"Raising its forecast, the U.S. government's weather agency on Thursday predicted the 2011 Atlantic hurricane season will produce 14 to 19 named storms, 7 to 10 of them becoming hurricanes."

"Drought worsened in the Midwest during the last week as record-high temperatures stressed the developing corn and soybean crops, while cotton and pastures eroded amid a historic drought in the southern Plains."

"The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is overseeing an effort to determine the extent of contamination at a former uranium mining site on the Navajo Nation that marked a high priority for assessment."

"Wyoming and the U.S. Department of Interior have reached an agreement that would end federal protection for wolves in the state and allow hunters to kill more than 50% of those living outside Yellowstone National Park."

Oil and gas executives have long claimed that there is no case in which hydraulic fracturing has contaminated a drinking water aquifer. But such a case exists. And one of the biggest bars to enumerating suspected additional cases is the oil and gas industry's refusal to allow disclosure of them -- a condition of court settlements with landowners.

"Wild horses on the vast rangelands of Wyoming can continue to roam free, for now, after the U.S. government's Bureau of Land Management postponed a planned roundup, horse advocates said on Tuesday."

"Conservation groups working across the Gulf of Mexico are supporting a bipartisan bill in the Senate that would direct to five Gulf states the billions of dollars in fines that may be imposed on BP and other companies found responsible for the last year's oil spill."

"Major climate talks in South Africa at year-end will be unlikely to strike agreement on a new pact, but will be important in determining the shape of long-term efforts to tackle climate change, a senior U.N. climate official said on Tuesday."