"The Chinese coal ship that ran onto the Great Barrier Reef was one of dozens of freighters to have taken a legal short cut between dangerous shoals this year, satellite images show."

"An O'Malley administration proposal to ease Maryland's stringent new storm-water pollution rules won legislative approval [Monday] night, capping a fierce debate over whether the Chesapeake Bay would suffer from giving developers more time and leeway in having to clamp down on rainfall washing off their building projects."

"HONG KONG -- Salvage experts and a tugboat crew struggled on Monday to save a large Chinese freighter that slammed into the Great Barrier Reef off Australia  over the weekend, trying to prevent the vessel from breaking apart as some of the 1,075 tons of engine fuel in its tanks began oozing from the hull, threatening the world’s largest collection of coral."

"The Environmental Protection Agency announced on Monday that it would overhaul drinking water regulations so that officials could police dozens of contaminants simultaneously and tighten rules on the chemicals used by industries."

"Human beings are flushing millions of tonnes of solid waste into rivers and oceans every day, poisoning marine life and spreading diseases that kill millions of children annually, the U.N. said on Monday."

"Close to 40 percent of Puget Sound's shorelines have been covered in concrete or otherwise walled off from the tides. State officials say restoring the health of Puget Sound will require removing some of those walls. But it's local governments that control the shore, and property owners want to build more seawalls as coastal developments expand."

"The federal government is doing what once had been unthinkable: Building a new stretch of pipeline and draining more water from the Columbia River system to aid farmers. The pipeline is approved to carry just a trickle, but will be designed to handle much more water than that. New proposals would dramatically increase the amount of river water provided to Columbia Basin farmers."

"People along the Clark Fork River are still getting used to the removal of Milltown Dam. But as far as the fish are concerned, it's history."

"San Joaquin Valley farmers hope for $3.3-billion dam and reservoir at Temperance Flat, but they need help paying for it."

"Scientists say global climate change may be contributing to the increased appearance of dead zones in the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian Oceans where low oxygen levels are damaging the undersea ecosystem."

"A group of 19 House Democrats is asking the Minerals Management Service to investigate whether BP PLC has the required engineering documents to safely operate its Atlantis oil and gas platform in the Gulf of Mexico."

"More than a year after President George W. Bush created a vast marine national monument near the Northern Marianas Islands, the federal government has yet to make good on promised investments in the islands."

"California water resources board plan, backed by environmentalists, would end practice of sucking in ocean water -- along with small animals, fish larvae and, occasionally, people -- to cool plants."

"Thousands of the nation's largest water polluters are outside the Clean Water Act's reach because the Supreme Court has left uncertain which waterways are protected by that law, according to interviews with regulators."

"Scientists have discovered an area of the North Atlantic Ocean where plastic debris accumulates. The region is said to compare with the well-documented 'great Pacific garbage patch'."