"Scuffles between protesters and security guards marred BP's first annual shareholder meeting since the Gulf oil spill Thursday, as investors registered their disapproval with sizable protest votes against company directors."
The fiscal year 2011 budget deal just passed by Congress slashes funds for weather satellites. That may hurt the bottom lines of small and large businesses from farming to shipping and insurance that depend on accurate weather forecasts. It is also wasteful of taxpayer funds, since the temporary budget cut is just show, according to the Congressional Budget Office, and laid-off workers in the program will need to be hired back at greater cost. It may also mean that people will die in weather disasters.
Some 10,000 young activists descend on Washington, DC, this weekend to train, network, lobby, and demonstrate on climate change in an event called Power Shift. On dirty energy, they suspect President Obama has goe over to the dark side.
"With everything Big Oil and the government have learned in the year since the Gulf of Mexico disaster, could it happen again? Absolutely, according to an Associated Press examination of the industry and interviews with experts on the perils of deep-sea drilling."
"The operator of Japan’s tsunami-damaged nuclear plant said Friday it would pay an initial $12,000 for each household forced to evacuate because of leaking radiation — a handout some of the displaced slammed as too little."
"Canada's annual seal hunt opened Monday off northeastern Newfoundland in an area called The Front, but few sealers went to the ice amid low demand for seal pelts, poor prices and a European Union ban on seal products."
"A fatal bat disease has been confirmed in Kentucky for the first time, state and federal officials said Wednesday."
"Two of the most well-known penguin species in Antarctica -- chinstraps and Adelies -- are under pressure because a warmer climate has cut deeply into their main food source, shrimp-like creatures called krill."
Mark Twain was not only one of America's most under-appreciated nature writers, but he may also have been the Jon Stewart of his time -- blending satire with acute journalistic observation to puncture received wisdom with real truth. Francesca Lyman starts a discussion on the subject in Sacramento -- Twain's old stomping grounds.
"With the Obama administration moving to impose tougher limits on toxic air pollution as well as emissions that lead to smog and acid rain, it's betting the private sector can add a new technology to the utility industry's arsenal."
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