Climate Change

"The first round of UN climate change talks since the Cancun summit in December is underway in Bangkok this week."

On a 50-50 vote, the Senate Wednesday night rejected an effort to strip EPA of its legal authority to regulate greenhouse gases, as well as several weaker alternatives. The efforts were supported by Republicans and some coal-state Democrats. The House may act on similar legislation today.

"In case there was any doubt, the White House on Tuesday issued a formal statement opposing a bill now before the House that would bar the Environmental Protection Agency from regulating greenhouse gases for the purpose of combating climate change." The House could pass it as soon as Wednesday, April 6.

"Last year's record-breaking drought across the Amazon Basin has turned nearly a million square miles of green rainforest to brown, finds a new mapping study based on NASA satellite data."

"Aircraft condensation trails criss-crossing the sky may be warming the planet on a normal day more than the carbon dioxide emitted by all planes since the Wright Brothers' first flight in 1903, a study said on Tuesday."

"President Barack Obama on Wednesday proposed to cut U.S. oil imports by a third over 10 years, a goal that eluded his predecessors and seen as extremely ambitious by analysts skeptical it can succeed."

"Giving new meaning to toasted wheat, a team of agricultural researchers has spent the past three years and almost a million dollars installing electric heaters over wheat fields in the desert of Maricopa, Ariz."

"Vegetation change underway in northern forests as a result of climate change creates feedback loop that prompts more warming, scientists say."