"None of Japan’s 16 nuclear power plants has satisfied the government's proposed new safety standards, making them ineligible to be restarted in the near future, according to an Asahi Shimbun survey."

"Wildfires in Alaska have become more widespread over the past 50 years, according to scientists in the US. The result suggests that Arctic wildfires will have an important effect on the climate in years to come – although whether it will be positive or negative, the researchers cannot say."

"Drilling specialists have been pumping heavy fluids into a gas well 50 miles off the Louisiana coast in a bid to halt natural gas moving among underground formations at the site."

"NEW ORLEANS -- Stunning new data not yet publicly released shows Louisiana losing its battle with rising seas much more quickly than even the most pessimistic studies have predicted to date."

"Court reduces company's maximum fine a week before trial over blowout that dumped millions of gallons of oil into Gulf of Mexico."

"HOUSTON — Unless the Justice Department and BP reach a last-minute settlement, the British oil company will return to court on Monday to face tens of billions of dollars in civil claims from the 2010 explosion on the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico that could cripple the company for years to come."

"MORGANTOWN, W.Va. -- The U.S. Department of Labor wants a federal judge to order the immediate shutdown of a potentially dangerous West Virginia coal slurry impoundment it says hasn't been certified by a professional engineer for two years."

Two new scientific studies explain a paradox: climate change is likely to bring more blizzards but less snow overall. It's physics.

"U.S. farmers will plant crops this spring under the shadow of a persistent drought that grips prime farmland from the mississippi river to the rocky mountains, with grain supplies already tight from drought losses in 2012."

"A new report from the Government Accountability Office elevates the problem of looming gaps in satellite weather data to a 'high risk' concern for the federal government."

"The U.S. government is at high risk of financial exposure from climate change, the Government Accountability Office said on Thursday, two days after President Barack Obama vowed to tackle the issue with or without Congress' help."

"Transocean Deepwater Inc. was found guilty by a federal judge Thursday of violating the federal Clean Water Act, based on the company's role in causing the uncontrolled release of 4.9 million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico from BP's Macondo well after Transocean's Deepwater Horizon drilling rig exploded and sank in April 2010."

"A newly discovered asteroid about half the size of a football field will pass nearer to Earth than any other known object of its size on Friday, giving scientists a rare opportunity for close-up observations without launching a probe."

"A lab analysis released by federal investigators Wednesday confirmed suspicions that a Chevron firefighter's sharp, pole-mounted device punctured an already leaking oil pipe at the company's Richmond refinery before the line caught fire in August."

"Amid all the progress on this planet -- declining losses from terrible diseases and war, rising literacy and the rest -- there remain plenty of planet-scale risks requiring serious focus, from pandemic flu to centuries of locked-in climate change to, yes, collisions with space rocks."