Lewenza, in a telephone interview, said he hopes the U.S. Congress understands that General Motors Corp, Ford Motor Co and Chrysler LLC are a key part of the economies in both United States and Canada.

"The announcement will come very soon, and actually specific plans have already been suggested to the government long ago," Han Wenke, director general of the research body, was quoted as saying.

Stockpiles probably climbed 1 million barrels in the week ended Nov. 14, according to the median of 12 analyst estimates before an Energy Department report today. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, the International Energy Agency and U.S. Energy Department slashed demand projections this month.

The company has set a medium-term strategy to fight climate change by introducing a tire which uses as little raw material made from oil as possible and at the same time that spins more smoothly to save more fuel than a conventional tire.

"A new body should be built to coordinate initiatives (on cutting emissions from deforestation) that are going around now," Federica Bietta, Deputy Director of New York-based Coalition for Rainforest Nations, which represents about 40 countries, told Reuters on the margins of a deforestation conference in Milan.

Stung by an association with gas-guzzling SUVs and pushed to the brink of failure by plunging sales, U.S. automakers have been touting efforts to roll out more fuel-efficient small cars, gas-saving technology and gas-free electric vehicles.

That's the word being used to describe the impact on Michigan and its largest city, Detroit, should financially ailing automaker General Motors (GM.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) file for bankruptcy protection.

Somali pirates over the weekend hijacked a Saudi supertanker with a cargo of two million barrels of oil and the U.S. navy said on Tuesday it was now anchored off Somalia.

The rigs were to be tendered exclusively to Brazilian construction companies this year.

Presentations made to the Fund and other potential donors obtained by the Financial Post show a multitude of green groups, including the New York-based Natural Resources Defense Council, Oregon-based Corporate Ethics International and Alberta-based Pembina Institute, have formed a coalition to broaden their attack on the Canadian sector, targeting politicians, regulators, investors, communities and the media.

Wong Poh Poh, a professor at the National University of Singapore, told a regional conference that global warming was disrupting water flow patterns and increasing the severity of floods, droughts and storms — all of which reduce the availability of drinking water.

The emirate ``has been booming on the oil surpluses'' from neighboring Gulf states and Russia, Citigroup's Mushtaq Khan said in the report today. ``Dubai's two specific concerns are its real estate sector and how it will refinance the debt it has built up in recent years.''

...Raj Patel, author of "Stuffed and Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System," says the right to food should be seen as a human right. But, he says, powerful corporate food distributors control too much of the world's food supply to ensure a robust global food supply.

But those missing markers of radiation, remnants from atomic bomb tests a half-century ago, foretell much greater threat to the half-billion or more people living downstream of that vast mountain range.