Demand for fresh food from local farms has surged in recent months, even as the pandemic has sometimes made it harder to get. Many people are looking for healthy ways to avoid grocery store shopping and support local small businesses.

A controversial plan to raise domesticated steelhead in net pens in Puget Sound faces a new legal challenge. Cooke Aquaculture wants to use its remaining leases with the state, despite the ban on net pen farming of non-native fish. So, it proposed switching from Atlantic salmon to sterilized native steelhead.

Underwater noise from ship traffic is one of the major threats to Puget Sound’s endangered Southern Resident orcas. It can interfere with the whales’ ability to communicate, navigate by echolocation and find the increasingly scarce salmon they prefer. A recommendation from the orca recovery task force convened by Gov. Jay Inslee in 2018-19 is to reduce noise and disturbance from large vessels. Work is underway to develop a program called "Quiet Sound," which will alert ships to the presence of

Climate action advocates say they’re hopeful they’ll see more success in Olympia, when lawmakers return to session. A recent webinar with several environmental groups provided an overview of the election outcome, and its implications for climate policies.

UPDATE, Nov. 25: The state Department of Fish and Wildlife has closed recreational fishing for Dungeness crab on the central Washington coast, effective immediately. That’s after new test results showed levels of the neurotoxin domoic acid have reached unsafe levels. The closure stretches from the Queets River to Point Chehalis and includes Grays Harbor and the popular Westport Boat Basin. The commercial crab season is not yet open. Tests next week will determine when it can open and if domoic

A potentially record-setting season f or razor clam digging in Washington has come to a screeching halt. Warm water off the coast has helped toxic algae thrive, rendering the clams unsafe to eat. Some species of algae that razor clams feed on produce domoic acid . It’s a neurotoxin that at high levels can cause brain damage in humans and other vertebrates. Tests in mid-October showed the levels of this toxin had reached unsafe levels. The clams are unaffected, but they concentrate it in their

Environmental groups have become some of the biggest spenders in U.S. politics this election. Washington state is no exception. The Washington Conservation Voters political action committee (WCV PAC) has poured some $425,000 into about 10 state legislative races. In each case, fossil fuel interests have funded campaigns on the other side.

Two Democrats are vying to fill the open seat in Washington’s 10 th Congressional District. State representative Beth Doglio is running against former Tacoma Mayor Marilyn Strickland. The race has been called a microcosm of the recent split in the Democratic Party between establishment liberals and left-leaning progressives. One issue that clearly displays their differences is how they would address climate change.

The state department of Labor and Industries has begun a rule-making process to protect outdoor workers from wildfire smoke. It will make Washington the second state after California to do so.

The clean energy sector was one of the fastest growing parts of the economy before the pandemic, and it’s been one of the hardest hit. But researchers say jobs in energy efficiency or solar or wind power are still some of the best paid .