"Cutting soot and other air pollutants could help 'buy time' in the fight against climate change, a senior U.S. official said on Tuesday as seven nations joined a Washington-led plan."

"Cordial and generally noncommittal, Allison M. Macfarlane, the new chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, gave her first testimony before Congress on Tuesday without reiterating some of the positions she has taken in the past on nuclear waste."

"MONTREAL -- More than 150 international and Canadian public health organizations and individual scientists are demanding a worldwide ban on the mining, export and use of asbestos."

"The Obama administration announced a plan on Tuesday to open public land in six southwestern states to speed up the development of solar energy, while blocking projects in areas deemed environmentally sensitive."

"Welcome rains provided some relief to heat-stressed cities and worried farmers in the U.S. Midwest on Tuesday, but reports of failed crops, wildfires and other fallout from the worst U.S. drought in more than 50 years tempered any optimism."

"PRAGUE, Okla. -- Jerri Loveland sees a connection between the oil drilling that surrounds her home and the earthquake last November that upended her life."

"Mexico's new president is unlikely to implement much of the sweeping climate change law signed in June by outgoing President Felipe Calderon amid inevitable resistance from industry and his party's focus on accelerating economic growth and ramping-up oil and gas production, policy experts said."

"Three simple numbers that add up to global catastrophe - and that make clear who the real enemy is."

"The surface of Greenland's massive ice sheet has melted this month over an unusually large area, NASA has said."

"Thousands of people consume fish from Washington, D.C.’s highly polluted Anacostia River, despite safety warnings."