How does industry control of water affect public land management?
Economy
Posted inJanuary 25, 2016: The Forever War
Coal company bankruptcies jeopardize reclamation
The public could foot the bill for billions in cleanup costs.
Posted inArticles
Shifts toward clean energy threaten Montana coal town
Washington and Oregon utilities consider pulling out of Colstrip’s power station.
Posted inArticles
Feds announce moratorium on new coal leases
Interior Department will examine the federal coal program in light of climate change.
Posted inArticles
Economic downturns fuel Sagebrush Rebellion events
Natural resource-dependent rural economies help explain why disputes happen where they do.
Posted inArticles
Nevada decision guts the state’s thriving solar industry
Electric utility pushed effort to sour economics of rooftop solar.
Posted inArticles
Huge U.S. coal company declares bankruptcy
Bad investments, cheap natural gas and air pollution regulations led to Arch’s decline.
Posted inArticles
Economic diplomacy in Sagebrush Rebel country
A new science and education center gives rural Utah a boost.
Posted inArticles
5 things I learned about managing my money from covering the oil bust
A reporter relays tips from her time in the field.
Posted inDecember 21, 2015: Secrets of the Deep
Highway injustice in Denver’s Latino neighborhoods
Poor districts have breathed I-70’s pollution for decades. Now they’re facing its expansion.
Posted inDecember 21, 2015: Secrets of the Deep
Two visions collide in Utah’s Wasatch Range
As ski resorts push for a mega-connection, backcountry skiers try to save some wild.
Posted inArticles
Locavores aren’t loved by everybody
In the last 20 years, the amount of locally grown foods consumed in the American diet has tripled, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and it now comprises 2 percent of the food consumed in the country. As with anything that’s popular, some have seen fit to attack this trend. Why do they do […]
Posted inArticles
Big Ag stands on shifting ground
Between 2006 and 2011, farmers on the western edge of the Midwest’s farm belt in Iowa, Nebraska, Minnesota and the Dakotas converted more than 1.3 million acres of grasslands to corn and soybean fields. Some people were seriously alarmed. Wildlife habitat was destroyed, and water, soil and the air itself suffered. But that conversion of […]
Posted inArticles
Millions in debt, a community wonders if its water source will provide
This master-planned community must keep building to survive, despite the drought.
Posted inDecember 7, 2015: Good Neighbors
Coal comfort, secretive powerbrokers and dastardly Ducks Unlimited
Hcn.org news in brief.
Posted inArticles
Will GMO salmon harm Alaska’s fishing industry?
Fishermen fear AquaBounty’s creation will collapse salmon prices, but history tells a more complex tale.
Posted inNovember 23, 2015: Water Hustle
How a plan to save southeastern Colorado went off the rails
Heritage tourism offered a way out of economic doldrums. Why did it go wrong?
Posted inArticles
Hillary Clinton woos coal communities
Coal companies say government programs won’t replace their high-paying jobs.
Posted inArticles
Photos: Tracing poverty in the West
Over 11.5 million people live in poverty in Western states; here are intimate portraits of their communities.