Top US intelligence analysts to study climate change

The House Intelligence Committee approved a provision late Wednesday as part of a spy budget bill that would require the National Intelligence Council to produce its highest-level assessment - a National Intelligence Estimate - specifically on climate change.

The bill, which the House of Representatives could take up next week, calls on analysts to study the political, social, agricultural and economic risks associated with climate change during the next 30 years.

Republicans rejected the endeavor as an unnecessary distraction from higher priorities.  (AP)