Barreling along

Local officials in Western Colorado spar over proposed Uinta Basin oil trains in the heart of Rep. Lauren Boebert's district.

Accident risks for proposed oil trains from Utah could be highest in this rugged region of Colorado that has seen numerous derailments.

Fears about the consequences of an accident of oil trains from the Uinta Basin Railway in Utah may be highest in Grand County, Colorado.

The additional traffic from the proposed Uinta Basin Railway, backed by a public-private partnership and granted key approvals by President Joe Biden’s administration, could quadruple the amount of hazardous materials transported by rail through Denver, city officials estimate.

The future of what may potentially become the largest lithium mine in the United States now rests on whether a law enacted in 1872 was correctly implemented when the mine was approved by federal land managers in 2021.

Oak Flat, a mountainous area east of Phoenix, is an Apache sacred site where Native Americans gather to pray and perform coming-of-age ceremonies and sweat rituals.

Residents of a town in central Arizona are engaged in a tug of war with Native American groups over a huge copper mine that's been proposed on national forest land.

Utah’s Kennecott mine on the west side of Salt Lake County is getting a $918 million investment intended to extend the life of the mine as electrification fuels demand for more copper.

Threatened by possible shortages of lithium for electric car batteries, automakers are racing to lock in supplies of the once-obscure “white gold” in a politically and environmentally fraught competition from China to Nevada to Chile.

After a 140 year absence, Banff National Park is now home to more than 100 plains bison — a number that could double by 2030.

The largest land mammal in America is rehabilitating a vast grassland in Coahuila, benefiting hundreds of species in a reserve that can theoretically store 6.3 million tons of carbon in its soil.

The Clark Fork River Coalition worked for a decade to secure instream flow rights in a key tributary to the beleaguered Clark Fork River.

Complaints of overcrowding, out-of-state competition prompt proposals for permitting systems, but institutional misgivings have made netting legislation tricky.

Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks are proposing to reduce the hunting quota for wolves statewide from 450 to 289, according to the department and an interview with a spokesperson.

Wildlife managers aren’t sure whether pronghorn can carry mycoplasma bovis, the respiratory pathogen thought to have killed 1,000 or so antelope near Pinedale this winter. The question is: Do antelope die when they contract the pneumonia? Or can some live, carry the disease and pass it along to other animals?

Flocks of pelicans and gulls that once darkened the sky have gone missing.

The M-44 devices are intended to kill predators on federal lands, but have injured unsuspecting hikers and killed endangered animals and pets.

Elk Mountain Ranch owner challenges a federal judge’s decision that stepping through his airspace without touching private land is not trespassing.

Fredric Eshelman, the owner of the ranch in a widely watched corner-crossing trespass case, wants Google to unmask an anonymous critic who said Eshelman “abused police resources” during the Carbon County trespass conflict.

As campers continue to flood into national forests — often towing large trailers, side-by-sides or outdoor gear — districts across Wyoming are taking steps to increase capacity, regulate use, protect resources and generate revenue for upkeep.

Years after an executive fiat changed Grand Teton National Park policy to allow e-bikes, the park is all for the controversial, zippy rides.

Conservatives aren’t so keen on conservation.

An upcoming proposal from the Forest Service would tweak an existing regulation, opening the door to geologic storage projects on public land.

“This is an excellent case study of how tribes have had to give up something to get something, as I've heard it said. On paper, they have senior water rights, but in order to get the wet water, they subordinated those senior paper rights.”

In the wake of a Supreme Court ruling against the Navajo Nation over rights to the Colorado River, another prominent Native American tribe is accusing the White House of flouting its vow to improve relationships with tribal governments. Leadership of the Ute Indian Tribe of the Uintah and Ouray Reservation called the Biden administration “hypocritical and no friend of Indian tribes.”

A snowy winter and rainy spring have provided a major boost to states in the grips of drought and helped ease pressure on water managers in the Colorado River basin.

The Little Colorado River is home to Indigenous cultures and an endemic fish. A hydropower proposal and climate change threaten it.

After persuading courts to freeze President Joe Biden’s signature water rule in more than half the country, Republican-led states are attempting to kill the regulation once and for all.

One of the railcars lodged in the Yellowstone River near Reed Point following a Montana Rail Link derailment appears to have leaked asphalt into the river, according to agency officials responding to a Saturday morning incident that resulted in 10 railcars plummeting into one of the state’s largest rivers.

The climate change-exacerbated megadrought/aridification gripping the Southwest is stressing the majestic giants of the Four Corners Country, according to a recent study by University of Arizona researchers.

The first youth-led climate lawsuit to go to trial considered if a statute preventing the state’s environmental agency from denying permits for fossil fuel development contradicts its constitution’s guarantee of a “clean and healthful environment.”

The Biden administration said on Wednesday it raised $105 million from solar power developers at a lease auction covering 23,675 acres of Nevada desert this week, making it the highest-yielding federal onshore renewable energy auction to date.

New Mexico oilfield and air quality regulators on Thursday announced unprecedented state fines against a Texas-based oil and natural gas producer on accusations that the company flouted local pollution reporting and control requirements by burning off vast amounts of natural gas in a prolific energy-production zone in the southeast of the state.

A federal judge has blocked two new Montana laws intended to stop public challenges to coal mine permits.

The environmental injustice of coal ash was clear at the hearing, as residents testified from Native American communities in New Mexico and Nevada, Latino communities in Midwestern cities, and Black communities in Alabama and Tennessee, among others.

Climate change and a lag in replacing coal with reliable renewable energy sources continue to put the West's electrical grid at risk.

As incentives kick in, experts fear there aren’t enough electricians in Colorado to help meet the demand for EV chargers and heat pumps.

A new report shows that the salaries of federal firefighters are, on average, 32.5% less than that of their state-employed colleagues working equivalent positions.

A helicopter crew is searching for possible problems with vegetation, inadequate clearance for lines and potentially overloaded poles.

A growing number of studies by archaeologists and fire historians point to Indigenous peoples' use of fire in clearing brush, enhancing the growth of important plants and keeping wildfires away from communities.