Public

"BOISE, Idaho -- When lightning ignited a wildfire near Idaho's Sun Valley in 2007, environmental regulators used monitoring gear to gauge the health effects for those breathing in the Sawtooth Mountains' smoky, mile-high air.

That equipment sits idle today after the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality was hit by $4 million in spending cuts, a quarter of its budget, since the recession began. Water testing on selenium-laced streams in Idaho's phosphate mining country also has been cut back, as have mercury monitoring and hazardous waste inspections.

"Large and small companies have told Republican-led congressional committees what the party wants to hear: dire predictions of plant closings and layoffs if the Obama administration succeeds with plans to further curb air and water pollution. But their message to financial regulators and investors conveys less gloom and certainty."

"Californians concerned about dangerous pipelines running underneath their neighborhoods are barred from obtaining government records about them by a 60-year-old state law backed by Pacific Gas and Electric Co. and other utilities, a Chronicle investigation shows."

"AUSTIN, TEXAS — The nuclear disaster in Fukushima, Japan, earlier this year caused many countries to rethink their appetite for nuclear power. It is also, in subtler ways, altering the fraught discussion of what to do with nuclear plants’ wastes."

"Mike Partain was startled two years ago when he tracked down nine former male residents of Camp Lejeune, N.C., who shared an exceedingly rare trait. A breast cancer diagnosis."

"While the Canadian government continues to block the inclusion of chrysotile asbestos from a UN agreement on hazardous materials, millions of dollars are being spent to remove the controversial substance from the Parliamentary Buildings and since Aug. 31, a combined total of more than 1,000 metric tonnes of asbestos have been removed from the West Block and Wellington Building, says Public Works."

"Radioactive substances from the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant have now been confirmed in all prefectures, including Uruma, Okinawa Prefecture, about 1,700 kilometers from the plant, according to the science ministry."

"The officials from around the world who will gather in South Africa on Monday to convene the latest round of U.N. climate negotiations are facing an uncomfortable fact: The global pact that has dictated greenhouse-gas targets since 1997 may no longer be relevant.

The mandatory targets of the Kyoto Protocol cover less than a third of the world’s carbon output. Major emitters are not bound by it. And, increasingly, the world is relying on a patchwork of measures rather than a universal treaty to lessen the impacts of global warming.