Supply shock sidelines OPEC.

Put that in your pipe and smoke it! The International Energy Agency is predicting that growing U.S. oil production will meet the majority of new oil demand globally over the next five years. This means that even if the global economy grows faster than expected, OPEC will still be constrained by the threat of even lower prices in attempting to increase output. By 2015, the report predicted, the U.S. will overtake Russia as the largest non-OPEC oil producer.

Read it at Reuters

Craig Ruttle/AP

Humans may not be able to stop climate change. But they can take preventative action to mitigate it’s effects. The Rockefeller Foundation is kicking off a $100 million project to make cities more resilient in the face of more powerful storms and rising tides.

The foundation associated with one of America’s most iconic, historical names is launching a challenge to bring better resilience and sustainability to cities around the world. The Rockefeller Foundation announced Tuesday that it will invest $100 million into cities worldwide to help make them better equipped for the ecological challenges they may face in the future.“In this world today we will not be able to predict or prevent every catastrophe, take climate change—extreme weather, raging fires, vicious storms,” Rockefeller Foundation President Judith Rodin told the Daily Beast.

Mark Von Holden

Backed in part by Tesla founder Elon Musk, SolarCity is succeeding where many other solar companies have failed. Josh Dzieza reports on the company’s innovative business model.

Sun Concept, Ampulse, Evergreen, Solyndra: the long list of defunct solar companies is enough to give pause to anyone trying to enter the business. But at least one company, SolarCity, has been succeeding where so many others have failed. Its secret? Staying away from manufacturing and focusing on installation.SolarCity was founded in 2006 by Lyndon and Peter Rive, on the advice of their cousin, Elon Musk, the Paypal founder who went on to start Tesla Motors and SpaceX, and is enjoying something of a moment.

Denis Poroy/AP

Tree huggers and deficit hawks rejoice: The federal government is buying up to 10,000 hybrid cars. There’s never been a better time to switch gears, writes Daniel Gross.

Procurement policy we can believe in!It’s not much of a slogan. But with President Obama’s domestic agenda apparently crippled by recalcitrant Republicans, it’s something for progressives to hang their hat on.The federal government is a large buyer of goods and services—security contractors, office space, weapons, paper products. The General Services Administration, handles a good chunk of those acquisitions. And so the decisions it makes can have real-world impacts.

Detroit's Emergency Manager has released a new plan for the city. It's not looking good.

Detroit's population has fallen by 60% since its peak.  15% of its land parcels are vacant, and over 70,000 buildings stand empty.  As the city's finances plunged deep, deep into the red, the state appointed an emergency manager, who just released his preliminary plan for the city.  The plan suggests, though it does not quite say, that things are pretty hopeless.  Consider what has happened to income taxes over the last decade: The city's gambling tax now takes in more than its property tax.

Seth Perlman/AP

SCOTUS rules against farmer.

Farmers better be careful whose seeds they plant. The Supreme Court ruled unanimously in favor of Monsanto in its suit against an Indiana farmer who planted its genetically modified seeds without paying the company. The case has been closely watched for its bearing on companies that hold patents on DNA molecules and other self-replicating products, but Justice Elena Kagan stressed that the court was ruling narrowly, addressing only the farmer’s violation of patent law. The farmer first bought seeds for a crop of soybeans that had been engineered to be resistant to the pesticide Roundup, which is also a Monsanto product. But for his second crop, he took a mix of seeds from a grain elevator, sprayed them with Roundup, and planted seeds from the plants that survived, exploiting what he believed to be a loophole in the contract.

Read it at The New York Times

A look at statistical significance, and what Oregon can really tell us

Last week, I asked Jim Manzi for his thoughts on the Oregon health care experiment.  Manzi is a very smart guy who has founded a very successful company that helps other companies do experiments.  He is also the author of the terrific Uncontrolled, a book about using randomized controlled trials to improve business, policy, and life in general.  Jim was kind enough to send me his very long, very smart, very wonkish thoughts, which you'll see below.

Spencer Platt

By Tom Lowry The escalating controversy over Bloomberg reporters accessing private information on Wall Street through the company's terminals puts the data and media empire founded by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg into strange, new territory. It is now in the rare position of having to explain its actions to an industry that puts billions of dollars into its coffers every year.Since news of the privacy breach broke on Friday, some of Bloomberg LP's biggest customers on Wall Street are re-examining their agreements with the company to see how much information the company can access from desktop terminals, say sources at those firms.

Despite lousy expectations.

The fundamentals of the economy are ... strong? With healthy numbers out of the automobile and construction sectors, retail sales were up 0.1 percent for the month of April. Analysts had expected a drop in retail sales on the back of the sequester cuts the expiration of the payroll tax cut. Core sales, which leave out cars, gas, and construction supplies, were actually up 0.5 percent.

Read it at CNBC

For garment workers.

Following a deadly factory collapse in April, Bangladesh’s government says it plans to raise wages for garment workers. In Bangladesh, the minimum wage per month is $38, half of Cambodia’s. Factory owners are protesting the planned raise, arguing that shoppers in Western countries expect cheap clothing. The death toll so far from the factory collapse stands at 1,118.

Read it at Wall Street Journal