Publication archives

The wildfires that swept through Southern California in 2003 may have caused wheezing and other respiratory problems in many children, even those without asthma, according to a new study. Asthmatic children, being particularly susceptible to the effects of the smoky air, suffered the most symptoms, the study found.

A dramatic rise of sea levels by the end of the century could wipe out some of America's barrier islands off its eastern and southern coasts, researchers said on Tuesday.

Like U.S. GIs during World War II, they're "oversexed and over here." The gray squirrel _ introduced to Britain from the United States in the 19th century _ is now overrunning the countryside, out-breeding and out-eating its smaller British cousin, the red squirrel.

The president of Uganda asked the National Forest Authority boss to quit after he refused to license a palm oil company to destroy a pristine rainforest on an island in Lake Victoria, according to his resignation note.

Ecuador's President-elect Rafael Correa said Sunday that he will not sign a free trade agreement with the United States. Talks between the U.S. and Ecuador derailed in May, after Ecuador canceled the operating contract of California-based Occidental Petroleum Corp.

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. -- U.S. corn farmers and ethanol makers will continue to have less competition from foreign imports of the renewable fuel until 2009. Included in legislation passed late Friday and early Saturday by the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate was an extension of the 54-cent-per-gallon tariff on imported ethanol.

As war simmers in the Middle East and oil prices rise along with global temperatures, Midwestern farmers and politicians aren't the only ones banging the drums for biofuels. Now big-time investors, security hawks, environmentalists, and even George W. Bush have joined their ranks. But is environmentally responsible bioenergy a real possibility, or are we bio-fooling ourselves?