NPR News - Environment

Farmers are starting to grow new crops in winter, when their fields usually lie fallow. Meanwhile, air pollution, which contributes to climate change, is weakening India's solar energy production.

(Image credit: Julie McCarthy/NPR)

Throughout human history, solar eclipses have been seen as having great religious significance, often as omens or signs of divine warning or punishment. Major and minor religions alike have their own understandings.

The move reverses an Obama-era policy put in place to encourage national parks to end the sale of bottled water. The aim was to cut back on plastic litter.

(Image credit: Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Portland Press Herald/Getty Images)

Fresh herbs are some of the most perishable items in the produce section. And yet, shoppers must buy amounts that are bound to go wasted at home.

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On a sunny day, California gets up to 40 percent of its energy from solar power. Monday's total eclipse isn't just a scientific spectacle, it's a major concern for the state's power grid.

(Image credit: Marcus Yam/LA Times via Getty Images)

An Obama order called for new public infrastructure projects to be built to withstand rising sea levels caused by climate change. President Trump revoked that order to accelerate the review process.

(Image credit: Michael Reynolds/Getty Images)

An Obama order called for new public infrastructure projects to be built to withstand rising sea levels caused by climate change. President Trump revoked that order to accelerate the review process.

(Image credit: Michael Reynolds/Getty Images)

Skywatchers and astrophysicists are already gearing up for next month's "Great American Solar Eclipse."

(Image credit: Ulet Ifansasti/Getty Images)

Last year China banned the sale of commercial elephant ivory. But that's led to another illicit trade — in woolly mammoth tusks — that is having a severe impact on Siberia's permafrost.

(Image credit: Amos Chapple/RFE/RL)

In the 15 years since the Guantanamo Bay detention camp was established to house suspected terrorists, a green buffer surrounding the facility to keep out the world has reverted back to the wild. Now some scientists would like to turn it into a protected research area.

New research suggests there is space on the open ocean to farm essentially all the seafood humans can eat — and then some. But such volumes of fish and shellfish could not be grown without costs.

(Image credit: Maxim Zmeyev/AFP/Getty Images)

New research suggests there is space on the open ocean to farm essentially all the seafood humans can eat — and then some. But such volumes of fish and shellfish could not be grown without costs.

(Image credit: Maxim Zmeyev/AFP/Getty Images)

That advice came in guidelines issued to residents of Guam on how to prepare for a missile threat on the island. The reason is conditioner can trap radioactive particles in strands of hair.

(Image credit: Smith Collection/Getty Images)

That advice came in guidelines issued to residents of Guam on how to prepare for a missile threat on the island. The reason is conditioner can trap radioactive particles in strands of hair.

(Image credit: Smith Collection/Getty Images)

There is no greater source for science, for the inspiration to do science, than the wild; that is where the sense of sacredness at the root of science's aspiration lives, says blogger Adam Frank.

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Wildfires are still burning in western Greenland, close to the Arctic island's ice sheet. As the fires burn, they release black particles that can coat the ice and snow, and make it melt more quickly.

(Image credit: Pierre Markuse/Flicker)

The Trump administration has opened a 45-day comment period ahead of proposed changes to Obama-era EPA rules for greenhouse gas emissions for cars and light trucks.

(Image credit: Susan Walsh/AP)

A new study is adding to evidence that a popular class of pesticides can harm wild bees, like bumblebees.

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"In the winter, the sea attacks us," a fisherman says. "We are afraid the village will sink into the sea." The World Bank says Egypt is among the countries most vulnerable to climate change's effects.

(Image credit: Ibrahim Ramadan/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)

The number of vultures in South Asia has plummeted. But "restaurants" to feed rescued chicks and wild vultures are good for the birds — and for the local economy.

(Image credit: Mary Plage/Getty Images)