"Clean-up costs associated with a Californian oil pipeline rupture that dumped as much as 2,400 barrels of crude onto a pristine stretch of coastline and into the Pacific Ocean have exceeded $60 million, the Los Angeles Times reported on Wednesday."

"The hard-line anti-whaling group Sea Shepherd Conservation Society said it has agreed to pay $2.55 million in damages to Japan’s Institute of Cetacean Research over its continued obstruction of whaling vessels despite an injunction."

"In the largest expansion of national marine sanctuaries in California in 23 years, the Obama administration on Tuesday more than doubled the size of two Northern California marine sanctuaries, extending them by 50 miles up the rugged Sonoma and Mendocino coasts."

"When Tampa Bay was grappling with repeated fish kills and murky waters two decades ago, the scientists who set out to restore its health by bringing back once-bountiful underwater grasses were doubtful it could be done in their lifetimes."

"Fish such as black seabass and summer flounder that prefer warm water are appearing more frequently in Long Island Sound because of climate change, according to a report released Monday on the health of the sound."

"Under canopies of dead angular branches and drooping fronds, UC Riverside ecologist Cameron Barrows made his way across a forest of skeletal Joshua trees that have not reproduced in decades."

"For half a decade, General Electric has been paying for a massive dredging operation on the upper Hudson River in New York."

"The drought-stricken Colorado River is fueling golf courses and growth across the Coachella Valley."

Despite early headlines, an EPA study on the impact of fracking on drinking water offered both sides ammunition.