Feds invest millions to keep groceries open as many rural residents face long drives for food

Grocery closings leave rural residents few options

Tainted ponds kill cattle and children play in contaminated fields in Nigerian lead crisis

Environmental damage looms in Nigerian lead crisis

Gold, and lead, bring illness and death to poor villages in northern Nigeria

Gold, and lead, bring illness and death in Nigeria

CDC: Nigerian lead poisoning outbreak ‘unprecedented’ as doctors struggle to help ill children

CDC: Nigeria lead poisoning crisis ‘unprecedented’

Cross placed at Mojave Desert site where another war memorial was stolen

Cross placed in Mojave Desert where one was stolen

Obama administration consulted environmentalists about protecting land in West; others upset

Govt met with environmentalists on land protection

Thieves steal Mojave Desert cross that was center of US Supreme Court dispute

Thieves take controversial Mojave Desert cross

Hiking the Israel National Trail, 620 miles from the Red Sea to Lebanon border

Hiking the Israel National Trail

MAKHTESH RAMON, Israel — I was enjoying a serene moment of yoga in the desert, my dusty hiking boots resting nearby, when a squadron of fighter jets roared overhead and reminded me — eight days after I last saw civilization — that I was still in Israel.

NASA begins science flights with robotic jet originally designed for Air Force reconnaissance

NASA begins science flights with robotic jet

California Science Center near downtown LA takes $165 million, hands-on approach to ecosystems

Museum takes new look at air, water, land and life

Often at odds, enviros and Calif. growers agree that old farmland makes perfect solar site

Enviros, growers agree on farmland reuse for solar

Huge Calif. solar project gets preliminary OK for $1.4 billion in US loan guarantees

Solar project gets tentative OK for US loan aid

Dilemma in the desert: Developer, environmentalists face off over huge Calif. solar complex

Solar showdown in Calif. tortoises’ desert home

BIA withdraws biological assessment for proposed Desert Rock power plant in NM

BIA withdraws assessment for Desert Rock

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The Bureau of Indian Affairs has withdrawn its biological assessment for a proposed power plant in northwestern New Mexico, saying it has “significant concerns” about the impact of mercury and selenium on two endangered fish species in the San Juan River.