Inherit essential environment variables in tests.

Note: it could be better to generalize this in SCons/Platform/posix.py
instead of just patching the tests.

diff --git a/SCons/ActionTests.py b/SCons/ActionTests.py
--- a/SCons/ActionTests.py
+++ b/SCons/ActionTests.py
@@ -98,6 +98,7 @@ outfile2 = test.workpath('outfile2')
 pipe_file = test.workpath('pipe.out')
 
 scons_env = SCons.Environment.Environment()
+scons_env['ENV']['PATH'] += os.environ['PATH']
 
 # Capture all the stuff the Actions will print,
 # so it doesn't clutter the output.
@@ -1090,6 +1091,8 @@ class CommandActionTestCase(unittest.TestCase):
         except AttributeError:
             env = Environment()
 
+        env = Environment(ENV={'PATH': os.environ['PATH']})
+
         cmd1 = r'%s %s %s xyzzy' % (_python_, act_py, outfile)
 
         act = SCons.Action.CommandAction(cmd1)
@@ -1884,7 +1887,7 @@ class ListActionTestCase(unittest.TestCase):
                     f.write("class2b\n")
 
         act = SCons.Action.ListAction([cmd2, function2, class2a(), class2b])
-        r = act([], [], Environment(out=outfile))
+        r = act([], [], Environment(out=outfile, ENV={'PATH' : os.getenv('PATH')}))
         assert isinstance(r.status, class2b), r.status
         c = test.read(outfile, 'r')
         assert c == "act.py: 'syzygy'\nfunction2\nclass2a\nclass2b\n", c
@@ -1948,7 +1951,7 @@ class LazyActionTestCase(unittest.TestCase):
         a([], [], env=Environment(BAR=f, s=self))
         assert self.test == 1, self.test
         cmd = r'%s %s %s lazy' % (_python_, act_py, outfile)
-        a([], [], env=Environment(BAR=cmd, s=self))
+        a([], [], env=Environment(BAR=cmd, s=self, ENV={'PATH' : os.getenv('PATH')}))
         c = test.read(outfile, 'r')
         assert c == "act.py: 'lazy'\n", c
 
diff --git a/SCons/SConfTests.py b/SCons/SConfTests.py
--- a/SCons/SConfTests.py
+++ b/SCons/SConfTests.py
@@ -71,7 +71,9 @@ class SConfTestCase(unittest.TestCase):
         # and we need a new environment, cause references may point to
         # old modules (well, at least this is safe ...)
         self.scons_env = self.Environment.Environment()
-        self.scons_env.AppendENVPath('PATH', os.environ['PATH'])
+        # Inherit the OS environment to get essential variables.
+        inherited_env = os.environ.copy()
+        self.scons_env['ENV'] = inherited_env
 
         # we want to do some autodetection here
         # this stuff works with