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"More than 200 people have been hospitalized with breathing difficulties in Tennessee as wildfires scorched the Southeast. Over 30 large fires have burned more than 80,000 acres in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama and Kentucky, according to the US Forest Service."

"Evacuations are now taking place in five North Carolina mountain counties as nearly 20 wildfires totaling more than 10,000 acres continue to spread."

"Florida voters rejected Amendment 1 on Tuesday, the utility-backed measure to limit rooftop solar expansion, after a scrappy, grassroots campaign and last-minute revelations raised doubts about the proponents’ claims that their goal was to expand solar generation."

"Are the many hog and poultry farms of eastern North Carolina creating 'fields of filth,' as two groups of environmental activists put it last summer? And if they are, what happens when a hurricane comes along and dumps a foot and a half of water on them?"

"Federal nuclear regulators have wrapped up a seven-year environmental study partly clearing the way for two new reactors at Turkey Point, just as work gets underway on a massive cleanup of leaking cooling canals connected to the plant’s old reactors."

"The Florida Supreme Court has rejected a request from solar industry advocates to remove a utility-backed solar amendment from the Nov. 8 ballot due to its language, the AP reports."

"When the remnants of Hurricane Matthew threatened the coastal lowlands of South Carolina, 335,000 people fled for higher ground. Marquetta Goodwine stayed put."

"Beaches in the Southeastern U.S. took a tremendous beating last month from Hurricane Matthew. The U.S. Geological Survey has found that the storm washed over and damaged 15 percent of sand dunes on Florida's Atlantic Coast, 30 percent along Georgia's coastline and 42 percent of the dunes on South Carolina beaches."

"An explosion and fire at a pipeline that delivers about one-third of the gasoline used on the East Coast is expected to raise prices at the pump and shows the fragility of a delivery system that is relied upon by tens of millions of people."

"Facing opposition from politicians, this North Carolina scientist is urging coastal communities to get ready for rising water."