Infrastructure

"The messages show the Trump administration included offshore wind foes in the push to cancel permitted projects."

"Twenty years out from the New Orleans disaster, the city’s levee and flood wall system must be raised or the region could become ineligible for federal flood insurance."

"Beaches from Crystal River, Florida, to Ogunquit, Maine, have been under advisories warning about water quality this week because of elevated levels of bacteria associated with fecal waste. The advisories typically discourage beachgoers from going in the water because the bacteria can cause gastrointestinal illness, rashes and nausea."

"As Spain takes a breath after yet another brutal summer heatwave, with temperatures above 40C in many parts of the country, the residents of the sherry-making town of Jerez de la Frontera have come up with a novel way to keep the streets cool."

"When a deadly landslide tore through part of Wrangell, Alaska, in 2023, there was only one place people there could go for information. "We're on an island, and there's one road, and everybody that lived south of that road lost everything — they lost their electricity, internet, television, phones," says Cindy Sweat, the general manager of KSTK, the community's public broadcaster. What was left, Sweat says, was the radio."

"As Gina Ramirez buckled her 11-year-old son into her car last month for their daily drive to school, she handed him a plastic water bottle."

"In the 20 years since Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, hurricane scientists have made great strides toward understanding how climate change influences tropical cyclones, at the same time as they have vastly improved hurricane forecasting. Better forecasts, in turn, save the country billions every time a storm makes landfall, according to a 2024 analysis published in the National Bureau of Economic Research."

"A powerful dust storm wreaked havoc on Nevada’s annual Burning Man festival over the weekend, tossing around early attendees’ campsites and trapping incoming Burners in up to eight hours of stop-and-go traffic."

"Misleading Mailer: Despite locals’ health concerns, the Chamber of Commerce has gone to unusual lengths to promote a data center, including sending a mailer with inaccurate information. 'Concierge Service': The chamber has a five-member operations team dedicated to xAI, one of Musk’s companies, as it tries to transform Memphis into a global hub of technological innovation."

"The Rio Grande Valley is home to ocelots and other endangered species. Now, the federal government will not have to follow the Endangered Species Act and more than two dozen other federal laws to build the border wall through a national wildlife refuge."