"Less than six months into the job, Ohio Environmental Protection Agency Director Craig Butler grew so weary of Toledo’s mule-like response to long-documented problems at its 73-year-old Collins Park Water Treatment Plant that he entertained the very drastic — and politically explosive — idea of trying to wrest control of it away from the city."

"A program being launched off the California coast this summer will tackle two environmental problems posed by thousands of cargo ships that ferry goods to and from the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach each year: Not only are the hulking vessels major sources of air pollution, their shipping lanes overlap with a prime feeding area for migrating blue whales off Santa Barbara."

"Imperial Metals describes substance spilled from dam as 'very close to drinking water.'"

"The largest red tide bloom seen in Florida in nearly a decade has killed thousands of fish in the Gulf of Mexico and may pose a greater health threat if it washes ashore as expected in the next two weeks, researchers said on Thursday."

"BAGHDAD — The crisis gripping Iraq escalated rapidly on Thursday with a re-energized Islamic State in Iraq and Syria storming new towns in the north and seizing a strategic dam as Iraq’s most formidable military force, the Kurdish pesh merga, was routed in the face of the onslaught."

"NICE, Calif. — An abandoned recreational vehicle was the first clue. In this hamlet two hours north of San Francisco and barely a mile from the largest natural freshwater lake in the state, the trailer sat on a hill, hidden from the main drag. Behind it rose a flimsy fence, tall enough to shield its bounty: 50 marijuana plants in hastily constructed wooden boxes."

"The crisis may have eased in Toledo, but the toxic algae in Lake Erie that contaminated the water supply for 500,000 people in Ohio continues to plague lakes and rivers across the country, including here in Maryland."

"Toxic metal threatens marine life as it accumulates faster in shallow layers than in deep sea due to human activity"

"This year's low-oxygen "dead zone" along Louisiana coast covers 5,052 square miles, an area the size of the state of Connecticut but about 800 square miles less than the 2013 dead zone, according to a week-long survey released Monday."

"The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced in a legal settlement Monday that it will immediately notify the conservation group Columbia Riverkeeper, which filed the lawsuit, of any oil spills among its eight dams on the Columbia and Snake rivers in Oregon and Washington."