"Less than half of Pennsylvania's fossil-fueled power plants have pollution controls, a long-tolerated dirty habit that's now getting its comeuppance in tougher, new federal regulations."
A report from the independent Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board says workers at the Energy Department's Hanford nuclear waste site in washington were fired for raising safety concerts and that the safety culture there is broken.
"A three-year study to determine the possible impacts of climate change on federal flood insurance will warn of huge increases to the amount of land that could be inundated by rising sea levels, heavier downpours and stormier coastlines."
"Thousands of residents living atop the gas-rich Marcellus Shale ... signed lowball leases in the years leading up to the boom in Pennsylvania. In those early days a half-decade ago, virtually no layperson had even heard of the rock formation, let alone knew that drillers had found a way to access the huge reservoir of natural gas locked inside it."
"According to a new report released yesterday, efforts to protect children's health have been fatally blocked by American industry's refusal to submit information on the commercial use of chemicals."
"The CIA organised a fake vaccination programme in the town where it believed Osama bin Laden was hiding in an elaborate attempt to obtain DNA from the fugitive al-Qaida leader's family, a Guardian investigation has found." The ploy may have damaged the confidence of the Pakistani public in vaccine programs -- at a time when vaccinations against diseases like polio are needed.
"The rivers that run into New York Harbor will be unfit for recreational activities at least through Sunday because of a catastrophic fire that shut down one of the city’s largest sewage treatment plants, the city’s health department said Thursday."
"For aid donors and humanitarian agencies, it is a Faustian bargain: reach and save tens of thousands of people on the verge of starving to death. The price: come to an 'understanding' with one of the most active affiliates of al Qaeda, and perhaps help it retain control of large swathes of Somalia."
"Despite decades of efforts to restore and protect the Great Lakes, dozens of old power plants still are allowed to kill hundreds of millions of fish each year by sucking in massive amounts of water to cool their equipment."
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