"Plans to open the first major coal export facility on the West Coast are likely to be delayed until next year because of an appeal filed by a coalition of environmental groups, which say shipping coal to Asia throws a wrench in U.S. efforts to reduce international greenhouse gas emissions."

"In many places around Western Pennsylvania residents see clusters of death and clusters of people sickened by cancer or heart and lung diseases. And, like Lee Lasich, a Clairton resident, they're frustrated that government health and environmental agencies don't see them too, don't do something about the problems and don't take a tougher stance on enforcement of air pollution regulations."

"Rare minerals. Food and water. Arable soil. Air-cleansing forests. In the intellectual heart of the American military and policy-making world, these are emerging not just as environmental issues, but as the potential stuff of conflict in the 21st century."

"Manatees died in record-breaking numbers this year, but not from being hit by boats or poisoned by Red Tide. Instead, the largest group of the 699 manatees that were killed as of Dec. 5 were done in by bad weather."

"Owls are dying under gruesome circumstances, bleeding to death from stomach hemorrhages in an agonizing and days-long decline. The culprit: An extra-potent class of rodenticides that has flooded the market in recent decades."

"A month before the Upper Big Branch Mine disaster, a Massey Energy worker admitted that he had used what turned out to be a forged foreman's card when he conducted hundreds of mine safety checks at the Raleigh County operation, the Sunday Gazette-Mail has learned."

"Greens and public health advocates fear the White House is losing its backbone when it comes to defending its environmental policies — at the worst possible time."

"The latest research on the District's decade-long effort to reduce lead in its drinking water is likely to reverberate well beyond the city's borders and add a chapter to one of the more tortuous public health chronicles of the past century."

"The sprawling green space across from the Catholic church might be Herculaneum's prettiest asset, the kind of inviting place where people could flock to picnic or sling a Frisbee — if potential danger didn't lurk in the grass and ground."