Environment

The Endangered Species Committee met for the first time in 34 years to make the decision. Legal action by environmental groups is already planned to protect the Gulf's vanishing Rice's whale.

The state is looking at "living shorelines" such as mangrove forests, oyster reef restoration and hybrid options like 3D-printed walls that help fight climate change.

The new law would prevent local governments from passing any "resolution, ordinance, rule, code or policy" that promotes net-zero goals. It also prohibits requiring assessments, fees or penalties to reach those goals.

Late last month, record-low temperatures cooled down the waters of the Gulf and the Atlantic significantly, causing almost 800 sea turtles to wash ashore across Florida's beaches.

The Everglades seldom benefit from invasive species. But now, as non-native apple snails disappear, the endangered Everglades bird, the snail kite, is paying the price.

Several bills coursing through Tallahassee have aroused the ire of many conservationists. But some bills also have their backing.

Millions still needed for cleanup as EPA moves toward first phase of work

The Environmental Protection Agency's Gulf Program has awarded a $750,000 grant to the Pensacola and Perdido Bays Estuary Program to establish a new regional water quality monitoring collaborative with project partners: Escambia, Santa Rosa and Okaloosa Counties, the City of Orange Beach and the Poarch Band of Creek Indians.

Rising temperatures, increasing nutrients, and changing currents could all be factors in the algae expansion.

Apalachicola Bay opened Jan. 1 for a brief season lasting through the end of February. It’s the first time the bay has opened for commercial harvesting since 2020, when the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission closed the area due to declining oyster reefs.