The European Parliament has passed a regulation requiring 'sulphur-free' gasoline and diesel fuels from 2009. The directive was made final in a Parliament vote on January 30, 2003.

The 'sulphur-free' fuels are defined as having no more than 10 ppm sulphur. Both sulphur-free gasoline (petrol) and diesel must be available for highway vehicles from 2005, and become mandatory in 2009. The 2009 sulphur-free diesel deadline also applies to mobile nonroad engines.

The Mercury Retirement Act was introduced by US Senator Susan Collins to eliminate and permanently manage surplus mercury. The legislation would ban the sale of mercury fever thermometers, increase the availability of mercury-free alternatives through a funded thermometer exchange programme and ensure that collected mercury would be taken out of circulation for good. Ways to permanently store mercury leftover from industrial production and military stockpiles will also be identified.

According to EPA, approximately 17 tonnes of mercury thermometers are disposed of as solid waste in the USA. Ten states have banned the sale of such thermometers while many local communities have organised exchange programmes where mercury-free digital thermometers are exchanged for the mercury thermometer.

The USA also has stockpiles of nearly 10 million pounds of mercury from weapons production. Sale of this mercury was halted in 1994. The bill would set up a task force to identify ways to permanently store mercury leftover from industrial production and military stockpiles. It would also look at reducing the mining of mercury, and use and release of mercury on a global basis.

A sensor system that can autonomously, continuously and in real-time monitor liquid bodies may help solve problems for environmentalists, manufacturers and those in charge of homeland security.

Dr Craig Grimes of Penn State University says that at present monitoring of rivers downstream from sewage treatment plants, large city water supplies, or the composition of the local pond must all be done by hand. This expensive, time consuming and sometimes dangerous practice is always time delayed and may miss short duration episodes of pollution or contaminants. Continuous, in-place monitoring would be the easiest, most timely and least expensive way to track changes in water bodies.

In recent years, there has been burgeoning evidence that air pollutants worsen allergies and asthma, says a professor from the University of California.

Dr David Pedan and his colleagues looked at the effects of ozone on people allergic to dust mites. Not only did ozone worsen allergy symptoms immediately, but among patients with asthma, researchers found there was a chronic inflammation of the airways that could be measured the next day. Other research also show that tiny particles in diesel exhaust can increase a person's sensitivity to pollen or dust mites or other allergy producing antigens.

A one-year study conducted by scientists at Rice University, USA, claims that polyunsaturated fatty acids released into the atmosphere during barbecues are contributing to the haze in Houston. Houston is ranked as one of the more polluted US urban areas in terms of air quality.

According to the USEPA, the number of days where the levels of ozone exceeded the eight-hour standard increased by 32% from 2001 to 2002 in the USA. The standard was exceeded 700 times last year, up from 532 and 516 in 2001 and 2000, respectively. Furthermore, the worst days in 2002 were smoggier than the worst days in 2001.

Chile's state-owned copper company Codelco said it completed over half of a project to convert its El Teniente mine to natural gas from diesel and expects to finish in July 2003.

The conversion is part of a clean-up and cost-reduction plan at El Teniente, which produced 350,000 tonnes of copper in 2001. Construction of an internal gas distribution system at the mine's smelter, Caletones, is 68% complete and the main machinery at the plant is being adapted for the new fuel.

Work on a 74-km pipeline bringing gas to the site is 50% complete. The fuel will be supplied by GasValpo, owned by the Australian Gas Light Co (AGLAX), which has a 15-year contract with El Teniente.

The US National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) reported that America's thirst for oil is a leading economic and security problem as it uses a quarter of the world's petroleum, but have just 3 % of the world's reserves.

The US government is considering energy legislation to authorize US $1.8 billion for fuel cell research and development, but only considering a study of oil savings from efficiency improvements to conventional vehicles.

The NRDC reported that while fuel cells are an important long-term solution, oil savings from a responsible fuel economy standard that is phased in over the next decade are 25 times greater by 2020 than a strategy that relies on fuel cells alone.

Overall wind power produces 0.4 percent of the world's electricity, with the proportion rising to 2 percent in Europe. According to the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) and the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA), the European Union produces three quarters of the world's wind-generated power while the United States is the third biggest producer, with 15 percent of the total world wind power supply of 31,127 mégawatts (MW) in 2002.

Germany is at the top of the list, generating 12,000 MW which is a third of world supplies. This is followed by Spain on 4,830 MW, the US on 4,685 MW, Denmark on 2,880 MW and India 1,702 MW.