"When China's environment ministry told attorney Dong Zhengwei he couldn't have access to two-year old data about soil pollution because it was a 'state secret', it added to mounting public outrage over the worsening environment."

"'Even on a good day, I get discouraged thinking about the election of a new pope,' laments Maureen Fiedler, a nun and blogger at the progressive Catholic newspaper National Catholic Reporter. 'They all look like a Vatican version of the tea party movement.'"

"Canada's Harper Administration is allegedly restricting what environmental information government scientists can share with journalists, according to academics and media watchdogs. Host Steve Curwood learns more from Tyler Sommers, coordinator of Democracy Watch."

"March is Women's History Month, and HuffPost Green is honoring female environmentalists that have helped defend the planet."

A new reconstruction of the global temperature over the past 11,000 years only confirms the unprecedented warming shown in the "hockey stick" graph which has become the target of anti-science climate deniers.

"Russian scientists believe they have discovered new life forms sealed off for millions of years in a subglacial lake deep under the Antarctic ice, the RIA news agency reported on Thursday."

"BANGKOK -- Efforts to curb the sale of ivory and rhino horns were voted down on Thursday at an international wildlife summit in Bangkok."

"Two consulting firms provided State Department with key analysis of whether the pipeline would speed development of Canada's oil sands."

"BANGKOK, Thailand -- Governments have refused to ban trade in polar bear pelts, paws and teeth from Canada, amid what one observer called “controversial and frosty scenes” at the meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species in Bangkok [Thursday]."

"Report says toxic waste is being spread by scrap metal dealers, and describes its 'alarming' use in civilian areas during Iraq wars."

"Permafrost—the ground that stays frozen for two or more consecutive years—is a ticking time bomb of climate change. Some 24 percent of Northern Hemisphere land is permafrost. That's 9 million square miles (23 million square kilometers) found mostly in Siberia, the Tibetan Plateau, Alaska, the Canadian Arctic, and other higher mountain regions."

"Oil analysts don't expect sudden changes in Venezuela oil policies after Hugo Chavez's death. But political change in post-Chavez Venezuela could open its oil industry to much wider foreign investment."

"US officials have been fighting to stop a $7.5 billion gas pipeline that would transport natural gas between Iran and Pakistan."

"A dark realm far beneath the Earth's surface is a surprisingly rich home for tiny worms and 'zombie microbes' that may hold clues to the origins of life, scientists said on Monday."

"The threat of extinction is growing for African forest elephants, according to a study released at the Cites summit in Bangkok."