Natural resource-dependent rural economies help explain why disputes happen where they do.
Economy
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Nevada decision guts the state’s thriving solar industry
Electric utility pushed effort to sour economics of rooftop solar.
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Huge U.S. coal company declares bankruptcy
Bad investments, cheap natural gas and air pollution regulations led to Arch’s decline.
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Economic diplomacy in Sagebrush Rebel country
A new science and education center gives rural Utah a boost.
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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.
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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 […]
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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 […]
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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.
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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?
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Hillary Clinton woos coal communities
Coal companies say government programs won’t replace their high-paying jobs.
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Photos: Tracing poverty in the West
Over 11.5 million people live in poverty in Western states; here are intimate portraits of their communities.
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Bankruptcy expected for Arch Coal, a reflection of industry woes
Climate policies make a rebound for coal unlikely.
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Two oil-boom soap operas, then and now
How ‘Blood & Oil’ in today’s Bakken and ‘Dynasty’ in a 1980s Colorado match up.
Posted inOctober 12, 2015: The Rise of Lisa Murkowski
The Colorado River’s desalination plant is on its last legs
The obscure Paradox Valley Unit keeps the Colorado River’s salinity levels in check for farmers, but causes quakes upstream.
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In Colorado, a ‘rental crisis’ forces workers into the woods
Tent cities, waste and overcrowding have created something foul in Crested Butte.