Pollution

While cruise ships can be a boon to local economies, they also produce huge amounts of waste and pollution.

Scientists are now studying the effects of Prozac in water on shrimp. After being secreted by humans, drugs like Prozac find their way through sewage systems and into waterways. Their effects on shrimp could be fatal.

EPA officials in New York had to postpone a planned hearing on the impact of the natural gas drilling method known as hydraulic fracturing. The reason: the large number of passionate people planning to attend or demonstrate.

"The opponents of Pebble, the giant copper and gold prospect in Southwest Alaska, have asked the federal Environmental Protection Agency to invoke its potent and rarely used power to block the potential mine. But U.S. Rep. Don Young late last month filed legislation seeking to strip the EPA of that authority."

"In the first case settled under the U.S. EPA's national enforcement push into the mining and mineral processing industry, a Florida fertilizer manufacturer will spend $12 million to reduce and manage hazardous wastes from its Plant City phosphoric acid and ammoniated fertilizer manufacturing facility."

"Canada’s oil sands  mining operations produce vast and fast-growing quantities of deadly substances, including mercury, heavy metals and arsenic, new data released by Environment Canada shows."

"A BP Texas City refinery that was the site of a massive 2005 explosion that killed 15 workers has a pattern of poor operation and maintenance practices, Texas environmental regulators reported after investigating a 46-day release of toxic and cancer-causing chemicals from the plant this spring."

"With a startling report that some researchers call more spin than science, the government said Wednesday that the mess made by the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is mostly gone already."

"More than 2,000 people filed a class-action lawsuit in federal court on Tuesday seeking over $10 billion in punitive damages from BP Plc for 40 days of excess pollution from the company's Texas City, Texas, refinery, according to court documents."