Environmental News ICYMI 10-27-17

A weekly roundup for busy people

By Paul Rauber

October 27, 2017

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Illustration by Peter Arkle

The Girl Scouts of Southern Nevada choose to abandon their longtime Camp Foxtail, which is surrounded on three sides by critical habitat for the endangered Mount Charleston blue butterfly.

After a group of men are photographed swimming inside a baited crocodile trap in northern Queensland, the environment minister of the Australian state advises against the practice.

A study published in The Lancet finds that pollution is the largest environmental cause of disease and premature death in the world today. It is responsible for 9 million premature deaths each year—more than from war and hunger.

The EPA purges a website of the words "climate change." The site was once dedicated to advising state and local governments on how to deal with climate change. 

The EPA expands the security detail guarding administrator Scott Pruitt to 30 agents. 

When asked her views on climate change, Kelly Craft, the new U.S. ambassador to Canada, said, “I appreciate and I respect both sides of the science.”

The Interior Department will offer 77 million acres in the Gulf of Mexico for oil and gas drilling, the largest such lease sale in the department’s history. The lease area comprises all available, unleased areas in the gulf. 

A two-person company from Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke’s hometown of Whitefish, Montana, wins a $300 million no-bid contract to repair Puerto Rico’s electrical infrastructure. Seventy-five percent of the island is still without power

Fearful for its tourist economy, Ocean City, Maryland, hires a well-connected lobbyist to kill two proposed wind farms that would be, respectively, 12 to 15 miles offshore and 17 to 21 miles offshore. 

The United Auto Workers says that electric-car manufacturer Tesla used a recent layoff to dismiss workers at its Fremont, California, plant who supported unionization. Tesla denies the charge. 

Corals eat microplastic because they like its taste

The National Park Service wants to double admission fees at its 17 most popular parks. (You can comment here.) 

A federal judge throws out a racketeering lawsuit against Greenpeace filed by multinational logging company Resolute Forest Products and orders the company to pay all court costs. 

A body of open water the size of Tasmania (known as polyna) has opened up in the Maud Rise sea ice off of Antarctica. 

Brad Gobright and Jim Reynolds climb “The Nose” on El Capitan in Yosemite National Park in 2:19:44, establishing a new speed record.