ICN Florida - Inside Climate News

In Florida, Skyrocketing Insurance Rates Test Resolve of Homeowners in Risky Areas

By Amy Green — Wed, 06 Mar 2024 10:05:00 +0000

Research shows the soaring costs hint at widespread, unpriced risk as the global climate warms, with states like California, Florida and Louisiana hit hardest.

By Amy Green

ALTAMONTE SPRINGS, Fla.—For most of his life, Cory Infinger has lived down a hill and along a bend in the Little Wekiva River, a gentle stream meandering northwest of Orlando. During Hurricane Ian, in September 2022, the stream swelled, inundating the homes of his family and his neighbors and also the street where they live, making it impassable.

VA Medical Centers Vulnerable To Extreme Weather As Climate Warms

By Anne Marshall-Chalmers, The War Horse — Thu, 29 Feb 2024 15:00:00 +0000

A Department of Veterans Affairs report identified hospitals in Kansas, Oklahoma, Arizona and Florida as most at risk for climate change-driven storms, flooding, wildfires and extreme temperatures that could damage facilities, cut staffing and hinder access to care.

By Anne Marshall-Chalmers, The War Horse

On July 19, 2022, a soupy, relentless heat smothered Muskogee, Oklahoma. By 4 in the afternoon, the temperature spiked to 106 degrees.

DeSantis Called for ‘Energy Dominance’ During White House Run. His Plan Still is Relevant to Floridians, Who Face Intensifying Climate Impacts

By Amy Green — Mon, 22 Jan 2024 17:30:00 +0000

Record heat and more damaging hurricanes leave some Floridians feeling their governor is ignoring the perils of a warming planet.

By Amy Green

SATELLITE BEACH, Fla.—Established by rocket scientists on a sliver of a barrier island south of Kennedy Space Center in the middle of the 20th century, this community is the sort of place where locals raise families after growing up here themselves. Most don’t want their community to change, but change is coming.

Judge Orders Jail Time For Prominent Everglades Scientist

By Amy Green — Thu, 04 Jan 2024 10:30:00 +0000

Tom Van Lent is accused of stealing “trade secrets” from his former employer, the well-connected Everglades Foundation.

By Amy Green

ORLANDO, Fla.—A renowned Everglades scientist whose work has helped steer one of the most ambitious attempts at ecological restoration in human history has been sentenced by a state judge to spend 10 days in jail in a bitter legal dispute with his former employer.

Hurricane-Weary Floridians Ask: What U.N. Climate Talks?

By Amy Green — Thu, 30 Nov 2023 10:00:00 +0000

Three months after Idalia, many here are more preoccupied with recovery than COP28.

By Amy Green

CEDAR KEY, Fla.—For this island fishing village along Florida’s Gulf Coast, Hurricane Idalia wrought some of its worst damage not on land but offshore.

In the Florida Everglades, a Greenhouse Gas Emissions Hotspot

By Amy Green — Mon, 06 Nov 2023 10:00:00 +0000

Drainage has exposed the fertile soils of the Everglades Agricultural Area, a region responsible for much of the nation’s sugar cane.

By Amy Green

ORLANDO, Fla.—It used to be the water spilled over Lake Okeechobee’s southern shore, flowing eventually into the sawgrass prairies of the Florida Everglades. For thousands of years the marsh vegetation flourished and died here in an endless cycle, the plant remains falling beneath the slow-coursing water to form a rich layer of organic soil called peat.

Fish and Wildlife Service Proposes Sprawling Conservation Area in Everglades Watershed

By Amy Green — Sun, 22 Oct 2023 09:30:00 +0000

Explosive growth continues to pressure Florida’s natural resources, and climate change will drive more development inland. The hope is to push back against the impact.

By Amy Green

ORLANDO, Fla.—A new federal proposal calls for creating a conservation area that would span 12 counties in Florida, from the Everglades’ headwaters in the center of the state to sawgrass prairies further south, preserving a region that is home to imperiled species like the Florida panther, the official state animal.

In Florida, Gen Z Activists Step Into the Fight Against Sugarcane Burning

By Michelle Mairena and Kyndall Hubbard, Youthcast Media Group — Thu, 19 Oct 2023 10:00:00 +0000

Every year, farmers in South Florida set fire to more than 400,000 acres of sugarcane fields pre-harvest, creating a “black snow” of ash and soot that falls on the low-income communities nearby.

By Michelle Mairena and Kyndall Hubbard, Youthcast Media Group

Christine Louis-Jeune knew she was home when she saw ash falling from the sky and onto her windshield.

Fish and Wildlife Service to Consider Restoring Manatee’s Endangered Status

By Amy Green — Thu, 12 Oct 2023 01:32:47 +0000

Nearly 2,000 manatees died in Florida in 2021 and 2022 as water pollution killed the seagrass they feed on. The manatee was downlisted in 2017 from endangered to threatened, over the objections of scientists, environmentalists and citizens.

By Amy Green

ORLANDO, Fla.—The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will consider tightening protections on the West Indian manatee after concluding that a petition demanding that the animal’s endangered status be restored presented substantial scientific evidence, the agency said Wednesday.

For Sanibel, the Recovery from Hurricane Ian Will Be Years in the Making

By Amy Green — Thu, 28 Sep 2023 14:02:56 +0000

Thousands of residents of this barrier island remain displaced a year after the costliest hurricane in state history.

By Amy Green

SANIBEL, Fla.—Few images of Hurricane Ian’s destruction in Florida a year ago this week were more indelible than those of the swamped causeway here, the only link between the mainland and barrier island where this small beach community is located.