"Illicit fishing goes on every day at an industrial scale. But large commercial fishers are about to get a new set of overseers: conservationists — and soon the general public—armed with space-based reconnaissance of the global fleet."
"Don Blankenship, the longtime chief executive officer of Massey Energy, was indicted Thursday on charges that he orchestrated the routine violation of key federal mine safety rules at the company’s Upper Big Branch Mine prior to an April 2010 explosion that killed 29 miners."
"BP Plc has failed to persuade a federal judge to oust the administrator overseeing payouts to businesses and individuals claiming damages arising from the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill."
"A federal judge this week struck down a government prohibition on harming the threatened Utah prairie dog on private property, setting up a potential constitutional showdown on the reach of the Endangered Species Act."
"Haul out the oil rigs, fracking can begin in Illinois."
"North Carolina regulators have ordered Duke Energy to resubmit its proposal for assessing the extent of groundwater contamination leaking from 33 coal ash dumps across the state after deeming the company's current plans 'inadequate.'"
"A day after voters decided to make Denton the first city in Texas to ban hydraulic fracturing, the reaction by the energy industry and government was swift."
"Despite their impressive gains last night, Republicans do not appear to have flipped enough seats to undo most of President Obama's environment and climate change agenda."
The growing number of threats and assaults against employees of federal land agencies in the West is certainly the public's business. But efforts to document it by High Country News using the Freedom of Information Act have been thwarted by the Bureau of Land Management's central FOIA office. Veteran journalist Ray Ring tells the sad tale in HCN.
The Society of Environmental Journalists wrote President Barack Obama October 23, 2014, urging him to take a strong position supporting legislation that would strengthen the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Bipartisan FOIA improvements may be one of the few pieces of legislation with a chance to clear the lame duck 113th Congress before control shifts to Republicans in 2015.
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