As Western coal-fired plants close, who gets their water?
CRAIG, Colorado – Coal-fired power plants use millions of gallons of water, but as more of these plants are shut down, what will become of the water they draw from the overallocated Colorado River?
Activists cite rising heat deaths, pollution, fires in asking Phoenix to declare climate emergency
PHOENIX – Arizona environmental groups gather in front of City Hall to ask Phoenix to declare a climate emergency.
Man vs. mussel: Buckeye mayor testifies on threat from invasive species
WASHINGTON - Buckeye Mayor Jackie A. Meck joined other witnesses before a Senate committee Wednesday to talk about threat that invasive species, like quagga mussels and salt cedars, post to water supplies in the West.
Clean energy produced on Navajo land could help power Los Angeles
LOS ANGELES – With the recent closure of the coal-fired Navajo Generating Station, the Navajo leaders are looking to jump start the tribal economy by partnering with Los Angeles to bring clean energy to the second-largest U.S. city using resources on tribal land.
Verde River watershed gets a grade of C+, but that ‘actually is very good’
CAMP VERDE — The first-ever Verde Watershed Report Card gave the river a C+. The report takes into account the quality of the habitat, the community and the water in and along the Verde River.
Hot planet: January 2020 was warmest January in 141 years of records, NOAA says
PHOENIX – January 2020 was the warmest January recorded across the world. But what does that mean for Arizona?
Blasting sacred sites for border wall ‘forever damaged’ tribes
WASHINGTON - An emotional Tohono O'odham Nation chairman told lawmakers Wednesday that blasting on sacred sites in national monuments to build a border wall near his reservation has "forever damaged our people."
UNESCO urged to protect World Heritage Site threatened by border wall construction
HERMOSILLO, Mexico – The Trump administration’s border wall construction is threatening El Pinacate and Gran Desierto de Altar Biosphere Reserve, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, according to a petition by conservationists and the Tohono O’odham Tribe.
Why Palo Verde, the country’s largest nuclear plant, is cutting its wastewater use
PHOENIX – Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station west of Phoenix is trying to reduce its use of wastewater in the nuclear cooling process by using even dirtier water.
Endangered species throw roadblock in path of Rosemont Copper mine
WASHINGTON - A federal judge has overturned environmental permits for the proposed Rosemont Copper Mine, saying the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service failed to consider the mine's impact on several endangered species in the Santa Rita Mountains.
To salvage recycling, Phoenix increases solid waste residential rate by 24%
PHOENIX – Residents will see their recycling and composting rates go up over the next two years. The rate increase comes after two years of China cutting back on what types of recycling it will accept, meaning less revenue to offset the city’s recycling program.
‘Perfect droughts’ were common in the past, researchers say, and could get worse
PHOENIX – “Perfect droughts,” when diminished streamflow and precipitation affect all of a region’s water sources, occurred in California an average of six times a century for the past 600 years, University of Arizona tree-ring experts say, and they could become longer and more common in the future, irrespective of climate change.
