"This summer, as a historic heat wave strained Texas’ electrical grid and hiked power prices, Scott Stambush’s electricity bill went negative."
"The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality has quietly proposed maintaining a target cancer-risk level for air pollution permits that scientists and public health officials consider inadequate to protect public health, especially for communities like those east of Houston that are exposed simultaneously to many sources of industrial emissions."
Reporting on environmental stories often leads to the state legislature, where key material can be frustratingly hard to access. Whether that’s because the state is deliberately hiding information, has poor systems for sharing it or isn’t even tracking it, there are ways to get what you need. Four seasoned environment reporters offer tips, tricks and commiseration.
"Even after a mail carrier’s recent death, the company continues to violate its own rules."
"The environmental health crisis ruminating in Houston’s Southwest Crossing neighborhood is the product of climate change and an unstable energy grid."
"President Joe Biden is suspending 26 environmental laws to build a border wall in south Texas, a move announced by the Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday. The laws include the Clean Air Act, Safe Drinking Water Act, Endangered Species Act, and National Environmental Policy Act—all waived in favor of constructing a border wall to stop migrants fleeing into the U.S. through Mexico."
"State regulators on Monday released their draft rules for what to do with all the hazardous oilfield waste that’s left over once a well is drilled. The announcement gives the public one month to comment on the new rules — while some industry representatives started giving input more than two years ago, documents and interviews show."
"Arizona governor Katie Hobbs said this week her administration is terminating state land leases that for years have given a Saudi-owned farm nearly unfettered access to pump groundwater in the dry southwestern state."
"Houston officials on Wednesday approved $5 million for a fund to help relocate residents from neighborhoods located near a rail yard polluted by a cancer-linked wood preservative that has been blamed for an increase in cancer cases."
