Environment

The Trump administration wants to limit the scope of a major clean water rule. It says the EPA under President Obama went too far in regulating isolated waters and wetlands far upstream from navigable lakes and rivers.

Trump EPA Proposes Major Rollback Of Federal Water Protections

4:55pm December 11, 2018

by Nathan Rott

The Trump administration wants to substantially limit which waterways are protected under the Clean Water Act. Farmers and developers have long lobbied against the current rule as too expansive.

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US Postal Service Ramps Up Mail Processing For Holiday Rush

Miracle On Your Street: How The Post Office Handles Holidays

3:24pm December 11, 2018

Is the USPS headed for a revamp?

U.N. Climate Change Summit Enters Crucial Final Week

9:29am December 11, 2018

by Rebecca Hersher

World leaders are gathered in Poland this week to discuss climate change. The U.S. hosted a meeting on coal, a highly polluting fuel, that many developing nations depend on.

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Environment

Why Scientists Are Talking About Attribution Science And What It Is

7:22pm December 10, 2018

by Christopher Joyce

As negotiators struggle to hammer out the rule book for a global climate agreement, scientists meeting in Washington, D.C., have yet more evidence linking climate change and extreme weather.

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Carbon Engineering CEO Steve Oldham stands in front of the company's Squamish, British Columbia, pilot plant. It uses a chemical process to extract carbon dioxide from the air and turn it into a fuel similar to crude oil.

How One Company Pulls Carbon From The Air, Aiming To Avert A Climate Catastrophe

1:44pm December 10, 2018

by Jeff Brady

A U.N. climate report says the only way to avoid the worst climate impacts will be to suck carbon emissions out of the air. Researchers are trying to find a feasible way to do that.

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Environment

Former U.S. Science Envoy: The Tone Of Climate Talks Is Now 'Quite Grim'

5:30pm December 09, 2018

NPR's Michel Martin talks with Daniel Kammen, former science envoy to the State Department, about the U.N. climate talks being held in Poland.

A motorists on Highway 101 watches flames from the Thomas fire leap above the roadway north of Ventura, Calif., in December 2017. Hundreds of homes were destroyed in what was then California's most destructive wildfire.

Fire-Resistant Is Not Fire-Proof, California Homeowners Discover

7:57am December 09, 2018

by Emily Guerin

California has some of the strictest building codes in the country for homes built in areas with wildfire risk. But recent fires show that even the most fire-resistant homes will burn.

Waves crash on the shore of Utqiaġvik in late October. Billy Adams, who has lived in the Arctic town his whole life, says that when he was growing up, by October there was almost always enough ice attached to shore that he could go hunting ringed seals o

How A Shorter Sea Ice Season Is Changing Life In The Arctic

7:55am December 09, 2018

by Ravenna Koenig

Climate change is so dramatic in northern Alaska that the effects on hunting and erosion are very real to people who've lived their whole lives there.

Ed Fuller and his wife, Sandra, are rebuilding their Ventura, Calif., home after it was destroyed in last year's Thomas Fire.

After Devastating Fire, Ventura Residents Push To Get Back Home For The Holidays

6:27pm December 07, 2018

by Stephanie O'Neill

"My wife is absolutely obsessed that she's ready for Christmas," Ed Fuller says. "Last Christmas, we sort of lost."

Researchers say they've found a way to let queen bees pass on immunity to a devastating disease called American foulbrood. The infectious disease is so deadly, many states and beekeeping groups recommend burning any hive that's been infected. Here, a fram

World's First Insect Vaccine Could Help Bees Fight Off Deadly Disease

3:48pm December 07, 2018

by Bill Chappell

American foulbrood is an infectious disease that devastates honeybee hives. Scientists say they've created a vaccine for it, despite a big hurdle: Bees don't have antibodies.