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High Country News

High Country News

A nonprofit independent magazine of unblinking journalism that shines a light on all of the complexities of the West.

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Water

Shayla Sissoko holds a microscope to the class brine shrimp.
Posted inJune 1, 2023: Seen and Unseen

How the tiny brine shrimp can help protect the Great Salt Lake

by Caroline Tracey May 18, 2023January 24, 2024

A conversation with the sixth-grade activists behind Utah’s new state crustacean.

People pass sand bags to protect homes from the rising flow of Emigration Creek through Wasatch Hollow Park, Salt Lake City, on April 12, 2023.
Posted inArticles

This year’s record-breaking snowpack is pouring into the dried-out Salt Lake

by Hannah Singleton May 15, 2023January 24, 2024

Snowmelt is replenishing depleted ecosystems and flooding communities.

Posted inArticles

Can the Dolores River be saved?

by Jonathan Thompson May 11, 2023January 24, 2024

A beleaguered Colorado waterway garners new attention.

Firefighters drop retardant over Aliso Canyon during the Coastal Fire in Laguna Niguel, California, on May 11, 2022.
Posted inArticles

Fire retardant kills fish. Is it worth the risk?

by Kylie Mohr May 10, 2023January 24, 2024

A lawsuit could change how the Forest Service fights fires.

The small town of Neah Bay.
Posted inMay 1, 2023: Reemergence

The artist and the harpooner

by Josephine Woolington May 1, 2023June 14, 2024

In Micah McCarty’s art, the past and future are one, and the whales never left.

Tucson, Arizona's Rillito River as seen after a summer monsoon storm in 2022.
Posted inMay 1, 2023: Reemergence

The spirit of the Rillito

by Ruxandra Guidi May 1, 2023March 14, 2024

‘New animism’ seeks a connection to nature’s pulse.

Posted inArticles

As the West’s epic snow melts, flood danger rises

by Chad Hecht April 18, 2023January 24, 2024

How do 2023’s atmospheric rivers compare to past extremes and what can be expected in the future?

Posted inArticles

Atmospheric rivers ease Western drought

by Jonathan Thompson March 30, 2023January 24, 2024

Record-breaking rain and snow bring salvation — and destruction — to a drought-parched West.

A filtration system designed to filter out PFAS from the water supply in Horsham, Pennsylvania. The latest EPA proposal sets enforceable standards that are achievable using filtration technology that some East Coast utilities have used for years.
Posted inArticles

Most drinking water in the U.S. is contaminated by PFAS; here’s what you can do about it

by Sarah Trent March 28, 2023January 24, 2024

The EPA just proposed new rules on toxic ‘forever chemicals.’

Posted inArticles

Q&A: The Diné worldviews in the SCOTUS water rights case Arizona v. Navajo Nation

by Anna V. Smith March 20, 2023January 24, 2024

What would it look like to interpret the treaties as tribes understood them?

Posted inArticles

Could Arizona’s new governor shift Colorado River politics?

by Jonathan Thompson February 16, 2023January 24, 2024

There’s a historic reckoning in the Colorado River Basin — and Katie Hobbs is here to play hard ball.

Posted inArticles

The Salinas River and the foretold flood

by Jeremy Miller February 8, 2023January 24, 2024

Agriculture beat the river into submission. It’s back.

Posted inArticles

What happens when an affluent Arizona suburb’s main water supply is cut off?

by Sarah Tory February 3, 2023January 24, 2024

As the Colorado River crisis worsens, an unregulated housing development faces a reckoning.

Posted inFebruary 1, 2023: The Reveal

Glen Canyon revealed

by Craig Childs February 1, 2023May 23, 2024

What comes next for Lake Powell?

Posted inFebruary 1, 2023: The Reveal

This Washington experiment could rebuild eroding coastlines

by Sarah Trent January 27, 2023January 24, 2024

In 2016, David Cottrell dropped $400 worth of rock on Washaway Beach to see what would happen. Now engineers are watching, too.

Posted inArticles

Plans for a new uranium mill in Utah announced

by Jonathan Thompson January 26, 2023January 24, 2024

Fierce opposition to the project is likely.

Posted inFebruary 1, 2023: The Reveal

LDS environmentalists want their institution to address the Great Salt Lake’s collapse

by Caroline Tracey January 24, 2023January 24, 2024

Advocates call for healing the rift between scripture and politics.

Posted inArticles

Researchers solve one of the Borderlands’ biggest water puzzles

by Caroline Tracey January 9, 2023January 24, 2024

Officially, the U.S. and Mexico share 11 groundwater basins. A new map bumps that figure up to a stunning 72.

Posted inArticles

The West’s salt lakes are turning to dust. Can Congress help?

by Caroline Tracey January 6, 2023January 24, 2024

A new research and monitoring program aims to conserve threatened but overlooked saline ecosystems.

Posted inJanuary 1, 2023: Ripple Effects

Can dam removal save the Snake River?

by Hayley Austin and Anna V. Smith January 1, 2023January 24, 2024

See the river as the climate changes, development continues and consequences grow with inaction.

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