“We have to provide a way for firefighters to enter and exit the career in a healthy manner,” says an advocate for improved working conditions.Continue readingFor wildland firefighters, another battle looms: for pay and mental health care to match their growing workload
Author: Felicity Barringer
Amory Lovins, a physicist who co-founded RMI (formerly called Rocky Mountain Institute), is a half-time adjunct professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Stanford and a visiting scholar at the Precourt Institute for Energy. Continue reading’Despair and complacency are equally unwarranted:’ Q&A with Amory Lovins, energy visionary
The data-driven insurance business is in trouble as climate-change-driven disasters arrive with greater fury and frequency. Continue readingFor beleaguered homeowners and their insurers, the fire next time could be a flood
Experts believe the Chinese balloon downed over the Atlantic coast this month was snooping on U.S. missile defenses. Part of the landscape for a half-century, they are headed for a costly refresh in an era of rising global tensions.Continue readingSpy balloon controversy draws attention to western nuclear missile facilities
New agencies find making sustainability plans is hard, but easier than persuading growers to accept them.Continue readingA simmering revolt against groundwater cutbacks in California
The long-term push to restore a portion of ancestral lands to Native American tribes has gained new energy, fueled in part by the efforts of non-profit conservation organizations and private land holders. Continue readingNative American land return movement makes gains, faces obstacles
The emerging science of road ecology has been tallying the cost of collisions to animal populations and vehicle owners. Now western states are mitigating the danger, a process that new Federal money could accelerate.Continue readingWildlife crossings seek to reconnect the animal West
As drought tightens its grip on the West, states are taking different approaches to encouraging water conservation.Continue readingWater restrictions close in, sporadically, on the West’s most populous areas
The West led the charge to legalize marijuana. As it becomes big business in many cities and towns, some others view it with distaste grounded in moral qualms or concerns about criminal cartels. Will growing revenues help sweeten the pot?Continue readingUrban, rural and tribal: how three Wests diverge on cannabis
Billions in potential federal dollars have led Gov. Gavin Newsom to pause the decommissioning of the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant — source of one sixth of the state’s green energy.Continue readingWeighing the consequences of losing carbon-free energy in California