GM asks U.S. gov't for $2.6 bln to build hybrids - Reuters

DETROIT, April 1 (Reuters) - General Motors Corp (GM.N) has asked for $2.6 billion of low interest government loans to support the development of three new hybrid vehicles, according to a business plan update released on Wednesday.

GM's loan request, which would help develop two spinoffs from its all-electric Chevrolet Volt, raises to $10.3 billion the aid it is seeking under a U.S. Energy Department program designed to support development of fuel-efficient vehicles.

Ikea demonstrates just how seriously they take the climate scam

Ikea didn't turn all its store lights out. It might have been bad for business. Instead it "turned all lighting in-store to minimum levels consistent while maintaining a safe working environment for co-workers and customers." Shouldn't they do that all the time? Or, since only half of their UK stores stay open that late on a Saturday, they could have shut the rest, allowing all the lights to go out. Just a thought.

It's April, and the Catlin alarmists are still complaining bitterly about the cold

“There’s a cocktail of motivational forces at work”, commented Expedition Leader Pen Hadow from the team tent, huddled over the sat-phone at the end of another long, cold day. “You can sum it up by saying we feel a commitment to represent the Arctic Ocean as an eco-system and the three of us have the skills that allow us to gather the information that will enable people to be better informed about the state of the region and its future”.

But given temperatures of -40 degrees centigrade with a wind chill factor in the minus seventies, does the motivation that fuelled the team from their warm UK base in the planning stages, diminish?

Photographer Martin Hartley who’s been crawling into a frozen sleeping back that becomes a wet sponge overnight for longer than he cares to remember, remarks “I’m getting extremely frustrated with the stupidly cold temperatures that are making my life a misery, day after day. All I can think about, 24 hours a day, is getting a new sleeping bag on the next re-supply”. [Still more complaining is here]