Public

The Central New York Oil & Gas Co. assured residents and regulators it would avoid using eminent domain to lay its pipeline in Pennsylvania's pristine Endless Mountains. But 2 days after FERC granted approval, the company went to court to condemn nearly half the properties along the route.

The Cossoloottoo family in Centerville, Iowa, suspected vaccinations were the culprit when their 6-month-old daughter got seizures and what looked like autism. Their concerns were worsened by studies linking vaccinations to autism -- studies later discredited as fraud. It wasn't until some 10 years later that a specialist at the Mayo Clinic correctly diagnosed their daughter as having a genetic disorder, Dravet syndrome, that strikes one in 20-40,000 children born.

"MIAMI -- The U.S. is not ready to handle an oil spill if drilling off the Cuban coast goes awry but can be better prepared with monitoring systems and other basic steps, experts told government officials Monday."

"Keeping the invasive Asian carp out of the Great Lakes will involve re-reversing the flow of the Chicago River -- an engineering marvel completed a century ago through a complex network of rivers, canals, and locks, a new study said on Tuesday."

"The prickly pear cactus may not sound like a trendy cash crop, but it could become a phenomenon among farmers on the arid west side of the San Joaquin Valley."

"Across southern Florida, rabbits, raccoons, bobcats and foxes have been disappearing at dramatic rates over the past decade, and invasive Burmese pythons are to blame, a US study said Monday."

"Certain disease outbreaks, including some of the worst pandemics of the 20th century, are linked to weather patterns in the Pacific Ocean, according to new research. Scientists said tracking these climate changes can help officials anticipate and plan for surges in illnesses."

TV weathercasters, who are not trained in climate science, are often misleading many members of the public into doubting the well-established science which indicates that human activities are warming the planet.

"For more than a century, through a dozen dry spells when lakes disappeared and the land died, thousands of cows from the Swenson Land & Cattle Co have roamed the fields of Texas. Yet the drought currently ravaging the southern Plains has done what the Dust Bowl could not: chased them off this land and driven them more than 600 miles north to Nebraska."

"A group of 44 senators, all but one Republican, have signed on to proposed legislation that would authorize the Canada-to-Texas Keystone XL oil pipeline despite the refusal of President Barack Obama to advance the project."

"Republican Senator John Hoeven is set to introduce the bill on Monday that, if passed into law, would allow work to begin immediately on all but the sensitive Nebraska portion of TransCanada's $7 billion controversial project.