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A polluted drainage ditch that once flowed with industrial waste from Lake Charles, La., petrochemical plants teems with overgrown, wild plants today.

A light-rail line zips past the spot where a now-defunct Portland, Ore., gasoline station advertised in 1972 that it had run out of gas.

A smoking Jersey City, N.J., dump piled with twisted, rusty metal has disappeared, along with the twin towers of the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan that were its backdrop.

Forty years after the Environmental Protection Agency sent an army of nearly 100 photographers across the country to capture images at the dawn of environmental regulation, The Associated Press went back for Earth Day this year to see how things have changed. It is something the agency never got to do because the Documerica program, as it was called, died in 1978, the victim of budget cuts.

AP photographers returned to more than a dozen of those locations in recent weeks, from Portland to Cleveland and Corpus Christi, Texas. Of the 20,000 photos in the archive, the AP selected those that focused on environmental issues, rather than the more general shots of everyday life in the 1970s.

Gone are the many obvious signs of pollution _ clouds of smoke billowing from industrial chimneys, raw sewage flowing into rivers, garbage strewn over beaches and roadsides _ that heightened environmental awareness in the 1970s, and led to the first Earth Day and the EPA’s creation in 1970. Such environmental consciousness caused Congress to pass almost unanimously some of the country’s bedrock environmental laws in the years that followed.

Today’s pollution problems aren’t as easy to see or to photograph. Some in industry and politics question whether environmental regulation has gone too far and whether the risks are worth addressing, given their costs.

Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney has called for the firing of EPA chief Lisa Jackson, while GOP rival Newt Gingrich has said the EPA should be replaced altogether. Jackson has faced tough questioning on Capitol Hill so often the in past two years that a top Republican quipped that she needs her own parking spot.

“To a certain extent, we are a victim of our own success,” said William Ruckelshaus, who headed the EPA when it came into existence under Republican President Richard Nixon and was in charge during the Documerica project. “Right now, EPA is under sharp criticism partially because it is not as obvious to people that pollution problems exist and that we need to deal with them.”

Environmental laws that passed Congress so easily in Ruckelshaus’ day are now at the center of a partisan dispute between Republicans and Democrats. Dozens of bills have been introduced to limit environmental protections that critics say will lead to job losses and economic harm, and there are those who question what the vast majority of scientists accept _ that the burning of fossil fuels is causing global warming.

In the 1970s, the first environmental regulations were just starting to take effect, with widespread support. Now, according to some officials in the oil and gas and electric utility industries, which are responsible for the bulk of emissions and would bear the greatest costs, the EPA has gone overboard with rules.

For instance, Documerica photographers captured a wave of coal-fired power plants under construction. Republicans and the industry now say environmental regulations are partly to blame for shuttering some of the oldest and dirtiest coal plants.

Jim DiPeso of ConservAmerica, a group that recently changed its name from Republicans for Environmental Protection, says the EPA is caught in the center of a perfect storm. “This time of greater cynicism about government, more economic anxiety and the fact that the problems are not immediately apparent, has created this political problem for EPA,” he said.

In an interview, Jackson said she believes that people in the United States still want to protect the environment. “There’s a large gulf between the rhetoric inside the Beltway to do everything from cut back on EPA to get rid of the whole place, and what the American people would actually stand for,” she said. “It’s very easy to make rash statements without thinking about what that means to the health of everyday Americans.”

A 2010 Pew Research Center survey showed that 57 percent of those questioned held a favorable view of the EPA, compared with a 1997 poll that showed 69 percent with a positive view of the agency. A CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll taken last year found that 71 percent of people surveyed said that the government should continue provide money to the EPA to enforce regulations to address global warming and other environmental issues.

“We are not done. We still have challenges we have to face,” Jackson said.

The agency last year began a volunteer photography project called State of the Environment. More than 620 people have participated and submitted 1,800 photographs, but only a few are at the same sites at the 1970s project.

Images always have spurred environmental consciousness. A 1980s satellite picture of the ozone hole helped lead to a ban on the chemicals in aerosol cans and refrigerants that were responsible. Underwater video of oil spewing into the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 opened the public’s eyes to the gravity of the largest offshore oil spill in U.S. history.

But a second Documerica project, with professional photographers, would be impossible today, given budget cuts facing the agency and the wariness of industry barring access by photographers.

Lyntha Scott Eiler, 65, shot photographs for Documerica around her then-home in northern Arizona, as well as one of the early emissions testing sites for automobile exhaust in Hamilton County, Ohio. At the Navajo Generating Station in Arizona, Eiler got right down in a strip mine “where the shovels were.”

“They weren’t afraid of the EPA, so it was, `What else you do you want to get a photograph of?,’” Eiler said. “You probably would have a hard time doing that today.”

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Kensington and Chelsea helped to push the asking price of a London home to a record this month as average values in the district broke through the 2 million-pound ($3.17 million) level for the first time, Rightmove Plc (RMV) said.

As with fast payday loans, this recently used to be the case, but competitive lenders and higher demand has taken this loan type to mainstay levels.

The current-account deficit in the U.S. widened more than forecast in the fourth quarter to $124.1 billion, the biggest in three years.

The gap, the broadest measure of international trade because it includes income payments and government transfers, grew 15 percent from a revised $107.6 billion shortfall in the prior quarter that was smaller than initially estimated, a Commerce Department report showed today in Washington. The median forecast of economists in a Bloomberg News survey called for a $115 billion fourth-quarter deficit.

Imports (USTBIMP) of goods may keep rising as an improving job market underpins consumer spending, and businesses replace outdated equipment. The overall balance of payments deficit is also a reminder of U.S. dependence on foreign investors for funding.

An Arnold Palmer from Michelob Ultra. Margaritas in a can. Light cider.

Those are three new brews Anheuser-Busch is readying to roll out this spring, the latest salvos in a bid by the brewing giant and other big brewers to prop up sagging beer sales with new products that are, well, not quite beer.

It’s no secret that beer sales are slipping, especially sales of the traditional light American lagers that are the stock-in-trade of Anheuser-Busch and MillerCoors. Both companies saw U.S. sales fall more than 3 percent last year, while wine and liquor continued to grow. Combined, wine and spirits now make up 46 percent of the U.S. alcohol market, up from less than 41 percent in 2000.

“Someone else is eating our lunch in the alcohol space,” Molson Coors Chief Executive Peter Swinburn told analysts last week.

Now the big boys are pushing back with a new round of flavored beverages that, while malt-based like beer, in some ways have more in common with cocktails.

Coors last week announced it will launch a new iced-tea flavored brew, first in Canada and then potentially the U.S. Sam Adams parent Boston Beer Co. plans to roll out its Twisted Tea in 15 more states this year. (It’s in 35 states now.) MillerCoors’ last month bought Crispin, the nation’s third-biggest brewer of hard cider.

And A-B is about to unveil some new concoctions.

It’s planning an April rollout for Bud Lite Lime-A-Rita, a margarita-inspired beer that will build off four-year-old Bud Light Lime. After that will come seasonal launches of Michelob Ultra Light Cider, which A-B hopes will broaden the growing cider market, and pint cans of Ultra 19th Hole, a tea-and-lemonade-flavored brew modeled after an Arnold Palmer.

“It’ll be easy to drink in the summertime,: said Pat McGauley, A-B’s vice president of innovation. “It fits well under the Michelob Ultra nameplate.”

Unlike Miller’s Crispin purchase, for instance, all three of A-B’s new brews build on existing brands — Bud Light and the steadily growing Michelob Ultra. That helps with name recognition, McGauley said, and creates “an expectation of quality.”

At the same time it helps to keep those brands in line with changing tastes, said Paul Chibe, A-B’s vice president of marketing payday advance lenders.

“Many consumers want more flavor. They want sweeter,” Chibe said. “Being where consumer preferences are is really important.”

The new brews come on the heels of the February launch of Bud Light Platinum. The blue-bottled version of Bud Light has more alcohol and a sweeter taste profile, and is designed to compete more directly with spirits. It has started strong, the company says, claiming more than one percent of all beer sales in its first month amid heavy marketing.

These extensions make sense for A-B InBev, said Benj Steinman, publisher of the trade newsletter Beer Marketer’s Insights. The integration of A-B and InBev is complete, and now the brewer is focused on growing revenue.

“Part of that is by ramping up innovation,” Steinman said. “They have what I’d characterize as a robust pipeline. They’re coming at the market in a lot of different directions.”

Of course, we’ve been here before. Remember Zima?

Coors launched the original “malternative” to much fanfare in 1993, and Zima made a dent in the U.S. beer market before winning the mockery of late-night comics and gradually fading into obscurity. It was discontinued in 2008. Anheuser-Busch’s Tequiza made with agave nectar and a hint of lime, met a similar fate, minus the mockery, before being largely replaced by Bud Light Lime.

Then, in the early 2000s, a new round took off, led by Mike’s Hard Lemonade and Smirnoff Ice. A-B partnered with Bacardi on the rum-flavored Bacardi Silver. They’ve carved a niche — last year flavored malt beverages (FMB) made up 2.4 percent of beer sales, according to Beer Marketer’s Insights. Now the sector is heating up again as a new generation experiments with different tastes.

That means new drinks, and lots of them.

“The (FMB) segment is very fickle. Brands switch around a lot,” Steinman said. “You have to have new products more often in FMBs than in other segments, really.”

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Satellite images of an Iranian military facility show trucks and earth-moving vehicles at the site, indicating that crews were trying to clean it of radioactive traces possibly left by tests of a nuclear-weapon trigger, diplomats told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

Two of the diplomats said the crews may be trying to erase evidence of tests of a small neutron device used to set off a nuclear explosion. A third diplomat could not confirm that but said any attempt to trigger a so-called neutron initiator at the Parchin site could only be in the context of trying to develop nuclear arms.

The images, provided to the IAEA by member countries, are recent and constantly updated, said one of the diplomats.

The diplomats are nuclear experts accredited to the International Atomic Energy Agency, and all asked for anonymity to discuss sensitive information.

Iran is under growing international pressure over its nuclear program, which it insists is peaceful. Israel has warned that it may resort to a pre-emptive strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities to prevent Tehran from obtaining atomic weapons payday loans.

The IAEA has already identified the Parchin military site as the location of suspected nuclear weapons-related testing. In a November report, it said it appeared to be the site of experiments with conventional high explosives meant to initiate a nuclear chain reaction.

It did not mention a neutron initiator as part of those tests but in a separate section cited an unnamed member nation as saying Iran may have experimented with a neutron initiator, without going into detail or naming a location for such work.

In contrast, the intelligence information shared with the AP by the two diplomats linked the high-explosives work directly to setting off a neutron initiator at Parchin.

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While record-low interest rates have cut income for savers, they will ultimately nurse the U.S. economy back to health, increasing returns for savers and investors alike, a top Federal Reserve official said on Thursday.

“Critics of the Federal Reserve’s accommodative monetary policy are correct that the low level of interest rates represents a strain on households who rely on income from interest-bearing assets,” Federal Reserve Governor Sarah Bloom Raskin said in a speech to the Y’s Men of Wesport/Weston.

But she said the Fed’s goal was “to strengthen the economic expansion and, over time, return the economy to sustainable rates of output growth, unemployment, and inflation.”

Ultimately, Raskin said that would lead to higher returns for stocks, real estate, businesses and retirement accounts, where the bulk of household wealth is held.

“For these other types of assets, rates of return depend primarily on the strength of the economy and how fast the economy is growing,” Raskin said.

The Fed has cut interest rates to near zero and said it will likely hold them there through 2014.

ECONOMY STILL FACING SLOW RECOVERY

Raskin said such an unprecedented period of low rates is necessary to support an economy that, while improving, is only likely to expand at a gradual pace over the coming months.

The Fed expects the U.S. economy to grow between 2.2 and 2.7 percent this year, not much different from the pace seen in the second half of 2011.

Higher gas prices may reduce household purchasing power in coming months, she said, but probably would not raise inflation expectations or inflation, which Raskin said is expected to run at or below the Fed’s long-term goal of 2 percent.

With housing still depressed and credit still hard to come by for small businesses, “the headwinds that have been restraining the expansion for some time have been easing, at best, only gradually,” Raskin said.

Raskin said low rates are also helping households, as evidenced by increased purchases of motor vehicles and other big-ticket durable goods that can be financed cheaply.

“And in many cases, households have been able to refinance their mortgages into lower-rate loans, freeing up income for other uses,” she said.

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Russia refrained from cutting interest rates after a surprise reduction in December, signaling for the first time since August that borrowing costs may remain unchanged in the

Asian stock markets were mostly lower Friday ahead of a U.S. jobs report that is a key gauge of how robust the world’s No. 1 economy is.

Benchmark oil was nearly unchanged at $96 per barrel while the dollar rose against the euro and the yen.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 index fell 0.5 percent to 8,829.69. South Korea’s Kospi dropped 1 percent to 1,964.78 and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng lost 0.1 percent to 20,719.23.

Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.4 percent at 4,249.40. Benchmarks in India, Thailand and New Zealand fell while Taiwan, Singapore and Indonesia rose.

Later Friday, the U.S. government releases its report on January job creation and the unemployment rate. In December, the country added 200,000 jobs, and the jobless rate was 8.5 percent.

Some analysts said they are not expecting a strong increase in jobs, based on a report Wednesday from private payroll agency ADP. The report said private-sector employment rose by 170,000 in January from the previous month _ fewer jobs than expected.

“The two series continue to track fairly closely and both show what everyone has rightfully fretted about for the past 18 months: there hasn’t been any trend improvement in job growth since mid-2010,” said analysts at DBS Bank Ltd. in Singapore.

Traders were largely refraining from big moves ahead of the employment data in case it turns out to be worse than expected.

“For right now, for major indexes like Dow Jones, the Hang Seng and also Germany’s DAX, they are already at a relatively high level,” said Linus Yip, strategist at First Shanghai Securities in Hong Kong. “For major indexes which shot up to high levels, we need more information for markets to expand the uptrend.”

The results of earnings reports, meanwhile, reverberated across markets. Japan’s Hitachi Ltd. jumped 7.3 percent after the electronics maker maintained its earlier earnings projection for the business year to March 31.

But Singapore Airlines fell 2.5 percent a day after announcing that quarterly profit plunged 53 percent as passenger demand slowed while higher fuel prices sent costs up. South Korean shipbuilder Hyundai Heavy Industries plummeted 7.2 percent after posting a 91 percent plunge in fourth-quarter net profit, Yonhap News agency said.

Elsewhere, Australian miner Lynas Corp. tumbled 9.4 percent amid opposition to its rare earths plant in Malaysia’s central Pahang state that is scheduled to begin operations later this year.

Stocks were largely unchanged on Wall Street on Thursday. The Dow Jones industrial average closed down less than 0.1 percent at 12,705.41. The broader Standard & Poor’s 500 index rose 0.1 percent to 1,325.54. The Nasdaq composite rose 0.4 percent to 2,859.68.

Benchmark oil for March delivery was up 4 cents to $96.39 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract fell by $1.25 to end at $96.36 per barrel in New York on Thursday.

In currency trading, the euro fell to $1.3131 from $1.3141 late Thursday in New York. The dollar rose to 76.18 yen from 76.16 yen.

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Greece’s prime minister resumed talks late Thursday with top bank negotiators to try and overcome obstacles to a major debt-relief deal needed to avoid bankruptcy.

Premier Lucas Papademos met with Charles Dallara, managing director of the Institute of International Finance, a banking lobby, and Jean Lemierre, senior adviser to the chairman of French bank BNP Paribas.

Private bondholders are being asked to forgive half their Greek debt, and in return accept cash payments and new bonds with longer maturities. The deal is required for a second international bailout with a looming euro14.5 billion bond repayment on March 20 that carries a serious threat of bankruptcy for Greece.

Top eurozone officials are pressing private bondholders to accept the new bonds at a lower interest rate.

A senior Greek government official said, despite delays in concluding the negotiations, Greece was still aiming to submit its formal offer for the bond-swap deal to banks and other private creditors by Feb. 13. The official asked not to be named because the talks are ongoing.

Dallara resumed the talks in Athens for a third successive week.

Eurozone countries have taken a tough stance with the IIF because they would have to provide additional help to Greece if the bond-swap deal falls short of expectations.

“To ensure debt sustainability for Greece, it is essential that a new program be supported by a combination of private sector involvement and official sector support,” William Murray, an IMF spokesman, said late Wednesday.

Murray said the IMF has not asked the European Central Bank, which holds more than euro40 billion ($52 billion) in Greek government bonds, to play any specific role in relieving Greece’s debt pile.

The ECB, as a public sector holder of Greek debt, is protected from any writedown.

“The Fund has no view on the relative contribution of private sector involvement and official sector support in achieving” the target of cutting Greece’s debt-to-GDP ratio to 120 percent, Murray said.

Greece is currently surviving on a euro110-billion loan package from eurozone countries and the International Monetary Fund, and has been promised an additional euro130 billion in rescue aid if the bond-swap deal goes through.

EU-IMF debt inspectors are currently in Athens for talks with the Papademos government, to set conditions for the second package that are expected to produce more austerity measures in the recession-hit country.

Hardship facing many Greeks has spurred a huge drop in support for the country’s Socialist party, which won the last general election in 2009 with nearly 44 percent of the vote, and formed a coalition government with rival conservatives two months ago.

A nationwide opinion poll published Thursday found support for the Socialists has dropped to 12 percent, just behind three opposition left-wing parties.

The VPRC survey for the Epikaira news magazine gave the conservatives 30.5 percent support. Sample data was not immediately available.

General elections are expected in late April.

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Anheuser-Busch President David Peacock, who has led the brewery’s U.S. operations since 2008, has resigned from the company.  

Employees were notified today of Peacock’s resignation, which is effective today. He’s leaving to spend more time with his family and pursue other business interests, according to the company.

Peacock will continue to serve in an advisory role, according to an email sent by Luiz Edmond, who is assuming leadership of the brewery’s U payday loans.S. operations based in St. Louis.

 Peacock was formerly vice president of marketing at the brewery.

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