Thousands of coal fires burn around the world; in the U.S., more than 100 underground fires are burning in at least nine states. Some have been burning for decades, but although they present a health and environmental hazard, they have been difficult to extinguish.

A decades-long drought, the ravages of long-running warfare and shrinking glaciers have exacerbated the ongoing water crisis in Kabul, Afghanistan, heightening concerns for future water availability — and also for security — in one of the harshest environments on Earth.

Nine-year-old Claire Dworsky combined her interests in science and soccer — to become one of the first winners of the national Kids' Science Challenge competition, and the youngest presenter at the American Geophysical Union's fall meeting in 2009.

National income isn't the only factor that should go into calculating a country's GDP, according to a new EARTH feature - environmental sustainability should be part of the equation, too.

What makes humans human? Many definitions have been proposed — language, using tools, even recreational sex — but none of these are unique to human beings. So energy policy analyst Michael Webber, of the University of Texas at Austin, proposes another option: manipulating energy.

In 1983, the erstwhile surface mine Gateway Hill, part of Canada's Athabasca Oil Sands Deposit, resembled a pockmarked, barren moonscape. Today, after years of reclamation effort, Gateway Hill is thickly forested and filled with wildlife — and as the first oil sands mine site to be certified by the government to be at pre-mine condition, it is a model for new and ongoing reclamation projects.

As the climate changes, warmer conditions are creeping northward — and termites, among other creatures, are likely to expand their territories into higher latitudes. Those areas, however, are currently ill-equipped to handle termites, which could cause billions of dollars in property damages.

Inexpensive, abundant and relatively clean: EARTH commenter and Stanford geophysicist Mark Zoback makes the case for natural gas to become a key part of U.S. energy policy.

Buried beneath Alaska’s North Slope are an estimated 17 trillion cubic meters of frozen methane, or natural gas. Getting the gas out of the reservoirs poses technical problems and serious risks — but a new approach that proposes to pump carbon dioxide in to replace the methane could help to solve two looming problems.

The people of Xuan Wei, China, suffer the world's highest incidence of lung cancer among non-smokers. Burning coal from the Permian-Triassic boundary may be to blame.

Whether storing water for the future or conserving it in the present, cities across the United States are beginning to reconsider their water management practices.

Elemental mercury enters the atmosphere via multiple sources, from volcanoes to forest fires to power plants. From there, rain washes it into waterways and wetlands — where it can enter the food chain. But a new study shows that sunlight can help remove significant amounts of mercury from wetlands.

Climatologist Michael Mann met the press today at the American Geophysical Union's fall meeting to answer questions about "Climategate" and what those hacked emails really said about climate science.

The biggest change in tomorrow's agriculture will be one of mindset: It must become an industry closely connected to energy, environment, health, global security and economic prosperity, says EARTH regular contributor George A. Seielstad in this comment.

Subsidence, sedimentation, sea-level change and human manipulation constantly alter the Mississippi Delta. And now, the beloved delta may be irrevocably shrinking.