"President Obama will designate five national monuments Monday including one commemorating Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad in Maryland, according to several environmental groups."
"Missouri Republican Sen. Roy Blunt said on Monday that he is placing a hold on Gina McCarthy, President Obama’s pick to run the Environmental Protection Agency, which could delay a full Senate vote on the nominee."
"YELLOWKNIFE -- Federal officials are scrambling to clean up a crumbling, abandoned northern gold mine that is in imminent danger of releasing massive amounts of arsenic, asbestos and other toxins."
"BILLINGS, Mont. -- A mining company plans to start exploratory work this spring on an estimated 400 million tons of coal beneath Montana's Crow Indian Reservation, adding to a spate of recent interest in the region's huge coal reserves despite flagging domestic demand for the fuel."
"With government snow plows idled by federal budget cuts known as the 'sequester,' small Wyoming towns on the fringe of Yellowstone are organizing a private fund-raising drive for this year's spring road-clearing operation inside the national park."
"U.S. EPA will head to court [Thursday] to defend its authority under the Clean Water Act to revoke a strip mining permit issued by the Army Corps of Engineers."
"MADISON, Wisc. -- Assembly Republicans sent Gov. Scott Walker a bill Thursday that could clear the way for a miles-long iron ore mine in northern Wisconsin, handing the GOP governor a victory that eluded him last year."
"CARRIZO SPRINGS, Tex. -- In this South Texas stretch of mesquite trees and cactus, where the land is sometimes too dry to grow crops, the local aquifer is being strained in the search for oil. The reason is hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, a drilling process that requires massive amounts of water."
"President Obama's nominee for Interior secretary was grilled this morning over how she would balance conservation and development on hundreds of millions of acres of public lands, whether she would support a carbon tax and how she would regulate the controversial technique of hydraulic fracturing."
"Sally Jewell, the CEO of outdoor retail giant REI, was also criticized by some Republican senators over her role as a board member of the National Parks Conservation Association and her support of outgoing Interior Secretary Ken Salazar's former "wild lands" policy.
"Sally Jewell's first political test as President Obama's nominee for Interior secretary comes Thursday before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, where she will be grilled on how she plans to run the $12 billion agency that controls one-fifth of the U.S. landmass and nearly all of its oceans."
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