Senate passes energy bill Late last month, after seemingly endless go-rounds, the Senate passed an energy bill that contains big boosts for nuclear power, "clean coal," and corn-blended ethanol, and would require 10 percent of electrical utilities' power to come from renewables by 2020. "With oil prices recently topping $60 a barrel, this legislation can come none too soon," said Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), though the bill's allegedly propitious timing was cast in doubt by Energy Secretary Sam Bodman's forthright acknowledgment that it wouldn't actually affect oil prices at all. The Senate's version of the bill bypasses several contentious …

Bush gets the watered-down G8 climate statement he wanted President Bush got exactly what he wanted on climate change during last week's G8 meeting of industrialized nations: The appearance of compromise without any shift in his administration's position. Just when it seemed that U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair -- buoyed by London's winning bid to host the 2012 Olympic Games -- was succeeding in putting real international pressure on Bush to budge on the issue, a series of terror attacks struck Britain's capital city, distracting the world's attention, muting protests, and casting a pall over the G8 agenda. One day …

With the G8 Summit just days away, pop stars the world over are preparing for marathon concerts tomorrow in each of the eight wealthiest nations in the world. Modeled after the Live Aid concerts 20 years ago (when the likes of U2, David Bowie, and Mick Jagger performed for some 1.5 billion people and helped raise money for Ethiopia's famine), the Live 8 concerts aim to draw attention to and demand action from the leaders gathering at the summit. Unfortunately, however, Live 8 is focused on only one of summit leader Tony Blair's two main goals for the meeting -- …

State-controlled Chinese oil company makes big bid for America's Unocal China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), a state-controlled Chinese oil company, is making an $18.5 billion bid to take over California-based oil and gas firm Unocal, which has extensive Asian operations. Rival bidder Chevron warns that China will have the power to raise energy prices for U.S. consumers if CNOOC prevails, and some lawmakers are anxious about national-security implications. But the Bush administration seems loath to comment on the deal, since China has some very pointy hooks in the U.S. economy. In particular, it acquired over $200 billion in U.S. …

Energy execs beg Congress to let them dig up the West for oil shale "We can safely say of our future with regard to oil and gas, it has yet to see its brightest days," said Rep. James Gibbons (R-Nev.) in a House subcommittee meeting yesterday. We know what you're thinking: What the ... ? Well, apparently Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming are sitting on top of lots and lots of oil shale, a porous rock soaked through with petroleum. In fact, the Green River Basin is estimated to contain over a trillion barrels of oil, enough to eliminate trans-Atlantic oil …

Fiddling on the roof. Photo: AstroPower/NREL. The Golden State could soon enact the most ambitious solar-energy initiative ever proposed in the U.S. -- legislation intended to put photovoltaic panels on a million California rooftops. Unless, that is, the bill gets derailed by a behind-the-scenes political pissing match between Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who has thrown his prodigious weight behind the initiative, and the Democrats who control the state legislature. The Governator unveiled the initiative last August under the name "Million Solar Homes," proposing a 10-year subsidy plan to stimulate solar purchases on residential buildings. It picked up bipartisan backing from …

Senate quashes emissions caps and state authority over LNG terminals The Senate voted yesterday to reject a measure that would have given governors more power over the siting of terminals for tankers carrying liquefied natural gas. The Bush administration has pushed for total federal control over LNG terminal sites, while many state officials -- including California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) -- and coast-state senators contend that the terminals could be targets for terrorist attacks or pose safety risks. The Senate also rejected by 60-38 the McCain-Lieberman proposal for mandatory caps on greenhouse-gas emissions, with opponents making the usual arguments that …

Remember when you first heard about that big hole in the ozone? Remember how they called it "the ozone hole"? Man, life was good then. Raise your hand if you're sure ... what you're talking about. Now everyone's talking about global warming. Or, actually, climate change. Or ... uh ... anthropogenic forcing? What we've got, to most people's ears, is global gibberish. This scientific lingo isn't just confusing the way, say, particle physics is confusing. It's also politicized beyond belief. Industry groups, politicians, scientists, and activists battle over terminology, wresting phrases from each other left and right. Onlookers are left …

Desertification will be big bummer for hundreds of thousands worldwide Hundreds of thousands of people -- some of them the world's poorest -- will be displaced in the next 30 years as the globe's deserts expand, according to the latest report from the U.N.'s Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. Climate change is likely to intensify droughts, heat waves, and floods in "drylands," which comprise 41 percent of the earth's land surface and are home to 2.1 billion people. Other human factors also contribute to desertification, including unsustainable farming and irrigation practices, overgrazing, and population overload. And the impacts are global: Huge dust …

Global warming to cause X-treme hurricanes; Sprite sponsorship in works Coming soon to our warming globe: extreme hurricanes. Research just published in the journal Science suggests that as higher temperatures draw more ocean water into the atmosphere, hurricanes and typhoons will intensify. Over the course of the 20th century, water vapor over the oceans increased by 5 percent overall and 10 percent in areas where hurricanes form, and will jump an additional 7 percent for every 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit the planet warms. Climatologists can't determine if there will be more storms -- numbers tend to hold steady worldwide from year …