"Ohio's state parks will be open for oil and natural gas drilling for the first time under legislation the state Senate passed on Wednesday."

"The largest mining company in Idaho's Silver Valley will pay $263.4 million plus interest to settle one of the nation's largest Superfund lawsuits -- one of the top 10 such settlements in history, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said Monday."

"A moratorium on new uranium mining around the Grand Canyon expires in six weeks, and the Interior Department is under pressure from conservation groups and mining companies over what to do about it."

"The Kentucky coal industry's compliance with U.S. surface mining regulations dropped sharply from 2008 to 2010, while the environmental impact of the violations has worsened, federal records show."

"First came lumber certified as environmentally friendly, then seafood. Now a move is afoot to give gravel -- blasted out of open-pit mines, then hauled out using diesel-belching trucks -- the green seal of approval."

"Brazil's environment agency gave its definitive approval on Wednesday for construction of the Belo Monte hydroelectric dam, a controversial $17 billion project in the Amazon that has drawn criticism from native Indians and conservationists."

Reversing course, the Obama administration's Interior Department scuttled a policy that it had touted barely five months before as reversing the wilderness policies of President Bush.

"The Elwha River on Washington's Olympic Peninsula once teemed with legendary salmon runs before two towering concrete dams built nearly a century ago cut off fish access to upstream habitat, diminished their runs and altered the ecosystem." Now the dams are being removed.