"A fatal bat disease has been confirmed in Kentucky for the first time, state and federal officials said Wednesday."

"Two of the most well-known penguin species in Antarctica -- chinstraps and Adelies -- are under pressure because a warmer climate has cut deeply into their main food source, shrimp-like creatures called krill."

Mark Twain was not only one of America's most under-appreciated nature writers, but he may also have been the Jon Stewart of his time -- blending satire with acute journalistic observation to puncture received wisdom with real truth. Francesca Lyman starts a discussion on the subject in Sacramento -- Twain's old stomping grounds.

"With the Obama administration moving to impose tougher limits on toxic air pollution as well as emissions that lead to smog and acid rain, it's betting the private sector can add a new technology to the utility industry's arsenal."

"Pennsylvania environmental regulators say they spend as little as 35 minutes reviewing each of the thousands of applications for natural gas well permits they get each year from drillers intent on tapping the state's lucrative and vast Marcellus Shale reserves."

"We're one week away from the first anniversary of the worst oil spill in the nation's history, and to commemorate it, House Republicans spent Wednesday marking up a trio of bills that would dramatically increase drilling in the US."

"Quebec is giving conditional support to a project that would revive one of Canada's last-remaining asbestos mines — even though its own public-health experts have condemned the initiative."

Wisconsin GOP Gov. Scott Walker's payback to the billionaire Koch brothers who helped elect him went beyond crushing unions to deregulating pollution. According to the liberal blog Think Progress, Walker and state Supreme Court Judge David Prosser worked quietly behind the scenes to allow Koch's Georgia Pacific paper plants to keep dumping thousands of pounds of phosphorus into the Fox River near Green Bay.

"The Davis Besse incident has resurfaced in the wake of the ongoing nuclear crisis at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi plant. Stories recounting close ties between Japanese nuclear regulators and utilities there have reinvigorated critics who say the NRC has not been an aggressive enough U.S. watchdog."