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The World Environment News is a daily environmental update bringing you all the latest environmental stories, pictures and video from across the globe, courtesy of the Reuters news service. if it’s happening in the world of environment, it’s happening in the World Environment News.
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Latest News (99 stories)
China plans tougher quality standards for coal to tackle pollution
Photo: David Gray
Date: 24-May-13
Country: CHINA
Author: Fayen Wong
China may impose higher quality standards for imported and locally traded coal to cut air pollution, two sources said, in a move that could slash imports while boosting the fortunes of a faltering domestic industry.
German brewers warn fracking could hurt beer industry
Photo: Michaela Rehle
Date: 24-May-13
Country: GERMANY
Author: Madeline Chambers
German brewers have warned Chancellor Angela Merkel's government that any law allowing the controversial drilling technique known as fracking could damage the country's cherished beer industry.
U.S. sees seven to 11 Atlantic hurricanes in 2013
Date: 24-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Tom Brown
The 2013 Atlantic hurricane season could be "extremely active" and spawn 13 to 20 tropical storms, seven to 11 of which are expected to become hurricanes, the U.S. government's top climate agency predicted on Thursday.
Oklahoma tornado victims astounded at how they survived
Photo: Rick Wilking
Date: 23-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Carey Gillam and Ian Simpson
Tornado survivors thanked God, sturdy closets and luck in explaining how they lived through the colossal twister that devastated an Oklahoma town and killed 24 people, an astonishingly low toll given the extent of destruction.
CP Railway reopens line, cleans up after oil spill
Photo: Mike Cassese
Date: 23-May-13
Country: CANADA
Author: Susan Taylor
Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd said on Wednesday it has repaired and reopened a rail line near Jansen, Saskatchewan, and continues to clean up after a derailment that spilled 575 barrels of crude oil on Tuesday.
America's frogs and toads disappearing fast, study warns
Photo: Reuters
Date: 23-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Deborah Zabarenko
Frogs, toads and salamanders have been in trouble for decades, but a new U.S. government study shows just how quickly many amphibians are disappearing from ponds and creeks across the United States.
In China, food scares put Mao's self-sufficiency goal at risk
Photo: Jianan Yu
Date: 23-May-13
Country: CHINA
Author: Dominique Patton
The discovery of dangerous levels of toxic cadmium in rice sold in the southern city of Guangzhou, the latest in a series of food scandals, has piled more pressure on China to clean up its food chain - possibly at the expense of Mao Zedong's cherished goal of self-sufficiency.
Montreal tells 1.3 million residents to boil their drinking water
Date: 23-May-13
Country: CANADA
Author: Cameron French
Montreal, Canada's second-largest city, has asked 1.3 million people to boil their drinking water after a problem at one of the city's water treatment facilities.
Shell feared disaster days before Alaska rig grounding: official
Photo: Luke MacGregor
Date: 22-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Yereth Rosen
Days before a Shell drillship went aground in the storm-tossed Gulf of Alaska, it was clear that towing failures could spell disaster for the vessel, the crew and the marine environment, a company official told a U.S. Coast Guard panel on Monday.
China says its legal ivory trade not to blame for poaching
Photo: Bobby Yip
Date: 22-May-13
Country: CHINA
Author: Sally Huang and Ben Blanchard
China's small traditional trade in carving uses ivory acquired through legal auctions and in no way encourages or worsens the problem of elephant poaching in Africa, a senior Chinese official said on Tuesday.
Showers to slow U.S. corn seedings from blistering pace
Photo: Darren Hauck
Date: 22-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Julie Ingwersen
Occasional rainfall over the next week to 10 days will slow seedings of the U.S. corn crop, which was planted at a record fast pace last week, an agricultural meteorologist said on Tuesday.
Energy infrastructure largely spared Oklahoma tornado's fury
Date: 22-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Kristen Hays and Erwin Seba
Energy infrastructure in Oklahoma largely escaped the fury of a vicious tornado that ripped through a central Oklahoma city on Monday, though a natural gas pipeline reported some damage, companies said.
Whole neighborhoods razed by Oklahoma tornado that killed 24
Photo: Adrees Latif
Date: 22-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Carey Gillam and Ian Simpson
Rescuers went building to building in search of victims and survivors picked through the rubble of their shattered homes on Tuesday, a day after a massive tornado tore through the Oklahoma City suburb of Moore, wiping out blocks of houses and killing at least 24 people.
EU energy chief says EU to look at fracking this year
Photo: Thierry Roge
Date: 21-May-13
Country: GERMANY
Author: Maria Sheahan
Environmental concerns over the practice of hydraulic fracturing to tap shale gas will be on the European Union's agenda this year, EU Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger told a German newspaper.
U.S. pesticide makers seek answers as bee losses sting agriculture
Photo: ?Heinz-Peter Bader
Date: 21-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Carey Gillam
Monsanto Co is hosting a "Bee Summit." Bayer AG is breaking ground on a "Bee Care Center." And Sygenta AG is funding grants for research into the accelerating demise of honeybees in the United States, where the insects pollinate fruits and vegetables that make up roughly a quarter of the American diet.
Threat of tornadoes in parts of 10 states
Photo: Gene Blevins
Date: 21-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Carey Gillam, Kevin Murphy, Steve Olafson, Jane Sutton, Chris Francescani and Ian Simpson
The central United States braced for another round of violent weather on Monday after tornadoes struck the region over the weekend, killing two Oklahoma men and injuring at least 39 people.
Insight: The fight for North Dakota's fracking-water market
Photo: Ernest Scheyder
Date: 20-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Ernest Scheyder
In towns across North Dakota, the wellhead of the North American energy boom, the locals have taken to quoting the adage: "Whiskey is for drinking, and water is for fighting."
Analysis: At margins of shale oil boom, a tempered euphoria
Photo: Lucy Nicholson
Date: 20-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Kristen Hays and Jonathan Leff
For the past three years, the boom in the U.S. shale oil industry has outstripped all expectations. Production surged far faster than any forecasts; drillers raced to secure space in new pipelines to get their crude to market.
Insight: The road to a greener America is littered with road-kill
Photo: Hugh Gentry
Date: 20-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Nichola Groom
In October 2004, then California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger rolled up to a pioneering fueling station at Los Angeles International Airport in a hydrogen-powered metallic blue Hummer loaned to him by General Motors Corp.
Analysis: Obama climate agenda faces Supreme Court reckoning
Photo: Kevin Lamarque
Date: 17-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Lawrence Hurley and Valerie Volcovici
With a barrage of legal briefs, a coalition of business groups and Republican-leaning states are taking their fight against Obama administration climate change regulations to the U.S. Supreme Court.
BP to ask UK government to intervene on Gulf spill payments: BBC
Date: 17-May-13
Country: UK
Author: Andrew Callus
British oil company BP wants Prime Minister David Cameron to intervene with the U.S. government over the escalating cost of compensating U.S. companies for the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster in 2010, the BBC reported Thursday.
New protest in Chinese city over planned chemical plant
Photo: Wong Campion
Date: 17-May-13
Country: CHINA
Author: Ben Blanchard
Hundreds of people took to the streets of the southwestern Chinese city of Kunming on Thursday to protest against the planned production of a chemical at a refinery, the second demonstration this month against the project.
Six dead, seven missing in Texas tornadoes: county spokesman
Date: 17-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Ian Simpson
Six people were killed and seven are missing after tornadoes slammed into north-central Texas after dark, Hood County spokesman Tye Bell said on Thursday.
Cyclone Mahasen buffets Bangladesh coast, six dead
Photo: Andrew Biraj
Date: 17-May-13
Country: BANGLADESH
Author: Andrew Biraj
Cyclone Mahasen buffeted Bangladesh's low-lying coast on Thursday, killing six people after forcing many thousands into emergency shelters, but authorities downgraded warnings later in the day as the storm lost strength.
Norwegian firm to seek ways to trap cement factory CO2
Date: 17-May-13
Country: NORWAY
Author: Alister Doyle
Norway's Aker Solutions has won a contract to make the world's first tests for capturing emissions of carbon dioxide from cement factories as part of efforts to slow climate change, the company said on Thursday.
Monster Texas tornado kills six, seven people missing
Photo: Richard Rodriguez
Date: 17-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Jana J. Pruet
Six people were dead and seven missing after a powerful tornado ripped through a neighborhood that included housing for the poor in the north Texas town of Granbury, marking the deadliest severe storm outbreak in the United States so far this year.
New fracking rules attempt to placate opposing camps
Photo: Shannon Stapleton
Date: 17-May-13
Country: USA
Author: Ayesha Rascoe
The Obama administration on Thursday unveiled a new proposal for regulating hydraulic fracturing on federal lands, rolling back some measures from its original, abandoned draft as it sought to ease concerns the rules would be too burdensome for producers.
BYD's electric taxis hit Hong Kong roads with big ambitions
Photo: Tyrone Siu
Date: 16-May-13
Country: HONG KONG
Author: Lavinia Mo
Warren Buffett-backed Chinese carmaker BYD Co Ltd rolled out Hong Kong's first electric taxi fleet on Wednesday, marking a milestone for its all-electric battery car that highlights its promise and its limitations.
Japan takes first step to a permanent reactor shutdown after Fukushima
Photo: Kyodo
Date: 16-May-13
Country: JAPAN
Author: Risa Maeda
Experts judged on Wednesday that a reactor on Japan's west coast is located on ground at high risk of an earthquake, setting in motion a process that will likely lead to the first permanent shutdown of a nuclear plant since the 2011 Fukushima crisis.
China granted observer seat on Arctic governing council
Date: 16-May-13
Country: SWEDEN
Author: Alister Doyle
The Arctic Council agreed on Wednesday to admit emerging powers China and India as observers, reflecting growing global interest in the trade and energy potential of the planet's Far North.