Diesel soot major global warming factor

NASA scientists say soot, mostly from diesel engines, is causing as much as a quarter of all observed global warming by reducing the ability of snow and ice to reflect sunlight.

Soot is a blackened material formed mainly from carbon particles that are, along with salts and dust, byproducts of burning fossil fuels and vegetation.

The Bush administration in 2001 ordered pollution cuts from heavy-duty diesel engines and diesel fuel used in highway trucks and buses. This year it proposed requiring a 90 percent reduction in pollution from diesel-powered construction and other off-road equipment, starting with 2008 models. (AP)

Federal court stops Bush’s changes in clean air regulations

A federal appeals court yesterday blocked some of the Bush administration’s changes to the Clean Air Act from taking effect, dealing a major setback to one of the White House’s biggest environmental decisions. Melissa McHenry, spokeswoman for Columbus-based American Electric Power, told The Plain Dealer she could not comment immediately on the court order because company officials had not yet had a chance to review it.

Suing to block the maintenance rule were the attorneys general of 12 states: Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin --and officials from New York City, Washington, San Francisco, New Haven and a host of other cities in Connecticut. Eliot Spitzer, New York’s attorney general, called the ruling a major decision.

“When it comes to environmental policy, this court decision is as big a success as we’ve had in stopping the Bush administration from undercutting the Clean Air Act,” he said. Tom Reilly, the Massachusetts attorney general, said the court “forced the EPA to take back its early Christmas present to the coal-fired power plants in the Midwest.”(AP)

Epic trip for ‘alternative’ car

A car that runs on just hydrogen and solar power has completed a journey through Australia -- the first crossing of a continent for a car of this type.

The organizers say the grueling 4,000 km trip shows greener alternatives to the traditional internal combustion engine can be developed. The exhaust emissions of the Japanese-built car consist of pure water.

“If you’re asking when this technology could be commercially viable, then the answer is ‘how long is a piece of string?’,” said Hans Tholstrup, an organizer of the event who pioneered solar-powered car races in Australia two decades ago. (BBC)

Florida suburbs pollute Everglades

A pumping operation on the edge of Florida’s Everglades is sending waves of apprehension across the Continental Divide, all the way to the West Coast.

“The thing that worries us the most is, there could be a blank check to pump dirty water around to much cleaner or pristine water,” said Howard Fox, an Earthjustice legal defense fund attorney representing more than a half- dozen environmental groups that filed a brief in the case. At the center of this storm is a large pumping station that sends polluted water from the western suburbs of Fort Lauderdale across a levee into the Everglades.

Last year, in a lawsuit filed by the Miccosukee Indian Tribe of Florida, the 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court ruling that the pumping operation needed a Clean Water Act discharge permit because it was piping water laced with phosphorus and other pollutants into the Everglades. The South Florida Water Management District, which runs the pumping station, argued that it was not the source of the contamination and was simply transferring water from one side of a levee to another.

The Supreme Court has been showered with written arguments in the case, including some from the US solicitor general. It initially urged the court not to take the case and then sided with the Florida water district. The federal arguments have been criticized by environmental groups and some former officials of the Environmental Protection Agency, who say it could narrow the reach of the Clean Water Act, exempting discharges between waterways. (San Francisco Chronicle)

Scientists at Texas A&M University produce first cloned deer

Tests have confirmed that a fawn named Dewey, born to a surrogate mother in May, was a genetic duplicate of a male white-tailed deer whose skin samples were used in the cloning process. Texas A&M said it was the first academic institution to have cloned five different species.

Its scientists have also cloned cattle, goats, pigs and a cat, the school said. (Reuters)