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Glen Canyon Dam holds back the waters of Lake Powell, a sprawling recreational reservoir that provides storage and power for residents along the Colorado River.

In a sign of how dire drought conditions have become in the American West, the Bureau of Reclamation will keep water in Lake Powell and add more water from the Flaming Gorge Reservoir upstream to stave off dropping water levels. Read more»

The Bighorn Fire burning along the Catalina Mountains near Golder Ranch and Oracle Roads in 2020.

As the gap between fire and rainfall season becomes shorter, devastatingly large wildfires followed by intense precipitation events will grow in frequency as the effects of climate change become more widespread and entrenched. Read more»

Coal Oil Point near the University of California, Santa Barbara.

A majority of Americans favor a transition to more carbon-neutral energy sources like solar and wind power, but approximately the same majority believes fossil fuels will remain a part of the energy portfolio for the foreseeable future. Read more»

While the move will likely be cheered by those eager to get to the bottom of how social media facilitated the events of Jan. 6, privacy advocates will oppose the effort of the government to snoop on the communications of private individuals.

The congressional committee charged with investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol subpoenaed four large Silicon Valley social media companies Thursday, saying the companies had failed to furnish requested items vital to the investigation. Read more»

Grosvenor Arch is a unique sandstone double arch located within Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in southern Utah.

The Biden administration will restore environmental protections to three national monuments, including two in Utah and the only marine monument in the Atlantic Ocean, that were diminished dramatically by his predecessor Donald Trump. Read more»

For the first time, the August 24-Month Study showed Lake Mead’s surface below 1,075 feet, triggering a Tier 1 shortage that will deprive low-priority users of some of their water, said Tanya Trujillo, assistant Interior secretary for water and science.

Scientists painted a grim picture of the changing climate and hydrological conditions in the American West during a virtual forum - while the recent dry patterns are part of a larger more extended trend, it is also impossible to overstate how dry and hot it has been in the last two years. Read more»

The June, 2020 Bighorn Fire burning in Ventana Canyon as the sun sets, and the fire becomes more visible Thursday evening.

Wildfires the world over have exacted a devastating toll, destroying lives with increased frequency as warming temperatures and questionable forest management practices have made fires larger, more intense and more frequent. Read more»

Horses graze on the grass where a fire scar helped promote its regrowth at the base of Ponderosa pine trees in Apache-Sitgreaves National Forests, where the Heber Wild Horse Territory is home to many feral horses in the high central Arizona area.

Wild horse advocates have created a stable of volunteers hoping to prove a concept of fertility control will work better to keep the population of wild horses in a healthy range than other practices currently used by the federal government. Read more»

In this screenshot, California Gov. Gavin Newsom (center) and U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack (right) discuss forest management as it relates to wildfires which have in recent years blackened huge swaths of the Golden State.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said the federal government needs to do a better job of forest management after viewing damage from the million-acre August Complex fire - a rare admission in an era where climate change receives the brunt of the blame for the spate of wildfires. Read more»

The Telegraph Fire, which burned through 180,757 acres in the Tonto National Forest.

Forecasts for high temperatures and precipitation bode ill for the American West, already in the throes of a prolonged drought and attempting to quell hundreds of large wildfires scattered across nine states. Read more»

The Telegraph Fire near Superior, AZ. It was of several fires in the state that fire officials have battled because of weather and drought conditions.

Despite the inordinate number of fires burning across America’s heat-afflicted West, communities have managed to evade death and destruction so far, but experts warn conditions appear conducive to a severe fire season as the summer deepens into fall. Read more»

In the American West, about 97% of the territory is experiencing some form of dryness while about half of the land is witnessing either 'extreme' or 'exceptional' drought, the worst categories.

The scale of the drought is beginning to crystallize as new information shows certain states experienced their driest winter ever while the American West is plunged steeper into a historic drought that covers much of the region. Read more»

Blue skies will smile on the American West for the next several months, according to federal meteorologists — bad news for a region already mired in a multiyear drought. Currently, the entire state of Arizona is experiencing some form of drought. Read more»

This is not the first time the Trump administration’s census plans have been in court – this photo shows protesters in 2019 outside the Supreme Court, which struck down an administration plan to add a citizenship question to the census.

A panel of three federal judges ruled Thursday that President Donald Trump’s memo excluding undocumented immigrants from the 2020 census count is unlawful, finding the U.S. Constitution mandates the enumeration of all people in the nation, not solely citizens. Read more»

Tents and tarps erected in a makeshift camp outside the port of entry in Tijuana, Mexico, where Central Americans wait to have their asylum cases heard by the United States.

A Christian pastor claims in a suit filed in federal court in California Monday that the federal government illegally targeted her for administering her faith to refugees and immigrants along the U.S.-Mexico border. Read more» 1

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