"As Duke Energy pleaded guilty Thursday in a North Carolina courtroom to nine criminal violations of the federal Clean Water Act, federal prosecutors recounted examples where time and again the nation's largest electricity company failed to prevent its illegal pollution."

A federal judge Wednesday rejected Freedom Industries' bankruptcy proposal and ordered the company to clean up the site where its January 2014 chemical spill contaminated Charleston, W.V., drinking water.

"Enbridge Energy and its affiliates will pay $75 million to settle a 2010 oil spill into Michigan's Talmadge Creek and Kalamazoo River that dumped 800,000 gallons of oil, state officials said on Wednesday."

"Duke Energy ignored repeated warnings before a broken pipe dumped tons of coal ash into the Dan River last year, according to court filings Thursday as the company faces a federal judge."

"The Port of Seattle’s board voted Tuesday to ask that the arrival of Shell’s Arctic drilling rigs be delayed, bowing to a wave of public pressure by protesters and city officials over the company’s plans to drill this summer off the coast of Alaska and use Puget Sound as a home port."

"There’s a new study that finds harmful algae blooms in the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries have been increasing dramatically over the last 20 years."

"Biologists looking at 40 years of fisheries data from Puget Sound have documented a dramatic shift in marine species. Key fish in the food chain, like herring and smelt, have declined, while the number of jellyfish has increased exponentially, to the detriment of the marine ecosystem."

"RIO DE JANEIRO — The head of rowing's governing body says races at next year's Olympics could be delayed because of severe water pollution at the venue."

"The Environmental Protection Agency has begun testing air and soil at Camp Minden [Louisiana] in the area where 7,500 tons of deteriorating and potentially explosive artillery propellant will be destroyed."

"The Sierra Club launched a system Tuesday to send text message alerts when smog pollution is at a high level in certain areas."