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Over the last decade, aspens in the Rocky Mountains have been fading away from "sudden aspen decline." Now, as scientists have gained better understanding of the syndrome, they hope that timber harvesting and prescribed burns will help stands regenerate.

"The Environmental Protection Agency said on Thursday that it would overhaul enforcement of the Clean Water Act, as lawmakers sharply criticized the agency's decade-long lapses in punishing polluters."

"The Arctic ice cap will vanish completely in summer months within 20-30 years, polar researchers said Thursday, sounding the alarm two months before a critical climate change summit in Copenhagen."

"The Office of Management and Budget has instructed U.S. EPA to use existing toxicity data rather than require companies to conduct new tests to determine whether chemicals can damage the human endocrine system."

"More automakers are joining the trend. Nine of the top 10 vehicles in the Environmental Protection Agency's fuel economy rankings for the 2010 model year are hybrids, made by six companies."

Despite Democrats' promises, a Congressional investigation into whether military contractor KBR knowingly exposed soldiers to toxic sodium dichromate in Iraq seems to be going nowhere.

"The state is poised to ban the use of mercury-tainted coal fly ash at a Ravena cement plant that is the state's second largest source of airborne mercury pollution."

A big-money rancher alumnus caused Cal Poly San Luis Obispo to change a scheduled lecture by best-selling sustainable food writer Michael Pollan -- raising questions about academic freedom.

"A proposed coal-fired power plant in Surry County (Va.) would add 'significant and harmful' amounts of mercury and other pollutants to the Chesapeake Bay and several river systems in coastal Virginia already suffering from excessive mercury levels, a study released Wednesday concludes."

"Canada's major waterways have suffered significant alterations in their natural flows, a WWF-Canada report contends."