the weekly news digest georgia jan21

SEOUL, SouthKorea (AP) -- NorthKorea swiftly lashedout against the U.N.Security Council'scondemnation of itsDecember launch ofa long-range rocket,saying Wednesdaythat it will strengthenits military defenses -including its nuclearweaponry - inr e s p o n s e .

The defiantstatement from NorthKorea's ForeignMinistry was issuedhours after the Security Council unanimously adopted aresolution condemning Pyongyang's Dec. 12 rocketlaunch as a violation of a ban against nuclear and missileactivity. The resolution, which required approval fromPyongyang's ally China, also added to sanctions againstthe North.

The Foreign Ministry called the launch a peaceful bidto send a satellite into space rather than a test of long-range missile technology. It said North Korea "shouldcounter the U.S. hostile policy with strength, not withwords."

The statement ominously warned that North Koreawill "bolster the military capabilities for self-defense includ-ing the nuclear deterrence."

The wording "considerably and strongly hints at thepossibility of a nuclear test," analyst Hong Hyun-ik at theprivate Sejong Institute think tank near Seoul saidWednesday.

North Korea conducted nuclear weapons testsweeks after rocket launches in 2006 and 2009, and theregion is bracing for the possibility that it may now test athird atomic device.

Satellite photos taken at North Korea's nuclear testsite in Punggye-ri last month indicated continued activity,even in winter, according to analysis by 38 North, a NorthKorea website affiliated with the Johns Hopkins School forAdvanced International Studies.

The Security Council on Tuesday reiterated ademand that North Korea abandon its nuclear weaponsprogram in a "complete, verifiable and irreversible man-ner," and ordered the regime to cease rocket launches.

"Today's resolution also makes clear that if NorthKorea chooses again to defy the international communi-ty, such as by conducting another launch or a nuclear test,then the (Security) Council will take significant action,"U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice said.

The binding resolution is the first in four years toexpand sanctions against Pyongyang. It ordered thefreeze of more North Korean assets, including the spaceagency, and imposed a travel ban on four more officials -limited sanctions that target individuals and specific com-panies.

"We believe that action taken by the Council should

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In The News This Week

be prudent, meas-ured, proportionateand conducive to sta-bility," ChineseAmbassador LiBaodong said afterthe vote.

Last month'srocket launch hasbeen celebrated as asuccess in NorthKorea, and the scien-tists involved treatedlike heroes. NorthKorean leader KimJong Un cited thesuccess of the launchin his New Year's Day

speech laying out North Korea's main policies and goalsfor the upcoming year.

Washington and its allies consider the long-rangerocket launch a covert test of ballistic missile technology,and suspect Pyongyang is working toward mounting anuclear warhead on a missile capable of striking the U.S.

North Korea claims the right to build nuclear weaponsas a defense against the United States, which stationsmore than 28,000 troops in South Korea. The foes foughton opposite sides of the three-year Korean War, whichended in a truce in 1953 and left the Korean Peninsuladivided at the 38th parallel.

Six-nation disarmament negotiations hosted byChina aimed at offering North Korea much-needed foodand fuel in return for dismantling its nuclear program havebeen stalled since North Korea walked away from thetalks following U.N. punishment for its 2009 rocket launch.

Since then, Pyongyang had indicated its readiness toresume discussing disarmament, and in February 2012negotiated a deal with Washington to place a moratoriumon nuclear and missile tests in exchange for food aid.

But that deal fell apart when North Korea unsuc-cessfully launched a long-range rocket in April.

The Foreign Ministry said Wednesday that it wouldrebuff any attempts to engage Pyongyang in disarma-ment negotiations.

"There can be talks for peace and stability of theKorean Peninsula and the region in the future, but no talksfor the denuclearization of the peninsula," it said in a state-ment carried by the state-run Korean Central NewsAgency.

The decision by China, North Korea's biggest allyand economic supporter, to approve the U.N. resolutionafter drawn-out discussions at the U.N. may reflect somefrustration on Beijing's part toward its neighbor.

"China has limited influence with North Korea,"Zhang Liangui, a researcher with the ruling CommunistParty's main research and training institute, said in Beijing."Beijing disapproves of any nuclear test or new missilelaunch, but there's not a lot it can do."

AFTER UN ACTS, NKOREAVOWS 'NUCLEAR

DETERRENCE'North Korea swiftly lashed out against the

U.N. Security Council's condemnation of its

December launch of a long-range rocket.

MILITARY HAS TO DECIDEWHICH COMBAT JOBS FOR

WOMEN

The Pentagon's decision to lift the ban on

women serving in combat presents a daunting

challenge to top military leaders Page 2

SECURITY AT CALIF. DIST.HAS HIGH-POWERED RIFLES

The semiautomatic rifles look like they belong

in a war zone instead of a suburban public

school, Page 3

GEORGIA ACCIDENTSTATISTICS

Accident Statistics from Georgia Department

of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles. Page 4

GEORGIA ACCIDENTREPORTS

This Weeks Accident Reports from Various

countys in Georgia. Page 5

NKOREA WARNS OF NUKETEST, MORE ROCKET

LAUNCHES

North Korea's top governing body warned

Thursday that the regime will conduct its third

nuclear test in defiance of U.N. punishment.

Page 6

53 SENATORS URGEAPPROVAL OF KEYSTONE

XL PIPELINETMore than half the Senate on Wednesday

urged quick approval of the Keystone XL oil

pipeline. Page 7

STUDY: DIGITAL INFORMA -TION CAN BE STORED IN

DNA

It can store the information from a million CDs

in a space no bigger than your little finger..

Page 8

WHAT HOLDS ENERGY TECHBACK? THE INFERNAL

BATTERYAs 21st century technology strains to become everfaster, cleaner and cheaper, an invention from morethan 200 years ago keeps holding it back. Page 8

WEEKLY NEWS DIGESTTHE

British Ambassador to the United Nations Mark Lyall Grant, left, and AmericanAmbassador Susan Rice vote on a Security Council resolution condemningNorth Korea's rocket launch in December that sent a satellite into orbit,

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2 Legal Street News Monday January 21, 2013

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M I L I T A R Y H A S T OD E C I D E W H I C H C O M B A TJ O B S F O R W O M E N

WASHINGTON

(AP) -- The Pentagon's

decision to lift the ban

on women serving in

combat presents a

daunting challenge to

top military leaders

who now will have to

decide which, if any,

jobs they believe should

be open only to men.

Defense Secretary

Leon Panetta is expect-

ed to announce

Thursday that more

than 230,000 battlefront

posts - many in Army

and Marine infantry

units and in potentially

elite commando jobs -

are now open to women. It will be up to the military service

chiefs to recommend and defend whether women should be

excluded from any of those more demanding and deadly

positions, such as Navy SEALs or the Army's Delta Force.

The historic change, which was recommended by the

Joint Chiefs of Staff, overturns a 1994 rule prohibiting

women from being assigned to smaller ground combat units.

The change won't take place overnight: Service chiefs

will have to develop plans for allowing women to seek the

combat positions, a senior military official said. Some jobs

may open as soon as this year, while assessments for others,

such as special operations forces, may take longer. The serv-

ices will have until January 2016 to make a case to that some

positions should remain closed to women.

Officials briefed The Associated Press on the changes

Wednesday on condition of anonymity so they could speak

ahead of the official announcement.

There long has been opposition to putting women in

combat, based on questions of whether they have the neces-

sary strength and stamina for certain jobs, or whether their

presence might hurt unit cohesion.

But as news of Panetta's expected order got out, many

members of Congress, including the Senate Armed Services

Committee chairman, Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., announced

their support.

"It reflects the reality of 21st century military opera-

tions," Levin said.

Objections were few. Jerry Boykin, executive vice pres-

ident of the Family Research Council, called the move

"another social experiment" that will place unnecessary bur-

dens on military commanders.

"While their focus must remain on winning the battles

and protecting their troops, they will now have the distrac-

tion of having to provide some separation of the genders dur-

ing fast moving and

deadly situations," said

Boykin, a retired Army

lieutenant general. He

noted that small units

often are in sustained

combat for extended

periods of time under

primal living condi-

tions with no privacy.

Panetta's move

comes in his final

weeks as Pentagon

chief and just days after

President Barack

Obama's inaugural

speech in which he

spoke passionately

about equal rights for

all. The new order

expands the department's action of nearly a year ago to open

about 14,500 combat positions to women, nearly all of them

in the Army.

In addition to questions of strength and performance,

there also have been suggestions that the American public

would not tolerate large numbers of women being killed in

war.

Under the 1994 Pentagon policy, women were prohibit-

ed from being assigned to ground combat units below the

brigade level. A brigade is roughly 3,500 troops split into

several battalions of about 800 soldiers each. Historically,

brigades were based farther from the front lines, and they

often included top command and support staff.

The necessities of combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, how-

ever, propelled women into jobs as medics, military police

and intelligence officers that were sometimes attached - but

not formally assigned - to battalions. So while a woman

couldn't be assigned as an infantryman in a battalion going

out on patrol, she could fly the helicopter supporting the unit,

or move in to provide medical aid if troops were injured.

And these conflicts, where battlefield lines are blurred

and insurgents can lurk around every corner, have made it

almost impossible to keep women clear of combat.

Still, as recent surveys and experiences have shown, it

will not be an easy transition. When the Marine Corps sought

women to go through its tough infantry course last year, two

volunteered and both failed to complete the course. And

there may not be a wide clamoring from women for the more

intense, dangerous and difficult jobs, including some

infantry and commando positions.

Two lawsuits were filed last year challenging the

Pentagon's ban on women serving in combat, adding pres-

sure on officials to overturn the policy. And the military serv-

ices have been studying the issue and surveying their forces

to determine how it may affect performance and morale.

Capt. Sara Rodriguez, 26, of the 101st Airborne Division, carries a litter ofsandbags during the Expert Field Medical Badge training at Fort Campbell,Ky. The Pentagon is lifting its ban on women serving in combat, opening hun-dreds of thousands of front-line positions and potentially elite commando jobsafter generations of limits on their service, defense officials said

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Street News Monday, January 21, 2013 3

FONTANA, Calif. (AP) -- The semiautomatic rifles looklike they belong in a war zone instead of a suburban pub-lic school, but officials in this Los Angeles-area city saythe high-powered weapons now in the hands of schoolpolice could prevent a massacre.

Fontana Unified School District police purchased 14 ofthe Colt LE6940 rifles last fall, and they were deliveredthe first week of December - a week before theConnecticut school shooting. Over the holiday break, thedistrict's 14 school police officers received 40 hours oftraining on the rifles. Officers check them out for eachshift from a fireproof safe in the police force's main office.

Fontana isn't the first district to try this. Other SouthernCalifornia districts also have rifle programs - some thathave been in operation for several years. Fontana schoolpolice Chief Billy Green said he used money from finger-printing fees to purchase the guns for $14,000 after iden-tifying a "critical vulnerability" in his force's ability to pro-tect students. The officers, who already wear sidearms,wouldn't be able to stop a shooter like the one inConnecticut, he said Wednesday.

"They're not walking around telling kids, `Hurry up andget to class' with a gun around their neck," the chief said."Parents need to know that if there was a shooter on theirchild's campus that was equipped with body armor or arifle, we would be limited in our ability to stop that threatto their children."

Some parents and students, however, reacted with alarmto the news that school resource officers were beingissued the rifles during their shifts. The officers split theirtime among 44 schools in the district and keep the riflesin a safe at their assigned school or secured in theirpatrol car each day before checking the weapon back into the school police headquarters each night.

Only sergeants trained for years to use the rifles areauthorized to check out the rifles from the police armory,where they are kept.

Still, James Henriquez, 16, a sophomore who justenrolled at Fontana High School this week after movingfrom Texas, was wary.

"If the wrong person gets ahold of the gun, then we haveanother shooter going around with a gun. What happensthen?" he asked.

Other students said they felt disillusioned that officialswould spend money on semiautomatic rifles while thedistrict eliminated its comprehensive guidance counsel-ing program two years ago.

"They should get guns, but not as many and not spendso much money on them," said student Elizabeth Tovar."They should use the money to get back our counselors

because a lot of us really need them."

The district saved millions by restructuring guidanceservices, said Superintendent Cali Olsen-Binks.

The 40,000-student district came up with the school rifleprogram after consulting with top school safety expertsand looking at what other large districts had done, saidOlsen-Binks.

Santa Ana Unified School District, in nearby OrangeCounty, has had a rifle program for about two years thatoperates similarly to the one Fontana has started, saidpolice Cpl. Anthony Bertagna.

The Los Angeles School Police Department also deploysrifles to its officers as needed, the department said in astatement. It would not say how many rifles district policehave but said the weapons are kept in the department'sarmory and are handed out and returned daily.

"I came from a teaching background, and it's appalling tothink that we'd have to have security officers - let alonearmed police officers - on our campuses," Olsen-Binkssaid. "But the bottom line is ... everybody has anxietyover school safety right now."

This image provided by the Fontana Unified School District Policeshows a Colt LE6940 semiautomatic rifle, one of 14 purchased by theFontana Unified School District to help provide security for the school,in California. The weapons, which cost $1,000 each, are high-pow-ered weapons that are accurate at longer range and can pierce bodyarmor.

Continued from page 2

The Joint Chiefs have been meeting regularly on the

matter and they unanimously agreed to send the recommen-

dation to Panetta earlier this month.

A senior military official familiar with the discussions

said the chiefs laid out three main principles to guide them

as they move through the process. Those were to maintain

America's effective fighting force, preserve military readi-

ness and develop a process that would give all service mem-

bers the best chance to succeed.

Women comprise about 14 percent of the 1.4 million

active military personnel. More than 280,000 women have

been sent to Iraq, Afghanistan or to jobs in neighboring

nations in support of the wars. Of the more than 6,600 U.S.

service members who have been killed, 152 have been

women.

The senior military official said the military chiefs must

report back to Panetta with their initial implementation plans

by May 15

A P I N T E R V I E W : C A M E R O NWA N T S U K T O R E M A I N I N E U

"We trust the people to take that choice,"he said.

"But what I want to achieve is change inEurope, to make it more open, competitiveand flexible," he said. "That is what I'mgoing to be fighting for over the comingyears. It's the right agenda for Britain, it'sthe right agenda for Europe, and I think itis eminently achievable."

His promise of a vote if his ConservativeParty wins the next general election,expected in 2015, formed the backdrop todiscussions he had with GermanChancellor Angela Merkel. The two metThursday at the forum, an annual gather-ing of political and business leaders wherehis referendum offer was one of thehottest topics for debate.

In the interview with The AP, Cameron alsoruled out the prospect of sending Britishcombat troops to Mali. However, he saidBritain will offer more help to a French-ledforce that is battling Islamist extremistswho are threatening a swath of northwestAfrica.

"We're not going to get involved in sendingcombat troops to Mali. That isn't the rolewe're going to play," he said.

Britain is supporting the operation with C-17 transport planes and logistics support,and British trainers will help Nigerian andother West African troops provide securityin the region, he said.

"We'll be giving the (French) other assis-tance as well," he added, without elaborat-ing.WASHINGTON (AP) -- A measure of

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W O M E NDAVOS, Switzerland (AP) -- British PrimeMinister David Cameron shrugged off thepossibility that his country may vote toleave the European Union, and arguedThursday that his vision of a changedEurope on Britain's terms is eminentlyachievable.

In an interview with The Associated Pressat the World Economic Forum in the Swissresort of Davos, Cameron said he wantedto achieve change in Europe "so that wecan secure Britain's place within it."

His comments come a day after he rattlednerves and raised ire across Europe byoffering British citizens the prospect of avote on whether to stay in the 27-countryEU.

British Prime Minister, David Cameron, gestures as hespeaks to the assembly of the 43rd Annual Meeting ofthe World Economic Forum, WEF, in Davos, Switzerland,Thursday, Jan. 24, 2013. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)


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North Korea claims the right tobuild nuclear weapons as adefense against the UnitedStates, its Korean War foe.

The bitter three-year warended in a truce, not a peacetreaty, in 1953, and left theKorean Peninsula divided bythe world's most heavily forti-fied demilitarized zone. TheU.S. leads the U.N. Commandthat governs the truce and sta-tions more than 28,000 troopsin ally South Korea, a pres-ence that North Korea cites asa key reason for its drive tobuild nuclear weapons.

For years, North Korea'sneighbors had been negotiat-ing with Pyongyang on provid-ing aid in return for disarma-ment. North Korea walkedaway from those talks in 2009and on Wednesday reiterated

that disarmament talks were out of the ques-tion.

North Korea is estimated to have stored upenough weaponized plutonium for four to eightbombs, according to scientist SiegfriedHecker, who visited the North's Nyongbyonnuclear complex in 2010.

In 2009, Pyongyang declared that it wouldbegin enriching uranium, which would giveNorth Korea a second way to make atomicweapons.

North Korea carried out underground nucleartests in 2006 and 2009, both times just weeksafter being punished with U.N. sanctions forlaunching long-range rockets.

In October, an unidentified spokesman at theNational Defense Commission claimed thatthe U.S. mainland was within missile range.And at a military parade last April, North Koreashowed off what appeared to be an interconti-nental ballistic missile.

Satellite photos taken last month at a nucleartest site in Punggye-ri, in far northeast NorthKorea, showed continued activity that suggest-ed a state of readiness even in winter, accord-ing to analysis by 38 North, a North Koreawebsite affiliated with the Johns HopkinsSchool for Advanced International Studies.

Another nuclear test would bring North Koreaa step closer to being able to launch a long-range missile tipped with a nuclear warhead,said Daniel Pinkston, an analyst with theInternational Crisis Group.

"Their behavior indicates they want to acquirethose capabilities," he said. "The ultimate goalis to have a robust nuclear deterrent."

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SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- North Korea'stop governing body warned Thursday that theregime will conduct its third nuclear test indefiance of U.N. punishment, and made clearthat its long-range rockets are designed tocarry not only satellites but also warheadsaimed at striking the United States.

The National Defense Commission, headed bythe country's young leader, Kim Jong Un,denounced Tuesday's U.N. Security Councilresolution condemning North Korea's long-range rocket launch in December as a bannedmissile activity and expanding sanctionsagainst the regime. The commission reaf-firmed in its declaration that the launch was apeaceful bid to send a satellite into space, butalso clearly indicated the country's rocketlaunches have a military purpose: to strike andattack the United States.

While experts say North Korea doesn't havethe capability to hit the U.S. with its missiles,recent tests and rhetoric indicate the country isfeverishly working toward that goal.

The commission pledged to keep launchingsatellites and rockets and to conduct a nucleartest as part of a "new phase" of combat withthe United States, which it blames for leadingthe U.N. bid to punish Pyongyang. It said anuclear test was part of "upcoming" action butdid not say exactly when or where it wouldtake place.

"We do not hide that a variety of satellites andlong-range rockets which will be launched bythe DPRK one after another and a nuclear testof higher level which will be carried out by it inthe upcoming all-out action, a new phase ofthe anti-U.S. struggle that has lasted centuryafter century, will target against the U.S., thesworn enemy of the Korean people," the com-mission said, referring to North Korea by itsofficial name, the Democratic People'sRepublic of Korea.

"Settling accounts with the U.S. needs to bedone with force, not with words, as it regardsjungle law as the rule of its survival," the com-mission said.

It was a rare declaration by the powerful com-mission once led by late leader Kim Jong Iland now commanded by his son. The state-ment made clear Kim Jong Un's commitmentto continue developing the country's nuclearand missile programs in defiance of theSecurity Council, even at risk of further inter-national isolation.

North Korea's allusion to a "higher level"nuclear test most likely refers to a device

made from highly enriched uranium, which iseasier to miniaturize than the plutonium bombsit tested in 2006 and 2009, said CheongSeong-chang, an analyst at the private SejongInstitute in South Korea. Experts say the NorthKoreans must conduct further tests of itsatomic devices and master the technique formaking them smaller before they can bemounted as nuclear warheads onto long-rangemissiles.

The U.S. State Department had no immediateresponse to Thursday's statement. Shortlybefore the commission issued its declaration,U.S. envoy on North Korea Glyn Davies urgedPyongyang not to explode an atomic device.

"Whether North Korea tests or not, it's up toNorth Korea. We hope they don't do it. We callon them not to do it," he told reporters inSeoul after meeting with South Korean offi-cials. "It will be a mistake and a missed oppor-tunity if they were to do it."

Davies was in Seoul on a trip that includes hisstops in China and Japan for talks on how tomove forward on North Korea relations.

South Korea's top official on relations with theNorth said Pyongyang's nuclear and missiledevelopment is a "cataclysm for the Koreanpeople," and poses a fundamental threat toregional and world peace. "The North Koreanbehavior is very disappointing," UnificationMinister Yu Woo-ik said in a lecture in Seoul,according to his office.

N K O R E A W A R N S O F N U K E T E S T ,

M O R E R O C K E T L A U N C H E S

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un speaks at a banquet for rocket scientists inPyongyang, North Korea. North Korea's top governing body warned Thursday,Jan. 24, 2013 that the regime will conduct its third nuclear test in defiance ofU.N. punishment, and made clear that its long-range rockets are designed tocarry not only satellites but also warheads aimed at striking the United States.The National Defense Commission, headed by the country's young leader,rejected Tuesday's U.N. Security Council resolution condemning North Korea'slong-range rocket launch in December as a banned missile activity and expand-ing sanctions against the regime

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O F K E Y S T O N E X L P I P E L I N E"No more excuses. It's time to put people to work,"Baucus said.

"Back home, we call this a no-brainer," added Sen.Joe Manchin, D-W.Va.

Hoeven, of North Dakota, said the tar sands oil willbe produced whether or not the U.S. approves theproject. "Our choice is, the oil comes to us or it'sgoing to China," he said.

Nebraska's approval of the pipeline means all sixstates along the proposed route now support theproject, said House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio.Majorities in the House and Senate also haveendorsed the pipeline. National polls repeatedlyshow a majority of Americans back the project.

Boehner said he recognizes the political pressureObama faces from environmental groups and otheropponents, but said "with our energy security atstake and many jobs in limbo, he should find a wayto say yes."

White House spokesman Jay Carney said Tuesdaythat the State Department was reviewing the projectand he did not want to "get ahead of that process."

Once that review is completed, "we'll obviouslyaddress that issue," Carney said.

Meanwhile, Secretary of State nominee John Kerrysaid he plans to divest holdings in dozens of com-panies in his family's vast financial portfolio to avoidconflicts of interest if he is confirmed by the Senate.

Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat, said he wouldnot take part in any decisions that could affect thecompanies he has holdings in until those invest-ments are sold off. Among the investments areholdings in two Canadian companies, Suncor andCenovus Energy Inc., both of which have publiclysupported the Keystone XL pipeline. Kerry's invest-ments are in family trusts.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- More than half the Senateon Wednesday urged quick approval of theKeystone XL oil pipeline, ramping up pressure onPresident Barack Obama to move ahead with theproject just days after he promised in his inauguraladdress to respond vigorously to the threat of cli-mate change.

A letter signed by 53 senators said Nebraska Gov.Dave Heineman's approval of a revised routethrough his state puts the long-delayed projectsquarely in the president's hands.

"We urge you to choose jobs, economic develop-ment and American energy security," the letter said,adding that the pipeline "has gone through the mostexhaustive environmental scrutiny of any pipeline"in U.S. history. The $7 billion project would carry oilfrom Canada to refineries along the Texas GulfCoast.

"There is no reason to deny or further delay thislong-studied project," said the letter, which was initi-ated by Sens. John Hoeven, R-N.D., and MaxBaucus, D-Mont., and signed by 44 Republicansand nine Democrats. Another Democrat, Jon Testerof Montana, supports the pipeline but did not signthe letter.

At a news conference Wednesday, senators saidthe pipeline should be a key part of Obama's "all ofthe above" energy policy, in which he hasexpressed support for a range of energy sourcesfrom oil and natural gas to wind, solar and coal.

The Obama administration has twice thwarted the1,700-mile pipeline, which Calgary-basedTransCanada first proposed in late 2008. The StateDepartment delayed the project in late 2011 afterenvironmental groups and others raised concernsabout a proposed route through environmentallysensitive land in Nebraska.

Under pressure from congressional Republicans tomake a decision on the pipeline, President Barack

Obama blocked it in January 2012, saying his con-cerns about the Nebraska route had not beenresolved. TransCanada submitted a new applicationlast spring.

The State Department said Tuesday it does notexpect to complete a review of the project beforethe end of March. The State Department has juris-diction over the pipeline because it crosses a U.S.border.

The renewed focus on the pipeline comes asObama pledged during his inaugural address torespond to the threat of global warming.Environmental groups and some Democratic law-makers argue that approving the pipeline woulddirectly contradict that promise.

"If we are going to get serious about climatechange, opening the spigot to a pipeline that willexport up to 830,000 barrels of the dirtiest oil on theplanet to foreign markets stands as a bad idea,"said Anthony Swift of the Natural ResourcesDefense Council.

The pipeline would carry heavy oil derived from tarsands in western Canada. The heat-intensiveprocess uses more energy than traditional oil, pro-ducing more heat-trapping gases that contribute toglobal warming.

Environmental groups have been pressuringObama to reject the pipeline, citing the oil's high"carbon footprint." They also worry about a possiblespill.

At a news conference Wednesday, senators fromboth parties said the Nebraska decision leavesObama with no other choice but to approve thepipeline, which would carry up to 800,000 barrels ofoil a day from tar sands in western Canada torefineries in Houston and other Texas ports. Thepipeline also would travel though Montana, SouthDakota, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma.



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index suggested an improving outlook incontrast to a few months ago when theexpectations were not so optimistic.

"Housing, which has long been a drag, hasturned into a positive for growth, and willhelp improve consumer balance sheetsand strengthen consumption," Goldsteinsaid. "However, for growth to gain moretraction we also need to see better per-formance on new orders and an accelera-tion in capital spending."

Five of the 10 indicators that make up theindex were positive factors in December.Consumers' dim outlook for business con-ditions and weaker expectations for manu-facturing orders held back the index.

The index is derived from data that for themost part have already been reported indi-vidually.

On Thursday, the Labor Department saidweekly applications for unemploymentclaims continued to trend lower. The felllast week to a seasonally adjusted330,000, a five-year low.

Home builders started work in 2012 on the

most new homes in four years, theCommerce Department said last week.

And stock prices are rising even faster inJanuary than last month. The Standard &Poor's 500 index on Thursday tradedabove 1,500 for the first time sinceDecember 2007. The Dow Jones industrialaverage increased 70 points to 13,849 inmorning trading. The Dow closedWednesday at a five-year high.

M E A S U R E O F F U T U R E G R O W T H

U P 0 . 5 P C T . I N D E C E M B E RWASHINGTON (AP) -- A measure of theU.S. economy designed to signal futureactivity increased in December fromNovember, suggesting growth maystrengthen in 2013.

The Conference Board said Thursday thatits index of leading indicators rose 0.5 per-cent in December, the best showing sinceSeptember. In November, the index wasunchanged. The gauge is designed toanticipate economic conditions three to sixmonths out.

A decline in applications for unemploymentbenefits, gains on Wall Street and increas-es in applications for building permitsdrove the index higher in December.

Conference Board economist KennethGoldstein said the rebound in the leading

http://www.charities.org/


NEW YORK (AP) -- It can store the information

from a million CDs in a space no bigger than your little

finger, and could keep it safe for centuries.

Is this some new electronic gadget? Nope. It's DNA.

The genetic material has long held all the information

needed to make plants and animals, and now some scien-

tists are saying it could help handle the growing storage

needs of today's information society.

Researchers reported Wednesday that they had stored

all 154 Shakespeare sonnets, a photo, a scientific paper,

and a 26-second sound clip from Martin Luther King Jr.'s

"I Have a Dream" speech. That all fit in a barely visible

bit of DNA in a test tube.

The process involved converting the ones and zeroes

of digital information into the four-letter alphabet of

DNA code. That code was used to create strands of syn-

thetic DNA. Then machines "read" the DNA molecules

and recovered the encoded information. That reading

process took two weeks, but technological advances are

driving that time down, said Ewan Birney of the

European Bioinformatics Institute in Hinxton, England.

He's an author of a report published online by the journal

Nature.

DNA could be useful for keeping huge amounts of

information that must be kept for a long time but not

retrieved very often, the researchers said. Storing the

DNA would be relatively simple, they said: Just put it in

8 Legal Street News Monday, January 21, 2013

S T U D Y : D I G I T A L I N F O R M A T I O N

C A N B E S T O R E D I N D N A

W H A T H O L D S E N E R G Y T E C H

BACK? THE INFERNAL BATTERYWASHINGTON (AP) -- As 21st century technologystrains to become ever faster, cleaner and cheaper,an invention from more than 200 years ago keepsholding it back. It's why electric cars aren't cloggingthe roads and why Boeing's new ultra-efficient 787Dreamliners aren't flying high.

And chances are you have this little invention nextto you right now and probably have cursed it recent-ly: the infernal battery.

Boeing is the first company to make extensive usein an airliner of technology's most advanced battery- lithium ion. But a Jan. 7 battery fire aboard aDreamliner in Boston, followed by a similar melt-down in Japan, led authorities around the world toground the fleet this month, highlighting a long-standing safety problem that engineers have strug-gled with.

In 2006 and 2007, more than 46 million cellphonebatteries and 10 million laptop batteries - all lithiumion - were recalled because of the risk of overheat-ing, short-circuiting and exploding. Additional safetyfeatures have been installed since then on lithiumion batteries used in consumer electronics.

As for the electric car industry, lithium ion batterieshave proved to have two major drawbacks: Theyare costly, and they do not allow automobiles to gofar enough between rechargings. A123, a maker oflithium ion batteries for electric cars, went bankruptlast year because of poor demand and high costsafter receiving a $249 million federal grant.

Lithium ion batteries, which store more energy at ahigher voltage and a lighter weight than earliertypes, represent the most recent big jump in batterytechnology. And that took place nearly a quarter ofa century ago.

"We need to leapfrog the engineering of making ofbatteries," said Lawrence Berkeley National Labbattery scientist Vince Battaglia. "We've got to findthe next big thing."

But none of the 10 experts who talked to TheAssociated Press said they know what that big thingwill be yet, or when it will come.

"If you crack it ... it'll change the world," saidCarnegie Mellon University materials science pro-fessor Jay Whitacre.

Batteries are so crucial to a greener energy future

that the Obama administration has spent more than$2 billion to jump-start the advanced battery industry,including setting up what some experts say is a mini-Manhattan Project for batteries.

To make the next breakthrough, researchers will haveto master complex chemistry, expensive manufactur-ing, detailed engineering, a variety of different materi-als, lengthy testing, stringent safety standards andgiant cost problems. It involves dealing with liquidsand solids, metals and organic chemicals, and thingsthat are in between, said Glenn Amatucci, director ofthe Energy Storage Research Group at RutgersUniversity.

"We're dealing with a system that you can imagine isalmost alive. It's almost breathing," Amatucci said."Trying to understand what's happening within thesebatteries is incredibly complex."

One reason the battery is the slowpoke of the high-tech highway is that it has conflicting functions. Its pri-mary job is to store energy. But it's also supposed todischarge power, lots of it, quickly. Those two jobs areat odds with each other.

"If you want high storage, you can't get high power,"said M. Stanley Whittingham, director of the NortheastCenter for Chemical Energy Storage. "People areexpecting more than what's possible."

On the commercial market, lithium ion batteries aregenerally ones small enough to fit into cellphones. Butto power bigger items - from a Prius to a 787 - theyget grouped together, increasing the juice they storeand provide. That also increases the safety risk,experts say. The lithium ion battery that caught fire ina Boeing 787 weighed 63 pounds and was 19 incheslong.

"You can't get around the fundamental thing is thatlithium ion batteries are stuffed full of flammable liq-uid," Whitacre said.

Even one-in-a-million problems with lithium ion batter-ies can result in many fires because there are billionsof them in use now, with dozens sometimes stackedtogether in a single device.

Experts say lithium ion batteries are more dangerousbecause their electrolyte, the liquid that allows ions tomove between electrodes in the battery, is more flam-mable than the substance in older type batteries.Those older types include the lead-acid batteries inmost cars and the nickel cadmium batteries that are

a cold, dry and dark place and leave it alone.

The technology might work in the near term for large

archives that have to be kept safe for centuries, like

national historical records or huge library holdings, said

study co-author Nick Goldman of the institute. Maybe in

a decade it could become feasible for consumers to store

information they want to have around in 50 years, like

wedding photos or videos for future grandchildren,

Goldman said in an email.

The researchers said they have no intention of putting

storage DNA into a living thing, and that it couldn't acci-

dentally become part of the genetic machinery of a living

thing because of its coding scheme.

Sriram Kosuri, a Harvard researcher who co-

authored a similar report last September, said both papers

show advantages of DNA for long-term storage. But

because of its technical limitations, "it's not going to

replace your hard drive," he said.

Kosuri's co-author, Harvard DNA expert George

Church, said the technology could let a person store all of

Wikipedia on a fingertip, and all the world's information

now stored on disk drives could fit in the palm of the

hand.

In an undated photo provided by European MolecularBiology Laboratory via Nature magazine, Dr. NickGoldman of EMBL-EBI examines synthesized DNA in anEppendorf vial. The genetic material has long stored allthe information needed to make plants and animals, andnow some scientists are saying it could help handle thegrowing storage needs of today’s information society.Researchers said Wednesday, Jan. 23, 2013 that as ademonstration project, they had stored in DNA all 154Shakespeare sonnets, a photo, a scientific paper, and a26-second sound clip from Martin Luther King Jr.’s ``IHave A Dream’’ speech. That all fit in a barely visible bitof DNA in a test tube

often in video equipment and power tools.

Still, MIT materials science and engineering professorGerbrand Ceder and others said the safety problemscan be fixed.

Change doesn't come often in the battery field.

"The big advances in battery technology happenrarely. It's been more than 200 years and we havemaybe five different successful rechargeable batter-ies," said George Blomgren, a former senior technolo-gy researcher at Eveready and now a private batteryconsultant. "It's frustrating."

Alessandro Volta - for whom the volt is named -invented the first useful battery in 1800. That was longbefore other breakthrough inventions like the internalcombustion engine, telephone, car, airplane, transis-tor, computer and Internet. But all of those develop-ments have seemed to evolve faster than the simplebattery.

The lead-acid car battery "has been around for 150years more or less," Whitacre said. "This is a remark-able testament to first how robust that chemistry isand how difficult change is."

Battery experts are split over what's next. Some thinkthe lithium ion battery can be tinkered with to getmajor efficiency and storage improvements. Amatuccisaid he thinks we can get two to three times moreenergy out of future lithium ion batteries, while otherssaid minor chemical changes can do even more.

But just as many engineers say the lithium ion batteryhas run its course.

"With the materials in the current lithium ion battery,we are definitely plateaued," Blomgren said. "We'rewaiting for something to come along that really doesthe job."

There are all sorts of new type batteries being workedon: lithium-air, lithium-sulfur, magnesium, sodium-ion.

"Right now it's a horse race," Blomgren said. "There'sdeficiencies in every technology that's out there. Eachone of them requires a major solution."

One of the nation's best hopes for a breakthrough,said Battaglia, is John Goodenough, the man respon-sible for the 1979 breakthrough that led the first com-mercial lithium ion battery in 1991. He will receive theNational Medal of Science at the White House nextmonth.

Goodenough is 90.

"I'm working on it," Goodenough, an engineering pro-fessor at the University of Texas at Austin, saidTuesday. "I'm optimistic in a sense that I'm willing tokeep working on it. I think we can do some interestingthings."


the weekly news digest georgia jan21

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