Situation Report

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thehill.com - by Peter Sullivan - January 19, 2018

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is planning to significantly reduce its overseas work to fight disease due to coming funding cutbacks, according to an internal email reported by The Wall Street Journal.

Unless it gets new funding, the CDC will be cutting down its work against diseases from 49 countries to 10 countries starting in October 2019, the Journal reported . . . 

 . . . The 10 countries where the CDC will continue its work are India, Thailand, Vietnam, Kenya, Uganda, Liberia, Nigeria, Senegal, Jordan and Guatemala, the Journal reported.

The CDC said it is starting to plan now to make transitions in the countries it cannot continue the work in.

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Visitors look at cars in the Ford booth at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, Michigan, U.S. January 15, 2018. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

reuters.com - by Paul Lienert - January 15, 2018

Ford Motor Co’s plan to double its electrified vehicle spending is part of an investment tsunami in batteries and electric cars by global automakers that now totals $90 billion and is still growing, a Reuters analysis shows.

That money is pouring in to a tiny sector that amounts to less than 1 percent of the 90 million vehicles sold each year and where Elon Musk’s Tesla Inc, with sales of only three models totaling just over 100,000 vehicles in 2017, was a dominant player.

With the world’s top automakers poised to introduce dozens of new battery electric and hybrid gasoline-electric models over the next five years - many of them in China - executives continue to ask: Who will buy all those vehicles?

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businessinsider.com - by Michelle Mark - January 13, 2018

Hawaii Gov. David Ige said Saturday that a false alarm warning the entire state of an inbound ballistic missile earlier that day occurred because someone accidentally "pressed the wrong button" during an employee shift change.

"It was a mistake made during a standard procedure at the change over of a shift, and an employee pushed the wrong button," Ige told CNN.

The false alarm was blasted to residents around 8 a.m. local time through their cellphones and on television and radio networks. The alarm caused widespread panic and chaos, after it directed residents to seek immediate shelter and warned "THIS IS NOT A DRILL."

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ALSO SEE RELATED ARTICLE WITHIN THE LINK BELOW . . .

 . . . Trump was wrapping up a round of golf at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida when the incident was unfolding. White House spokeswoman Lindsay Walters said Trump was briefed and that it “was purely a state exercise.”

CLICK HERE - FERC rejects DOE NOPR, kicking resilience issue to grid operators

CLICK HERE - Order terminating rulemaking proceeding, initiating new proceedings, & establishing additional procedures re Grid Reliability & Resilience Pricing under RM18-1 et al. Commissioners LaFleur, Chatterjee, & Glick concurring statements attached.

washingtonpost.com - by Steven Mufson - January 8, 2018

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on Monday unanimously rejected a proposal by Energy Secretary Rick Perry that would have propped up nuclear and coal power plants struggling in competitive electricity markets.

The independent five-member commission includes four people appointed by President Trump, three of them Republicans. Its decision is binding.