Energy, Mining & Utilities

The new virus is spreading, but it has primarily affected the fish of Marine Harvest, a Norwegian company that is the world's biggest producer of farm-raised salmon and exports about 20 percent of the salmon that come from Chile. Read More

Indonesia's economy is riding the recent wave of high global commodity prices. But local pressure is arising towards steel makers and power producers in China and India who have diverted coal supplies abroad by locking in 20-year supply contracts with Indonesian miners. Read More

Permission for Petrobras of Brazil to drill for oil in Yasuni National Park, one of the most biologically diverse places in the world, has been suspended, but some damage has already been done by Swedish construction giant Skanska. Unless new money is found to protect the forest, exploration may resume. Read More

Shell is one of several international oil companies - including BP and the US groups ExxonMobil and Chevron - that have been tapping into Iraq's oil industry by remote control. Read More

You might have heard the story about General Motors Vice Chairman Bob Lutz. At a recent closed-door meeting with reporters, the 76-year-old, who's in charge of product development said he thinks global warming theory is "a total crock of sh*t" and that hybrid cars "make no economic sense." Read More

The spills, at the Alabama Biodiesel Corporation plant outside this city about 17 miles from Tuscaloosa, are similar to others that have come from biofuel plants in the Midwest. The discharges, which can be hazardous to birds and fish, have many people scratching their heads over the seeming incongruity of pollution from an industry that sells products with the promise of blue skies and clear streams. Read More

The Luoyang Zhonggui High-Technology Co. of Henan, China, is a green energy company, producing polysilicon for solar energy panels. But the byproduct -- silicon tetrachloride -- is a highly toxic substance that poses environmental hazards. Read More

Erai Maggi's company Bom Futuro produces more than 600,000 tonnes of soya a year, most of it to feed livestock ending up as meat in China and Europe, and generating £175m in revenue. Critics decry the link between increasing soya production and Amazon deforestation. Read More

A company controlled by the Persian Gulf state of Bahrain accused Alcoa Corp. of a 15-year conspiracy involving overcharging, fraud and bribery. Read More

The Ugandan parliament will soon have a hearing on the draft Plant Variety Protection Bill, approved by the cabinet early last year. According to an inside government source, seeds companies including Monsanto have been lobbying for such intellectual property protection. Read More