Annie Ropeik

Offshore wind advocates in New Hampshire have high hopes after federal regulators this week approved construction of the Vineyard Wind project in Massachusetts – the largest offshore wind farm yet to reach the construction stage in the U.S.

Two New Hampshire towns will get federal grants to clean up contaminated sites seen as obstacles to economic revitalization.

Boscawen and Jaffrey are among about 150 towns nationwide to receive the brownfield funding from the Environmental Protection Agency this year.

Boscawen will use half a million dollars to clean up a former mill and leather tannery on its riverfront. The contaminated Allied Leather site has sat abandoned since 1987. 

There’s a new top cat on the rock pile.

The staff of the Mount Washington Observatory have adopted a new feline companion: a 1-year-old short-hair named Nimbus.

For almost a century, the summit station has usually kept at least one cat as a mouser, mascot and pet for the overnight weather observers.

Their last cat, Marty, died in November after 12 years on top of the tallest mountain in the Northeast.

State regulators will give an update Thursday night on drinking water contamination in Bedford, in the first of a series of upcoming public meetings around the Saint-Gobain plastics factory in Merrimack.

Natural gas use is expected to increase in New York after the closure Friday of the state's largest nuclear plant. But it probably won’t trickle out to New England, according to a regional industry leader.

A new federal grant aims to protect the Merrimack River from climate change, pollution and development pressures in New Hampshire and Massachusetts.

The U.S. Forest Service says the Merrimack River watershed is one of the most threatened in the country due to forest loss and increasing water quality risks. 

Seacoast tourism and business leaders want federal officials to approve more foreign visa workers and economic aid to support what they hope will be a busy summer on the tail end of the pandemic.

With another drought developing in much of the state as of this Earth Day, Gov. Chris Sununu is urging affected residents to take advantage of an emergency aid program.

Much of southern and western New Hampshire is in moderate drought, with abnormally dry conditions in the rest of the state. Without more sustained precipitation, forecasters say, the drought could worsen in the coming weeks.

A top state environmental regulator who had ties to the chemical industry has resigned less than a month after his confirmation.

The governor and Executive Council on Wednesday accepted Dennis Deziel’s resignation as assistant commissioner of the Department of Environmental Services.

Deziel began the job in late March and says in a statement that he is leaving for “personal reasons.”

Officials in the town of Thornton have rejected a proposed cell tower on land owned by Gov. Chris Sununu’s family at the edge of the White Mountain National Forest.

Eversource is joining a group of utilities aiming to build a national network of high-speed electric vehicle chargers.

The company, which is New Hampshire’s largest electric provider, is the first in the Northeast to join the Electric Highway Coalition, launched last month by utilities in the Southeast, Gulf Coast and Midwest.

New Hampshire’s U.S. senators are asking federal regulators to allow state and local governments to spend pandemic stimulus funds on addressing PFAS chemical contamination.

Senators Jeanne Shaheen and Maggie Hassan joined a bipartisan group making the request to theTreasury Department this week.

A Rochester city councilor is facing calls for his resignation after being accused of sexually abusing boys two decades ago.

The state says it hasn't been following its own rules in notifying people of potential water contamination near the Saint-Gobain plastics factory in Merrimack.

Regulators say they’re working to correct the problem and think most affected properties are already aware of the issue. But citizen advocates are worried that some in the area may be unknowingly drinking contaminated water as a result of the lapse.

Liberty Utilities has suspended a home weatherization program for its natural gas customers because of delays at the Public Utilities Commission in approving expanded energy efficiency goals for the state.

Other electric and gas utilities say they could soon face similar choices that will affect their customers if regulators continue to leave the issue undecided.

This week's ice-out on Lake Winnipesaukee is part of a trend toward earlier spring thaws in New Hampshire due to climate change.

The lake was declared ice-free and navigable by boat on Monday, April 5. It's about two weeks earlier than the average ice-out date over the past hundred-plus years.

Responders have put out at least two small brush fires in New Hampshire this week amid dry conditions and high winds.

One was in Cornish, near homes on Route 12-A. The other destroyed a barn in Hinsdale.

Fire danger has been rated at least moderate in the state this week. And there's little rain in the forecast in the coming days. The state is well below average on precipitation for the year, with another potential drought in the works this spring.

Combined with gusty winds, the state says it means any open burning can easily catch and spread uncontrolled.

In a federal whistleblower complaint, a former attorney for the Saint-Gobain plastics company claims he was told to “look the other way” on potential water contamination like the kind that’s affected New Hampshire and Vermont. 

In a report released Tuesday, New Hampshire’s Attorney General ruled a police officer was justified in shooting and killing a man in Meredith last November. It was the fifth police-involved shooting the state has investigated in about a year.

New Hampshire is likely headed into an early spring drought despite recent rain and snow, according to the latest national forecast – and state officials are already warning of the potential drinking water impacts.

President Biden’s $2-trillion-dollar infrastructure plan could bring expanded Amtrak train service to New Hampshire and Northern New England.

Amtrak, the publicly funded national rail operator, released a new map this week of expansions it could offer by 2035 under Biden’s proposal.

New runoff controls are coming to Great Bay after three adjacent cities reached an agreement with the Conservation Law Foundation to avert an appeal of a key federal water quality permit.  

The Environmental Protection Agency issued the long-awaited permit for a dozen towns around Great Bay last year.

A Seabrook man who shouted racist threats at a family last year violated the state's Civil Rights Act, the Rockingham Superior Court has ruled.

According to a complaint released by the Department of Justice in January, John Doran, unprovoked, began shouting slurs at a car containing a family returning from a beach trip last July.

When one victim approached him, Doran pointed a gas hose at them, threatened to burn them and said "go back to Africa."

New Hampshire Sen. Maggie Hassan is re-introducing a bill to give more federal support to multi-state climate change programs like the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.

A former chemical industry lobbyist and top official in the Trump Administration's Environmental Protection Agency will serve as the assistant commissioner for the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services.