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Los Angeles' transportation agency is slashing its water use by 20 percent. -

As California's drought rages on, the MTA will limit landscape irrigation to two days a week and remove lawns from its facilities. It will also disclose water usage at its facilities in a public database. Reuters

Good-bye coal-fired power plant, hello energy-efficient data facility. -

TVA is retiring Alabama's Widows Creek Fossil Plant soon, and in its place Google will build a $600 million data-processing center, requiring about 100 jobs. The tech company has been carbon-netural since 2007 and plans to power the repurposed plant with renewable energy. Times Free Press

Pakistan's heat wave has killed more than 1,000 people. -

This is the second heat wave this year with a death toll in the four-digit range. Temperatures in Karachi, a city of 20 million, reached 111 degrees. Making matters worse, it has hit during Ramadan, when observant Muslims don't drink during daylight hours and many shops won't sell water or ice. Reuters

The clock is ticking for the lemur. -

Thanks to slash-and-burn agriculture, just 10 percent of Madagascar's original forests remain. This is the only habitat for 106 lemur species—all endangered. Primatologist Jonah Ratsimbazafy believes that if the rate of deforestation continues, the animals could be gone within 25 years. BBC

This is a real massacre, it's a tragedy...It's not just elephants; there are many other endangered species.

Catherine Novelli, undersecretary of state for economic growth, energy, and the environment, on wildlife trafficking. Yesterday, U.S. and Chinese officials pledged to work together to end the illegal trade of tigers, rhinos, pangolins, moon bears, sun bears, and many other victims of poaching.

One of the world's worst invasive species just arrived in Florida. -

The New Guinea flatworm reproduces quickly and decimates local snail and invertebrate populations wherever it comes calling. The worm has been spotted in Miami gardens—and there's a good chance this slimy interloper will spread to other parts of the South. Huffington Post