Coal company owned by Sen. Jim Justice’s family faces court hearing over continued failure to clean up mines 

In a federal court hearing regarding a motion to hold A&G Coal Company in contempt for violating a January 2023 consent decree, attorneys for the company argued that it doesn’t have enough money to meet the terms of the decree, including funding mine cleanup at three delinquent mines. But attorneys representing the conservation groups that brought the original lawsuit presented evidence that executives for companies owned by the family of West Virginia Sen. Jim Justice — including A&G — routinely move money between the companies as they feel is warranted.

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‘We Certainly Have a Long Way to Go’

Theo Crouse-Mann feels fortunate to be able to return to his home, even if it has taken a year and he’s encountered a lot of red tape to fund the restoration work. “It's hard to grasp the whole thing,” he shares, emphasizing that only now has the “deeper stuff” and “trauma” of what his family went through begun to settle in. Photo by Abby Hassler

On the one-year milestone of Hurricane Helene, communities reflect on the challenges they still face on the long road to recovery. The storm caused significant destruction, but it also exacerbated existing issues. New instances of housing insecurity and mental health concerns bubble to the surface every day — and will for months and years to come. For those doing the arduous work of long-term recovery, it feels never-ending.

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Part two: Why Dominion Energy’s bad track record on energy efficiency matters for its proposed Chesterfield gas plant

This is the second of two blogs on the proposed methane gas power plant in Chesterfield, which Dominion Energy calls the Chesterfield Energy Reliability Center or CERC. Here we’ll look at Dominion Energy’s failure to meet their energy efficiency requirements and why that’s important, and we’ll show that there is a cleaner and more affordable way for Dominion to produce electricity.

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‘King of the Darters’ Removed from Endangered Species List 

Roanoke logperch swimming in a stream

The Roanoke logperch, a striking, large freshwater fish found in a handful of watersheds in Virginia and North Carolina, is no longer on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s endangered species list. It’s a sign of the fish population’s improvement. But some individuals and environmental and conservation organizations see its removal from Endangered Species Act protections — rather than moving from “endangered” to “threatened” status — as premature.

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