"Imperial Sugar Co. and managers of its Georgia refinery ignored known dangers of explosive dust for decades before a chain of dust-fueled fireballs erupted at the plant last year and killed 14 people, investigators said in a report Thursday."

"The Senate declined Thursday to take up Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s effort to limit for a year the Environmental Protection Agency's ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from power plants, factories and other stationary sources of pollution."

"Over the last decade, the drinking water at thousands of schools across the country has been found to contain unsafe levels of lead, pesticides and dozens of other toxins."

"An oil field review starting with a state inspector questioning the size of spill containment facilities on Alaska's North Slope has resulted in a hefty civil payment for a subsidiary of BP PLC."

"Recent research has the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) concerned that the huge quantities of metal, plastic, paint chips and other man-made debris floating at sea, hundreds and even thousands of miles from land, may be working their way into the American diet."

"Water managers, environmental agencies and conservation groups have been talking about cleaning up Lake Okeechobee for decades. The water quality has only gotten worse. Much worse."

"The oil industry has been on a hot streak this year, thanks to a series of major discoveries that have rekindled a sense of excitement across the petroleum sector, despite falling prices and a tough economy."

"Texas' new plan to improve the Houston area's famously dirty air may not meet federal limits for smog."

"The record rains of the past few days flooded out sewage treatment plants in Fulton, Cobb and Gwinnett counties [GA], dumping millions of gallons of untreated sewage into local waterways."

"The United States needs to lead a global effort to protect people from new outbreaks of deadly infectious diseases that originate in animals, such as swine flu, AIDS and SARS, health experts said on Tuesday."