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Showing posts with label Yale University. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Yale University. Show all posts

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Huffington Post: US is 61st in 2010 Environmental Performance Index

Huffington Post | Gazelle Emami Posted: 02- 1-10 11:20 AM

Environmental experts at Yale and Columbia universities released their biannual Environmental Performance Index at the World Economic Forum.

The index ranks 163 nations according to their performance on 25 indicators that fall into ten policy categories, which are as follow: environmental burden of disease, air pollution (effects on humans), air pollution (effects on ecosystem), water (effects on humans), water (effects on ecosystem), biodiversity and habitat, forestry, fisheries, agriculture, and climate change.

Iceland dominated the rankings, coming in 1st, while the United States came in at a mediocre 61st, a sizeable drop from its 39th place rank in the EPI's last evaluation in 2008.

However, this year's rankings cannot be compared accurately to the 2008 index, as "the scientists have shifted their methodology slightly as they seek to zero in on the fairest way to quantify the broad and nebulous area of environmental performance," The New York Times reported.

Additionally, since most of the data pulled for the index are from 2007 and 2008, it is not an accurate representation of the Obama administration's efforts to improve, the Times said. All the same, the U.S. falls far behind its fellow industrialized nations such as the United  Kingdom, which came in at a respectable 14th place.

An overview of the US follows on the environmental index:

click on graphic to enlarge

source: Huffington Post

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Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Another Mini-Madoff sentenced to 20 years for financial fraud

www.chinaview.cn 2009-07-14 10:31:04

NEW YORK, July 13 (Xinhua) -- A New York lawyer was sentenced to 20 years in prison Monday for financial fraud, following arch swindler Bernard Madoff's imprisonment of 150 years last month.

Marc Dreier, a lawyer in Manhattan, admitted he had stole more than 46 million dollars from hedge funds by selling them fake promissory notes.

Dreier's lawyers asked the court to sentence him only 10 years in prison, however, Dreier was assumed to be sentenced to as long as 145 years in jail. His judge Jed Rakoff sentenced him 20 years in prison, which was obviously much shorter than expected.

Dreier, 59, graduated from Yale University and Harvard Law School, and then became a lawyer in Manhattan. On May 11, 2009, he pledged guilty to eight charges including money laundering, securities fraud and wire fraud.

Dreier reportedly spent a huge amount of money to maintain his luxury lifestyle. He had an ocean view luxury apartment on the Upper East Side New York. He also has several expensive cars and a 18-million-dollar yacht. His office had a large number of art collections including Picasso and Warhol's works. The estimate value of his collections was 40 million dollars.

Editor: Zhang Xiang

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-07/14/content_11705608.htm

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