Author: Dan Elliott, The Associated Press

A new round of soil testing near a former nuclear weapons plant outside Denver found no radioactivity above the cleanup standard for the site with a history of environmental violations, U.S. officials said Friday. The Fish and Wildlife Service released the results of tests on 48 soil samples from planned trails at the Rocky Flats…

Colorado has just begun rewriting its oil and gas rules under a new law that flips the state’s priorities from producing energy to protecting the public, but industry defenders and critics are already testing the legislation’s limits. Officials in energy-friendly Weld County say the new law gives the county complete control over the location of…

Elevated levels of plutonium were found in the soil near Rocky Flats, site of a former nuclear weapons plant outside Denver, while a second test showed far lower levels, health officials said Tuesday. The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment said it is trying to sort out the conflicting results of tests done near…

From Rocky Flats to a tiny Pacific island, from the Rocky Mountain Arsenal to a leafy Indiana forest, a handful of sites where the United States manufactured and tested some of the most lethal weapons known to humankind are now peaceful havens for wildlife. An astonishing array of animals and habitats flourished on six obsolete…

GREELEY – A drone soared over a blazing hot cornfield in northeastern Colorado on a recent morning, snapping images with an infrared camera to help researchers decide how much water they would give the crops the next day. After a brief, snaking flight above the field, the drone landed and the researchers removed a handful…

Denver and northern Colorado’s urban corridor failed to meet federal ozone pollution standards, and the state will have to come up with a new plan to clean up the air, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said Thursday. The move was expected after Democratic Gov. Jared Polis said in March the state would no longer ask…

The U.S. Department of Justice has lost track of more than 60 boxes of documents from a 27-year-old criminal investigation into safety and environmental violations at the former Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant in Colorado, officials said Tuesday. The files were gathered in a two-year grand jury probe of the Rocky Flats plant outside Denver,…

Colorado’s long-running battle over oil and gas drilling in suburban neighborhoods has erupted again, and this time the stakes are deeply personal. As state lawmakers debate whether to clamp stronger health and safety regulations on the industry, stories of loss and anxiety are emerging on both sides. “Nobody should ever have to experience what my…

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced three long-term goals Wednesday for cleaning up the Bonita Peak Mining District Superfund site in southwestern Colorado. The goals call for improving water quality in four sections of rivers and streams, stabilizing mine waste piles to keep more pollutants from leaching into waterways and preventing big releases of tainted water from…

Frustrated residents of a Denver suburb say state law is forcing them to participate in a major oil and gas drilling project against their wishes, so they launched legal challenges with potentially significant consequences for the industry. Backed by a federal judge, they have a chance this week to ask state regulators to block multiple…