"Florida's promoters like to sing its superlatives — best beaches, prettiest sunsets, perfect climate (except for the occasional hurricane). But there's a No. 1 distinction the boosters never mention. Florida is infested with more exotic and invasive species than any other state and perhaps, some say, than anywhere else in the world."

"The Memphis City Council yesterday stepped into the path of a proposed oil pipeline through the Tennessee city, casting its opposition as a fight against 'environmental racism.'"

"On the Outer Banks, homeowners in Avon are confronting a tax increase of almost 50 percent to protect their homes, the only road into town, and perhaps the community’s very existence."

"The Arizona Legislature has taken up a range of water-related measures this year, but some bills that would strengthen the state’s water rules to protect declining groundwater and desert streams have run into opposition and have failed to move forward."

"They’ve been buried — alive — for 17 years. And now, Brood X, one of the world’s largest swarms of giant fly-like bugs called cicadas, is ready to rise. When the ground warms to 64 degrees, they’ll stop gnawing on tree roots and start scratching toward the surface by the hundreds of billions."

"LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A chemical plant here that makes a raw material for everything from Teflon to lubricants used on the International Space Station also appears to do more damage to the climate than all of this city’s passenger vehicles."

"Officials in Miami-Dade County, where climate models predict two feet or more of sea-level rise by 2060, have released an upbeat strategy for living with more water, one that focused on elevating homes and roads, more dense construction farther inland and creating more open space for flooding in low-lying areas."

"Shannon Miller Ward would like to know how someone loses enough gasoline to fill nearly two Olympic swimming pools without even missing it. Last summer, a crack in the Colonial pipeline, the country's biggest fuel pipeline, leaked at least 1.2 million gallons of gasoline into a small nature preserve here on the edge of the Charlotte suburbs."

"

"Miami-Dade County appears to be home to yet another new invasive species — this one a mosquito that was last officially documented in the Florida Keys 75 years ago."