"When the World Trade Organization ruled this week that China must again start exporting rare earth elements key to manufacturing high tech and defense products, traders and the markets that need the materials rejoiced. But less happy were the Chinese who claim complying will hurt the environment."
"The number of U.S. children with autism has surged to one in 68, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Thursday, a 30 percent increase since the agency estimated just two years ago that one child in 88 suffered from the disorder."
"WASHINGTON — The federal government on Thursday designated the lesser prairie chicken as a threatened species, a long-anticipated announcement that politicians warned could set off a possible battle over states’ rights."
"Less than a week after an oil spill in the Houston Ship Channel, environmentalists say there has been limited damage to nearby bird sanctuaries, but it is too soon to know whether there will be long-term problems to wildlife."
"Pacific Gas and Electric Co. expects to face criminal charges from the federal government over the 2010 San Bruno pipeline explosion that killed eight people and leveled a neighborhood, the company reported Thursday."
"DAKOPE, Bangladesh — When a powerful storm destroyed her riverside home in 2009, Jahanara Khatun lost more than the modest roof over her head. In the aftermath, her husband died and she became so destitute that she sold her son and daughter into bonded servitude. And she may lose yet more."
"Labeling tags were not attached to 1,500 valves controlling the flow of radioactive water in piping and other equipment at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant in the aftermath of the March 2011 disaster, sources said."
"An Endangered Species Act listing for the lesser prairie chicken is either a death knell for the U.S. oil boom or business as usual for energy developers and landowners in the southern Great Plains. It depends on whom you ask."
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