"Proposed Interior Department rules for drilling in the Western Arctic are spurring two contradictory views: that President Joe Biden has thwarted an oil boom in northern Alaska or paved the way for one."
With climate-related legal disputes playing out worldwide, we could see more environmental journalists facing subpoenas to access their newsgathering materials and reveal their sources. Case in point: the legal battle embroiling a news nonprofit over its coverage of pipeline protests. The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press’ Chris Young looks at shield laws and resources to help deal with legal threats to your journalistic integrity.
"People in Alaska’s rugged Interior have long known the hills surrounding the Native Village of Tetlin hid gold. As tribal member Kevin Gunter grew up, his elders told him such riches should be left alone. Nothing good would come of digging them up, they warned. Now, Gunter fears what might happen as an open-pit mine comes to his tribe’s land."
To make climate change less abstract and more direct, writer Madeline Ostrander traveled the country to speak to those living with its impacts in the places they call home. In a BookShelf “Between the Lines” Q&A, Ostrander discusses her resulting book, “At Home on an Unruly Planet: Finding Refuge on a Changed Earth,” and addresses the lenses she used, the characters she portrayed and the surprises she encountered.
Top environmental journalists and others at the Society of Environmental Journalists annual “Journalists’ Guide to Environment and Energy” program foresee some challenging realities to cover in 2024, most notably with the ongoing impacts of climate change. Bright signs emerged as well. Read our take, watch the event video and visit our full “2024 Journalists’ Guide to Environment + Energy” special report.
"Anchorage scrambled Tuesday to come up with more temporary housing for the homeless after back-to-back snowstorms dumped more than 3 feet of snow on the city in just nine days, an amount that is high even by Alaska standards."
"Alaska Native leaders are fuming at Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, saying she has ignored or rejected at least eight of their invitations for in-person meetings about the administration’s energy policies impacting their communities."
"The crash of salmon stocks in Western Alaska’s Kuskokwim River has sparked a bitter court fight between the federal and state governments, and now Alaska Native leaders are calling for congressional action to ensure that Indigenous Alaskans have priority for harvests when stocks are scarce."
"The Alaska Department of Fish and Game announced Friday [Oct. 6] it will again cancel this year's Bering Sea snow crab harvest. Bristol Bay red king crab will re-open."
"A road critical to operating a proposed open-pit mine in a remote part of Alaska hit a new hurdle Friday when the Biden administration issued a finding that the road could threaten Alaska Native communities and their lifestyle more than previously estimated."
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