Pity the poor American consumer. If he is even fortunate enough to have a job in this weak economy, his purchasing power is eroded by steadily rising food and health care prices. Wages are stagnant, and at the same time, policymakers in Washington are taking a breather from the long-term budget fight that is doing little to help American consumers.
Environmentalists are toiling to stop a modern-day gold rush at the top of the world, as the U.S. and four other countries scramble to stake claims to potentially vast oil riches under the frozen waters of the Arctic Ocean.
The entire world will soon depend on renewable energy so governments ought to start subsidizing these industries immediately. So said the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in a report released Tuesday. The study's conclusion was such a blockbuster that the panel issued a press release last month previewing the finding. "Close to 80 percent of the world's energy supply could be met by renewables by mid-century if backed by the right enabling public policies a new report shows," it proclaimed.
Dozens of environmental activists on Sunday climbed on top of Berlin's landmark Brandenburg Gate to demand a speedy end to the use of atomic energy.
Three Greenpeace activists on Sunday climbed up an oil rig off Greenland's coast in an attempt to stop a Scottish oil company from starting deepwater drilling in the arctic waters, the environmental group said.
Renewable sources such as solar and wind could supply up to 80 percent of the world's energy needs by 2050 and play a significant role in fighting global warming, a top climate panel concluded Monday.
Greenpeace said Monday that hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians are still eating food contaminated by radiation from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant explosion a quarter-century after the blast.
Just 20 miles north of where BP's blown-out well spewed millions of gallons of oil into the sea, life appears bountiful despite initial fears that crude could have wiped out many of these delicate deep-water habitats.
Hundreds of FBI agents, including the head of the Washington field office and several supervisors, cheated on a mandatory test of new procedures employees must follow when conducting investigations of U.S. citizens — the Justice Department inspector general said in the second critical report handed down against the bureau in recent weeks.
