Water & Oceans

"As in the oceans, carbon dioxide from the atmosphere could throw off water chemistry in large freshwater bodies like the Great Lakes, putting the food web at risk."

"Imagine an oil slick quickly growing through the Straits of Mackinac from a rupture of the 62-year-old, twin pipelines known as Line 5 traversing the bottom of where Lakes Michigan and Huron connect."

"A fire on an oil platform in the Caspian Sea burned on Monday for a fourth day, and the Azerbaijani company that operates the site warned that the fire could spread to the oil wells that feed the platform, heightening the risk of a spill."

Major parts of the coastal United States are in the same boat as vulnerable, low-lying nations and islands when it comes to climate-driven sea level rise and extreme weather, says Thomas Lovejoy, a noted ecologist.

"A Russian-flagged oil tanker has run aground off Nevelsk on the southwest coast of Sakhalin Island, spilling oil into the sea, Russia’s Ministry of Emergency Situations reports."

"The process to relicense the hydroelectric dam system on the Klamath River will likely move forward if Congress fails to act by the end of the year on historic settlement agreements to remove four of the dams."

"A concerted 30-year effort has seen substantial improvement in the health of the largest freshwater habitat on Earth, but persistent and emerging problems exist prompting calls for further investment, legislation and long-term planning".

"Brazil filed a lawsuit on Monday against two of the world's largest mining companies for 20 billion Brazilian reais ($5.2 billion) to clean up what it says was its worst environmental disaster, caused by the collapse of a tailings dam."

"Construction work on a controversial canal that would link the Pacific Ocean with the Caribbean via an overland route across Nicaragua and through Central America’s largest lake has been postponed until late 2016, says the company behind the project."