"Consider the albatross. A bird that mates for life and flies over 6,000 miles for food, the albatross has seen profound population declines over the past several decades. It appears now as though a harbinger for its own demise."

"The National Park Service thought it had a good strategy for reining in the discarded water bottles that clog the trash cans and waste stream of the national parks: stop selling disposable bottles and let visitors refill reusable ones with public drinking water."

"House Republicans moved Tuesday to force the Obama administration to disclose certain documents related to the development of the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) major water jurisdiction rule."

"Capitol Hill lawmakers from Louisiana have intervened on behalf of a New Orleans company that has failed to stop a decade-old oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico but lobbied for a refund of money reserved for spill containment work, according to letters obtained by The Associated Press through public records requests."

"An animal rights group said SeaWorld Entertainment Inc, known for its dolphin and killer whale performances, sent an employee on secret missions to infiltrate events organized by the group in an attempt to undermine its work."

"Assurances from Enbridge Energy that the company's twin oil pipelines under the Straits of Mackinac are in 'excellent' condition and pose 'minimal' risks of a spill are not enough to resolve existing public concerns about the line's potential threat to the Great Lakes and Michigan's economy."

"SAN JUAN, P.R. — On an island that is flirting with default, fending off comparisons to Greece and losing its people to the mainland, the biggest problem most people face is something more elemental — one of the worst droughts in Puerto Rico’s history."

New projections put sea-level rise from climate change as high as six meters (20 feet). A mapping tool from the independent research organization Climate Central shows such a rise "are striking, to say the least – the inundation of Galveston, Matagorda and Padre islands, along with cities such as Port Arthur, part of Beaumont, Galveston, Texas City, the Freeport-Lake Jackson area and part of Corpus Christi."