Your State

,

Deep in the northeast Pacific Ocean, The Blob is acting strangely. When the abnormally warm patch of water first appeared in 2013, fascinated scientists watched disrupted weather patterns, from drought in California to almost snowless winters in Alaska and record cold winters in the northeast. The anomalously warm water, with temperatures three degrees Centigrade above normal, was nicknamed The Blob by U.S climatologist Nick Bond. It stretched over one million square kilometres of the Gulf of Alaska — more than the surface area of B.C. and Alberta combined — stretching down 100-metres into the ocean.

There is no better time than World AIDS Day to recommit ourselves to achieving an AIDS-free generation. This year, we will celebrate the tremendous progress we have made together in expanding access to HIV prevention, treatment, and care services, and focus on the potential to achieve sustainable epidemic control and end AIDS as a public health threat.

THE PRESIDENT: Good morning. Last December — more than 13 years after our nation was attacked by al Qaeda on 9/11 — America’s combat mission in Afghanistan came to a responsible end. That milestone was achieved thanks to the courage and the skill of our military, our intelligence, and civilian personnel. They served there with extraordinary skill and valor, and it’s worth remembering especially the more than 2,200 American patriots who made the ultimate sacrifice in Afghanistan.

Ridgeline wind continues to be controversial, and offshore wind comes with its own set of on-site issues, including a much higher installation cost. However, if America is ever going to replace fossil fuels with clean alternatives, wind has to be part of the mix. Some innovative designers and engineers have come up with a solution worthy of Jules Verne: floating turbines.

In the last 34 years, the average October temperature in Barrow has risen by more than 7°C − an increase that, on its own, makes a mockery of international efforts to prevent global temperatures from rising more than 2°C above their pre-industrial levels. If you doubt that parts of the planet really are warming, talk to residents of Barrow, the Alaskan town that is the most northerly settlement in the U.S.

The release of carbon dioxide into the air from factory smokestacks to the tailpipe on your car could pose a risk to red king crab and other lucrative fisheries in Alaska, a new report says. Ocean water becomes more acidic when it absorbs carbon dioxide released by human sources, such as the burning of fossil fuels. Increased ocean acidification could harm important Alaska commercial and subsistence fisheries and communities that rely heavily on them, according to the new research aimed at spurring discussion on how to address the changes.

Environmental Resources Management (ERM) has an incredibly poor history when it comes to making environmental assessments of its industrial projects. It whitewashed the impact from its portion of the Keystone XL pipeline, and now looks to do the same with a gold and copper mine right in the middle of one of the biggest fisheries in the world, in the heart of Alaska's pristine wilderness.

Kenneth Copeland, the controversial televangelist, made waves on Veteran's Day by dismissing the reality of PTSD and demanding that those diagnosed simply "get rid of it" by clinging to a verse he plucked out of the book of Numbers, callously dismissing the reality and hardships of the disease.

Climate change is impacting Alaska and other high-latitude regions quicker than rest of the world. In fact, the state is likely to see the first climate change refugees in North America, due to rising sea levels swamping native villages on the Arctic Ocean.

Twice in recent weeks newscasters have said what my three-year old calls "bad words" (where's George Carlin when you need him?) on television accidentally, and both times they've been fired, because apparently we're all still striving to reach puberty.

The EPA submitted a letter faulting the State Department’s environmental review of the Keystone XL pipeline for being “insufficient” and raising “Environmental Objections” to the project.

In the past 30 days, the global oil industry has had 13 spills on three continents. And it's not just pipeline leaks. Oil has spilled offshore and on, at train derailments and during routine maintenance.