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DPU moves to smooth electric bill spikes

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:34:26 GMT

State utility overseers have ordered Eversource and National Grid to split two of the coldest (and often most costly) months of the year into two procurement and billing periods, implementing an idea that Maura Healey’s office proposed when she was attorney general eight years ago.The Department of Public Utilities said that ordering two of the state’s three electric distribution companies to change their basic service periods for residential and small business customers to the six-month periods of February through July and August through January “is expected to mitigate large seasonal changes in basic service electricity supply prices and differences across electric distribution companies.”The third distribution company, Unitil, already uses that schedule. DPU said National Grid and Eversource supported the proposal.DPU launched an investigation in early January and made recommendations related to the way that basic service (the default electric service prov...

Madison Park grads keep Boston’s lights beaming

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:34:26 GMT

Fresh out of high school, Joshua Padilla, Adriel Carvajal and Jay Barbosa go to work every day maintaining the city’s over 70,000 street lights.On a typical day, 17-year-old Padilla said, they’ll come in, prep the trucks, test the light fixtures and head out to their first job site.“Since I’m a city worker, when I’m working I get more people that come up to me and talk and they always have questions about the lights,” said Barbosa. “So that’s pretty new, but also I enjoy that because they want to take care of their community, which I would probably do the same. It’s pretty nice, and I’m a friendly person too, so it doesn’t bother me.”The three are among the first cohort to get a jumpstart into city work through a new job pipeline for grads of Madison Park Vocational Technical School. Earlier during their senior year, they met with department officials, liked the job opportunity and applied.“When we were pr...

Oil jumps on more Saudi, Russian cuts 

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:34:26 GMT

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Saudi Arabia and Russia agreed to extend their oil production cuts through the end of this year, trimming 1.3 million barrels of crude daily out of the global market and boosting energy prices.The dual announcements from Riyadh and Moscow pushed benchmark Brent crude above $90 a barrel in trading Tuesday, a price unseen in the market since November.The countries’ moves could increase inflation and the cost for motorists at gasoline pumps. It also puts new pressure on Saudi Arabia’s relationship with the United States, as President Biden last year warned the kingdom there would be unspecified “consequences” for partnering with Russia on cuts as Moscow wages war on Ukraine.Saudi Arabia’s announcement, carried by the state-run Saudi Press Agency, said the country still would monitor the market and could take further action if necessary.“This additional voluntary cut comes to reinforce the precautionary efforts made by OP...

Tropical Depression 13 will likely become ‘powerful hurricane’ in record-warm waters, East Coast could be threatened

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:34:26 GMT

A new tropical depression has formed in the Atlantic Ocean, as forecasters expect that the system will become a “powerful hurricane” later this week and possibly impact the East Coast.Tropical Depression 13 has developed in the central Atlantic Ocean, and meteorologists on Tuesday said it will strengthen into a tropical storm and then Hurricane Lee.The East Coast, along with the Caribbean and Bermuda, could be threatened by the major hurricane.“Tropical Depression 13 forms in the Central Atlantic, forecast to become a powerful hurricane by the end of the week,” the National Hurricane Center posted on Tuesday.“The depression is forecast to become a major hurricane by this weekend and could bring impacts to the Leeward Islands by that time,” the forecasters added. “While it is too soon to determine the location and magnitude of these possible impacts, interests in this area should monitor the progress of the depression and updates to the forec...

Disney, Spectrum direct customers to other TV services as dispute keeping ESPN off air continues

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:34:26 GMT

By DAVID BAUDER (AP Media Writer)NEW YORK (AP) — Both sides of a dispute that has left nearly 15 million cable TV subscribers without ESPN or other networks affiliated with The Walt Disney Co. are directing customers to other services where they can watch television.The offers speak to the unusual nature of the business dispute between Disney and Charter Communications, and doesn’t auger a quick resolution.Charter is telling its Spectrum TV customers about a special deal being offered by the Fubo live television streaming service to get two months at discounts of 25% or 30%, depending on the plan.“I’ve covered carriage disputes for more years than I would like to remember, and I don’t recall a TV provider ever offering its customers a discount to another TV provider during a channel blackout,” wrote journalist Phillip Swann, who runs tvanswerman.com.Spectrum had no comment Tuesday on the offer’s implications.Disney, meanwhile, is also offeri...

US steps toward forcing recall of 52 million air bag inflators that can explode and hurl shrapnel

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:34:26 GMT

By TOM KRISHER (AP Auto Writer)DETROIT (AP) — The U.S. government is taking a big step toward forcing a defiant Tennessee company to recall 52 million air bag inflators that could explode, hurl shrapnel and injure or kill people.The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration on Tuesday said it has made an initial decision that the inflators made by ARC Automotive Inc., and under license by another company, are defective. The agency scheduled a public hearing for Oct. 5, a required step before deciding to seek a court-ordered recall.In May the agency asked ARC to recall the inflators, which it says are responsible for at least seven injuries and two deaths in the U.S. and Canada since 2009. But ARC has refused to issue a full-scale recall, setting the stage for the possible court fight.Messages were left Tuesday seeking comment from ARC. The company maintains that no safety defect exists, that NHTSA’s demand is based on a hypothesis rather than technical conclusions, ...

Biden awards Medal of Honor to Army helicopter pilot who rescued soldiers in a Vietnam firefight

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:34:26 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden awarded the Medal of Honor to Capt. Larry Taylor on Tuesday, honoring the Army pilot who risked his life during the Vietnam War by flying into heavy enemy fire to save four members of a reconnaissance team from almost certain death as they were about to be overrun. On the night of June 18, 1968, then-1st Lt. Taylor flew his Cobra attack helicopter to rescue the men after they had become surrounded by the enemy. “It was pitch black. No moon. No stars. No light beyond the glow of Lieutenant Taylor’s cockpit control, when he heard a whisper coming through his radio, ‘We’re surrounded,’” Biden said, adding, “Lieutenant Taylor knew the risks, but he was ready.” Taylor, a Tennessean who is now 81, recalled in an interview last week that he had to figure out how to get the men out, otherwise “they wouldn’t make it.”David Hill, one of the four Taylor saved that night, said his actions were what “we now call thinking outside the box.”Hill and...

At least 7 people die as severe rainstorms trigger flooding in Greece, Turkey and Bulgaria

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:34:26 GMT

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Fierce rainstorms battered neighboring Greece, Turkey and Bulgaria on Tuesday, triggering flooding that caused at least seven deaths, including two holidaymakers swept away by a torrent that raged through a campsite in northwestern Turkey.Turkish Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said four other people were missing after the flash flood swept over the campsite in Kirklareli province, near the border with Bulgaria. He said about 12 vacationers were at the site when the waters hit.Search teams had located two bodies, he said on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter. “The search and rescue efforts for the missing (four) continue uninterrupted,” he added.Television footage showed rescuers carrying a young girl and an adult to safety from waters reaching waist-high in some areas. The rains also damaged and forced the closure of a main road, HaberTurk television reported.In Istanbul, Turkey’s largest city, heavy rain flooded streets and homes in ...

Trump plans to attend the Iowa-Iowa State football game in the leadoff 2024 GOP voting state

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:34:26 GMT

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Former President Donald Trump plans to attend Saturday’s football game between Iowa State University and the University of Iowa, his campaign said.The game, hosted this year by the Iowa State Cyclones in Ames, is the marquee sporting event in the state, which is scheduled to host the leadoff Republican presidential nominating caucuses in January. The visit will mark Trump’s sixth trip to the state this year. Biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, who is among a dozen challengers to Trump for the 2024 GOP nomination, also plans to attend the Iowa State-Iowa game, his campaign said. With about four months before the caucuses, Trump leads his rivals in Iowa by wide margins in recent polls, despite facing four criminal indictments. Two of the indictments allege that he acted illegally to try to overturn his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe Biden.Trump is the heavy favorite in early caucus polls, with 42% of likely Iowa Republican caucus participants ...

Swiss parliamentary panel urges expulsions of Russian, other spies who threaten national security

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:34:26 GMT

GENEVA (AP) — A Swiss parliamentary commission voted Tuesday to urge the government to systematically expel Russian and other spies who threaten Switzerland’s security through illegal intelligence activities. The foreign affairs commission of the lower house of parliament passed the motion by 11 votes to 9, with one abstention. It amounts to a procedural step that would require broader authorization by the Swiss executive branch to take effect.It comes as the Swiss legislature grappled with a flurry of Russia-related matters as its latest session gets under way. Switzerland has faced criticism from both Moscow and the West about its self-professed neutrality in international affairs against the backdrop of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s more than 18-month war against Ukraine.The United States and some other Western countries are frustrated over Switzerland’s refusal to allow European partners to ship Swiss-made weaponry to Ukraine, among other complaints. Switz...