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National Geographic News - Environment
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AP - Traffic flowed a little smoother. Busy avenues had fewer cars. By nightfall, even the hazy sky had mostly cleared.
Carolina wrens — small cinnamon-brown birds that choose to live around outbuildings — will hide their nests almost anywhere: a discarded boot, a bucket turned on its side. With a little innovation, it is possible to make a connection with wrens.
California is in the midst of a long, hot summer of wildfires. Nationally, costs to fight wildfires now take nearly half of the U.S. Forest Service budget. That's up from just 13 percent in 1991. The ever-rising costs have spurred a debate in California over who should pay: all new home buyers or only those who choose to build and live in fire-prone areas?
When you think of Detroit, you think of cars — not trains or buses. Fifty years after Detroit's last streetcar went out of service, there's talk of bringing mass transit back. After years of false starts, this time, Motor City business leaders are on board.
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While gas-thirsty cars are languishing in the garage, people are hopping on buses, riding bikes, and reverting to the most time-tested form of transportation: their feet. Alex Chadwick talks to Christopher Leinberger, visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution, about why urban planners are paying more attention to cities' "walkability."
Congress members say they're determined to do something about fuel prices before leaving for their August recess. But there's little consensus on energy issues. Will Democrats and Republicans be able to agree on any proposals to lower fuel prices?
In a Guatemalan rainforest, the huff of a rare mammal known as a coatimundi lurks under a toucan's call.
With the price of hay up and adoptions down, the government may begin euthanizing wild horses. There are currently about 30,000 of them in federal holding centers; a number wild horse advocates blame on careless management.
To gear up for the summer Olympic Games in less than a month, Beijing has rolled out new pollution-control measures. They're designed to cut the amount of vehicle exhaust and industrial pollution.
AFP - Moves around the world to drain marshes and other wetlands to make space for farming could be hastening climate change, scientists gathering in Brazil from Monday will be hearing.
Republican John McCain says he supports nuclear power. Democrat Barack Obama says it shouldn't be taken off the table. But the issue is a delicate one, and both presidential candidates have chosen their words with care.
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 | The discovery in an eastern Ecuadorian rain forest marks the highest number of bat species ever recorded in one place. |
| The Mexican government has grossly undervalued coastal mangrove forests, which are vital to the long-term sustainability of the country's commercial fishing industry, according to a new report. |
AFP - Beijing residents enjoyed the novelty of congestion-free streets Sunday as the city launched strict driving curbs to rein its notorious air pollution and traffic for the Olympics.
The U.S. Conference of Mayors has passed a resolution urging governments to phase out bottled water in city buildings. Scott Simon talks with Martin J. Chavez, mayor of Albuquerque, N.M., and one of the co-authors of the resolution.
AP - Beijing's Olympic shutdown begins Sunday, a drastic plan to lift the Chinese capital's gray shroud of pollution just three weeks ahead of the games.
AP - A federal judge has restored endangered species protections for gray wolves in the Northern Rockies, derailing plans by three states to hold public wolf hunts this fall.
Reuters - Ontario will join
the Western Climate Initiative, a planned U.S.-based regional
carbon credit trading pact aimed at curbing global warming.
The Conservation Reserve Program pays farmers who own environmentally important areas to leave them idle. But in recent years, the demand for crops such as corn has prompted calls to put many of these protected wildlands back under the plow.
Thousands of megawatts of solar-generated power might not see the light of day if Congress doesn't act soon. Ira Flatow also looks at how you can bring solar to your sockets faster, without taking out a second mortgage.
Earthrace circumnavigated the globe in just 60 days, 23 hours and 49 minutes – 14 days less than the fastest previous time for a powerboat. And they did it all with biofuels, including some converted from human fat removed via liposuction.
In a time of ever-increasing energy prices, this week President Bush overturned a long-standing executive order banning offshore oil exploration in certain parts of the country. The move is largely symbolic at this point, as additional congressional action would be needed to fully open up offshore oil drilling.
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We meet a family who helped organize the largest gathering of hybrid car owners in the country. The event will occur this weekend in Madison, Wis. Participants share fuel-saving tips.
AP - For years, visitors wanting to see Denali National Park's grizzly bears, moose, sheep and caribou have had to ride school buses that polluted the air and spoiled the tranquillity with their noisy, carbon dioxide-spewing diesel engines.
AFP - Nobel laureate and former US vice president Al Gore echoed president John F. Kennedy on Thursday as he urged Americans to shoot for the moon and make a total shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy in 10 years.
AFP - Olympic president Jacques Rogge believes pollution-cutting measures for next month's Games will leave a lasting legacy in China's fight against environmental meltdown.
 | A tailless plane and a craft that sports engines on top of its wings were among the ultra-efficient designs that took top honors in the 2008 NASA Fundamental Aeronautics Student Competition. |
| An autopsy on the cub, born at an Amsterdam zoo, showed the animal's windpipe filled with milk, indicating it had choked to death, officials report. |
Just as John F. Kennedy launched the space race, Al Gore is challenging the nation and the next president to produce every kilowatt of electricity through clean energy sources within 10 years.
AP - Texas, headquarters of America's oil industry, is about to stake a fortune on wind power.
With climate change increasingly threatening the survival of plants and animals, scientists say it may become necessary to move some species to save them.
In the movement to go green, how do you get through to people when they're more worried about getting food on the table? Two ad execs explain their methods.
AP - Just as John F. Kennedy set his sights on the moon, Al Gore is challenging the nation to produce every kilowatt of electricity through wind, sun and other Earth-friendly energy sources within 10 years, an audacious goal he hopes the next president will embrace.
Read the prepared text of former Vice President Al Gore's speech in Washington Thursday about renewable energy.
The United States must commit to end its dependence on carbon-based fuels and switch to clean, renewable sources in the next decade, former Vice President Al Gore said Thursday. Gore challenged the nation to find a way, within 10 years, to produce all electric power from renewable sources.
The former vice president and Nobel Peace Prize winner speaks with host Neal Conan about his major address on energy and global warming in Washington, D.C., on Thursday and how America can make a giant leap for humankind.
AFP - Russian scientists on Thursday outlined plans for a submarine expedition this month that will for the first time probe the depths of Lake Baikal, a unique ecosystem and the deepest lake in the world.
AFP - Eight out of ten factories and industrial parks in Vietnam breach environmental regulations, state media reported Thursday, citing a government study in the rapidly-industrialising country.
Reuters - Pope Benedict on Thursday told a huge
gathering of young people that they were inheriting a planet
whose resources had been scarred and squandered to fuel
insatiable consumption.
AFP - Nuclear power operator British Energy said Thursday that it was continuing to hold talks with potential buyers.
AFP - The commercial aviation industry, widely accused of not doing enough to tackle climate change, pledged at the Farnborough International Airshow this week to become more 'green.'
AFP - British Olympic chiefs have praised Chinese authorities for taking steps to ensure air pollution will not cause major problems at next month's Beijing Olympics.
 | Dead and dying fish have become a common sight in Yucat谩n waters, killed off by a rare but naturally occurring algal bloom known as red tide. |
 | Rapid warming will cause more icebergs to break free, drift, and scour away practically all life on swaths of the seafloor, a new study says. |
 | Animals and plants that can't escape climate change on their own should be relocated by humans, researchers say. But others argue it should only be a last resort. |
