News bites: Global warming fuels wild weather, US poised to allow energy investments in Burma, and more

The New York Times unwraps a report showing that some of the weather extremes afflicting people around the world have become more likely because of global warming.

“A new study found that global warming made the severe heat wave that afflicted Texas last year 20 times as likely as it would have been in the 1960s,” the piece notes.

The Associated Press has the latest on the intrigue over the ouster of Progress Energy’s CEO after the company’s merger with Duke Energy. From its story:

Duke Energy Corp.’s surprise CEO said Tuesday that America’s largest electric company dumped Progress Energy Inc. CEO Bill Johnson the same evening it was created in a merger because directors of the two merging corporations worried about Johnson’s authoritarian style and being forced to pump billions into a troubled Florida nuclear plant.

Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers remained CEO after the merger, though the companies had said they planned for Johnson to head the expanded company.

AP also reports on the energy implications of U.S. relations with Burma.

“The United States is poised to allow U.S. companies to invest with Myanmar’s state oil and gas enterprise as the Obama administration takes its biggest step yet to roll back sanctions, marking a rare break from democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi,” the news service reports.

The Wall Street Journal reports that Russian President Vladimir Putin “navigated carefully through the debate within his government over the privatization of state energy assets.”

Bloomberg looks at plans for deepwater oil drilling off Kenya’s coast.