"FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. -- With inviting beaches that run for miles along South Florida’s shores, it is easy to put sand into the same category as turbo air-conditioning and a decent mojito — something ever present and easily taken for granted."

"ATLANTA -- If Georgia was starting from scratch, it would not build a nuclear power plant. That conclusion from a state financial analyst illustrates how an anticipated boom in nuclear power turned into a bust as natural gas prices fell."

"Authorities in south Georgia say at least three people have been injured in a chemical explosion that rocked an industrial complex."

"TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- Federal officials are declaring a fishery disaster for Florida's oyster industry in the Gulf of Mexico.

The collapse of the oyster industry last year followed a drought that reduced freshwater into Apalachicola Bay. But state officials have also blamed the lack of freshwater flow due to increased consumption in Georgia.

"No more than 15 years ago, it would have made a bird watcher's week to see the seldom-seen wood stork. Today, a daily siting is not unusual."

"MAYFLOWER, Ark. -- In the week after an oil spill strangled the air in Ann Jarrell's neighborhood, tens of thousands of her bees either died or went mad."

"Lake Okeechobee keeps rising — and so do worries about an aging dike the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers ranks among the most vulnerable to failure in the country."

"MELBOURNE, Fla. — The first hint that something was amiss here, in the shallow lagoons and brackish streams that buffer inland Florida from the Atlantic’s salt water, came last summer in the Banana River, just south of Kennedy Space Center. Three manatees — the languid, plant-munching, over-upholstered mammals known as sea cows — died suddenly and inexplicably, one after another, in a spot where deaths were rare."

"The train that derailed in Lawtell [La.] is leaking chemicals and at least one of two cars carrying a hazardous chemical, vinyl chrloride, is damaged."

"Roads near a gas plant in Lake County were littered with twisted pieces of propane canisters early Tuesday, hours after explosions that injured at least eight people and forced the evacuation of residents up to a mile away."

"The fire that severely damaged a drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico subsided Thursday as sand and mud stopped up a natural gas well that blew out earlier this week, federal regulators said."

"NEW ORLEANS -- An out-of-control natural gas well off the Louisiana coast has caught fire, hours after a blowout that prompted the evacuation of 44 workers."

"The regional levee authority overseeing East Bank flood protection will file a lawsuit Wednesday against dozens of oil, gas and pipeline companies aimed at forcing them to repair damage to a buffer zone of wetlands and ridges 'that helps protect the greater New Orleans region from catastrophic flooding,' according to a press release from the agency."

"Oil plant demolition in Port Everglades part of a nationwide trend to decommission inefficient, costly, and polluting facilities."

"ATLANTA — Georgia Power must purchase more solar power for its energy system under a plan approved Thursday by state utility regulators, a move sought by solar developers and renewable energy proponents but denounced by a commissioner who argued it could raise costs."