It’s a big day for insects.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced Tuesday that it is proposing the monarch butterfly for threatened species status under the Endangered Species Act, a big step forward in a process set in motion in 2014 with a petition from conservationists.

After a 90-day public comment period, the agency will make a ...Read more

We all just want our stuff to work, right?

Since most of us have abandoned landlines, our cell phones are our lifelines and the main way we communicate with each other and stay informed.

One of my bigger fears is my phone or laptop running out of power just when I need it most, so I’m an “overcharger.”

My phone transitions from one ...Read more

Huawei Technologies Co.’s latest flagship smartphone is powered by a chip little different from the one that set off alarm bells in Washington a year ago, signaling a slowdown in the Chinese company’s tech advances.

The newly introduced Mate 70 Pro Plus phone runs on a processor built with the same 7-nanometer technology used in its Mate 60...Read more

A material that’s been around since people built shelters – wood – is increasingly being proposed for low- and mid-rise buildings.

Companies behind these “mass timber” projects say that wood is a lower-carbon alternative to steel or concrete and brings other benefits, such as faster construction time and lower cost than ...Read more

It's nice to write about a gadget that will save you money, but how much depends on the user. I'm referring to the Shelfy, a compact device (6.6 by 4.5 by 2.6 inches) you place in your refrigerator. It extends the life of fruits and veggies by eliminating bacteria and breaking down pollutants that accelerate ripening.

A company representative...Read more

I work in a place that has on-site daycare for its employees, and I occasionally have to go fix a computer or iPad in a room with sleeping babies and toddlers. The teachers in those classrooms are usually playing white noise to keep the kids asleep.

What those teachers taught me is that you don’t need a dedicated white noise machine. You ...Read more

Indiana Jones has been such an iconic character that he has inspired generations of new heroes, and nowhere is that more evident than in video games. Dozens of projects feature swashbuckling adventurers or daring archaeologists, all of whom owe a debt to George Lucas and Steven Spielberg’s protagonist.

Unfortunately, his popularity on ...Read more

Seven Western states that depend on the Colorado River are ending the year at an impasse in negotiations over the writing of new rules for dealing with chronic water shortages.

Representatives of California and other states who attended an annual Colorado River conference in Las Vegas last week said they remain deadlocked in their talks on long...Read more

The federal government has proposed listing the monarch butterfly as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, a step aimed at reversing the species’ steep population decline, particularly in California.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service also proposed designating 4,395 acres of critical habitat for the western migratory population in ...Read more

The Arctic can feel like a far-off place, disconnected from daily life if you aren’t one of the 4 million people who live there. Yet, the changes underway in the Arctic as temperatures rise can profoundly affect lives around the world.

Coastal flooding is worsening in many communities as Arctic glaciers and the Greenland Ice Sheet ...Read more

For more than a century, conservationists have worked to preserve natural ecosystems by creating national parks and protected areas. Today the Earth faces a global biodiversity crisis, with more than 1 million species at risk of extinction. This makes it even more important to conserve places where at-risk species can thrive.

In 2022,...Read more

LOS ANGELES — On an afternoon in late summer, the bees that live at a Long Beach mall were flying high, winging their way back to their hives atop a parking garage.

Upon their return, they emptied the “pollen pants” they were sporting on their hind legs to make food for the colony’s offspring. The colorful clusters of pollen are a sign ...Read more

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — The Biden administration said Monday it will hold the second lease sale for potential oil and gas exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge on Jan 9.

The sale is required by the 2017 Tax Cut and Jobs Act, passed by Republicans during President Donald Trump's first term.

The Bureau of Land Management said it ...Read more

Across the U.S. and worldwide, energy demand is soaring as data centers work to support the wide and growing use of artificial intelligence. These large facilities are filled with powerful computers, called servers, that run complex algorithms to help AI systems learn from vast amounts of data.

This process requires tremendous ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — Shortly after noon Sunday, the waters eight miles off the coast of Newport Beach were broken by an unusual, if not majestic, sight.

A several-ton humpback whale broke through the surface and leaped into the sky, like a Pacific Life insurance commercial, scattering adjacent seabirds while opening its massive mouth to consume ...Read more

It's a U.S. Food and Drug Administration rule that most Americans know little about, yet gives corporations the license to add potentially harmful ingredients to foods without regulatory oversight or public notice.

For decades, the FDA's "generally recognized as safe," or GRAS, designation has allowed food makers to decide for themselves ...Read more

SEATTLE — With the near complete end of commercial whaling, ship collisions are now a leading cause of death worldwide for large whale species, according to new research published in Science.

Yet little is done to manage this risk, found authors of the study, led by the University of Washington.

In a first of its kind global analysis, ...Read more

Every year, Americans buy somewhere between 35 million and 50 million Christmas trees, and many more pull an artificial tree out of storage for the season. In all, about three-quarters of U.S. households typically have some kind of Christmas tree, surveys show.

People often ask which is more sustainable – a real tree or an ...Read more