Should citizens in the United States have a constitutional right to clean air and clean water, just as they have rights to free speech and freedom of religion? That's the broad question raised by a court decision in Montana last month. Fight for your right to clean water. In a ruling that is sure to reverberate around the country, the Montana Supreme Court held that the state's constitution guarantees all Montanans a fundamental right to a "clean and healthful environment" and protects the state's resources from potential harm as well as from actual, proven damage. "Our constitution does not require …

California announced yesterday that it is filing suit against the feds over the issue of offshore oil drilling, demanding more of a say in decisions that will affect some of the state's most scenic coastal stretches. Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt outraged California officials and enviros last week by allowing oil companies to begin moving forward with exploration an development plans for 36 drilling leases in virgin waters. No actual drilling will occur yet, but the companies can now spend the next two to four years developing detailed drilling plans to dramatically expand oil production off the state's Central Coast. The …

The Arctic Ocean's ice cover has thinned by about 40 percent in the last 20 to 40 years, according to a new study published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters. The study's researchers, from the University of Washington, were surprised by the dramatic shift, but couldn't say whether it was the result of human-caused climate change or natural cycles. The study fits with other research that has shown Arctic ice is retreating, causing problems for wildlife.

The Sierra Club is launching a five-year campaign to protect and restore millions of acres of wildlands along the route traveled nearly 200 years ago by the explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark. The group has its eye on 34 sites in eight states, mostly public land, that it would like to keep from development. Its ambitious proposals include designating free-flowing stretches of the Missouri River as "wild and scenic," making Oregon's Steens Mountain a national monument, and breaching four dams on the lower Snake River in Washington state. The National Park Service estimates that up to 25 million people …

Rapid logging of the mangrove forest that stretches across coastal areas in India's southeastern state of Orissa seems to have contributed to the terrible destruction caused by an October 29 cyclone that killed at least 7,600 and affected some 15 million. The mangrove forest has traditionally protected inland areas from serious damage by cyclones and strong winds, but despite calls for its preservation, logging has escalated in recent years. According to noted Indian environmentalist Banka Behari Das, the forest depletion helped make the recent cyclone much more damaging than two previous ones that had hit the area in the past …

Seeking to shore up enviro support and mollify free trade critics, Vice Pres. Al Gore announced yesterday that Pres. Clinton will sign an executive order requiring full environmental reviews of all new trade agreements. The order begins to put environmental concerns on par with business concerns in international agreements, a step that some environmentalists praised yesterday as a good start. Still, the executive order does not address environmental issues in other nations, and the environmental community is pressing the administration to push for reform of World Trade Organization rules and block any expansion of the WTO's authority until the environmental …

You may remember him from such box-office blockbusters as "Titanic" and "Romeo and Juliet." Leonardo DiCaprio's latest project is even bigger -- getting the world to do something about climate change. Today DiCaprio is announcing that he will host Earth Day 2000 events on the Mall in Washington, D.C. He joins the Earth Day Network in mounting a major worldwide campaign for clean energy, culminating on April 22, 2000. Check out Leo's webcast about his Earth Day endeavors today at 11:00 a.m. PST (2:00 p.m. EST), or chat the Young One up in his first live web question and answer …

Fifteen years after a Union Carbide pesticide plant leaked a poisonous gas that killed at least 7,000 people in Bhopal, India, and permanently injured tens of thousands more, survivors and relatives of victims filed suit yesterday against Union Carbide and its former chair in federal court in Manhattan. The suit seeks unspecified damages and wants the U.S. federal court to take back control of litigation that was moved to India in 1986. The plaintiffs charge that Union Carbide failed to obey rulings by courts in the U.S. and India and that company officials have failed to appear in Indian court …

Senate Republicans agreed last night to eliminate or change a number of anti-environmental riders that have been tacked onto the Interior Department spending bill, clearing the way for agreement with the White House on a budget deal. GOP leaders consented to allow the feds to charge oil and gas companies a more fair, significantly higher royalty rate for drilling on public lands. A rider that would have allowed mining companies to dump thousands of tons of waste on public land has been weakened. And Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.) lifted his threat to hold up a budget deal unless Congress …

Climate change is threatening polar bears along Hudson Bay with starvation by shortening their hunting season, according to a study by the Canadian Wildlife Service published in the journal Arctic. In the past 20 years, the sea ice season on Hudson Bay has been reduced by three weeks, giving the bears in the area less time to hunt on the ice for their main food source, the ringed seal. The shorter season has resulted in bears returning to the mainland with a lower body mass and females giving birth less often, the researchers say. Bears have also been traveling more …