MANILA: A struggle for control has broken out at the largest power utility in the Philippines after the government put pressure on it to cut rates, and analysts say the dispute could affect privatization of the power sector. The state pension fund, Government Service Insurance System, or GSIS, has called for a management revamp at Manila Electric, or Meralco, in a bid to drive down rates. "I believe we can only bring down rates if we change management and put in somebody who can initiate reforms," said Winston Garcia, president of GSIS.

COLOGNE: The global carbon market more than doubled in 2007 from 2006 to $64 billion, the World Bank said in a study issued on Wednesday. The centerpiece, the European Union emissions trading program doubled in value to $50 billion from a year earlier, the study said. The Kyoto offset market, which consists of emissions reductions achieved outside the industrialized world, also more than doubled last year to $13.4 billion. "It would be a shame for the world to lose this momentum now," said Karan Capoor, the main author of the study.

This just in from Climate Counts, the nonprofit group that scores consumer products companies on their green track records: consumer companies are getting greener, but they are still a pretty carbon-intensive lot. On Wednesday, the group was to release its second annual ranking of 56 consumer companies on how they measure greenhouse gas emissions, their plans to reduce them and how fully they disclose those activities. Its intention is to persuade consumers to use the scores in deciding which brands to buy.

After years of warnings, and a spell of hot weather that did nothing to improve the stink of tons of uncollected trash around Naples, the European Commission filed suit against Italy on Tuesday, charging that it had failed to meet its obligation to collect and dispose of its rubbish.

Duchenne muscular dystrophy may not seem to have much in common with heart attacks. One is a rare inherited disease that primarily strikes boys. The other is a common cause of death in both men and women. To Dr. Atul Butte, they are surprisingly similar.

Hundreds of people marched in a western provincial capital over the weekend to protest environmental risks they say are associated with the construction of a petrochemical factory and oil refinery, witnesses said Monday. It was the latest in a series of rare but increasingly ambitious grass-roots movements in Chinese cities aimed at derailing government-backed industrial projects that could damage the environment and people's health.

MOSCOW: Chinese engineers are coming to the rescue of the Russian electricity sector under a five-year expansion plan that will rival the efforts of Lenin and Stalin to electrify the Soviet Union. An estimated 41,000 megawatts of new generating capacity is expected by 2011, much of it powered by coal rather than natural gas. This goal is way out of reach for Russian machine builders and even threatens to swamp the order books of global companies like General Electric and Siemens.

It is great to see that we Americans finally have some national unity on energy policy. Unfortunately, the unifying idea is so ridiculous, so unworthy of the people aspiring to lead the United States, it takes your breath away.

WASHINGTON: President George W. Bush has proposed spending an additional $770 million in emergency food assistance for poor countries, responding to rising food prices that have caused social unrest in several nations. The president's proposal Thursday came days after Democrats in Congress had called for increases, and it received a largely positive response, though some Democrats criticized the fact that the aid would not be available until the next fiscal year begins in October.

DETROIT: Soaring gasoline prices have turned the steady migration by Americans to smaller cars into a stampede. In what industry analysts are calling a first, about one in five vehicles sold in the United States was a compact or subcompact car during April, based on monthly sales data released Thursday. Almost a decade ago, when sport utility vehicles were at their peak of popularity, only one in every eight vehicles sold was a small car.