"With just shy of 800 residents, West Bend, Iowa is barely a blip on a prairie landscape, but it has become home base for an uncommonly large expanse of organically grown crops- operations that have found success in challenging the popular convention that pesticides and other agricultural chemicals are needed to feed the world."
"The Department of the Interior announced that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has published proposed updates to strengthen conservation and management of greater sage-grouse habitat on public lands, informed by the best available science, collaborative work with states, and input from local, Tribal and federal partners."
"The newspaper’s motto reads “Real data. Real value. Real news.” But there is nothing real about it."
The displacement of populations by climate impacts, while not a new phenomenon in human history, is worsening in the face of global warming’s extreme weather patterns. Yet the extensive international regime to aid refugees doesn’t cover those migrating due to flooding, drought, natural disasters or climate change. Backgrounder considers the implications and how nations will respond to the new realities.
"A multimillion-dollar bank stabilization project proposed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers could protect one of the densest collections of ceremonial and burial mounds still existing in North America."
"The project, which could expand wind power, was supposed to be done by 2018. The holdup? The American burying beetle."
"A company proposing an $8 billion carbon dioxide pipeline through eastern South Dakota says the project would be good for the environment. ... While that’s true, participating ethanol plants could still emit about 7 million metric tons of additional carbon dioxide annually. That’s because the pipeline would only capture some — not all — of the CO2 emitted by the plants."
"Companies and others responsible for some of America's most toxic waste sites are using a federal health agency’s faulty reports to save money on cleanups, defend against lawsuits and deny victims compensation, a Reuters investigation found."
"On a sweltering summer day in central Kansas, farm fields shimmer in the heat as Clint Brauer watches a team of bright yellow robots churn up and down the rows, tirelessly slicing away any weeds that stand in their way while avoiding the growing crops."
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