"The Obama administration said Thursday it will require companies that drill for oil and natural gas on federal lands to publicly disclose chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing operations. The new "fracking" rule replaces a draft proposed last year that was withdrawn amid industry complaints that federal regulation could hinder an ongoing boom in natural gas production.

"WASHINGTON — A sharply divided Senate committee on Thursday approved the nomination of Gina McCarthy to serve as administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.

"The Arctic Council agreed on Wednesday to admit emerging powers China and India as observers, reflecting growing global interest in the trade and energy potential of the planet's Far North."

"If the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency isn’t going to ensure Seattle’s Duwamish River is clean enough for needy residents to fish there for their dinner, the agency needs to ensure those people get fish some other way – even if that means supplying seafood through food banks. Or building clean urban fishing ponds. Or giving people shares in a seafood cooperative akin to a community-supported-agriculture operation."

"Snow cover across the entire Rocky Mountain range has been shrinking due to warmer spring temperatures over the past 30 years, a new study finds."

"Updated federal advice on mercury levels in fish appears to have stalled within the U.S. department of health, frustrating scientists and advocacy groups who argue that exposure to mercury may be dangerous at lower levels than previously thought."

"Frogs that were imported for pregnancy tests and set loose in California carry a deadly fungus responsible for wiping out vast numbers of amphibians worldwide, scientists have found."

"Fish and other sea life have been moving toward Earth’s poles in search of cooler waters, part of a worldwide, decades-long migration documented for the first time by a study released Wednesday."

"If U.S. EPA air chief Gina McCarthy is eventually confirmed as agency administrator, the Office of Air and Radiation will join four other agency offices that have no permanent, Senate-confirmed leaders."

"Experts judged on Wednesday that a reactor on Japan's west coast is located on ground at high risk of an earthquake, setting in motion a process that will likely lead to the first permanent shutdown of a nuclear plant since the 2011 Fukushima crisis."