Power generation from coal is falling quickly. According to new figures from the U.S. Energy Information Administration, coal made up 36 percent of U.S. electricity in the first quarter of 2012 — down from 44.6 percent in the first quarter of 2011. ... read more >>

Safe drinking water is a "necessity for healthy living and economic growth and opportunity for the community ... read more >>

Given that drastic climate change is inevitable, the only way to lessen its impact is to prepare ourselves and adapt to it in the best possible manner. ... read more >>

If the world’s nations ever sign a treaty to limit emissions of climate-warming carbon dioxide gas, there may be a way to help verify compliance: a new method developed by scientists from the University of Utah and Harvard.
Using measurements from only three carbon-dioxide (CO2) monitoring stations in the Salt Lake Valley, the method could reliably detect changes in CO2 emissions of 15 percent o ... read more >>

The planet is warming up, especially at the poles. How do organisms react to this rise in temperatures? An international team(1) led by a CNRS researcher from the Center for Functional and Evolutionary Ecology(2) has shown that little auks, the most common seabirds in the Arctic, are adapting their fishing behavior to warming surface waters in the Greenland Sea. So far, their reproductive and sur ... read more >>

As people pump groundwater for irrigation, drinking water, and industrial uses, the water doesn’t just seep back into the ground — it also evaporates into the atmosphere, or runs off into rivers and canals, eventually emptying into the world’s oceans. This water adds up, and a new study calculates that by 2050, groundwater pumping will cause a global sea level rise of about 0.8 millimeters per ye ... read more >>

The island nation of Kiribati is one of the countries most threatened by rising sea levels. However, many of the floods it has seen may be due to a mix of natural variability and human activities, complicating the picture of how rising sea levels are endangering Kiribati and other island nations. ... read more >>

For the first time, researchers have been able to combine different climate models using spatial statistics - to project future seasonal temperature changes in regions across North America. ... read more >>

oday’s mega forest fires of the southwestern U.S. are truly unusual and exceptional in the long-term record, suggests a new study that examined hundreds of years of ancient tree ring and fire data from two distinct climate periods. ... read more >>

The underground aquifer in Eastern Washington and the Columbia River basin is on the decline, and about 25 communities could see their municipal wells go dry in as soon as 10 years. ... read more >>