Documents obtained by the Bay Citizen, an award-winning nonprofit news organization, showed Navy officials responsible for ensuring the site was properly cleaned up trying to convince California state health officials not to put their radiation concerns in writing.

The existing climate research budget crunch may be made worse by across-the-board cuts mandated if Congress and the White House fail to reach a budget agreement by January 2013.

A new report by Sabrina Tavernise in the New York Times points out that basic data about the routine use of antibiotics in farm animals (which consume some 80 percent of the nation's antibiotics) is largely missing and that a ferocious germ resistant to many types of antibiotics had increased tenfold on chicken breasts.

More than 70 scientists from research and health groups wrote House and Senate Appropriations Committee leaders September 4, 2012, urging them not to cut funds for the biennial Report on Carcinogens, which showed that formaldehyde and styrene can cause cancer.

You wouldn't think you would get arrested for trying to cover the 2012 Democratic convention in Charlotte, NC, September 4 or the Republican convention in Tampa, FL, August 27. But such things have happened before, and reporters have available some resources to support their rights.

More than a decade ago, on February 17, 2000, the entire EPA website was taken down for two weeks because of data security concerns raised by the House Energy Committee. There are faint hints that such events may be in the offing again.

The Food and Drug Administration is so far refusing to name a Southwestern Indiana farm that voluntarily recalled its cantaloupes after a Salmonella outbreak last month that killed two people and sickened some 150.

There are well over a thousand binational or multinational environmental agreements, usually technical and obscure. However, environmental reporters would do well to know about them — to shed light on local stories and to find national or international news. Here's help.

For years, scientists at the National Toxicology Program have published the "Report on Carcinogens," which lists chemicals known to (or believed to) cause cancer. The "12th Report on Carcinogens" was released on June 10, 2011 — will there be a 13th? Some House Republicans want to stop updating and publication of the report.

An analysis of records and statistics by Post reporter James Ball concluded: "Three years later, new evidence suggests that administration officials have struggled to overturn the long-standing culture of secrecy in Washington. Some of these high-profile transparency measures have stalled, and by some measures the government is keeping more secrets than before."