Bad air, here chemicals, UV a deadly mixture.

If our smog doesn’t rot your lungs, the sun shining through may attack your skin. Lung and skin cancer rates in the Great Lakes region, the province’s smog belt, are higher than Ontario averages.

[News Source]

Is Ankleshwar fit to handle Bhopal waste? The Gujarat Pollution Control Board has given the Bhopal toxic waste disposal plan the go ahead in Ankleshwar, but it has barely started work on Central Pollution Control Board’s directive, even six months thereafter. [News Source]

Experts predict rise in pollution-related deaths. Health officials warned that some 4,000 people in California will die over the next 13 years as a result of pollution-related illness, it was reported Saturday. [News Source]

Simple options for summer’s outdoor get-togethers cut pollution, save energy. You don't have to sacrifice any of the fun of a summer cookout to make things just a little easier on the environment. [News Source]

Are hybrid cars worth the cost? Hybrid automobiles used to be the sort of thing reserved for high-end car shows or a museum's Future World exhibit. But with gas prices perilously approaching the $3.50 mark, hybrid vehicles are becoming the way to go. [News Source]

Gas prices put charge in electric car interest They have cute names such as ZAP, ZENN, Kurrent and Dynasty, and an Oak Forest used-car dealer thinks they can help save the planet. Rick Sbragia, who for years hawked high-end nameplates such as Lexus and Mercedes, says the Lilliputian electric cars he's now selling have caused a U-turn in his thinking about car exhaust and global warming. [News Source]

Oil refineries struggle to keep up. Gasoline supplies keep getting tighter, as growing demand, increasingly complex environmental standards, the lingering effects of hurricanes and the oil glut of the 1980s conspire to make U.S. refineries into energy-supply bottlenecks, despite their attempts to keep up. [News Source]

Firing up the grill? Make it a ‘rare’ occasion.

Although pretty much anything tastes better hot off the grill, the natural chemicals that give barbecued foods their trademark crusty-brown smokiness are toxic and carcinogenic.

[News Source]

Reaping what we sow in shadow of a stack. Mercury, lead, dioxin and arsenic and their components are released into the air from a Canadian hazardous waste disposal site. Farmers downwind worry about cancer. [News Source]

Learning in the shadow of coal. Thirty-five years after a coal mine's waste dam failed and wiped out a community, an Appalachian elementary school sits at the very foot of another massive lagoon. [News Source]

Riding the hydrogen highway. When California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger visits Vancouver next week, he and Premier Gordon Campbell will be touting the "hydrogen highway" as a key initiative in the pursuit of a more environmentally sustainable transportation sector. [News Source]