"Japan is facing the toughest test yet in its effort to restore nuclear energy more than three years after the Fukushima disaster: scrutiny from a skeptical population."

"Monsoon rainfall was 41 percent below average for the week ended July 9, the weather office said on its website on Thursday, the fifth straight week of poor rains after a late start to the season."

"TOKYO — A giant typhoon was sweeping across Japan's Okinawa prefecture Tuesday, bringing with it powerful winds, high waves and heavy rains, prompting the Japan Meteorological Agency to issue its highest warning."

Rare dolphins on the Mekong River may soon be gone if Laos proceeds with its plant to build the  Don Sahong Dam.

"Swathes of north India are sweltering under the longest heatwave on record, triggering widespread breakdowns in the supply of electricity and increasingly angry protests over the government's failure to provide people with basic services."

"Scientists have criticised China's bulldozing of hundreds of mountains to provide more building land for cities."

"A Japanese court ruled against allowing the restart of a nuclear power plant west of Tokyo on Wednesday, its operator said, a rare case in which anti-nuclear plaintiffs have successfully won a ruling to shut down reactors."

"The survey by Dutch research agency Motivaction said in China, where public anger has mounted over hazardous levels of pollution in towns and cities, environmentalists had a greater sense of urgency about action needed to tackle the problem than Western counterparts, where the financial crisis has knocked environmental policy down the political agenda."