"Loons have enjoyed unprecedented population growth over the last 30 years. They outlived DDT and a time when people used to shoot loons for sport."

"DES MOINES, Iowa -- Environmental and animal welfare groups sued the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday, alleging the federal agency unlawfully scrapped a rule that would have authorized it to collect information from large-scale livestock confinement farms."

"In and around Texas’ vast oil and gas fields, the hydraulic fracturing boom is putting a strain on water supplies already reeling under one of the worst droughts in the state’s history."

"Mercury found in high levels in deep Pacific Ocean fish such as swordfish has a chemical fingerprint, and it implicates coal-burning power plants in Asia, according to a new study."

"Researchers in the key corn-growing state of Illinois are finding significant damage from rootworms in farm fields planted in a rotation with a genetically modified corn that is supposed to protect the crop from the pests, according to a new report."

"Mark Lynas has done the world a service in providing on-the-ground reporting from the Philippines, digging in on some vital questions related to the destruction of field trials of non-commercial, genetically modified, vitamin-fortified Golden Rice there in early August. ... The same is true for Amy Harmon, who wrote an incisive analysis of the research vandalism that ran in The Times on Sunday. The two pieces powerfully strip away distortions and myths surrounding the latest instance of anti-biotechnology violence and the grain that was the focus of the assault."

"NEW ORLEANS -- Flying over southeast Louisiana, it's easy to see human fingerprints on what's left of the wetlands below."

"The White House is expected to fill the EPA slot left vacant by Gina McCarthy's promotion by naming Janet McCabe, a deputy who will be tasked with navigating the legal hurdles that lie ahead."

"DILLINGHAM, Alaska — President Barack Obama’s top environmental official was visibly moved as people in this fishing town told her the giant Pebble Mine would kill wild salmon and destroy their culture."

"Scientists probing the mystery of the so-called 'global warming hiatus' may have made a breakthrough. According to a new study published Wednesday in the journal Nature, a persistent area of unusually cool sea surface temperatures in the tropical Pacific Ocean could explain why, despite ever-increasing amounts of manmade greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, global average surface temperatures have increased at a slower rate during the past 15 years."