Southwest (AZ NM OK TX)

"Early on a Saturday morning, deep inside a chemical plant in La Porte, Javier Ortiz took his last sip of coffee."

"Have oil and gas companies injected toxic materials into Texas groundwater sources? State regulators don't know, even though they agreed in 1982 to track injections into zones that could hold underground sources of drinking water, according to records obtained by The Texas Tribune."

"Federal regulators believe “there is a significant possibility” that recent earthquakes in North Texas are linked to oil and gas activity, even if state regulators won’t say so."

"With little more than a promise, the Texas Railroad Commission is trusting a struggling coal industry to pay for the cost of cleaning up old mines."

"A state appeals court has struck down a plastic bag ban in Laredo in a high-profile fight over local control that could ultimately impact similar laws in other Texas cities."

"Think of Mesa Verde National Park and you probably imagine iconic cliff dwellings sketched in sandstone. Those homes were built by the Ancestral Pueblo before they left the area in the late 13th Century. Climate change may be putting some of those dwellings in jeopardy."

"A puzzling concentration of the greenhouse gas methane over the Southwestern United States appears to come mostly from leaks in natural gas production, scientists said Monday."

"Negotiators for two Native American tribes and the state of Oklahoma said Wednesday they have reached a settlement that would end a modern-day water rights and tribal sovereignty dispute that has its roots in the 19th century."

"A Texas baby born with Zika-related birth defects has died, officials said Tuesday, the first death related to the virus in the state."

"The Ogallala aquifer turned the region into America's breadbasket. Now it, and a way of life, are being drained away."