WASHINGTON

EFFORT TO REPEAL MERCURY EMISSIONS RULE DEFEATED

The Senate yesterday narrowly turned back a challenge to the Bush administration’s strategy on mercury pollution, leaving intact federal rules that give power plants flexibility in how they reduce emissions of the dangerous toxin.

With a 51-47 vote, the Senate defeated a resolution to void Environmental Protection Agency rules finalized last March. The Democrats and nine Republicans who supported the repeal contended the EPA approach was too slow and too weak in dealing with a pollutant that can cause serious neurological damage to newborn and young children.

– Associated Press

STUDY: U.S. LOSING GROUND IN EDUCATION

America is losing ground in education, as peers across the globe zoom by with bigger gains in student achievement and school graduations, a study shows.

Among adults ages 25 to 34, America is ninth among industrialized nations in the share of its population that has at least a high school degree. In the same age group, America ranks seventh, with Belgium, in the share of people who hold a college degree. By both measures, America was first in the world as recently as 20 years ago, the director of education for the Paris-based Organization for Cooperation and Development, Barry McGaw, said. The 30-nation organization develops the yearly rankings as a way for countries to evaluate their education systems and determine whether to change their policies. Top performers included Finland, Korea, the Netherlands, Japan, Canada, and Belgium.

– Associated Press

SOUTH

OPHELIA STALLS IN ATLANTIC

ATLANTIC BEACH, N.C. – More of the exposed Outer Banks chain of islands was ordered evacuated yesterday as Tropical Storm Ophelia drifted closer to the coast of the Carolinas with pounding surf and a threat of heavy rain.

Rain was scattered along the coast as Ophelia bobbed and weaved slowly to the north-northwest, with its top sustained wind staying at about 70 mph.

A hurricane warning was in effect from Georgetown, S.C., to North Carolina’s Cape Lookout, east of Morehead City, the National Hurricane Center said. A tropical-storm warning extended north along the Outer Banks from Cape Lookout north to Oregon Inlet. With many people on edge because of Hurricane Katrina, all residents and visitors were ordered to evacuate Hatteras Island in the Outer Banks on Tuesday, visitors already had been ordered off Ocracoke Island and 300 National Guard troops were on duty. The National Park Service closed the Cape Hatteras lighthouse and the Wright Brothers National Memorial in Kill Devil Hills. Schools were closed in several coastal counties in both North and South Carolina.

– Associated Press