"Fifteen days after Tropical Storm Helene sent debris, runoff and a cocktail of toxins — including raw sewage and pharmaceuticals — pouring into the French Broad River in the fall of 2024, Shea Tuberty set out to investigate the damage."
"An unknown number of abandoned oil and gas wells dot the National Park System, but the one at Cuyahoga Valley National Park revealed itself with a whistling plume of colorless, odorless, and potentially lethal, methane gas."
"Federal workers were guaranteed back pay once the government reopened. Some at the National Park Service are still waiting."
"United Nations climate officials announced Thursday that Turkey will host the 2026 Conference of Parties, COP31, making it the fourth time in five years that the climate talks are held in a country under authoritarian rule."
At one time, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was a reporter’s mecca for databases. Nowadays, not so much. But as the latest Reporter’s Toolbox points out, there remains a great government data source for journalists focused on environmental issues. Find out more about the official source for spending data on the U.S. government, including its superpower — search.
If it’s a journalism feel-good story you need heading into the holiday season, peek over the shoulder of the Ernie Pyle statue to the hall that houses the Media School at Indiana University Bloomington. Inside, you’ll find the heroes of the Indiana Daily Student, who, with the help of fellow journalists, stood up to suppression. WatchDog Opinion shares their inspirational story.
'For the past few weeks, Oitancan “Oi” Zephier has labored among piles of vinyl records nearly 2 feet high. KILI-FM, the Porcupine, South Dakota-based tribal public broadcasting station Zephier manages, has gone digital and no longer needs the records. The station is selling the records, because what it needs is cash."
"Mining company Blue Moon Metals plans to dispose of its mining waste in Repparfjord, a nationally protected salmon fjord in the Norwegian Arctic that Indigenous Sámi fishers rely on."
"Despite the efforts of more than half of all countries worldwide to curb a key climate super-pollutant, a report released this week by the United Nations Environment Programme at the U.N. climate summit shows that global methane emissions continue to climb at a troubling pace."
"Southwestern states are bracing for many of their streams to lose federal safeguards under the EPA’s proposal to lift Clean Water Act protections for many wetlands and waterways across the US. New Mexico, Arizona, California, and other arid states face the brunt of the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposal because it explicitly excludes streams that only run when it rains—one of the most common kinds of waterways in the desert Southwest."
