I can rarely find the time to make it to the movies, but my staff is buzzing about The Avengers, which focuses on a new, limitless clean energy source called “The Tesseract.” In the film, there is evidently an intergalactic struggle to claim this new resource – one we can only win by relying on heroes like Captain America, Thor, Iron Man, Black Widow, and the Incredible Hulk. Naturally, the group includes a couple scientists! While the “Tesseract” may be fictional, the real-life global competition over clean energy is growing increasingly intense, as countries around the world sense a huge economic opportunity AND the opportunity for cleaner air, water, and a healthier planet. This is now a $260 billion global market, a sum that would ... Continue reading →

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By Edward Krudy and Alistair Barr NEW YORK | Fri May 18, 2012 10:35am EDT NEW YORK (Reuters) - Shorting the Facebook IPO on its first day of trading will not be for the faint of heart. As the hottest initial public offering in recent memory, Facebook has drawn 1990s-style tech-mania interest from mom and pop investors and big institutions alike.That intense appeal means even short-selling veterans are a bit wary, at least for now."I have no interest in shorting a cultural phenomenon," hedge fund manager Jeffrey Matthews of Ram Partners in Greenwich, Connecticut, told Reuters in an email interview.Asked if this was because such stocks trade without regard to normal market valuation, he wrote back, "Bingo."Short sellers looking to get in are facing an ... Continue reading →

OSLO | Fri May 18, 2012 8:41am EDT OSLO May 18 (Reuters) - Norwegian authorities filed charges against two executives of fertilizer firm Yara in relation to a corruption probe against the firm, Yara said in a statement on Friday. Head of Upstream Tor Holba and Chief Financial Officer and Head of Strategy Hallgeir Storvik have been charged by the Norwegian National Authority for Investigation and Prosecution of Economic and Environmental Crime in relation to an ongoing investigation of the firm which started in 2011.Yara declined further comment.Yara has been under investigation for possible wrongdoing in relation to its ventures in Lybia, India and Switzerland, the firm said earlier.Police said it had detained the executives. (Reporting by Balazs Koranyi; Editing by Dan Lalor) Continue reading →

By Ben Hirschler LONDON | Fri May 18, 2012 8:40am EDT LONDON (Reuters) - International drugmakers are working with European authorities on emergency plans to keep medicines flowing into Greece if the country crashes out of the euro. Discussions have intensified in recent days, according to industry sources, and manufacturers are looking closely at the experience of Argentina's collapse in 2002, when some firms agreed to continue to supply medicines without payment for a period of time.Executives at leading drug companies - particularly those with European headquarters - are under pressure to avert a health catastrophe, which could occur if Greek imports are halted by a massive devaluation of newly issued drachma."There's a moral obligation to continue to supply," said Simon Friend, global pharmaceutical leader ... Continue reading →