"At its heart, a major new U.S. EPA report that synthesizes more than 1,000 studies about connections among streams, wetlands, rivers and lakes comes down to what elementary school students are taught about the water cycle. Streams flow into creeks that flow into rivers."

"SALEKHARD, Russia -- Russia announced on Tuesday that it had opened a piracy investigation against the crew of a Greenpeace ship after its activists scaled an offshore oil platform in the Arctic last week. The step signaled that the authorities intended to act decisively to thwart more protests against Russia’s ambitious plans to expand energy exploration in the region."

"Environmental inspections of oil and gas facilities on public lands have jumped nearly twofold since 2007, but federal investigators said Monday that the government is doing a poor job of targeting the riskiest sites."

"SAN JOSE -- Anticipating a cleanup cost estimated as high as $1.6 billion, local governments from across California made their final legal pitch Monday to hold the paint industry accountable for allegedly threatening children's health by spreading toxic lead paint through tens of thousands of homes."

"New regulations to oversee hydraulic fracturing of oil and gas wells in Alaska could be issued later this year by state regulators, officials said at a public hearing on Monday."

"The Environmental Protection Agency will move Friday to strictly limit the amount of carbon that future coal- and gas-fired power plants can pour into the atmosphere, the first such restrictions on greenhouse gases imposed by the agency."

"The death threat itself didn’t bother Mike Ehlebracht. He’d been threatened plenty of times before."

"In the reality TV series 'Prospectors,' gem hunters on a peak in central Colorado face the dangers of high-altitude lightning, rock falls, cave-ins and whiteouts while digging for valuable rocks 'just like their predecessors 150 years ago.'"

"The White House is expected to fill the EPA slot left vacant by Gina McCarthy's promotion by naming Janet McCabe, a deputy who will be tasked with navigating the legal hurdles that lie ahead."

"WASHINGTON -- The federal government is fighting with itself over a massive fire at a Chevron refinery in California that sent 15,000 people to hospitals with respiratory ailments."

"JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- An environmental group is heading to court in another attempt to overturn the way Missouri officials have implemented a 2008 ballot initiative about renewable energy."

"The Interior Department [Wednesday] proposed a new rule designed to strengthen the safety of offshore oil and gas production technologies as industry reaches into deeper and riskier waters."

"WASHINGTON -- States cannot shut down nuclear plants over safety worries, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled on Wednesday, upholding a lower court’s decision that allowed the Vermont Yankee plant to keep running despite a seven-year effort by the Vermont Legislature to close it."

"DENVER -- Colorado regulators looking at new air quality rules for oil and gas drillers are getting more time to set the rules."

"British oil giant BP sued the U.S. government on Monday over its decision to bar the company from new federal contracts to supply fuel and other services following the company’s agreement to plead guilty to manslaughter and obstruction charges in connection with the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill disaster."