"Tokyo Electric Power Co. (9501), the operator of the Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant, said a cooling system for one of its spent fuel pools at the crippled nuclear station stopped today."

"SHANGHAI/HONG KONG --  Chinese authorities slaughtered over 20,000 birds at a poultry market in Shanghai on Friday as the death toll from a new strain of bird flu mounted to six, spreading concern overseas and sparking a sell-off in airline shares in Europe and Hong Kong."

"TORONTO, Ontario, Canada, April 4, 2013 (ENS) – The province of Ontario is harnessing more renewable electricity from Niagara Falls through the just-completed Niagara Tunnel Project, as part of its plan to phase out its coal-fired power plants by the end of 2014."

Next year, Ontario will become the first industrial region in North America to eliminate coal-fired electrical generation.

"Scientists taking a first look at the genetics of the bird flu strain that recently killed two men in China said Wednesday that the virus could be harder to track than its better-known cousin H5N1 because it might be able to spread silently among poultry without notice."

"Cleanup costs at a single northern mine next to Great Slave Lake are ballooning so high they are forcing Ottawa to rethink plans for thousands of contaminated sites across the country."

"New Zealand's top climate change scientists have rallied together to slam a visiting sceptic who is touring the country to proclaim global warming as a myth that should be ignored."

"Exxon Mobil was working to clean up thousands of barrels of oil in Mayflower, Arkansas, after a pipeline carrying heavy Canadian crude ruptured, a major spill likely to stoke debate over transporting Canada's oil to the United States."

"Wide-ranging investigation, which will look into six different federal departments, is to review incidents in which the media was thwarted when trying to speak to Canadian government scientists about their work."

"Canada has become the first country to drop out of the UN convention to combat desertification."

"Most city governments on the mainland withheld vital information on pollution from the public last year, with many scaling back their disclosure to protect polluters as economic growth slowed, two major environmental organisations said in a study released in Beijing yesterday."

"...Over the past couple of years, the number of monarch butterflies that reach the Mexican sanctuaries has been declining, generating concern among rural communities that rely on spillovers of butterfly tourism activities, as well as entomologists, biologists, ecologists and monarch aficionados around the world. ..."

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"Energy subsidies cost governments from the U.S. to Egypt $1.9 trillion, discourage private investment and help wealthy consumers more than the poor, according to a study by International Monetary Fund staff."

"A mile-long train hauling oil from Canada derailed and leaked 30,000 gallons of crude in western Minnesota on Wednesday, as debate rages over the environmental risks of transporting tar sands across the border."

"The Arctic Ocean reached the most frozen it's going to get this year on 13 March. Now the melt season begins, predicts the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC). The seasonal stats were gloomy. The max sea ice area of 2013 was was 5.84 million square miles (15.13 million square kilometers). That's the sixth lowest extent on record and a whopping 283,000 square miles (733,000 square kilometers) below the 1979 to 2000 average maximum."