"Last fall, remote cameras in a rugged expanse of desert grasslands in Southern Arizona captured arresting images of a jaguar slinking through the underbrush, its yellow eyes fixed on some distant sight. The photos add to the dozen or so documented sightings of the endangered cat on American soil in the last century."

"In a bid to clean up one of the nation’s dirtiest coal-fired power plants without causing economic harm to the Navajo Nation that surrounds it, the Environmental Protection Agency indicated on Friday that it would give the plant’s owners five extra years, until 2023, to install expensive state-of-the art emissions reduction equipment."

"WEATHERFORD, Texas -- When a man in a Fort Worth suburb reported his family's drinking water had begun "bubbling" like champagne, the federal government sounded an alarm: An oil company may have tainted their wells while drilling for natural gas. At first, the Environmental Protection Agency believed the situation was so serious that it issued a rare emergency order in late 2010 that said at least two homeowners were in immediate danger from a well saturated with flammable methane. More than a year later, the agency rescinded its mandate and refused to explain why."

The U.S. Supreme Court agreed Friday to take up the controversy of the thirsty Fort Worth area's bid to get water from Oklahoma.

"Residents of Gardendale, a suburb near the hub of the west Texas oil industry, face having up to 300 wells in their backyards."

"The low-income neighborhood of older wood-frame homes in West Dallas is a far cry from the suburb of newly built brick houses in Frisco 30 miles to the north. But the two North Texas communities share a bond: Both were contaminated by industrial lead for nearly half a century."

"Among air experts, it's an open secret: federal and state officials grossly undercount a crucial type of air pollution, often by an order of magnitude and particularly in areas like Houston with its major concentrations of petrochemical plants."

"Houston's biggest sources of smog-forming pollution may avoid tens of millions of dollars in penalties for the region's failure to achieve federal clean-air goals."

"ALBUQUERUQE, N.M. -- With much of New Mexico still stuck in severe drought, water managers are improving miles of channel along the Rio Grande so more winter and spring runoff can find its way to Elephant Butte Reservoir."

"TEXAS CITY — A fire at BP's Texas City refinery sent a large plume of black smoke over the industrial sector of the city. The fire broke out at about 1:30 p.m. and was out by 3:05 p.m., BP officials said."

"SANTA TERESA, N.M. -- An unknown hazardous material sickened about 200 people Tuesday just northwest of El Paso, Texas, as some workers in the industrial area where the substance released described feeling a burning sensation on their skin, according to New Mexico authorities."

"SUMNER, Texas -- Oil has long lived in harmony with farmland and cattle across the Texas landscape, a symbiosis nurtured by generations and built on an unspoken honor code that allowed agriculture to thrive while oil was extracted."

"Fifteen residents of Corpus Christi, Texas -- so sickened by pollution they have been deemed crime victims -- are asking a federal judge to force Citgo Petroleum Corp. to set up multimillion-dollar trust funds to cover medical and relocation costs, in a case with national ramifications."

"FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. — Klee Benally, a member of the Navajo tribe, has gone to the mountains just north of here to pray, and he has gone to get arrested. He has chained himself to excavators; he has faced down bulldozers. For 10 years, the soft-spoken activist has fought a ski resort’s expansion plans in the San Francisco Peaks that include clear-cutting 74 acres of forest and piping treated sewage effluent onto a mountain to make snow."

"Port Arthur, Tex. -- The Valero oil refinery looms over the small streets of this blighted port city. A vast maze of pipes and vats and boilers, the refinery traces its rootsback 111 years, to just months after the historic Spindletop gusher that triggered the Texas oil rush."