Report: Pollution reducing snowfall. Scientists say bits of air pollution as small as a thousandth of a hair's width appear to be reducing rain and snowfall in the Sierra, Cascades and Rockies, potentially adding to threats of water shortages tied to global warming. [News Source]

Will a layer of silt in the sky save the earth? The idea is to do what volcanoes do: inject material into the stratosphere. That would create a thin haze and reflect some sunlight. [News Source]

Clean technology sticker shock. Xcel Energy plans to build a clean-coal power plant to capture its CO2 emissions. But Colorado ratepayers may be stuck with a billion dollar bill. [News Source]

New report shows temperatures on the rise in California. The first seven months of 2006 were the warmest start to a year in California since climate record-keeping began in 1895, according to a report released Thursday by Environment California in a press conference on the steps of City Hall. [News Source]

In Gamble, Calif. tries to curb greenhouse gases. California has just delivered a new message to energy suppliers: If you cannot produce power with the lowest possible emissions of these greenhouse gases, we are not interested. [News Source]

Acid test. Acidification of the oceans is the sleeping giant of global warming. Scientists are only beginning to understand what the changing chemistry could mean. [News Source]

Irrigation holds off global warming effects on farmland. California's agricultural lands have largely escaped the effects of global warming, but the honeymoon may soon be over. [News Source]

Britain ‘must act now to cut carbon emissions or pay the price later.’ Britain has four years to put in place a "road map" to ensure a low-carbon economy where petrol stations would be redundant and wind turbines would be a feature of every home by 2050. [News Source]

Polar bears’ hunting season threatened by break-up of ice sheet. The retreat of sea ice in the Arctic is forcing the world's wild polar bear population into an unnatural fast which threatens the species with extinction. [News Source]

Computer model looks at how to cool the earth back down. A two-pronged approach to stabilizing climate, with cuts in greenhouse gas emissions as well as injections of climate-cooling sulfates, could prove more effective than either approach used separately. [News Source]

Philanthropy Google’s way: Not the usual. The ambitious founders of Google, the popular search engine company, have set up a philanthropy, giving it seed money of about $1 billion and a mandate to tackle poverty, disease and global warming. [News Source]