National (U.S.)

"The Obama administration is preparing to issue new fuel economy standards and the first-ever greenhouse gas limits for large trucks and buses."

"Former House majority leader Tom DeLay  (R-Tex.) was both defiant and ebullient on Monday after hearing that the Justice Department had dropped its six-year investigation of his interactions with lobbyist Jack Abramoff and a host of other political contributors for whom he allegedly did political favors."

"Tom Donohue scares millions of dollars out of corporations and Republicans. But is his U.S. Chamber of Commerce good for business?"

"Researchers at the University of Georgia said Monday that more than three-quarters of the oil spilled in the Gulf of Mexico following the Deepwater Horizon drilling-rig explosion could still be in the Gulf threatening fisheries and marine life, disputing government statements that much of the oil had been safely dispersed."

"Perhaps the most striking thing about Monday's opening of the fall inshore shrimp season was how much remained closed."

"The Obama administration said Monday that it would require significantly more environmental review before approving new offshore drilling  permits, ending a practice in which government regulators essentially rubber-stamped potentially hazardous deepwater projects like BP’s out-of-control well."

"Utilities across the country are building dozens of old-style coal plants that will cement the industry's standing as the largest industrial source of climate-changing gases for years to come."

"Recently retired Environmental Protection Agency environmental engineer Weston Wilson is best known for criticizing his employer’s 2004 finding that hydraulic fracturing poses little or no risk to domestic groundwater. Now, the Denver EPA whistleblower is encouraged by the agency’s interest in studying the natural gas development procedure’s potential impacts on air quality as well."

"Without DDT and the other now-banned pesticides that kept bedbugs in check for more than 50 years, the United States is as vulnerable as parts of the world where the insects remain a plague."

While cruise ships can be a boon to local economies, they also produce huge amounts of waste and pollution.