"LONDON -- The Arctic needs to be better protected from a rush for natural resources as melting ice makes mineral and energy exploration easier, the United Nations' Environment Programme (UNEP) said."

"JUNEAU -- A bill moving through the Alaska Legislature would eliminate wilderness restrictions in a portion of a state park in the Bristol Bay region so a utility can study a hydroelectric project on a lake where such development now is banned."

"It's legal to catch the animals outside the national park. But critics say the trappers are after bobcats that often crisscross the invisible park boundaries."

"PAICINES -- With a California condor overhead and history underfoot, hundreds of people gathered beneath a canopy of blue skies Monday to celebrate an accomplishment almost as rare as statehood itself: the dedication of America's 59th national park."

"The Fish and Wildlife Service has recommended against a proposed land exchange that would allow a 20-mile road through the heart of Alaska's pristine Izembek National Wildlife Refuge, pleasing environmentalists who bitterly opposed it but angering state leaders who say the road is a public safety priority for nearby residents."

"PRESTON TOWNSHIP, WIS. -- When the biggest frac-sand mine in Trempealeau County opened here in 2011, even the dead were shown consideration."

"The effects of the so-called sequestration budget cuts on the federal government are revealed in a Jan. 25 memo to National Park Service staff written by Park Service Director Jon Jarvis."

"A Canadian mining company has come one step closer to building a mile-wide, half-mile-deep open-pit copper mine on public land 30 miles south of Tucson. On Thursday, Arizona’s Department of Environmental Quality granted Rosemont Copper, a subsidiary of Augusta Resource of Vancouver, a crucial air quality permit, saying emissions from the proposed mine would not violate federal standards for carbon monoxide, nitrogen and sulfur dioxide, or fine and large particles."

"Appalachian coal producers worry about new environmental laws as poverty and pollution rise in some mining regions."