NEW YORK — Investment banks insist that climate change is not a fad and say this will be the year when returns start coming in Climate change has been on investment banks’ radar screens for more than a decade. But the promise of high returns from the renewable energy sector has until recently failed to materialise. Progress has been hindered by regulatory tussles about emissions, unproven technologies, weak performance from some public companies, difficulty in valuations and patchy investor demand. However, investment bankers expect this year to be the one when the sector delivers. They spent the past 12 months building their teams to take advantage of the well-financed wave of companies focused on emissions technologies, clean coal and other forms of new energy technologies. John Cavalier, head of alternative energy investment banking at Credit Suisse, said: ‘Some people say this is a bubble and a fad. We know this is for real and people need to understand that climate change is a scientific reality. We believe the drivers today are permanent drivers.’ Andrew Safran, global head of energy, power and chemicals investment banking at Citigroup, said: ‘The alternative energy sectors, while not huge today, […]
WASHINGTON — Researchers at the California Department of Public Health said autism rates in that state have continued to rise despite the removal of the mercury-containing preservative thimerosal from most childhood vaccines. The research, which is being published in this month’s Archives of General Psychiatry, looked at autism rates of children ages 3 to 12 from 1995 through March 2007 who had active cases with the department, or those who were receiving services from the state for an autism disorder. In 1999 federal health officials recommended the elimination of thimerosal from children’s vaccines on concerns about a possible link to rising autism rates seen in the 1990s. In 2004, the Institute of Medicine concluded there wasn’t a relationship between the mercury-containing vaccines and autism, but recommended researchers continue looking at autism rates as thimerosal exposure dropped. Autism is characterized as impairments in social interaction, communication, and unusual behavior and interests. The cause of the disorder isn’t known, and there is no cure, although medication and therapy can improve symptoms. Other states besides California have also reported an increase in autism rates. Federal health officials have said part of the increase in rates, which fall under […]
A couple of years ago, Michael T. Arnold landed at the Los Angeles International Airport after a 20-hour flight from the Philippines. He had his laptop with him, and a customs officer took a look at what was on his hard drive. Clicking on folders called ‘Kodak pictures’ and ‘Kodak memories,’ the officer found child pornography. The search was not unusual: the government contends that it is perfectly free to inspect every laptop that enters the country, whether or not there is anything suspicious about the computer or its owner. Rummaging through a computer’s hard drive, the government says, is no different than looking through a suitcase. One federal appeals court has agreed, and a second seems ready to follow suit. There is one lonely voice on the other side. In 2006, Judge Dean D. Pregerson of Federal District Court in Los Angeles suppressed the evidence against Mr. Arnold. ‘Electronic storage devices function as an extension of our own memory,’ Judge Pregerson wrote, in explaining why the government should not be allowed to inspect them without cause. ‘They are capable of storing our thoughts, ranging from the most whimsical to the most profound.’ Computer hard […]
The U.S. government today postponed a final decision on whether to list the polar bear as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act. The delay stems from a backlog of work, not scientific uncertainty or a pending lease sale for oil and gas development in polar bear habitat, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said during a telephone press briefing. The service said it will miss its original Wednesday deadline but plans to make a formal recommendation within 30 days. No firm decision date was set, however. Evaluation of a suite of reports from the U.S. Geological Survey that concluded two-thirds of the world’s polar bears could go extinct by 2050 prompted the delay, the service said. The studies were completed last September, but in response, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reopened and extended a public comment period on the findings. Evaluation of the new science and the comments it generated is still going on, Dale Hall, director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said during the briefing. ‘While we do not like missing time lines that are called for under the act, it is far more important to us to […]
CHICAGO — Flu viruses must be able to pick a very specific type of lock before entering human respiratory cells, U.S. researchers said on Sunday, offering a new understanding of how flu viruses work. The discovery may help scientists better monitor changes in the H5N1 bird flu virus that could trigger a deadly pandemic in humans. And it may lead to better ways to fight it, they said. The scientists found that a flu virus must be able to attach itself to an umbrella-shaped receptor coating human respiratory cells before it can infect cells in the upper airways. ‘What the lock needs is the right key. It opens the door,’ said Ram Sasisekharan, a professor of biological engineering and health sciences at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. The H5N1 avian flu virus now almost exclusively infects birds. But it can occasionally pass to a person. Experts have feared that the bird flu virus would evolve slightly into a form that people can easily catch and pass to one another, triggering an epidemic. ‘We now know what to look for,’ said Sasisekharan, whose study appears in the journal Nature Biotechnology. Before a flu […]
Remote Viewing the Year 2060
