Bush environmental policy woeful to the end. As close as they are to losing power and authority, the president's anti-environment minions at the Interior Department felt compelled to pull yet one more harmful stunt. [News Source]

Government has to make a clean break with past. The approach speaks of a scenario in which action taken now will see greenhouse gas emissions peaking by 2020-25, then reaching a plateau for a decade, and finally declining by 2050, with the aim of limiting temperature increases below two degrees. [News Source]

My biodiesel bug. I turned in my red, gas-hungry Jeep Wrangler for a diesel-burning Volkswagen Beetle. Inspired by friends, I would fill my little green slug Bug with a nontoxic, sweet- smelling fuel made from vegetable matter called biodiesel. [News Source]

Smoke-free areas in Australia still a hazy health hazard. NSW pubs and clubs poured millions of dollars into outdoor smoking areas to comply with new laws, but a study has found air quality in many such areas remains "poor" and a potential health hazard. [News Source]

Port funds could be diverted. Money collected in Los Angeles County to clean up its polluted ports would be shared with the Central Valley under a proposal by the Schwarzenegger administration that is drawing opposition from Southern California leaders. [News Source]

Proposal would cut Oregon coal plant’s haze-causing pollution. Oregon regulators are proposing cutting haze-causing pollutants from Portland General Electric's Boardman coal plant by 65 percent by 2014. [News Source]

Oregon agency wants PGE to spend $424 million to clean up Boardman coal plant. The largest contributor to air pollution in the Columbia River Gorge would have to clean up its act — at a cost to its owner of at least $424 million over 10 years — under a draft plan released Thursday by Oregon air quality regulators. [News Source]

Clean up coal plant, regulators say. Portland General Electric should spend more than $400 million of ratepayer money in the next decade to cut 80 percent of the haze- and acid-rain causing pollution that spews from its Boardman coal plant, Oregon regulators proposed Thursday. [News Source]

Hot temperatures usher in smog warning in Puget Sound. The smog watch, called Thursday morning by the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency, serves as a warning that people sensitive to pollution should stay indoors. [News Source]

Navajo, environmental groups challenge EPA permit. Environmentalists and Navajo groups who have been fighting a proposed coal-fired plant on tribal land in northwestern New Mexico have appealed an air permit granted for the plant. [News Source]

Change orders bump up the price of Fernley’s water treatment plant . Since April, the Nevada city council approved six change orders to the city's water treatment plant cost, which was initially priced at $43 million for the treatment plant and the microfiltration membrane system. [News Source]