The death of Ted Stevens, the longest-serving Republican senator, marks the loss of a great influence over environmental and energy policy for the better part of a half century. Stevens devoted much of his time in the U.S. Senate from 1977 to 2009 to opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWAR) for petroleum development.

EPA officials in New York had to postpone a planned hearing on the impact of the natural gas drilling method known as hydraulic fracturing. The reason: the large number of passionate people planning to attend or demonstrate.

"Russian emergency workers have increased forest patrols in a western region previously contaminated by the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster, trying to prevent wildfires from spreading harmful radiation, officials said Wednesday."

"A month after the Deepwater Horizon disaster began, scientists from the University of South Florida made a startling announcement. They had found signs that the oil spewing from the well had formed a 6-mile-wide plume snaking along in the deepest recesses of the gulf. The reaction that USF announcement received from the Coast Guard and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the federal agencies that sponsored their research: Shut up."

"With 3-1/2 months left before a United Nations climate summit in Cancun, Mexico, the spade work ahead of the meeting seems to be turning up more boulders than a New England plow."

"The opponents of Pebble, the giant copper and gold prospect in Southwest Alaska, have asked the federal Environmental Protection Agency to invoke its potent and rarely used power to block the potential mine. But U.S. Rep. Don Young late last month filed legislation seeking to strip the EPA of that authority."

"Farmers and other pesticide users would not need to secure Clean Water Act (CWA) permits before spraying over water under Senate legislation offered late last week in response to a pivotal federal court ruling."

"In the first case settled under the U.S. EPA's national enforcement push into the mining and mineral processing industry, a Florida fertilizer manufacturer will spend $12 million to reduce and manage hazardous wastes from its Plant City phosphoric acid and ammoniated fertilizer manufacturing facility."

"More than three weeks after BP capped its gushing oil well ... wildlife officials are rounding up more oiled birds than ever as fledgling birds get stuck in the residual goo and rescuers make initial visits to rookeries they had avoided disturbing during nesting season."