There’s economic development in reclaiming coal mines and plugging idled wells.
Oil
Posted inArticles
Will New Mexico learn from coal’s decline?
The state relies on oil and gas revenue, but the industry faces an uncertain future.
Posted inMarch 1, 2021: The Rough Road Ahead
All fracked up: A debut memoir wrestles with toxic masculinity in the oil fields
Michael Patrick F. Smith’s ‘The Good Hand’ offers sharp observations on North Dakota’s extraction industry.
Posted inMarch 1, 2021: The Rough Road Ahead
Public land is no longer on sale to oil and gas companies
President Biden’s leasing pause signals a major shift in federal land policy.
Posted inArticles
Oil lease sale for Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge draws few bidders
The Trump administration succeeded in opening the refuge for drilling. The highest bidder? The state of Alaska itself.
Posted inFebruary 1, 2021: End of the Line
New wind projects power local budgets in Wyoming
As the pandemic hit the fossil fuel industry, renewable energy projects filled community coffers.
Posted inArticles
A crude virus: How ‘man camps’ can cause a COVID surge
The Keystone XL Pipeline threatens to spread more than just oil through Indigenous communities.
Posted inArticles
Lawsuit over proposed fossil fuel railway in Utah moves forward
The plaintiff says funding earmarked for the project was meant for communities ‘to alleviate the boom and bust cycle of energy production.’
Posted inArticles
New Mexico is on track to have the weakest methane emissions regulations in the nation
Laguna Pueblo Gov. Wilfred Herrera, Jr., urges the state to strengthen its proposed air quality rules.
Posted inArticles
Montana’s new governor scares conservationists
Republican Greg Gianforte has a history of support for rolling back protections for public lands and waters.
Posted inArticles
New Mexico’s oil fields have a sinkhole problem
The hunt for industrial brine has opened massive and unexpected sinkholes, which is taking delicate work, and more than $54 million, to fill.
Posted inDecember 1, 2020: A Community Divided
Trump gutted NEPA regulations, but a Biden presidency could restore them
An environmental lawyer discusses the future of the country’s bedrock environmental law.
Posted inArticles
Will the extraction industry’s economic turmoil blight Colorado?
Questions about gas well maintenance, clean up and public safety rise amid bankruptcies in the sector.
Posted inOctober 1, 2020: Democracy's Frayed Western Front
Energy dominance or climate action: Trump, Biden and the fate of public lands
In Grand Junction, Colorado, the presidential election is a choice between two distinct energy futures.
Posted inOctober 1, 2020: Democracy's Frayed Western Front
When home is next to an oil refinery
All I knew about Wilmington, California, was poverty, so I long hid my connection to it.
Posted inArticles
Why the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge may not be drilled
The economic, legal and political obstacles to petroleum extraction on Alaska’s North Slope.
Posted inArticles
Who’s minding Montana’s abandoned oil and gas wells?
Left-behind extraction wells pollute after drilling and pumping stops. One foundation gets proactive.
Posted inArticles
Trump cancels methane regs intended to quell pollution
As the climate crisis worsens, oil and gas companies can continue to emit the potent greenhouse gas.
Posted inArticles
How big oil funds big brother
Some of the largest fossil fuel companies in the nation back police foundations that raise money for weapons, equipment and surveillance technology.
Posted inAugust 1, 2020: Infectious Ideologies
The job loss epidemic
COVID-19 impacts ripple through every sector of the economy.