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"[A House subcommittee] took a first step on Wednesday to fast-track a controversial Alberta tar sands pipeline, ordering Barack Obama to reach a decision on the project by 1 November."

"A crisis is looming: To feed our growing population, we’ll need to double food production. Yet crop yields aren’t increasing fast enough, and climate change and new diseases threaten the limited varieties we’ve come to depend on for food. Luckily we still have the seeds and breeds to ensure our future food supply—but we must take steps to save them."

"Ohio's state parks will be open for oil and natural gas drilling for the first time under legislation the state Senate passed on Wednesday."

"China has been accused of trying to cover up the extent of lead poisoning among children, and of blocking effective testing and treatment."

"The House voted Wednesday to prohibit the Food and Drug Administration from approving genetically modified salmon for human consumption."

EPA chief Lisa Jackson told the Senate Environment Committee Wednesday that American Electric Power's recent narrative about job loss resulting from EPA's mercury regulations was were "misleading at best and scare tactics at worst."

"The sun is heading into an unusual and extended hibernation, scientists predict. Around 2020, sunspots may disappear for years, maybe decades. But scientists say it is nothing to worry about. Solar storm activity has little to do with life-giving light and warmth from the sun."

"Sometimes it seems hard to believe how much skepticism still exists about climate change, with the scientific community in near-unanimous agreement that yes, it's happening and yes, it's our fault. But as Minnesota State Senator Michael Jungbauer reminded us yesterday, most of that dissent comes from people who are more or less clueless about the science."

"Climate change crept into the discussion of fire management at a Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources hearing yesterday, despite Republicans' tiptoeing around the issue."

"Nuclear safety rules in the United States do not adequately weigh the risk that a single event would knock out electricity from both the grid and from emergency generators, as an earthquake and tsunami recently did at a nuclear plant in Japan, officials of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Wednesday."