Paul Zoubkov and Helen Turek talk about Transparency International’s (TI) Europe wide initiative to improve national anti-corruption systems.
Good governance, accountability and rule of law are among the key hallmarks of a healthy society, and yet right across Europe, there is a deep sense of frustration that key national institutions and actors are not living up to the expected standards of integrity.
A recent EU-funded study, has found that almost four in five EU citizens identify corruption as being a major problem for their country, while TI’s own Global Corruption Barometer has shown almost equal numbers consider corruption getting worse in…

On July 1, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC) released its much-anticipated “Preliminary Revised Draft Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement (SGEIS) on the Oil, Gas and Solution Mining Regulatory Program.” Behind its fearsome name, this document outlines the parameters for a regulatory regime surrounding hydraulic fracturing in New York. The Preliminary Revised Draft SGEIS was undertaken after NYSDEC received thousands of public comments in response to the first Draft SGEIS it released in September 2009.
New York’s acceptance of hydraulic fracturing stands in contrast to recent developments in New Jersey andFrance, where legislators recently passed bills…

A 2011 study suggests that consumers are changing the way they look at transportation. This is one of the key findings of an Accenture survey tiled Plug-in Electric Vehicles: Changing Perceptions, Hedging Bets.
The Accenture survey also found that:
Purchase price is only one deciding factor in buying an electric vehicle. Recharging convenience, range anxiety and even the source of the energy for recharging are all of concern to potential buyers.
Today’s consumer favors plug-in hybrids over full electric vehicles
Utilities will have to invest in infrastructure upgrades to meet consumer preference for where and when…