regulators

LAGUNA NIGUEL, Calif.--Absent having a vote in Congress, the best way for people to tackle climate change is to make clean energy cheap, said President Bill Clinton at a green business conference here on Wednesday.

Speaking at the Fortune Brainstorm Green event, Clinton said through the Clinton Climate Initiative philanthropy, he is involved in a number of projects which show how environmental awareness makes sense for business.

Successful sustainability efforts help provide the political leverage for passing climate change regulations in the U.S., and internationally, Clinton argued.

The House this week is having hearings on a energy and … Read more

LAGUNA, NIGUEL, Calif.--What do you get when you put the CEO of a coal-dependent utility on stage with two environmental advocates to discuss whether coal can be clean? A surprisingly civil discussion with more than just straight "pro" and "con" positions.

The CEO of American Electric Power, Michael Morris, spoke on the same panel with Michael Brune, the executive director of the Rainforest Action Network, and David Hawkins, the director of climate programs at the Environmental Defense Council on Tuesday at the Fortune Brainstorm Green conference here.

AEP is the second-largest electricity generator in the … Read more

The European Union is considering forcing Microsoft to distribute rival browsers as part of Windows, the software maker disclosed in a regulatory filing this week.

As part of its quarterly filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission filed on Thursday, the software maker offered more details on the EU's statement last week that it believes Microsoft's inclusion of a browser in Windows violates antitrust law.

Microsoft said that the EU is considering forcing computer makers, known as original equipment manufacturers, or OEMs, to offer multiple browsers with new Windows PCs.

"While computer users and OEMs are already … Read more

The European Union's new complaint against Microsoft really takes one back. Like, a decade or so.

Its objection--that bundling a browser into the operating system violates antitrust law--is the same one that U.S. regulators raised in 1996.

The newest allegations stem from a 2007 complaint by Norway's Opera that Microsoft was hurting competition by including Internet Explorer in Windows and by not better adhering to Web standards.

What is most odd about the EU taking up the issue is its timing. The EU spent years going after … Read more

Apple recently took an axe to Murderdrome, an electronic comic book in its App Store that the company deemed too violent.

Murderdrome, created by the United Kingdom-based Infuriouscomics, had been created especially for the iPhone. Apple turned down Infuriouscomics' application to put the comic in the App Store.

"This is due to the part of the SDK that suggests content must not offend anyone in 'Apple's reasonable' opinion," a post on the Infurious blog read. "Here at Infurious, we would love to work with Apple to ensure a content-rating system can be put in place to … Read more

Software company Carbonetworks on Monday is expected to announce it has secured $5 million in series A financing, led by clean-tech venture firm NGEN Partners.

The company's software could be described as a carbon accounting package. It allows corporations to do an inventory of their greenhouse gas emissions and provides them with an application to manage a program to cut down on those emissions.

A company could, for example, achieve reduction goals by making data centers operations more efficient or purchasing carbon offsets.

There are already regulations in Europe to restrict emissions of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas. But … Read more

Will money start to flow to carbon software?

CarbonFlow has raised $2.9 million in its first round of venture funding from Clean Pacific Ventures, OVP Venture Partners, and Meridian Energy Limited, a New Zealand renewable energy supplier, which is a strategic partner.

The San Francisco-based company's founders are carbon emissions trading expert Karla Bell and Neal Dikeman, founder of merchant bank Jane Capital Partner and a contributor to CNET's Green Tech blog.

CarbonFlow's software, which is still under development, is being designed for managers of carbon emissions-reduction projects that want to monetize their carbon credits.

For … Read more

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said on Friday that Congress, not the EPA, should regulate greenhouse gases.

EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson hosted a conference call with reporters on Friday where he said that existing law, the Clean Air Act, is "ill-suited" to addressing greenhouse gas emissions.

Instead, Johnson said that Congress should draft legislation to address climate change.

"It's really at the feet of the Congress to come up with good legislation that cuts through what will likely be decades of litigation and regulation," he said on the call.

A document published by … Read more

IBM is looking to clean up companies' supply chains, part of a larger effort to make money from environmental concerns.

The company on Thursday detailed a software and service offering called Carbon Tradeoff Modeler that is designed to give businesses an idea how to lower the carbon footprint of their network of suppliers.

The need for carbon-modeling supply chain software is driven by regulations to lower greenhouse gas emissions, IBM said. Even in the absence of mandatory measurements and cuts, many companies are already undergoing voluntary efforts.

Large corporations hold significant sway over their supply chain partners in pushing them … Read more