The Department of Agriculture has started spreading rabies vaccine packets from aircraft over 13 states to vaccinate wildlife against the disease, AP reports.
Why it matters: The aim of the air-dropped vaccines is to keep a strain of the virus from spreading to states where it hasn't yet been detected or isn't currently common.
The drops are occurring from Maine to Alabama from helicopters and airplanes.
The Environmental Protection Agency unveiled Friday a proposal to designate certain "forever chemicals" as hazardous substances under the 1980 Superfund law.
Why it matters: Designating two of these chemicals as hazardous will increase transparency around releases of the compounds and could allow the EPA to hold polluters accountable by forcing them to clean up their contamination.
The Biden administration announced Friday it will nominate an ambassador-at-large for the Arctic, raising the profile of American policymaking for the region.
Why it matters: The move comes at a time of increased militarization in the far north, with NATO members squaring off against Russia, and at a time of rapid climate change that is making the Arctic more accessible.
Residents in the U.K. will experience an 80% increase in their annual household energy bills, bringing average costs up from 1,971 pounds ($2,332) a year to 3,549 pounds ($4,197), the country’s energy regulator said Friday.
Driving the news: The price cap announced Friday will take effect Oct. 1, after which it is expected to increase again, CNBC reports.
The Atlantic hurricane season to date has been unusually quiet, with not a single named storm since July 2, a feat that last occurred in 1982. However, our luck is likely to run outsoon, scientists tell Axios.
Why it matters: Nature's strongest storms typically are the most costly weather-related disasters in a given year.
Heavy monsoon rains that triggered flooding and landslides in Pakistan this summer have killed over 900 people, including 326 children, and displaced tens of thousands, Pakistani officials say.
The big picture: Millions have been affected by the rains and flooding, which have destroyed more than 95,000 homes and damaged hundreds of thousands more, according to the UN. It's one of the worst monsoon seasons Pakistan has seen in recent years, with last month being the wettest July since 1961, per Reuters.
Wall Street giants have a Texas-sized problem: making good on flashy vows to make clients' investments greener while limiting political and financial blowback from red states.
Catch up fast: On Wednesday, Texas Republican Comptroller Glenn Hegar released a list of 10 companies and 348 investment funds that will be barred from doing business with the state because they “boycott energy companies.”
Billionaire Marc Lore is fleshing out his plan to build a utopian city called Telosa for 5 million people in the American desert — and he's not the only one with such ambitions.
Why it matters: There are about a dozen projects worldwide to create sustainable, hypermodern cities-from-scratch. While they may never come to fruition, the proposals themselves hint at what the city of the future might look like.
