keep the residential real estate market liquid by buying mortgages from banks and repackaging them into securities."
"In humanity’s war against rats, other animals are often collateral. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released its final biological evaluation on rodenticides on Nov. 22 and found that the rat poisons are jeopardizing at least 78 endangered species such as black-footed ferrets and California condors."
"The Biden administration is proposing to raise a key threshold determining how much of a pesticide that’s commonly used in the agriculture industry the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finds concerning in the environment — spurring ire from some environmental advocates."
"When he served as a Republican congressman from New York, Lee Zeldin delighted environmentalists by championing efforts to protect critical wildlife habitat from potential development efforts, including a golf course proposed by Donald Trump." "Now, as Trump’s pick to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, Zeldin is pledging to deliver on the president-elect’s promise to eliminate several environmental regulations that the fossil fuel industry views as burdensome, according to half a dozen Senate Republicans who met with Zeldin this week."
"Scientists say there were 18.7 million chikungunya cases that exacted a total cost of nearly $50 billion over a decade."
"More than 400 chemicals regularly used in everyday plastic products are linked to breast cancer, and the dangerous compounds could be a driver of increasingly elevated cancer rates in young women, new research finds."
"After the loss of key federal wetlands protections in 2023, scientists are warning the damage this change could bring to wetlands would also bring billions of dollars of flood damage with it. According to a report from the Union of Concerned Scientists, there are 30 million acres of wetlands across the upper Midwestern United States providing crucial flood prevention benefits, whose loss could potentially cost the region more than $22 billion annually."
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