"We have to confess: When we heard that Twinkies will have nearly double the shelf life, 45 days, when they return to stores next week, our first reaction was -- days? Not years?"

OAKLAND, Calif. -- The U.S. State Department is in the process of deciding whether the proposed Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline would be in the U.S. national interest, but the determination is being made without Keystone XL’s digital GIS data, such as the longitude and latitude of milepost markers, waterbody crossings and the centerline route."

"ATLANTA -- A political group founded by billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch wants Georgia's utility regulators to reject a plan requiring Southern Co. to buy more solar energy, but an Associated Press review ahead of a vote on the issue finds that it has used misleading figures to build its case."

"Archaeologists digging in the foothills of Iran's Zagros Mountains have discovered the remains of a Stone Age farming community. It turns out that people living there were growing plants like barley, peas and lentils as early as 12,000 years ago."

"Hydrologist David Evetts drove north from his office in Boise, Idaho, to the former prospecting town of Elk City on May 2. Fifty miles down a dead-end mountain road, he stopped at a gray metal box on a bridge over the South Fork Clearwater River. Reaching inside, he turned off the satellite feed that once relayed the river's water-level measurements from stream gauge number 13337500 every 15 minutes."

"GENEVA -- Global warming accelerated since the 1970s and broke more countries' temperature records than ever before in the first decade of the new millennium, U.N. climate experts said Wednesday."

"When the Environmental Protection Agency abruptly retreated on its multimillion-dollar investigation into water contamination in a central Wyoming natural gas field last month, it shocked environmentalists and energy industry supporters alike."

"Scientists have found a way to forecast El Nino weather events in the Pacific a year in advance, long enough to let farmers plant crops less vulnerable to global shifts in rainfall, a study showed on Monday."

"Just a day before President Obama announced he would only approve the Keystone XL pipeline if it 'does not significantly exacerbate the climate problem,' six environmental groups quietly lodged a protest with the State Department charging it would do exactly that."

"Following the recent federal decision to list captive chimpanzees as an endangered species, the National Institutes of Health announced Wednesday it would retire the majority of the approximately 360 government-owned chimpanzees currently held in laboratories."

"The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has concluded that current testing of hormone-altering chemicals is adequate for detecting low-dose effects that may jeopardize health."

"President Obama set a high bar for approval of the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, declaring for the first time that he would let the project go forward only if it does not 'significantly increase' emissions of greenhouse gases."

"Yes, such a group exists. It thinks the world is flat -- but also getting warmer."

"A federal environmental regulator will not finish and review a draft report tentatively linking hydraulic fracturing to Wyoming groundwater contamination and will instead allow state agencies to further investigate the issue."

"Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives made manifest yesterday how much they dislike President Barack Obama's clean-energy agenda as a House spending panel voted for massive cuts in clean-energy research."