The higher fuel prices, along with rising food prices, are contributing to sharp inflation.
The commission has said that flawed rules for California's deregulated electricity market contributed to sharp price increases and power shortages in 2000 and 2001.
Fears that the trouble would spread and hobble the global economic recovery contributed to sharp falls in stock indexes and the value of the euro.
They said they believed that such advertising had contributed to sharp rises in consumer spending on drugs, one of the fastest-growing items in the nation's health care budget.
Higher prices and a rush to drill new wells have also contributed to sharp inflation in the industry, with exploration and production costs more than doubling in recent years.
Over the past year, Beijing has progressively tightened the spigot on the ample bank lending that has fueled growth but also contributed to sharp increases in property prices and overall consumer prices.
Investigators described the operation as the federal government's most aggressive effort to shut down the so-called pill mills they say have contributed to sharp increases in overdoses and addiction.
The uncertainty has contributed to sharp drops by shares of large European banks and may reflect investor fears that governments, already awash in debt, will not be able to finance another round of bank rescues.
The new banking measures and other concerns about the course of the crisis in Argentina contributed to sharp declines today in stock indexes in neighboring Brazil and in Spain, where a number of major banks, utilities and other companies have major interests in Argentina.
The project developers, in turn, have had to reduce their estimates of the number of credits they will receive, contributing to sharp falls in some of their share prices (see chart).On average, IDEAcarbon calculates, if you discount the first wave of big, easy projects, emissions-reduction schemes have yielded only 70% of the expected number of credits.
