National (U.S.)

After years of wrangling, and little significant action, federal legislative efforts addressing greenhouse gases and climate change are beginning to crystallize.

Looking for a story with timely consumer appeal, audio/video fun, a climate change connection, and the opportunity to unleash your inner punster? Check out high-efficiency toilets (HETs), also known as "low-flow" or "dual-flush" toilets.

National forests throughout the US are expected to be subject to substantial development pressure around their periphery in the next quarter century, according to a US Forest Service study announced Oct. 25, 2007.

One of those problem areas is the thousands of old mines that were dug to extract uranium ore. During the era from the 1940s to the 1980s when most were excavated, many were simply abandoned when they played out or the economic incentives changed. Radioactivity now contaminates many sources of human and environmental exposure.

Another effort to revamp the US General Mining Act of 1872 is under way. The House on Nov. 1, 2007, passed by a 244-166 margin a bill that for the first time would collect for the U.S. Treasury royalties for mining "hard rock" minerals on federally owned lands.

Stories that we think will have great impact on the lives of Americans, but which we suspect will slip "under the radar" because of war-related media inattention.

For the past decade, federal and state officials have put an immense amount of environmental information behind a veil of secrecy, justifying it on the grounds that the information could help terrorists. A look at the most comprehensive open-source terrorism database offers strong evidence that such fears are ill-founded.

The PACER system puts many — but not all — federal court records on line. It's an easy-to-use information access tool for journalists.

Federal employee unions want lists of political appointees whose status has been transferred to career civil service positions at the end of the Bush administration.

The Society of Professional Journalists has called on President-elect Obama and the incoming Congress to complete action on a federal shield law for journalists.