"Beneath the lush, green hills of eastern Utah's Uinta Basin, where elk, bear and bison outnumber people, the soil is saturated with a sticky tar that may soon provide a new domestic source of petroleum for the United States. It would be a first-of-its kind project in the country that some fear could be a slippery slope toward widespread wilderness destruction."

"U.S. EPA's long-awaited study of formaldehyde's toxicity got panned today by a National Academy of Sciences' panel that sharply disagreed with the agency's conclusions and declared the effort in need of 'substantial revision.'"

"Critics say it's a chemical that could cause infertility or cancer, while others see it speeding the growth of super weeds and causing worrying changes to plants and soil. Backers say it is safe and has made a big contribution to food production."

"An internal review of the Coast Guard’s performance during the BP oil spill cleanup last year has concluded that the agency was caught badly unprepared and that the response operation was dogged from the beginning by significant planning failures."

"Millions of gallons of radioactive water have leaked from nuclear power plants throughout the U.S. since the 1970s, threatening water supplies in New Jersey and other states, an Asbury Park Press investigation found."

It looks like political pressure from the coal industry and Rep. Nick Rahall (D-WV) has caused the Obama White House Office of Management and Budget to intervene to stop the Obama EPA's efforts to limit environmental damage from mountaintop removal mining.

"The Maine House of Representatives on Thursday overwhelmingly endorsed banning the chemical bisphenol-A from children's products such as sippy cups and baby bottles."

"A lot of dead dolphins continue to wash ashore along the Gulf Coast and now a lot of sea turtles — most of them rare Kemp's ridleys — are washing up dead too, federal officials said Thursday."

"Two years ago some University of South Florida researchers began studying the effects of the most widely used fungicide in the country to see if it might kill more than just fungus. Turns out it's also a pretty effective frog-icide."