Environment

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A vegetable vendor peeks out from behind a sign promoting arugula at a market in Buenos Aires. (Associated Press)

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**FILE** Officers of the urban management bureau, known as chengguan in Chinese, demand Nov. 20, 2011, a beggar and his child leave a street in Guiyang, in southwestern China's Guizhou province. (Associated Press)

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Gerry Bell, lead seasonal hurricane forecaster at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Climate Prediction Center, discusses the upcoming hurricane season at a press conference in Miami on Thursday, May 24, 2012. (AP Photo/J. Pat Carter)

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Mohamed El Baradei, former chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency, speaks May 24, 2012, to the media in Vienna, Austria. (Associated Press)

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Craftmark Homes is building 91 single-family homes at Park Ridge in Clarksburg. The Oakton Alternate model, with 4,275 square feet, is priced from $738,900 to $758,900.

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Photo by patrick Michaelyan, Positive Energy LLC The calibrated door blower test is a common diagnostic measure used by firms that conduct energy audits. It helps pinpoint where cracks and poor seals are letting air in and out of a home.

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Quarry Springs at Stoneyhurst in Bethesda will offer 97 condominium homes in four buildings on the site of the oldest working quarry in the region. The homes, with 2,200 to 4,000 finished square feet, will range in price from $1,800,000 to $4,000,000.

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Buyers at Quarry Springs can customize their homes with a choice of walnut, cherry or oak flooring and kitchen cabinets in 10 styles and colors.

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Palmetto trees, the state tree of South Carolina, frame a gas station sign on Folly Beach, S.C., on Monday, May 21, 2012. The Carolinas AAA motor club reported that South Carolina had the cheapest gas in the nation on Monday and prices could drop even more this summer. (AP Photo/Bruce Smith)

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Axis deer are plentiful on the island of Maui in Hawaii, where they have caused considerable damage over the years to the landscape, but now there are an estimated 100 on the Big Island, 30 miles away, and no one knows how they got there. (Forest and Kim Starr via Associated Press)