Rachel Waldholz, Alaska’s Energy Desk

Communities around the state seem to be dealing with new threats to water and sewer systems from environmental changes linked to global warming.

Researchers at Yale have landed on a particular way of describing our complicated, contradictory climate change opinions.

Regulators say an oil leak could cause much more environmental damage than the current natural gas leak. Both pipelines run through key habitat for endangered beluga whales.

Two Anchorage Democrats have introduced a bill to create a statewide commission on climate change. But even its authors doubt the bill has much of a chance this session.

State regulators wrote that the design information submitted so far is “unacceptable for the department’s decision making process” and that “the very limited data provided to date indicates that substantial vessel design deficiencies may exist, particularly in the area of winter operations.”

At a meeting in Anchorage Friday with elected officials from around the Arctic, Murkowski said she’s fielding questions about potential changes in U.S. policy.