Air

"WASHINGTON, DC -- The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency [Wednesday] issued a rule making greener refrigeration gases legal in household refrigerators and some commercial freezers."

"The Environmental Protection Agency is expected Friday to approve a tough new rule to limit emissions of mercury, arsenic and other toxic substances from the country's power plants, according to people with knowledge of the new standard."

"BEIJING — Armed with a device that looks like an old transistor radio, some Beijing residents are recording pollution levels and posting them online. It’s an act that borders on subversion. The government keeps secret all data on the fine particles that shroud China’s capital in a health-threatening smog most days. But as they grow more prosperous, Chinese are demanding the right to know what the government does not tell them: just how polluted their city is."

"The federal government's strict new rules on mercury emissions are a pro-life issue that Christians should embrace to protect unborn children, according to a group of Christian environmentalists."

"The Scripps Institution of Oceanography will present fresh evidence during a science conference in San Francisco Tuesday that pollution from central Asia affects the intensity of winter storms in California's Sierra Nevada, which provides a portion of the water consumed in San Diego County."

"U.S. EPA [Friday] released a reworked package of proposed rules to tackle toxic emissions from 201,000 of the largest boilers and incinerators nationwide, hoping to clear up complaints from manufacturing groups as the agency clamps down on the industrial boilers that are one of the largest U.S. sources of harmful air pollution."

"The Obama administration said Thursday that a series of new air pollution rules for power plants would not cause power shortages, although the expert panel designated by the government to ensure electricity reliability warns that compliance with these rules could strain generating capacity.

"BALTIMORE — An environmental group said Wednesday that infrared video shows air pollution streaming from natural gas sites that have been sprouting up across the Chesapeake Bay watershed."

The first-ever rule to limit toxic mercury in coal-fired powerplant emissions is about to take effect. It will require updating antique equipment -- and part of the utility is fighting that tooth and nail, complaining about how costs will hurt the economy. But where plants have installed the new scrubbing devices, many new jobs have been created.