Water & Oceans

"The snowpack in the Rocky Mountains has been gradually thinning over much of the past century, and a new study attributes much of that to global warming."

"The spectrum of actions marking the UN's annual World Oceans Day ranges from the celebratory to the cautionary as ocean health is assaulted by challenges that include climate change, oil spills, pollution and overfishing."

"A 10-knot limit off the West Coast could prevent deaths, advocates tells the U.S. Department of Commerce. Shippers oppose the limits."

"Releases from six Missouri River reservoirs, already at historic levels, will be increased again this month, say water managers with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers."

"North China is dying. A chronic drought is ravaging farmland. The Gobi Desert is inching south. The Yellow River, the so-called birthplace of Chinese civilization, is so polluted it can no longer supply drinking water. The rapid growth of megacities — 22 million people in Beijing and 12 million in Tianjin alone — has drained underground aquifers that took millenniums to fill."

"Floodwaters around the South Dakota capital of Pierre are rising and they're about to get much higher. The dams along the Missouri River can't hold back a massive surge of water spurred by record rains in Montana."

"Philadelphia got the green light Wednesday for a $2 billion storm-water plan that will transform the way the city deals with rain. The 25-year plan, which has been hailed as a national model, envisions green roofs on office buildings, porous pavement on city streets and parking lots, and plants and trees with tubs of gravel below ground to hold water and stall runoff in a storm."

"Libya’s enormous aquatic reserves could potentially become a new weapon of choice if government forces opt to starve coastal cities that heavily rely on free flowing freshwater."

"Scientists have been using small variations in the Earth’s gravity to identify trouble spots around the globe where people are making unsustainable demands on groundwater, one of the planet’s main sources of fresh water."