Industrial Emissions

California utility regulators are poised to take a major step toward curbing emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming. On Thursday, the California Public Utilities Commission is expected to approve rules that would require all investor-owned utilities to make sure that the power they generate or purchase is at least as clean as that produced by the latest generation of natural-gas-fired turbines.

California companies are rushing to voluntarily register their greenhouse gases before the launch of a major statewide program this year to address global warming. A total of 116 companies registered their emissions with the California Climate Action Registry in December -- more than doubling the number of companies enrolled to 221.

ConocoPhillips on Wednesday became the first major U.S. oil company to join a corporate/environmental coalition urging Congress to require limits on greenhouse gases tied to global warming. The decision could give the Houston-based company an important voice in helping to guide legislation that might alter the way the industry produces fuel -- and almost certainly make that production more costly, analysts say. ConocoPhillips became the newest member of the U.S.

Led by California, 31 states representing more than 70% of the U.S. population announced Tuesday that they would measure and jointly track greenhouse gas emissions by major industries. The newly formed Climate Registry is the latest example of states going further than the federal government in taking steps to combat global warming.

Angel Jesus Pacotaype is a child of lead, one of hundreds of youngsters in this Andean town suffering from what a U.S. health study has labeled an "epidemic" of exposure to the toxic metal. The 3-year-old is lethargic and exhibits signs of sluggish development, classic symptoms of lead poisoning. "We are desperate," said Luisa Pacotaype, 39, a mother of five who lives with her family in an adobe house in the old part of town, La Oroya Antigua. "We don't know who to turn to."

It was only three months ago that international energy officials revised a prediction that China would surpass the United States as the world's largest producer of greenhouse gases by 2009 or 2010. It could happen, they warned, as early as the end of this year. That may have been conservative.

Democratic lawmakers charged the Schwarzenegger administration Friday with bullying the state's air board into softening enforcement of environmental laws, as two former top regulators testified that the governor's chief deputies routinely pressured them not to push ahead with policies that industry found objectionable.

California's diesel-powered bulldozers, scrapers and other heavy construction equipment must be retrofitted or replaced over the next 13 years to reduce the air pollution that sickens tens of thousands of residents every year, state regulators decided Thursday. Under tough new rules adopted by the Air Resources Board, California is the first state to make construction companies fix existing diesel-powered machines.

Boeing Co. faces a nearly $500,000 fine for allegedly allowing excessive levels of lead, mercury and other toxins to flow from its Santa Susana Field Lab in Ventura County into surrounding canyons and the Los Angeles River, regulators said Thursday.

Soot from coal-burning factories in northeastern United States may have been the most important factor in the warming of the Arctic region during the first half of the 20th century, U.S. researchers reported Friday. At its peak, soot produced about double the warming effect that modern-day carbon dioxide levels produce -- 3.2 watts per square meter, compared with about 1.6 watts -- the team reported in the online journal Science Express.