Environmental News

MPR News is your source for environment news from Minnesota and across the country.

Getting to Green: Minnesota’s energy future

Getting to Green is an MPR News series that shares stories about Minnesota’s clean energy transition, including what needs to be done to get there.

Submit a question or story for Getting to Green here.

Climate Cast

Listen to Climate Cast, the MPR News podcast all about our changing climate and its impact in Minnesota and worldwide.

Replanting a resilient forest in the ashes of the Greenwood Fire
Last summer the Greenwood Fire destroyed a dozen cabins in northeastern Minnesota and scorched more than 40 square miles of forest. Now, work is underway to replant the burn area with more than 100,000 trees, to make the forest more diverse and resilient.
With 40 percent of food getting wasted, what are your strategies for wasting less?
Wasted food could instead help feed people who are struggling financially. And if we cut down our food waste, we are helping to cut back greenhouse gas emissions. How do you try to avoid wasting food in your home? MPR News host Angela Davis discussed with expert guests about how we can prevent food waste.
Deaths of 3 women in early Chicago heat wave raise questions, fears
What happened this month is a reminder that the safeguards in place to make sure people don't freeze to death because they have not paid their heating bills often do not exist to prevent people from overheating in their homes.
The 'zero landfill' promise often means burning waste — which is better?
Amazon, American Airlines, Subaru and other companies say they don’t send any waste to landfills. Dig deeper and you’ll learn that’s because they send waste to incinerators.
We never got good at recycling plastic. Some states are trying a new approach
New York is the latest, and largest, state to consider charging product-makers to dispose of their packaging. But lawmakers are clashing over how much to involve industry in creating a new system.
State probe: 3M mismanaged waste at Cottage Grove plant for over 2 decades
The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency on Thursday slammed 3M for years of hazardous waste violations at the company’s facility in Cottage Grove in St. Paul’s eastern suburbs. Regulators ordered the Maplewood-based company to pay $2.8 million.