Dealers oppose a plan to adopt California’s emission standards.

Maryland auto dealers oppose a plan for the state to adopt California-style emission standards to reduce vehicle pollution, arguing that the program does not regulate nitrogen oxides which are the real problem.

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Proposed clean air act all huff and puff. Prime Minister Stephen Harper's Conservative government is taking a weak approach to environmental issues with its proposed clean air legislation and a related promise of $345 million to fund biofuels development in Canada, says NDP Leader Jack Layton. [News Source]

City steps up effort to sniff out smog. Ontario's dirty air watchdogs are doubling the monitoring they use to declare smog alerts in Ottawa but a city advisor says it still can't tell us where we're breathing in the worst pollution. [News Source]

China launches campaign to clean up the environment. China is launching a multi-billion-dollar effort to cut pollution and soaring coal and oil demand by raising energy efficiency in apartments and office buildings, a government minister said Thursday. [News Source]

Censured Chinese power firms say cleaning up act. Four of China's largest power companies censured last week for violating environmental protection rules have closed down most of their offending plants. [News Source]

The toxic top 10 that are choking our city. City chiefs have drawn up a map identifying the worst places in the city for build-ups of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) – mainly caused by lorries and cars. The city council monitors 13 areas, called air-quality management zones, to assess how bad pollution is in the city. [News Source]

City gets second biomass proposal. A Jacksonville company is offering to become a second producer of biomass energy for the city of Tallahassee. [News Source]

Perry sued over coal-plant permits. Four local environmental groups sued Gov. Rick Perry on Thursday over his executive order that put permits for new coal-burning power plants on the fast track. [News Source]

House Dems target energy independence, global warming. As the House's new Democratic majority celebrated the completion of its populist 100-hour agenda Thursday, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., unveiled the party's next legislative target: an ambitious plan to wean the U.S. from foreign oil and slow global warming. [News Source]

Tories announce new funding for clean energy.

The Conservative government announced $230 million in new funding Wednesday for the development of clean energy technologies.

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Climate change: Lessons from a distant monsoon. The burden of global warming falls most heavily on the developing world. A connection forged between the Indian Ocean climate, Asian monsoons and drought in Indonesia makes for an especially bleak outlook for that nation. [News Source]