The Hyatt Regency Hakone Resort & Spa will participate in Japan's "Carbon Dioxide Reduction Light-Down Campaign' by turning the lobby lights off for two hours on June 21 and July 7. The Hyatt will also be lighting its lobby fireplace with candles, instead of a fire, between June 21 and Aug 31. The "Carbon Dioxide Reduction Light-Down Campaign' was started by the Ministry of the Environment to help reduce carbon dioxide emissions and encourage thoughts about how to prevent global warming.

- Global warming will likely drain more water from the Great Lakes and pose added pollution threats to the region's vulnerable ecosystem, environmental groups said in a report issued on Wednesday. Climate change could further reduce scant ice cover observed in recent winters, increasing evaporation rates and dropping water levels in the five lakes that collectively make up 20 percent of the world's surface fresh water.

Talking fridges hate global warming - pass it on YOUR refrigerator could soon be helping to cool the planet as well as your food. A bar fridge built by the CSIRO has the ability to communicate with other refrigerators. The appliances do not gossip about what kind of milk you have bought, but exchange data that could help balance energy usage across the day and, ultimately, reduce the need for power stations, said a CSIRO research scientist, Geoff James.

Obese and overweight people require more fuel to transport them and the food they eat, and the problem will worsen as the population literally swells in size, a team at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine says. This adds to food shortages and higher energy prices, the school's researchers Phil Edwards and Ian Roberts wrote in the journal Lancet on Friday. "We are all becoming heavier and it is a global responsibility," Edwards said in a telephone interview. "Obesity is a key part of the big picture."

NSW power play stirs up a giant of global warming SOONER or later, some anti-privatisation activist will start doing background checks on China Huaneng Group, which is at the front of the queue to bid for $15 billion in NSW power assets. They'll see that Sydney might soon be powered by the world's biggest corporate contributor to global warming.

Architectural education will have to focus on the need for mobility of architects and the university courses on global warming. The architects are also required to address issues like natural disasters and rising energy prices while undertaking rebuilding and sustainable development. This was stated by Architect Ga

If farmers think they have a tough time producing enough rice, wheat and other grain crops, global warming is going to present a whole new world of challenges in the race to produce more food, scientists say. In a warmer world beset by greater extremes of droughts and floods, farmers will have to change crop management practices, grow tougher plant varieties and be prepared for constant change in the way they operate, scientists say.

IT IS great to see that we finally have some national unity on energy policy. Unfortunately, the unifying idea is so ridiculous, so unworthy of the people aspiring to lead our nation, it takes your breath away. Hillary Clinton has decided to line up with John McCain in pushing to suspend the federal excise tax on petrol, 18.4 cents a gallon, for this summer's travel season. This is not an energy policy. This is money laundering: we borrow money from China and ship it to Saudi Arabia and take a little cut for ourselves as it goes through our petrol tanks. What a way to build our country.

China has overtaken the USA to become the world's No. 1 industrial source of carbon dioxide, the most important global-warming pollutant, according to a scientific study to be published today. The study and two others

Japanese and European Union leaders on Wednesday agreed to push for the launch by the Group of Eight powers of a new energy-saving framework to curb global warming at July's G-8 summit in Japan, while sharing