"Job growth in the nation's coal fields has taken a hit amid tough market conditions for U.S. coal and competition from natural gas, according to a review of federal employment statistics."

"The Bureau of Land Management is advancing what could become the world's largest solar power project in a region of the Southern California desert where environmental groups and American Indian tribes have filed multiple federal lawsuits to stop already approved, large-scale renewables projects."

Fecal contamination of coastal waters causes many cases of gastrointestinal and respiratory illness. While environmental agencies do monitor water contamination, they do not look at beach sand, which can also harbor disease-causing germs.

"Brazil's President Dilma Rousseff on Friday vetoed divisive elements of a new law that relaxes the forest cover farmers must preserve on their land, taking a stand against the agricultural lobby that pushed a more lenient version through Congress."

"The latest round of international climate change talks finished on Friday in discord and disappoint

President Obama's preoccupation with Shell's proposal to drill for oil in the offshore Arctic -- even after the BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico -- appears to signal that it will be inevitable, barring a major legal challenge.

The incidence of autism seems to be increasing, and genetics does not account for all the cases. Researchers are asking whether environmental factors like toxic chemicals are partly to blame, but definitive answers have not yet been found.

"TOKYO — What passes for normal at the Fukushima Daiichi plant today would have caused shudders among even the most sanguine of experts before an earthquake and tsunami set off the world's second most serious nuclear crisis after Chernobyl."

"SANTA FE, New Mexico -- Calmer winds and cooler temperatures promised relief on Sunday to fire crews battling blazes in New Mexico and Colorado, where wildfires sweeping across miles of forest, brush and grass have forced evacuations and disrupted holiday weekend travel plans."

"Tropical Storm Beryl threatened to snarl traffic on Memorial Day as it brought drenching rain, winds and the possibility of flooding to the southeastern U.S. coast.

The storm made landfall in Florida early Monday near Jacksonville Beach around 12:10 a.m. ET with near-hurricane-strength winds of 70 mph, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center.