December 4th - 8th

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ENN rounds up the most important and compelling environmental news stories of the week. In the news December 4th - 8th: Wakeful bears, bird flu questions, the cell phone-cancer link, a greener Victoria's Secret catalog, and much more.

Top Ten Articles of the Week

In the news October December 4th - 8th: Wakeful bears, bird flu questions, the cell phone-cancer link, a greener Victoria's Secret catalog, and much more.


1. Brazil Creates Largest Tropical Rainforest Preserve
Brazil created the world's largest tropical rainforest preserve Monday in a section of the Amazon scarred by illegal logging and decades of violence between loggers, ranchers, conservationists and land rights activists.


2. EPA to Begin Final World Trade Center Health Air and Dust Testing
The Environmental Protection Agency plans to launch its final Sept. 11 contamination cleanup program next month, more than five years after the attacks and following years of criticism that the agency still has not done enough.


3. Flowers in Alps, Bears Can't Sleep as Winter Waits
Flowers are blooming on the slopes of Alpine ski resorts and bears are having trouble hibernating in Siberia amid a late start to winter that may be a portent of global warming.


4. Scientists Criticize Bird Flu Search
Birds from Latin America -- not from the north -- are most likely to bring deadly bird flu to the main U.S., researchers said Monday, suggesting the government might miss the H5N1 virus because biologists have been looking in the wrong direction.


5. Deal on Tax Breaks Thursday Opens Way for Expanded Gulf Drilling
An agreement on a tax package Thursday moved Congress closer to opening a vast area in the Gulf of Mexico, 125 miles south of Florida's panhandle, to oil and gas drilling.


6. Environment Agency Drops Part of Its Plan to Ease Pollution Reporting Rules
The Bush administration, looking at the prospect of stronger oversight from a Democratic-led Congress, is withdrawing a proposal to let big polluters report less often on what they spew from their smokestacks.


7. Study Disputes Cell Phone-Cancer Link
A huge study from Denmark offers the latest reassurance that cell phones don't trigger cancer. Scientists tracked 420,000 Danish cell phone users, including 52,000 who had gabbed on the gadgets for 10 years or more, and some who started using them 21 years ago.


8. A Greener Look for Victoria's Secret Catalog
The publisher of the Victoria's Secret catalog agreed Wednesday not to buy paper produced from habitat of a threatened Canadian caribou herd, a move environmentalist hailed as a victory in efforts to limit logging in Canada's boreal forests.


9. D.C. Council Passes Green Building Rules for Private Development
Waterless urinals and recycled carpet could become common building features in the nation's capital under green construction legislation passed Tuesday by the District of Columbia Council.


10. Prince Charles to Use Commercial Flights
Putting his money where his environmentalist mouth is, Prince Charles is swapping gas-guzzling private planes and helicopters for commercial flights, train journeys and biodiesel cars.