This week's Indy Environment newsletter looks at how climate change might be a key issue in the Nevada caucus. It also breaks down a BLM whistleblower complaint reported by The Nevada Independent and POLITICO over the weekend.

With bipartisan support, the Legislature created a mining oversight commission in 2011 that supporters hoped would mirror the Nevada Gaming Commission. Then after four years, the commission stopped meeting. As Gov. Steve Sisolak looks to revive it, what is its future?

Two top Nevada gold operators, Nevada Gold Mines and Coeur Rochester, are crying foul over the Department of Energy’s recent decision to designate a private Texas facility as the long-term storage site for mercury generated from their mining. The agency’s decision to use the Texas facility, Waste Control Specialists (WCS), came with a hefty storage fee: $37,000 per metric ton.

This week's Indy Environment newsletter looks at how Nevada might be affected by the Trump administration's decision to scale back federal protections. The newsletter also looks at the Navy's request to expand its military base near Fallon and an opportunity for geothermal production.

For decades, the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe has worked with state wildlife managers to figure out a way to reintroduce bighorn sheep to the Lake Range, which rises east of the desert lake. Bighorn sheep all but disappeared on the tribe's land — and across the West — in the early 1900s as Western expansion decimated their ranks through disease and overhunting.

“Congress has a lot of people who can come up with bills, and they can decide if they can pass a bill, and that’s their job,” said Bernhardt, a former lobbyist for the oil and gas industry. 

The legislation proposes a ban on oil and gas leasing on public land where there is zero to low oil potential. Under the bill, a parcel’s prospects for development would be determined based on a study known as a Reasonably Foreseeable Development Scenario, crafted with a public comment period.

This week's Indy Environment newsletter looks at the recent snow survey and the military's plan to expand the Fallon Naval Air Station. It also looks at the state's greenhouse gas inventory and the proposed legislation for a Clark County Lands Bill.

Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto is working to change the conversation around the Clark County lands bill proposal, especially as it relates to conservation. To do that, the senator’s staff began floating legislative language — known as a “discussion draft” — Tuesday that aims to resolve some of the most controversial aspects of the county’s plan.

But now, Nevada political leaders are now facing a hard truth — the state is unlikely to meet its new and ambitious carbon reduction and climate change goals without implementing major policy changes — such as adopting California’s stricter standards for vehicle emissions.

A contentious $30 million, 10-year marketing deal between the Southern Nevada Water Authority and the Las Vegas Raiders is still on the table after two months of delay, but several members of an advisory panel that was tasked to review the agreement have raised questions about how cost-effective it is.

County commissioners on Tuesday scheduled a Jan. 21 public hearing for an ordinance that will consolidate the air quality department and the Office of Sustainability into a single Department of Environment and Sustainability.

Reduced precipitation from climate change and disputes over Colorado River water rights loom over Nevada’s water supply, but the agency that oversees it says officials can manage the uncertainty with a boost from new conservation programs and legislative mandates. The SNWA's Joint Water Conservation Plan was approved by the board’s seven member agencies in December, after significant updates to the conservation formula and strategies.

This week's Indy Environment newsletter looks at the state's decision to temporarily halt new housing developments that rely on groundwater in a valley north of Reno. The newsletter also looks at a Southern Nevada solar project and things to watch in 2020.

Documents obtained through two public records requests offer new insight into the relationship between business and government at an industrial park that lured companies with incentives and support from the state. The letter comes amid new scrutiny of those practices. Last month, The Nevada Independent detailed how the industrial park’s public water district, which wants to use eminent domain to build the pipeline project, blurred the line between a government and private utility for decades.

Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto said Thursday that the military’s proposed 300,000-acre expansion of the Nevada Test and Training Range does not “balance” different public land uses, the first time the senator has shared her position on the issue. On Thursday, Cortez Masto introduced compromise legislation supported by the entire Nevada delegation that would limit the proposal to roughly one-third of the military’s original ask — about 98,000 acres.

This week's Indy Environment newsletter focuses on a proposed water recycling project in Southern California that could help Las Vegas supplement its Colorado River supply. The newsletter also looks at the debate over oil extraction on public land and a new study on cheatgrass.

After years of deliberations over how to cut back water use on the Colorado River, Southwest water managers clicked pause on a new round of negotiations — likely to be even more challenging — during a conference in Las Vegas last week. Sort of.