Background Articles

The most-expensive project in the nationwide initiative is $25 million for Alaska to replace a dozen culvert sites along the Parks Highway.

“We started seeing structural timber,” one resident said. “And then I was like, ‘Oh, my God. That’s from houses upstream.'”

For countless US veterans, the Army’s mismanagement and careless disposal of hazardous substances since the early years of the Cold War have been an enduring source of debilitating and fatal consequences. Notorious instances such as the pervasive contamination at Camp Lejeune, where toxins leached into groundwater for over 30 years.

This rural part of the island of Oahu is not connected to city sewers — and waste from toilets, sinks and showers is mostly collected in hundreds of pits called cesspools. Rising seas are also pushing groundwater closer to the surface, allowing cesspool effluent to mix with the water table and flow into the ocean.

Tenants in the Forest Park trailer court say they have few, if any, affordable options. Some officials see a warning sign of a worsening housing crisis to come.

State officials say Unalakleet will see work to improve conditions on its water system in the near future.

Engineers struggled to keep snow geese away from Montana’s deadly Superfund site, but ecologists have a new plan.

The region of Catalonia, northeastern Spain, is in its worst drought since measurements began. The sheep reservoir supplies water to the city of Barcelona.

Atmospheric river boosted California's snowpack, especially in Central and Southern Sierra. Now the levels are record level creating safety issues such as roofs collapsing and helping with drought conditions across the western states.

This weekend marks the third anniversary of the World Health Organization’s declaration of the global pandemic — and Juneau’s wastewater is awash with COVID. 

At times, the water level in the river Skjoma in Narvik is so low that the salmon freezes to death. But Statkraft has refused to release more water into the watercourse. Now the NVE intervenes.

Bristol Bay will receive 13 million in Federal Funding to help with projects such as safe drinking water.

Warming soils beneath Utqiagvik are triggering erosion that threatens homes, infrastructure and cultural resources. The North Slope has seen some of the fastest changes in coastal erosion in the nation.

Dozens of once crystal-clear streams and rivers in Arctic Alaska are now running bright orange and cloudy, and, in some cases, they may be becoming more acidic. This otherwise undeveloped landscape now looks as if an industrial mine has been in operation for decades, and scientists want to know why.

By Seth Borenstein | The Associated Press FILE - A kayaker paddles in Lake Oroville as water levels remain low due to continuing drought conditions in

The dam altered the subsistence gathering patterns of the Tagish Kwan, the Daḵká Kwa’an and the Kwanlin Dün people. Residences, cabins and fish camps along the Whitehorse rapids were dismantled, gatherings at M’Clintock stopped, and many people dispersed to Fish Lake and Whitehorse.

Scientists have documented a recent population explosion of beavers on the Baldwin Peninsula near Kotzebue.

Fairbanks International Airport and Eielson Air Force Base no longer use a type of firefighting foam containing a chemical compound that’s contaminated groundwater around the city, and that poses a potential threat to human health.

Kenai River flooding began last week when glacier-dammed lakes burst and caused water levels to rapidly rise. Water levels were already high due to recent rainfall.

Federal regulators have approved a plan to demolish four Klamath River dams, a historic act that is intended to save imperiled salmon. “The Klamath salmon are coming home,” Yurok Tribe Chairman Joseph James said in a statement. “The people have earned this victory and with it, we carry on our sacred duty to the fish that have sustained our people since the beginning of time.”