"State-sponsored Russian hackers appear far more interested this year in demonstrating that they can disrupt the American electric utility grid than the midterm elections, according to United States intelligence officials and technology company executives."
"NextEra Energy, owner of the Duane Arnold Energy Center, says it will retire Iowa's lone nuclear plant in late 2020, five years earlier than anticipated."
"'In many places, people are preparing for the past or present climate. But this summer is the future.'"
"Earth's global warming fever spiked to deadly new highs across the Northern Hemisphere this summer, and we're feeling the results—extreme heat is now blamed for hundreds of deaths, droughts threaten food supplies, wildfires have raced through neighborhoods in the western United States, Greece and as far north as the Arctic Circle.
"Fishermen and environmentalists are at odds over a suite of changes to American fishing laws that was approved by the House of Representatives, and the proposal faces a new hurdle in the Senate."
"A group of House Democrats is calling for the government’s ethics office to investigate acting Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) head Andrew Wheeler's meetings with former lobbying clients."
"Radioactive uranium has leaked through the floor at the Westinghouse fuel factory on Bluff Road, contaminating the soil in an area of Richland County with a nearly 35-year history of groundwater pollution from the plant."
"In his first three weeks on the job, Andrew Wheeler, the acting head of the Environmental Protection Agency, has sought to halt two major efforts by his predecessor, Scott Pruitt, to roll back environmental regulations, arguing that the policies are legally vulnerable, according to people who have heard his reasoning."
"The lawyer nominated to run the Superfund toxic cleanup program is steeped in the complexities of restoring polluted rivers and chemical dumps. He spent more than a decade on one of the nation’s most extensive cleanups, one involving Dow Chemical’s sprawling headquarters in Midland, Mich."
"A 70-year-old woman and her two great-grandchildren were among six people killed when a wildfire engulfed entire communities in northern California, officials and family members said."
"An arid region 180 miles south of Tijuana is the crossroads where strawberries, economics, and groundwater meet. Baja usually gets less than three inches of rain annually, and there is a multi-year drought. But strawberries grown for export have become so valuable, farmers keep trying to grow more, and are allowed to use more groundwater than nature replenishes."
