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Page Updated:
Sept. 24, 2026

• • From a Nepal in Pain, a Young Leader
  Makes a Case for Climate Reparations

  But Concerns About His Style Are Growing At Home After Devastating Floods Left Thousands Dead Or Missing

  

  Sept. 24, 2026 -He hides behind dark sunglasses, skips Parliament meetings and communicates mostly through social media posts. But in his six months in office, Balendra Shah, the 36-year-old prime minister of Nepal, has transformed into an avatar of politically engaged youth worldwide.

  On his first trip overseas since taking office in March, Mr. Shah will address the United Nations General Assembly on an issue vital for many young people: climate reparations. Low-income countries have been battered by the effects of a global warming not of their own making.

• • A Second Judge Strikes Down New
  York’s Climate ‘Superfund’ Law

  A Federal Judge Ruled That The New Law, Which Would Force Fossil Fuel Companies to Pay $75 Billion to Help Cover the Costs of Climate Change, Was Unconstitutional

  

  Sept. 24, 2026 -A second federal judge in New York has ruled that the state’s new climate “superfund” law is unconstitutional, dealing a blow to the nascent effort to popularize such measures around the country.

  The groundbreaking law would require fossil fuel companies to pay billions of dollars to cover the costs of climate change. A handful of other states are considering similar laws, which the energy industry and Republican states have vigorously opposed.

• • Judge Dismisses Unusual Climate Suit
  Claiming Oil Giants Broke Antitrust Law

  The lawsuit, Filed By Michigan, Claimed Oil Companies Colluded to Obstruct Solar Power and to Misrepresent Climate Risks...

  

  Sept. 22, 2026 -A federal judge on Tuesday dismissed Michigan’s novel antitrust lawsuit against oil companies over their role in climate change.

  The lawsuit, filed in January by Attorney General Dana Nessel, accused a handful of fossil fuel companies of creating a “cartel” and raising costs for residents by suppressing the development of renewable energy and information about the risks of global warming.

• • Judge Allows Transfer of Land in
  Wildlife Refuge to SpaceX, for Now

  Clearing a Path For a Land Swap Deal That Would Expand Elon Musk’s Starbase Launch Site in South Texas

  

  Sept. 21, 2026 -A federal judge on Monday cleared the way for a land exchange that would allow SpaceX, the rocket and satellite maker run by Elon Musk, to expand its launching and production site into a federal wildlife refuge in Texas.

  The judge, Fernando Rodriguez Jr. of U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas, declined a request from conservation and tribal groups for a preliminary injunction to block the land exchange.

• • Federal Court Rules There is No Consti-
  tutional Right to Safe Drinking Water

  The Ruling Signals That Black Residents May Face the most serious Consequences Of Unsafe Or Failing Water Systems While Having Limited Ability to Seek a Remedy Through the Constitution

  

  Sept. 19, 2026 -A federal appeals court has used a decades-long water crisis in one of the Blackest cities in America to rule that the U.S. Constitution does not guarantee Americans the right to clean and safe drinking water.

  The September 4 ruling came even after Jackson, Mississippi, residents alleged officials knew the water was contaminated and assured the public it was safe. To this point, the appellate court also ruled that the Constitution does not offer citizens the “right to truthful information from officials during a public health crisis.”

• • FEMA Denies Portions of Colorado's
  Disaster Declaration Request

  Including Individual Assistance
  
  {KOAA NEWS}

  Sept. 19, 2026 -Victims of the Aspen Acres Fire and subsequent flooding will not receive individual assistance for disaster recovery from the Federal Government.

  That's according to the Colorado State Government, which said in a news release Friday that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) denied portions of the Disaster Declaration Request made by Governor Jared Polis in August of 2026.

• • U.N. Chief’s Test: Shaming Without
  Naming the World’s Climate Delinquents

  António Guterres Told World Leaders Gathered in New York That Their Efforts to Address the Climate Crisis Had Come Up “Abysmally Short.”

  

  Sept. 19, 2026 -The world’s top diplomat, António Guterres, the United Nations secretary general, on Tuesday told world leaders their efforts to address the climate crisis had come up “abysmally short” and called on them to do what even climate-ambitious countries have been reluctant to do: stop expanding coal, oil and gas production.

• • For Climate-Vulnerable Countries, Debt
  Costs 25 Times More Than Climate Action

  As Climate Disasters Intensify, Mounting Debt is Leaving Vulnerable Countries With Less Money to Prepare...

  

  Sept. 19, 2026 -The countries most vulnerable to climate change are spending nearly 25 times more on repaying debt than on climate action, according to a new ActionAid report released Wednesday.

  The report, “Debt Fuels the Climate Crisis: How the Finance Flows,” is “really unpacking the narrative about how the climate and debt crises are supercharging each other,” said Teresa Anderson, one of the authors and global lead on climate justice for ActionAid International, a nonprofit global federation focused on poverty eradication and social justice.

• • Nepal Isn’t the Only Disaster-Struck Country Waiting For
  Money From the Global Climate Loss and Damage Fund

  It Was Not Merely a Request For Aid Or Charity But a Demand For Justice and “Legal and Moral Liability.”
  
  {THE CONVERSATION}

  Sept. 18, 2026 -As it faces the enormous task of rebuilding from a deadly flood that tore through communities in the Himalayas, Nepal is seeking compensation from the international Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage – meaning from countries that are major contributors to climate change, which it blames for the disaster.

  “Nepal’s greenhouse gas emissions are virtually negligible. Yet, we are paying the ultimate price for a global crisis we did not create,” Khanal told the Kathmandu Post. “The rapid melting of glaciers and these catastrophic mountain tsunamis are direct consequences of global climate change.”

• • Judge Rules Epa Illegally Terminated $7 Billion
  Solar Program Intended to Help Poorer Americans

  The EPA Said Friday It is Reviewing the Decision and Considering Options For Appeal

  

  Sept. 18, 2026 -The Trump administration illegally terminated a $7 billion Solar for All program intended to make solar power accessible to more than 900,000 lower-income Americans, a federal judge in Rhode Island ruled Friday.

  The Environmental Protection Agency rescinded the Solar for All funds in August 2025 after President Donald Trump’s massive tax and spending law passed in Congress a month earlier, with Administrator Lee Zeldin calling the Biden-era grant program a “boondoggle.”

• • At Least 124 Land and
  Environmental Defenders Killed in 2025

  Mostly in Latin America
  
  {EARTH.ORG}

  Sept. 17, 2026 -At least 124 land and environmental defenders were killed last year for standing up to protect their lands and livelihoods from destruction, a new report has revealed.

  This represents a decrease from 2024, when Global Witness, the environmental watchdog behind Wednesday’s report, documented 142 killings and four disappearances, and from 2023, when it verified 196 killings. Since it began gathering data in 2012, the NGO was able to verify and report on 2,375 killings globally, although each year it warns that the figures are likely a “significant underestimate,” as many cases go unreported.

• • The Racial Disparities of Flood Buyouts

  This, According to New Research

  

  Sept. 17, 2026 -After a flood, homeowners are often faced with a difficult choice: Rebuild and risk a repeat disaster or move away. The federal government’s efforts to nudge them toward the second option have resulted in more than 43,000 buyouts in recent decades for damaged and at-risk homes, which are destroyed or moved.

  But new research has unearthed a troubling racial gap in what homeowners are paid for their properties, which are sold through the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Hazard Mitigation Grant Program

• • The Push To Get Polluters To Pay For Nepal's Floods

  The Tiny Country Contributes Less Than 0.1 Percent of Annual Global Greenhouse Gas Emissions—But...

  

  Sept. 16, 2026 -In the days, weeks, months, and years before a two-square-kilometer mass of glacier ice and rock collapsed from the Langtang Lirung mountain to the valley floor in Nepal’s Rasuwa district in the Himalayas—generating a debris flow that killed over 1,300 people and left 5,000 more missing—climate change was at work, conditioning the slope for failure.

  That’s the conclusion of an international group of researchers that rapidly analyzed the disaster for World Weather Attribution, an initiative that studies the role climate change plays in specific extreme weather events.

• • Sarasota Flood Victims Get New
  Chance In Lawsuit Against County

  Sarasota County Homeowners Flooded By Tropical Storm Debby Get a New Chance to Pursue a Negligence Claim After a Judge Reconsiders Her Ruling

  

  Sept.16, 2026 -Sarasota County homeowners whose houses flooded during Tropical Storm Debby in 2024 may get another chance to pursue a negligence claim against the county after a judge agreed to reconsider an earlier ruling in their lawsuit.

  On Sept. 4, 12th Judicial Circuit Judge Dana Moss granted a motion from Laurel Meadows residents to reconsider her Aug. 12 ruling.

• • An Environmental Defender Is Murdered Every Three Days

  At Least 124 People Were Killed In 2025 For Protecting Their Homelands, Forests, Farms and Waterways From Pollution and Other Harms

  

  Sept. 15, 2026 -Every three days someone is killed for defending nature.

  In 2025, watchdog group Global Witness documented 124 such deaths worldwide, a toll researchers say is likely only a fraction of the total number because repression and armed conflict make many deaths impossible to verify.

• • Congressional Republicans Aim to Shield
  Fossil Fuel Companies From Climate Lawsuits

  The House Judiciary Committee Will Consider the Stop Climate Shakedowns Act as the Trump Administration Moves to Roll Back Federal Limits On Greenhouse Gas Emissions

  

  Sept. 15, 2026 -Republicans in Congress are continuing their efforts to shield the fossil fuel industry from legal liability for its role in unleashing the heat-trapping gases linked to a cascade of deadly, record-setting disasters across the globe.

  On Wednesday, the House Judiciary Committee is scheduled to debate and vote on a bill introduced in April by Rep. Harriet Hageman (R-Wyo.) titled the “Stop Climate Shakedowns Act of 2026.”

• • WA Top Court Deals Death Blow to Natural Gas Initiative

  That Measure, Which Would Have Killed the State’s Fledgling Carbon Market, Was Shot Down By Voters

  

  Sept. 15, 2026 -The Washington Supreme Court has ruled the state’s natural gas initiative unconstitutional, ending a 2024 effort to turn voters out against policies intended to curb climate change.

  Voters passed Initiative 2066 with 52% of the vote, but it was struck down in Superior Court in 2025. Not long after, state Attorney General Nick Brown and the Building Industry Association of Washington asked the state’s Supreme Court to weigh in.

• • TVA Fad a Busy Week In Court

  TVA Sees Fossil Fuels As Key For Near-Term Reliability (It’s Eyeing 7-26 GW of New Gas By 2040 and Delaying Coal Retirements), and Many Ratepayers Aren’t Pleased
  
  {energy central}

  Sept. 12, 2026 -Environmental groups are suing TVA, claiming the utility failed to obtain the proper air quality permit for a 1.45-GW gas plant in Tennessee (located next to a coal plant that TVA had planned to retire by late 2028—but decided to keep online).

  The new ruling: In a separate case, a federal court ruled that TVA violated the law in building a $2.5B, 1.5-GW plant elsewhere in Tennessee (also on the site of a recently revived coal plant). Why? The utility “failed to evaluate cleaner and cheaper alternatives to the gas plant” and “improperly committed” billions in ratepayer funding before even deciding to build the plant, according to a statement from the Center for Biological Diversity. The court decision overturns the environmental impact statement for the plant.

• • Mesa Verde National Park to Return Thousands of
  Native American Artifacts and Indigenous Remains to Tribes

  Federal Records Show National Park Service Found 4,304 Objects Associated With Death Rites and Remains of 85 People
  
  {The Denver Post}

  Sept. 12, 2026 -Mesa Verde National Park plans to return more than 4,000 sacred Native American objects and the remains of 85 Indigenous people in its possession, marking the largest potential repatriation in the park’s recorded history.

  Park officials told The Denver Post last week that they have been conducting a thorough inventory of human remains and culturally significant objects in Mesa Verde’s collection over the past two years, as required by a 1990 federal law designed to return Native American remains and artifacts to tribes.

• • National Science Foundation and White House
  Sued for Refusing to Release Government Records

  Lawsuit Calls For More Transparency Around the Decision to Dismantle Critical Research Center That Supports Our Nation’s Public Safety, Economic Prosperity, National Defense, and Understanding Of Climate Change
  
  {Union of Concerned Scientists}

  Sept. 10, 2026 - Today, Union of Concerned Scientists, represented by Earthjustice, and Environmental Defense Fund filed a lawsuit against the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) and the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for withholding information about their plans to dismantle the NSF National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR).

• • States Sue Over Trump’s Cuts to Endangered Species Rules

  Two Lawsuits Seek to Reverse the Trump Administration’s Moves to Open the Habitats Of Imperiled Wildlife to Commercial Activities

  

  Sept. 9, 2026 -Twenty states and the District of Columbia sued the Trump administration on Wednesday over what they called the most severe cuts to protections for wildlife in the half-century since the passage of the Endangered Species Act.

  Two lawsuits filed in federal court in California challenged a series of regulatory changes that opened the habitats of imperiled animals to drilling, farming, logging and other commercial activities.

• • Blocking New UK Oil and Gas

  Climate Justice
  
  {LOE.ORG}

  Sept. 4, 2026 -Great Britain is Europe’s third largest oil and gas producer, even with a commitment to a net-zero economy by 2050. A small group of climate activists is helping the UK meet that target by winning a Supreme Court decision that’s blocking any new UK oil and gas projects that don’t assess climate impacts. Sarah Finch of Surrey, near London led the fight against proposed oil and gas drilling in the region known as the Weald, and she’s been recognized with the 2026 Goldman Environmental Prize for Europe.

• • As Extreme Weather Worsens, Black and Hispanic
  Homeowners Are Paying More for Insurance

  Residents in Predominantly Hispanic Communities in Florida Are Paying On Average $5,014 More Annually For Their Policies

  

  Sept. 4, 2026 -Homeowners in Hispanic and Black communities nationwide are paying a disproportionate share of skyrocketing home insurance costs, according to a recent report. The disparities leave communities of color at greater risk as climate change increases the frequency of billion-dollar disasters.

  The report, released in July by the Consumer Federation of America, a nonprofit representing nearly 250 consumer groups, concluded that homeowners in predominantly Hispanic ZIP codes pay on average a 30 percent higher premium ($950 more annually) compared with homeowners in white communities. In predominantly Black ZIP codes, homeowners pay, on average, a 16 percent higher premium ($500 more annually).

• • MoD Withheld Information About
  Nuclear Test Veterans' Records

  Absolute cover-up' on nuclear test veterans' medical records
  
  {BBC NEWS}

  Sept. 3, 2026, -Former veterans minister Tobias Ellwood has accused the Ministry of Defence (MoD) of deliberately withholding the medical records of Cold War veterans who oversaw nuclear tests, calling it "an absolute cover-up".

  Ellwood told BBC Newsnight he now believes some information he gave to Parliament about the UK's nuclear programme, based on MoD briefings, was "a complete lie".

• • No Relief for Maui Wildfire Survivors
  Losing Thousands to Contractors
  

  Homeowners Rebuilding In Lahaina Have Lost Hundreds of Thousands of Dollars to Unlicensed Or Unreliable Contractors. Government Officials Have So Far Failed to Hold Anyone Accountable

  

  Sept. 2, 2026, -Three years after the deadly Lahaina wildfire destroyed her childhood home, Raquel Utrillo cannot bear the thought of returning to the block where she grew up.

  Others in the neighborhood have finished rebuilding, but her family’s lot remains almost empty. It is a painful reminder of how long it has been since Utrillo last heard from the contractor she hired to construct a new home for her mother and sister.

• • Man Arrested In Connection With Deadly Chelan Hills Fire

  The Chelan Hills Fire Was One of Many Large, Dangerous Blazes Burning Across the State and Region in What Became a Difficult Wildfire Season

  

  Sept. 2, 2026, -Authorities on Wednesday arrested an 18-year-old Kent man in connection with the Chelan Hills wildfire that ignited July 4 in Central Washington, killing one person and burning about 15 square miles.

  Detectives from the Douglas County sheriff’s office traveled to Kent to make the arrest, according to a news release from the office.

• • Colorado Congresswoman Introduces Legislation
  to Update Radiation Exposure Compensation Act
  Missing After Indonesian Ferry Capsizes

  The Legislation Would Expand Eligibility For Residents In 57 Colorado ZIP Codes...
  
  {CBS NEWS}

  Sept. 1, 2026 -A long-standing piece of federal legislation could soon be updated and have a high impact on Colorado residents who live or have lived near nuclear facilities. Rep. Brittany Pettersen, a Democrat representing Colorado's 7th Congressional District, helped introduce the Radiation Exposure Compensation Reauthorization Act of 2026 alongside Republican state Rep. James Moylan.

  "This is a huge issue in Colorado. We still are dealing with the ramifications from Rocky Flats as well as in Fremont County for Cotter Mills," said Pettersen.

• • The Amazon’s Defenders Declare a State of Emergency
  

  As Governments Push Oil and Mining Expansion, Thousands of Indigenous Leaders and Activists Gathered in Ecuador to Chart Another Path

  

  Sept. 1, 2026, -People fighting oil wells, mines and other threats to their homelands did not come to this Amazonian city to lobby politicians at an environmental conference hosted by governments. They built the conference themselves.

  The 12th Pan-Amazonian Social Forum, known as FOSPA, brought together Indigenous leaders, Afro-descendent communities, women, youth and other environmental defenders and social-movement members from across the Amazon and Andes for six days of debate in August about how to protect the region from the forces reshaping it.

• • Judge Strikes Down New York’s Climate ‘Superfund’ Law

  The Court Said the Measure, Which Required Energy Companies to Pay $75 Billion to the State, Conflicted With Federal Law

  

  Sept. 1, 2026 -A federal judge struck down New York State’s new climate “superfund” law on Monday, ruling that it conflicted with federal law.

  The New York law was modeled on the 1980 federal Superfund program to clean up industrial waste, and several other states have been considering similar climate legislation. Republican-led states, the Trump administration and business groups have challenged New York’s law as well as a similar one in Vermont.

• • Who Pays for Wildfire Damage? California Can’t Agree

  Lawmakers Balk at Newsom’s Proposal to Limit Utilities’ Wildfire Liabilities, Sending Shares Down Sharply
  
  {THE WALL STREET JOURNAL}

  August 31, 2026, -A last-minute bid by California Gov. Gavin Newsom to reduce electric utilities’ wildfire liabilities failed in the state legislature after an outcry from survivors.

  Instead, California lawmakers introduced a bill Saturday that includes limits on executive compensation at utility companies that start wildfires, a “fast pay” program for victims, and a ban on private-equity funds from buying wildfire claims. They are set to vote on it Tuesday before closing out their current legislative session.

• • Nepal Puts Cost of Disaster at $5
  Billion, Blaming Climate Change

  The Country is Seeking Urgent Help From a Special U.N. Climate Fund, But...

  

  August 31, 2026 -Putting the cost of recovery at $5 billion, a senior Nepali official said his country had requested urgent financial help from the United Nations’ special fund for climate-disaster recovery.

  The official, Maheshwar Dhakal, the climate change chief in the Ministry of Agriculture, Forest and Environment, explicitly asserted that human-caused climate had been a factor in last week’s horrific glacial collapse and flooding. In an interview on Monday he framed the event as an inequity in which decades of greenhouse-gas emissions from richer nations are harming vulnerable countries like his that can’t cope.

• • A Native Tribe’s Way of Life
  Was Threatened By Canada Tariffs

  More Are Coming

  

  August 29, 2026 -The July day dawned warm and dry, like it was designed for haying, but by midafternoon, farmer Wayne Smith had yet to cut a single blade of grass.

  His baler had broken that morning, and as soon as he fixed it, his tractor refused to run. He knew what would make the machine go again — a pointed metal fitting the size of a half-smoked cigar — but he also knew that he didn’t have one and, because of President Donald Trump, the part would be hard to find

• • Delaware Gov. Matt Meyer Signed First-of-Its
  Kind Legislation Requiring Data Centers
  to Generate (and Pay for) Clean Energy

  Proposed Data Centers Are Set to Double Delaware’s Energy Usage and Raise Electricity Prices By Up to 80% By 2029
  
  {energy central}

  August 27, 2026 -BYONCE: Data centers and other large energy users must supply their own power while aligning with state renewable standards (which order DE utilities to source 40% clean energy by 2035).

  The package: Meyers signed a handful of laws to protect ratepayers, including legislation that 1) requires large loads to pay for infrastructure upgrades 2) bans data centers from obtaining certain tax credits and 3) restricts costs that monopoly utilities can recover from residential customers.

• • Who Pays For Wildfire Damage?

  Newsom Returns to a Defining California Fight
  
  {FACTOR THIS}

  August 27, 2026 -The bookends of California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s nearly eight years in office have been defined by a crucial question: Who should cover the cost of damage from wildfires caused by utility equipment?

  The most destructive wildfire in state history, a blaze that killed 85 people and destroyed more than 18,000 buildings in Northern California, started two days after Newsom won the governorship in 2018. Investigators determined it was caused by Pacific Gas & Electric equipment. Facing tens of billions of dollars in liability, the giant utility filed for bankruptcy just weeks after Newsom’s inauguration.

  Months later, Newsom signed a law creating a $21 billion fund, paid for by utility shareholders and ratepayers, to help utilities pay for wildfire damages if they take certain safety measures.

• • Nevada Sues in Federal Court to Block Colorado River Cuts

  Nevada Officials Pointed Directly at Colorado and Its Fellow Upstream States Saying Water Cuts Need to Be Shared By Everyone
  
  {THE COLORADO SUN}

  August 25, 2026 -Nevada became the first to sue over the Colorado River’s future Monday, citing frustrations over the steep, federally imposed water cuts it faces and the lack of mandatory cuts in upstream states, like Colorado.

  The lawsuit came three days after the Department of the Interior released its final management plan for the river basin’s key reservoirs, Lakes Mead and Powell. States and tribes have heatedly debated how to manage the reservoirs after 2026, when the current management rules expire. The decision impacts 40 million people, economies and environments across the West.

• • The Biggest Carbon Polluters Are to Blame for
  Half of U.S. Western Water Lost to Climate Change

  Some of the Most Impactful Changes Have Come in the Stressed Colorado River Basin

  

  August 25, 2026 -Some of the largest fossil fuel companies on Earth are disproportionately responsible for the water crisis in the American West, according to a first-of-its-kind study published Tuesday.

  From 2014 to 2024, climate change sapped over a third of the region’s typical annual snowpack and decreased streamflows by about 13 percent, the authors found in the paper, which appeared in Nature’s Communications Earth and Environment journal. About half of those losses are attributable to emissions from “carbon majors,” 122 fossil fuel companies and cement producers, the study concluded.

• • It Just Got Way Easier to Sue Fossil
  Fuel Companies Over Climate Change

  For Years, Industry Has Argued You Can’t Prove Which Company Caused Which Disaster. A New Study Says Otherwise
  
  {Mother Jones}

  August 24, 2026 -Deadly heatwaves in May smashed records in the UK, France, Spain, and parts of North Africa. India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh saw April temperatures soar to 113-122 degrees Fahrenheit. A late spring heat dome in the US marked the hottest March on record, and in a 1,000-year July storm, parts of Texas were left reeling after flash flooding killed multiple people. That same month, wildfires in Canada turned skies orange and exposed over 106 million North Americans to hazardous air quality. In the US alone, catastrophic events from 1980 to 2026 have killed approximately 17,377 people and cost over $3.2 trillion.

  In terms of the sheer scope of heat and extreme weather, 2026 has been a year of climate disasters.

  Meanwhile, the fossil fuel industry—by far the greatest contributor to global climate change, accounting for approximately 68 percent of greenhouse gas emissions and almost 90 percent of carbon dioxide emissions—is holding firm.

• • Sarasota Flood Victims Suffer Setback
  In Fight For Compensation

  Victims Seeking Compensation After Tropical Storm Debby Suffer a Setback in Their Lawsuit Against the County

  

  August 24, 2026 -Residents seeking compensation from Sarasota County for flooding from Tropical Storm Debby in 2024 received a setback Aug. 12 when 12th Judicial Circuit Court Judge Dana Moss granted most of Sarasota County’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit.

  The lawsuit includes an inverse-condemnation claim alleging that Sarasota County’s actions or inaction resulted in an uncompensated taking of the plaintiffs’ property or substantially deprived them of its beneficial use.

• • Mold Is Driving America’s Homeowners Crazy

  And They Want Builders to PaY
  
  {THE WALL STREET JOURNAL}

  August 24, 2026 -It is in showers, behind walls, and deep in linen closets. It is black and slimy, white and fuzzy, or green and spongy. It is making homeowners struggle to breathe and costing them millions in repairs and healthcare bills, they say.

  Mold is driving Americans crazy, and they want their home builders to pay.

  Modern energy efficiency codes have lowered the margin of error for builders when it comes to moisture management. And construction defects can cause mold growth, which thousands of Americans believe is making them sick.

• • Environmental Group Sues Trump Administration
  Over Plan to Dismantle Boulder’s NCAR

  The EDF Filed a Lawsuit Against the Trump Administration Seeking to Stop Its Attempt to Dismantle Boulder’s National Center for Atmospheric Research
  
  {Boulder ReportingLab}

  August 20, 2026 -The lawsuit follows a similar lawsuit filed in March by the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, a nonprofit consortium of 129 universities that manages NCAR. Like UCAR’s lawsuit, the environmental group argued that the federal government violated the Administrative Procedure Act by failing to provide an explanation for the attempt to dismantle NCAR.

  The Trump administration first moved to break up NCAR in December, shortly after Trump attempted to pardon election official Tina Peters, who was convicted of felonies related to 2020 election conspiracy theories. The pardon was ineffective because Peters faces state, not federal, charges. Both UCAR and EDF argue that the attempt to dismantle NCAR was retaliation for Peters’ conviction and Colorado Gov. Jared Polis’ refusal to pardon her.

• • A Supreme Court Case May Be Slowing
  Trump’s Next Climate Rollback

  “EPA is Trying to Have Their Cake and Eat It, Too,”
  
  {E&E NEWS}

  August 20, 2026 -The Trump administration’s next major step toward dismantling federal climate regulation has been stalled at the White House for more than three months. A looming Supreme Court case may help explain why.

  EPA’s planned repeal of Biden-era power plant carbon standards has been under Office of Management and Budget review since May, an unusually long pause for an administration that trampled procedural norms last year in its haste to get out of the business of regulating climate emissions.

• • Inside the Struggle to Dismantle
  America’s Greenhouse Gas Data

  New Accounts Show the Oil and Gas Industry Trying to Weaken Methane Reporting While Saving the Federal Emissions System It Relies On
  
  {DeSmog}

  August 18, 2026 -When the Trump administration announced plans last year to repeal the federal government’s greenhouse gas reporting system, rather than celebrate, many oil and gas companies publicly urged the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to preserve it. But for more than a year, behind closed doors, the fossil fuel industry has been pushing to weaken one of the reporting program’s most consequential elements.

  Oil and gas companies fear this Biden-era revision to the methane reporting rule, known as Subpart W, would force them to disclose much higher — and previously hidden — pollution levels. Those concerns, brewing for years, grew into a wave that ultimately would break onto the friendly shores of the Trump EPA, in response to the agency’s expected overhaul of both the methane reporting rule and the Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program, the most comprehensive system for tracking the nation’s greenhouse gases, industry comments and public records show.

• • Environmentalists Sue to Halt First
  Sale of Seabed-Mining Rights

  U.S. Decision to Allow Mining For Minerals In American Waters Didn’t Consider the Potential Harm to Endangered Species

  

  August 18, 2026 -A coalition of environmentalists and community advocates sued the federal government Tuesday in an effort to halt the first-ever commercial sale of deep sea mining leases in American waters.

  The Marine Minerals Administration, which oversees offshore mineral mining, last month announced plans to sell mining leases for 31 million acres of seabed in the Pacific Ocean off American Samoa, in U.S. territorial waters. The lawsuit challenges a finding by the National Marine Fisheries Service that mining “is not likely to adversely affect” species protected by the Endangered Species Act. That finding greenlit the sale.

• • Court Blocks Road Through Alaskan Wildlife Refuge

  The Trump Administration Broke the Law When It Approved a Deal to Allow a Road Through the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge

  

  August 18, 2026 -A federal judge on Tuesday blocked a land exchange that would have allowed a contentious road to be built through the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge, a vast wild area in southwestern Alaska.

  The decision by Judge Sharon L. Gleason of U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska was a setback for the Trump administration, which finalized the land swap deal in October. It was a victory for Alaska Native tribes and environmental groups that sued to stop road construction.

• • They Were Told to Park Outside.
  Then Their Cars Burst Into Flames

  Modern Vehicles Don’t Need to Be Moving — Or Even Turned On — to Catch Fire

  

  August 17, 2026 - Late last year, when Sarah Lammersen learned her 2022 Jeep Wrangler plug-in hybrid was being recalled because the high-voltage battery could catch fire at any time — even when the vehicle was parked — she jokingly texted the dealership, “I hope the car doesn’t catch on fire while we wait to schedule an appointment.”

  Days later, the Jeep burst into flames. No one was injured in the blaze, which occurred while Lammersen’s daughter drove the vehicle, but the Jeep was destroyed, according to a lawsuit over the incident.

• • Fixing Seattle’s Power Outages
  Continues a 1960s Class Divide

  More than 300 miles of These Cables Are Decades Past Their Useful Life. They Will Cost More Than $2 Billion to Fix Over at Least 15 Years

  

  August 16, 2026 -Since moving to Queen Anne in 2021, Anna Romanova has lost power more than 20 times, including six times through the first half of the year.

  When the lights go out, her family and neighbors are living through a failing more than 50 years in the making: deteriorating underground power lines.

  The fraying cables were mostly installed as part of a 1960s-era beautification effort in the city’s wealthiest neighborhoods. Today, they are leading to more frequent blackouts in parts of Seattle, making it one of the slowest utilities in the country for restoring power outages.

• • The ‘Country Hicks’ Who Refused
  $26 Million from an AI Data Center

  A Kentucky Mother and Daughter Turned Down a Life-Changing Offer for Their Farmland
  
  {THE WALL STREET JOURNAL}

  August 15, 2026 -The offer arrived out of nowhere just over one year ago.

  An unknown company was scooping up Kentucky farmland, and few plots were more valuable than those owned by Delsia Bare and her mother, Ida Huddleston.

  The money would be life-changing. From Bare’s farm, the company wanted 463 acres at $48,000 apiece. From Huddleston’s nearby piece of property, it sought 71 at $60,000 per acre.

• • South Africa’s Top Court Blocks Shell’s
  Offshore Oil Exploration Right

  Constitutional Court Rules That Shell and Its Partners Failed to consult affected communities and Did Not Properly Consider Environmental Risks
  
  {CLIMATE HOME NEWS}

  August 14, 2026 -After a five-year legal battle, the Constitutional Court of South Africa has blocked Shell and local partner Impact Africa's permit to explore for oil and gas off the country's East Coast, in a landmark victory for local communities and civil society.

  “Today’s judgment makes me feel very happy and proud that the ocean is not for profit for mining companies,” said East Coast resident and environmental campaigner Siyabonga Ndovela.

• • Judge Rejects Suit That Sought
  Professor’s Emails on Climate Law

  A Conservative Group Tried to Force the University of Michigan to Hand Over Messages From a Law Professor Who Worked on “Climate Superfund” Bills

  

  August 14, 2026 -A lawsuit against the University of Michigan demanding the emails of a professor who has worked on “climate superfund” laws has been dismissed by a state judge.

  Conservative groups and the energy industry oppose these laws, which would require oil companies to help cover the mounting costs of climate change.

• • Trump Administration Fights Republican
  Effort to Lower Flood Insurance Costs

  Justice Department Lawyers Are Defending a FEMA Program That Environmentalists Support
  
  {E&E NEWS}

  August 14, 2026 -The Trump administration is defending a flood policy imposed by the Biden administration and supported by environmental groups against efforts by Republican-led states to overturn it in court.

  The Justice Department under President Trump recently asked a federal judge in Louisiana to dismiss a lawsuit brought by 10 Republican state attorneys general who say the policy has unfairly raised the cost of federal flood insurance.

  The policy was launched in 2021 by the Biden administration after decades of offering discounted insurance had led the federal government to understate the flood risk faced by millions of properties covered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency program. The higher insurance rates were hailed by environmentalists as a way to discourage construction in flood-prone areas. Rates are decreasing for roughly 20 percent of the insurance program’s 4.5 million policies.

• • NIPSCO Wants MISO Ratepayers to Cover the
  $38M it Spent Running a Coal Plant Under Federal Orders

  So Far, the DOE’s Emergency Orders to Fossil Fuel Plants Around the Country Have Cost Ratepayers Over $400M
  
  {energy central}

  August 12, 2026 -The hole: The two Indiana coal units cost $116.7M to operate this January-March…but they earned $33.5M. Now, NIPSCO is preparing for potential DOE emergency orders through late 2028.

  For context: The DOE’s 202(c) authority lets the feds force generators to stay online in the name of reliability. For NIPSCO’s plant, Energy Sec. Chris Wright first invoked 202(c) on Dec. 23; these retirement-blocking orders have been renewed every 90 days since (and they’re currently set to expire on Sept. 19).

• • Amazon Accused of ‘Greenwashing’ Seafood Products

  Something 'Fishy' Here

  

  August 5, 2026 -On Amazon, some seafood products are labeled “wild caught” and “responsibly sourced,” but a lawsuit filed Friday suggests there’s something fishy going on.

  In a proposed class-action lawsuit filed in Seattle federal court, two consumers accused the e-commerce giant of “greenwashing,” or falsely marketing seafood products as sustainable. The lawsuit targets dozens of tuna, salmon and other seafood products sold by Amazon online and in stores under brands including Chicken of the Sea, Bumble Bee, StarKist and 365 by Whole Foods.

• • Federal Appeals Court Revives Lawsuit
  Over Colorado Refinery Pollution

  A Lower Court Judge Was Too Quick to Dismiss a Challenge From Environmental Groups, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Ruled
  
  {POLITICOPRO}

  August 3, 2026 -An environmental lawsuit over alleged air pollution from a Suncor refinery in Colorado is getting a second life after a federal appeals court on Monday reversed a lower court that had tossed the case.

  The question of when groups can sue over pollution from power plants, refineries and other industrial facilities comes as the Trump administration has eased off environmental enforcement. It intervened in a different citizen suit over emissions from an xAI data center in Memphis for the novel purpose of quashing the challenge.

• • Migrant Crisis Pits Spain’s Leader Against Critics Across Europe

  Prime Minister Lashes Out at EU Colleagues Who Blame His Policies For Ceuta Episode
  
  {THE WALL STREET JOURNAL}

  August 3, 2026 -As most migrants left a tiny Spanish territory in North Africa this weekend, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez pivoted to a new crisis—one playing out in Europe’s halls of power.

  His country had just experienced an extraordinary breach of sovereignty, with some 50,000 migrants illegally pouring into Ceuta from neighboring Morocco.

• • Revealed: Major Oil Firms Make $93Bn
  Profits Amid War and Climate Crisis

  Iran Conflict Windfall Over Three Months Reignites Calls For Companies ‘Cashing In On Human Misery’ to Pay For Environmental Damage

  

  August 2, 2026 -Eight of the biggest oil companies amassed profits of more than $90bn (£67bn) in just three months as the Iran conflict sent energy prices soaring and the emissions-fuelled climate crisis caused deadly heatwaves.

  The windfall war profits have reignited calls for oil and gas supermajors such as Saudi Aramco and BP to pay for the environmental damage caused by “cashing in on human misery” and fund a rapid transition to renewable energy.

• • Michigan Lawmakers Move to Block
  State’s Climate Case Against Oil Companies

  The State Attorney General Said She Doesn’t Need the Legislature’s Permission to Sue Fossil Fuel Producers For Contributing to Climate Change
  
  {E&E NEWS}

  July 30, 2026 -Lawmakers in Michigan have found a new way to target climate lawsuits against the oil and gas industry: cut off funding to the lawyers.

  A new provision in the state’s 2027 budget prevents the state attorney general from “joining a multistate lawsuit or taking part of a lawsuit against the federal government or an oil or gas entity” without legislative approval. The language appears to have been added during budget negotiations between Democrats who control the Senate and Republicans who control the House.

• • The Case For Making Polluters Pay Moves Into the Mainstream

  With Fossil Fuel Firms Set to Report Huge Profits Off the Back of the Iran War Amid Heatwaves and Wildfires in Europe, Public Debate is Asking Who Should Pay For the Damage?
  
  {CLIMATE HOME NEWS}

  July 28, 2026 -This coming week, as record-breaking heat has morphed into killer wildfires, major oil and gas companies will report their second-quarter earnings and are widely expected to announce profits that have doubled or even quadrupled in the last three months. The obscenity of that contradiction is impossible to ignore.

  Oxfam analysis, released as the Q2 earnings season gets underway, shows that the world’s six largest fossil fuel corporations - BP, Chevron, Eni, ExxonMobil, Shell and TotalEnergies - are on course to nearly double their combined net income compared with the first quarter of the year, from $23 billion to around $45 billion.

• • Boulder Asks the Supreme Court to
  Keep Its Climate Lawsuit Alive

  The Fossil Fuel Industry has Argued That Federal Law Bars the Lawsuit. But...
  
  {E&E NEWS}

  July 28, 2026 -Two Colorado communities are asking the Supreme Court to allow them to continue suing fossil fuel producers for climate change, saying the lawsuit is an “exercise of traditional state power.”

  In a brief filed Monday, the city and county of Boulder outlined their arguments in Suncor v. Boulder, a blockbuster climate case the court will take up in the fall that could derail nearly two dozen similar lawsuits against the oil and gas industry.

  The governments are asking the court to reject the industry’s bid to overturn a 2025 Colorado Supreme Court decision that allowed the lawsuit to proceed in state court.

• • Johnson & Johnson to Pay $5.5bn
  Settlement In Talc Cancer Lawsuit

  Landmark Deal Covers About 76,000 Claims and Could End Contentious, Decade-Long Legal Battle

  

  July 28, 2026 -Johnson & Johnson said it would pay an estimated $5.5bn to resolve tens of thousands of lawsuits alleging its baby ?powder and other talc products caused ?ovarian cancer, in a landmark deal that could end a contentious, decade-long legal battle.

  Johnson & Johnson on Monday said the settlement covers about 76,000 claims, including ones consolidated in a federal court in New Jersey, and related cases in state court,representing nearly all of the remaining talc claims against the company.

• • Climate-Impacted Communities Across
  Asia Are Taking Their Fight To Court

  Communities In South Korea, the Philippines, India and Indonesia Are Increasingly Turning to the Courts to Demand Justice and Accountability
  
  {EARTH.ORG}

  July 25, 2026 -When Super Typhoon Rai – equivalent to a Category 5 hurricane – began battering Batasan Island in Bohol, Philippines, in December 2021, Trixy Elle and her husband, two children, and father waded into the storm, fearing they would be trapped in their home. Holding on to one another, they were determined not to let go.

  By morning, the house Elle and her husband had spent years building was gone. So was much of the island. They were left with just the clothes on their backs. In the days that followed, the family survived in conditions that stripped life to its barest terms, at one point, eating livestock they had found dead in the storm’s aftermath.

  The 35-year-old mother felt a deep sense of injustice. The typhoon – locally known as Odette – affected 10.6 million people in the Philippines, killing more than 400 and displacing 1.4 million from their homes. Elle began to question why communities like hers had to endure such devastation despite contributing so little to the climate crisis. “Why are we the ones struggling the most?”