Britain’s steams and lakes are twice as brown as they were two decades ago because they are returning to their pre industrial revolution colour,

China’s water and air are straining to cope with the country’s industrial take-off, the government said on Monday

For the first time, emissions of a key component of acid rain and smog from power plants fell below 10 million tons in a year

New Jersey is considering a proposal that would phase out plastic bags over the next three years in stores larger than 10,000 square feet. The proposal would make it the first state in the country to outlaw plastic grocery bags.

“These bags are a serious environmental problem,” said Assemblyman Herb Conaway (D), a sponsor of the bill with Assemblyman Jack Conners (D). “Millions of them become litter that ends up in the soil and water and can harm wildlife. They take years to break down. They help fill up our landfills. And they take 12 million barrels of oil a year to make.”

Last week, San Francisco became the first U.S. city to ban plastic bans, and similar bans are being considered in cities around the world. But the bans are controversial for two reasons: Plastic bags are convenient, and there are concerns that paper bags contribute just as much to the world’s pollution problem.

The United States and European Union proposed a major trade plan today that seeks to open the international exchange on hundreds of billions of dollars in climate-friendly goods and services.

In a joint announcement, President Bush’s top trade official and the E.U. trade commissioner outlined a two-step proposal that seeks to expand global markets on everything from solar panels to wind mill turbines, nuclear reactor parts and environmental engineering.

“By eliminating tariff and non-tariff barriers to environmental goods and services, particularly clean energy technologies, we can lower their costs and increase global access to and use of these important products,” said U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab.

Companies that invent cutting-edge energy technologies and their financiers are in agreement: Developing clean energy will require them to get their hands dirty in Washington.

So the so-called cleantech sector is boosting its lobbying and trying to get smart about swaying federal policy.

“I think the investment community and the clean energy community must, and slowly are, becoming more politically mature and sophisticated,” said John O’Donnell, executive vice president of Ausra Inc., a California-based solar-energy startup.

Congress’ failure to increase Nuclear Regulatory Commission funding above fiscal 2007 levels could delay the agency’s consideration of reactor-license applications by as much as two years, NRC Chairman Dale Klein warned yesterday.

Klein said his agency was in a “growth spurt” and needs more money to tackle the largest workload it has ever confronted. Over the next few years, he said, the commission expects to review applications for 21 new reactors, the Energy Department’s license for the Yucca Mountain waste repository along with reactor license renewals and power upgrades.

“We will not compromise the safety of the existing fleet,” Klein told a gathering at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies.

House and Senate negotiators are close to agreement on fuel efficiency regulations, with a few key issues — chiefly, the extension of flex-fuel credits for automakers and U.S. EPA authority over tailpipe emissions — still on the table, lobbyists tracking energy-bill talks said today.

Lawmakers have settled on a final corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) target of 35 miles per gallon — the same as in the Senate bill — but have kept as a concession to the House separate regulations for passenger cars and light trucks, the sources said.

House and Senate aides are scrambling to wrap up energy-bill negotiations this week. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has expressed hopes of unveiling a final compromise package when lawmakers return next week from Thanksgiving break, and congressional aides say there could be votes on measure then.

After another round of destructive Southern California wildfires, a Senate appropriator wants state and local governments to straighten building standards in fire-prone areas.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), chairwoman of the Senate Interior Appropriations Subcommittee, wants the National Institute of Standards and Technology to create a model “fire safe” ordinance for communities within the wildland-urban interface (WUI), including suggested standards for water supplies, building materials, defensible space and vegetation management.

In order to get communities to play ball, Feinstein’s bill (S. 2390) would give them more money from the federal government when fires do come. Currently, the Federal Emergency Management Agency reimburses 75 percent of the firefighting and emergency costs of state and local governments, but that would go up to 90 percent for those entities that participate in the new ordinance.

More than 1 billion trees have been planted around the world so far this year, the United Nations Environment Programme reported today.

The agency said that the worldwide tree plantings, inspired by the work of Nobel Peace laureate Wangari Maathai, will help reverse the damaging effects of deforestation and climate change.

“An initiative to catalyze the pledging and the planting of 1 billion trees has achieved and indeed surpassed its mark. It is a further sign of the breathtaking momentum witnessed this year on the challenge for this generation — climate change,” UNEP chief Achim Steiner said in a statement.