Australia Friday approved two multi-billion dollar coal gas projects with strict environmental conditions, clearing the way for exports of millions of tonnes of clean-burning energy to Asian countries.
Environment Minister Tony Burke imposed more than 300 conditions to protect ecological treasures such as the Great Barrier Reef as he gave the go-ahead to BG Group and the Gladstone Liquefied Natural Gas (GLNG) joint venture.
Russia on Wednesday agreed a huge 5-year privatisation drive worth 60 billion dollars in a dramatic return to sell-offs after a decade that saw the government increase control over key assets.
First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov announced that the government had taken its final decision and the plan only now required the approval of President Dmitry Medvedev.
Under the plan, the state would sell a further 15 percent stake in Russia’s largest oil company Rosneft over the next five years and even give up a controlling holding after 2015.
Other big firms set for state reductions are state banks VTB and Sberbank, the state Russian railways firm RZhD, said Shuvalov, adding a stake sale was also possible in flag carrier Aeroflot.
As India seeks to boost its strategic reach by inducting more mid-air refuellers, European defence major EADS has announced that it would aggressively bid for the multi-billion reopened contract by offering latest technology.
India is seeking to buy six more air-to-air refueller to augment its fleet of six Russian IL-78 tankers and the European consortium Airbus Military said it would offer its new state-of-the-art Multi-role Transport Tanker aircraft A330 MRTT “at competitive prices.”
The European tanker would come with Aerial Refueling Boom System (ARBS), a technology which only the Americans have so far. The ARBS system enables refueling even in adverse weather and day or night.
A new one billion dollar system is being developed to help prevent another Gulf oil spill disaster.
The goal of what developers are calling a more efficient system is to build and test a cap and siphon contraption that will be able to contain oil in deep water.
Developers say once testing is complete the invention could be deployed and used within weeks of a future well blowout
The United States announced a major arms sale deal to Saudi Arabia worth around 60 billion dollars. Officials say the deal is not expected to draw objections from Israel.
The deal, posted on the website of Defense Security Cooperation Agency, is comprised of 84 F-15SA fighter jets, 70 AH-64D APACHE Longbow Helicopters, 72 UH-60M BLACKHAWK Helicopters, 36 AH-6i Light Attack Helicopters, 12 MD-530F Light Turbine Helicopters, and hundreds of units of engines, weapons and navigation systems.
The package also includes the upgrade of 70 existing F-15S fighter jets in the Saudi Air Force. It is expected to be completed within 15 to 20 years.
If approved by the Congress, it would be the single largest military sale in U.S. history.
Organized crime generates revenues of more than 120 billion dollars globally every year, with drug smuggling by far the most lucrative activity, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime said Monday.
UNODC calculated that heroin and cocaine smuggling generated annual revenues of 105 billion dollars worldwide, which was being invested in criminal businesses and fuelling terrorism.
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A few months back Glyn Moody, noted open-source journalist, asked the question, “Why No Billion-Dollar Open Source Companies?” Jim Whitehurst, Red Hat’s CEO answered, “Red Hat could get to $5 billion in due course, but that this entailed ‘replacing $50 billion of revenue’ currently enjoyed by other computer companies. Guess what? Red Hat is on its way.
In its latest quarter, Red Hat’s total revenue was $219.8 million, an increase of 20% from the year ago quarter. Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) Subscription revenue for the quarter was $186.2 million, up 19% year-over-year. I guess Oracle’s attempt to snatch Red Hat’s business away with a re-branded RHEL really hasn’t worked.
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Electricity bills can get pretty expensive, especially during the summer when air conditioners are running almost constantly. One Georgia (USA) woman’s billion $ bill may set a record.
When Scarlett Hall sat down to pay her bills, she saw it was $1,016,500,130.09!
Hall lives in an Acworth home with her husband and three children.
She’s had high power bills before but nothing like this. Knowing this bill had to be a mistake, Hall called Cobb Energy.
“She started laughing and laughing,” she said, describing the customer-service representative’s response. “Then out of the blue, she goes ‘I’m sorry ma’am. That just caught me off guard.’ And I said ‘Yeah, me too!’ ”
Hall said the customer-service rep was able to correct the bill, bringing it down to a more reasonable and accurate $287.
At the Green Growth Committee meeting held recently, President Lee Myung-bak said Korea should make the solar and wind power sectors the pillars of the future national economy by developing them into the second semiconductor and shipbuilding industries.
He also stressed that green growth is not an option, but a compulsory task in order to achieve industrial growth, as well as to tackle climate change.
Therefore, the Ministry of Knowledge Economy announced that the government, together with the private sector, plans to invest 40 trillion won or roughly 36 billion US dollars over the next five years in order to become one of the tope five global leaders in the field.
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According to the surveys, in America there is the highest rate of obesity, and a growing economic cost estimated to be about 73.1 billion dollar including ,lack of productiveness, medical expenditures etc.
Two surveys were carried out, one in 2006 and one in 2008. The results showed that the amount of 30.3 billion dollar was related to obesity medical costs, approximately 12 billion dollars for lost productivity (the obese people who took the days off work because of health problems) and 30 billion dollars to low productivity in work because of health problems.
Well, world over that would be about $300 billion per year (just using America’s GDP as a yardstick). What an opportunity, not just for those developing medicines, but for those providing support services such as information support etc!
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