Apparently, some of the world’s largest automakers were listening when California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger announced that he had a dream of a "hydrogen highway" running through his state and beyond. Last week, General Motors, Honda and BMW acknowledged that they would each be producing small runs of hydrogen-powered fuel cell cars for California’s roads within five years. Analysts expect most of the initial production models, probably numbering in the hundreds of vehicles statewide, to be used as part of public and municipal fleets.

In an interview with TV anchor Diane Sawyer, President Bush proclaimed confidently, "I don’t think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees." The statement had about as much grounding in reality as one made a few days later by his mother, Barbara Bush, who was visiting Houston as part of Republican spin control and was favorably impressed with conditions inside the Astrodome: "And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this–this is working very well for them," she said.

Researchers monitoring Earth’s atmosphere for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) report that the ozone layer has stopped shrinking and can now make steps toward recovery over the next several decades.

In what some analysts are calling the worst environmental disaster in recent history, New Orleans remains underwater following the wrath of Hurricane Katrina last week. The Big Easy’s extensive man-made levee system–built to protect the city, which lies largely below sea level in a geological bowl–may be turning a bad situation worse by keeping the surging floodwaters in the city, where they can harbor the disease-bearing viruses and bacteria that thrive in stagnant water.