"The Tennessee Valley Authority said Monday that it would spend $43 million on economic development projects in Roane County, Tenn., the site of a huge coal ash spill at one of the authority’s power plants last December."

Ironworker Joe Picurro volunteered to help work on "the pile" at Ground Zero that resulted from the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center. Now he is nearing death from the air he breathed there. He is one of thousands suffering similar diseases.

"Members of Congress Thursday demanded a shake up at the agency that regulates the transport of hazardous materials, saying officials for years have quietly waived safety rules because of a cozy relationship with industry."

"The Station fire in the San Gabriel Mountains has taken an enormous toll on the environment."

"In a mile-high duel, driven firefighters are determined to keep flames from the historic facility."

"President Barack Obama is creating a new federal interagency task force to coordinate the "economic and environmental resiliency" of Louisiana and the rest of the Gulf Coast region."

"LOS CABOS, Mexico – Emergency workers struggled to evacuate thousands of reluctant slum dwellers as extremely dangerous Hurricane Jimena approached Mexico's resort-studded Baja California Peninsula on Tuesday."

"The Station blaze [near L.A.] has destroyed more than 50 buildings and burned more than 105,000 acres of mountainous brush. Little hope of containment is seen as long as hot, dry conditions continue."

"The giant fire in Angeles National Forest continued its slow-motion rampage through the mountains Sunday, causing the deaths of two firefighters as it bore down on the semirural community of Acton and threatened to overrun Mt. Wilson."

"Fire crews were battling to save hundreds of homes that were threatened by two wildfires burning in dry, explosive brush near La Cañada Flintridge and on the Palos Verdes Peninsula."

"The first hurricane of the Atlantic season loomed far out in the ocean Tuesday, gaining power and moving on a track that forecasters said could take it close to Bermuda by the end of the week."

Firefighters have largely contained many of the major fires that forced thousands of residents in various parts of California to flee their homes. Some are already returning.

"A mudslide triggered by torrential rains from a typhoon may have buried up to 600 villagers in mountainous southern Taiwan, disaster officials said on Monday."

"Government officials have been slow to upgrade security at U.S. laboratories that handle deadly germs nearly a year after congressional investigators found weak security controls, a new audit finds."

"Union Carbide is defending its former chief executive now wanted for arrest in India, saying that managers at the company’s plant in Bhopal could not have anticipated a gas leak that killed 10,000 people 25 years ago."