North Dakota, now the second-largest oil-producing state in the US, is neglecting the gas that also comes from its wells, says a report, wasting money and adding to greenhouse gas emissions.

The highly radioactive water leaking from the wrecked Fukushima plant is part of a problem that Japan will take decades to resolve and which will blight many thousands of lives.

Rachel Maddow reports on the increased emergency level at the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan where hundreds of tons of radioactive water is leaking into the sea.

Scary stories of kidnappings and explosions lead our news feeds, but it's the good news that helps break down the myth of our own powerlessness. "If it bleeds, it leads." Ever hear that maxim of journalism? If you want readers, go with the scary, gruesome story—that's what gets hearts pumping and grabs attention. But what grabs our attention can also scare the heck out of us and shut us down.

It's taken 60 years, but solar is tantalizingly close to beating fossil fuels on price. The prices of solar cells are falling rapidly, and will keep doing so for the next few years. The big questions revolve around the rate of the price declines. And the panels themselves aren't the only place where cost reductions will be found. America has very high "soft costs" -- installation, permitting, marketing etc. Whittling down these expenses will help, too.

The arguments for and against fracking seem clear-cut. But it’s not that simple, and there is mounting evidence that exploiting shale gas may be neither necessary nor sensible. As the international debate intensifies over the arguments for and against exploiting shale gas, the largest British nature conservation charity has objected to proposals to drill at two sites in Britain.

When I give these climate talks, by the end people are typically agitated and full of questions. “What technology is going to fix this?” “How are we ever get people to agree on a solution?” “I’m just one person, what could I possibly do that would make an impact?”

I recently had the opportunity to engage in conversation with Guy McPherson about a number of topics and subsequently began reading his book Walking Away From Empire, Guy’s personal journey of leaving a tenured professorship to radically alter his living arrangements in preparation for the collapse of industrial civilization.

Peoples who have lived in the same place for countless generations – the Amazon, perhaps, or the Arctic – possess invaluable knowledge about living with climate change, and it is evolving all the time. Climate change often seems to be seen as the preserve of scientists and environmental journalists. But what about the accumulated wisdom of traditional and indigenous peoples?

Dutch scientists have thought up a new use for all the carbon dioxide that pours from the chimneys of fossil fuel-burning power stations: harvest it for even more electricity. They could, they argue, pump the carbon dioxide through water or other liquids and produce a flow of electrons and therefore more electricity.

The world’s coral reefs are under threat. Some scientists say doses of cloud brightening could provide a solution to the problem. Here’s a new twist to the geoengineer’s dilemma: just change the climate locally – over the bit you want to protect – and leave the rest of the planet alone.

Trees may be getting more efficient in the way they manage water. They could be exploiting the higher levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, growing foliage from a lower uptake of groundwater. If so, then the carbon dioxide fertilisation effect – predicted by theorists and observed in laboratory experiments – could be real.

Urban sprawl may not be as bad for the environment as we thought – as long as every home is fitted with solar panels and electric cars become the norm. Modern planners are building compact cities, believing tightly controlled zones are better for the environment. New research suggests the opposite: urban sprawl might be a better option, with solar power fitted to suburban houses and the adoption of electric cars transforming the energy needs of a city.

An electric car is only as good for the climate as the electricity used to power it. And in states that rely heavily on fossil fuels like coal and natural gas for their electricity there are many conventional and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles that are better for the climate than all-electric cars.

Turning deserts into forests sounds like a utopian dream, but a group of scientists believe that “carbon farming” really might be the answer to climate change. Large forests planted with a single species of tough small tree could capture enough carbon from the atmosphere to slow down climate change and green the world’s deserts at the same time, researchers say.

Research into one of the world’s oldest and driest deserts has unearthed evidence of the evolutionary timeline for species that have avoided extinction by adapting to dramatic climate change

Finnish researchers say they have found how to produce biofuel cheaply, while a US team says it can make hydrogen from water at less cost than conventional methods.

Many of the lessons learned are most applicable to those living in a similar climate to the Whole Systems Farm in Vermont; however, the farm’s thriving ecosystem has been created on marginal land, and Falk stresses that the concepts can be transferred to other locations where only marginal land is available and creative solutions are needed.

The results are similar to a previous report that I wrote about in the article BC’s revenue-neutral carbon tax experiment, four years on: It’s working, but updated, with one more year of data.  The new data show that the carbon tax is working even better than reported previously.

In the weeks and months immediately following 9/11, one of the most touching responses in my neighborhood, not far Ground Zero, was the overwhelming support of police and fire departments from around the country.

Two more US states say they will require insurance companies to reveal how prepared they are to cope with risks related to climate change.

With Arctic sea ice thinning and shrinking rapidly in recent years, the U.S. military and scientific agencies are scrambling to cope with the looming prospect of a seasonally ice-free Arctic Ocean. At a meeting in Washington last week, top U.S. Arctic officials at the Coast Guard, Navy, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and other agencies acknowledged that the U.S. lags behind other nations in dealing with the rapidly changing Arctic environment.