Katla, the giant Icelandic volcano that last erupted in 1918 and is overdue for another eruption, is releasing up to 24,000 tons of carbon dioxide a day, a sign of a magma buildup. An eruption by Katla could dwarf that of Eyjafjallajökull in 2010. 

The Trump administration foresees a catastrophic warming of 7°F by the year 2100, but doesn’t plan to do anything about it.

Glyptotermes nakajimai, a species of termite in southern Japan, gets along just fine in all-female colonies. 

Glyphosate, the active ingredient in Bayer’s Roundup herbicide, is shown to kill honeybees.  

Florida’s red tide, usually confined to the Gulf Coast, closes beaches in Palm Beach and Miami-Dade County. 

The Federal Emergency Management Agency failed to properly oversee the spending of $1.5 billion in debris cleanup in Florida and Georgia from Hurricane Irma in 2017.

The owner of a Washington seafood company gets two years in prison for overharvesting sea cucumbers.

Two executives of the Dutch oil-services firm SBM Offshore are convicted of bribing foreign officials in Angola, Brazil, and Equatorial Guinea, and are sent to prison for terms of three years and 30 months, respectively.

Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke calls protests against new gas pipelines “simply un-American.”

The Supreme Court upholds a ban on uranium mining on nearly a million acres around Grand Canyon National Park. The court also rejects a challenge to California’s coastal-access law from Silicon Valley billionaire Vinod Khosla, who had sought to restrict public access to a San Mateo County surf spot known as Martin’s Beach.  

Starting in 2030, Denmark will ban the sale of fossil-fuel-powered cars.

Governor Jerry Brown authorizes California police to impound driverless vehicles.

Arizona’s 47,000-acre Sawmill wildfire in April 2017 was ignited by an off-duty Border Patrol agent shooting at a target filled with colored powder (and also an explosive substance) that would reveal the gender of his future child to guests at a party.   

Hippos that escaped from Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar’s private zoo after his death in 1993 are multiplying in the Magdalena River, where they may serve the same beneficial ecological role as the toxodon, a giant Paleolithic mammal that died out 20,000 years ago. 

Alaska’s Katmai National Park and Preserve celebrates Fat Bear Week.

The EPA seeks to weaken emissions standards—primarily from coal-fired power plants—for mercury, a potent neurotoxin. The agency also considers weakening regulations on exposure to radiation. An EPA news release cites a fringe scientist who argues that exposure to radiation may be beneficial.  

The White House deletes language about the effects of climate change on children’s health from a draft EPA proposal on HFCs, a class of powerful greenhouse gases.