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Are you thinking of new ways to go green this spring? Try getting a new AT&T Zero Charger for your cell phone, which will stop drawing an electrical charge if your charger is plugged into the wall, but the phone isn't attached. Conventional chargers continue to draw power when devices are plugged into a wall, even when the battery has finished charging or when no device is attached to the charger. AT&T said Wednesday that it will soon be selling this replacement cell phone charger starting in May for $29.99.

It is 1,500 light-years from Earth but CoRoT-9b is the first temperate planet found known to be similar to those within our own Solar System. The presence of CoRoT-9b was detected by a space mission designed to find planets we cannot see from the ground. "It is the size of Jupiter and has an orbit similar to Mercury," said lead researcher Dr Hans Deeg. In the journal Nature, the scientists say it is the first planet of its type which can yield detailed information. Eccentric orbits More than 400 exoplanets, or planets outside the Solar System, have been discovered so far but Dr Deeg, who works at the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias in the Canary Islands, explained that the others have all been "exotic". "They are either extremely hot, being very close to the central star on short orbits, or they are on eccentric orbits, taking them close to and far from the central star, giving them extreme temperatures." CoRoT-9b has a temperate climate. "This is the first planet where it makes sense to apply the models developed for planets within our solar system," said Dr Deeg.

We've seen the prescription for national health care reform shrivel from brain surgery to a bandage on the forehead. I fear that the FCC's National Broadband Plan could suffer the same fate. The lack of competition in broadband, both wired and wireless, is at the root of a myriad of evils, including poor service, overcharges, opaque billing, and a complete lack of service in parts of the country. But for all its good intentions, the plan postpones hard choices on how to fix a broken system, and this gives the carriers and others the opening they need to delay, dilute, and damage the plan's important goals. "While the FCC does take some important steps toward a new framework for competition policy, many of the critical questions are deferred for further review," says Chris Riley, policy counsel for Free Press, a nonpartisan advocacy group. "We hope the plan will confront the competition problems directly and will include specific policies to put consumers first. Implementing the policies needed to bring every American affordable, robust broadband will require courageous leadership and a willingness to stand up to narrow corporate interests."