U.S. Power may expand plant output in N.Y., Hub

THE REGION

U.S. Power Generating Co., the power producer with buyout firm Madison Dearborn Partners LLC as its largest shareholder, may spend more than $3 billion in a decade to expand output of its plants in New York and Boston. Timing and pace of the expansions depend on market incentives provided by officials in New York and New England, chief executive Jacob Worenklein, 58, said, after the closely held company completed its merger of New York's Astoria Generating and Boston's EBG holdings. U.S. Power's three New York plants account for 20 percent of the city's power supply and five other plants meet half the electricity needs of Boston. (Bloomberg)

THE NATION

US consumers should avoid any toothpaste made in China after the discovery of products containing a poisonous chemical, federal health officials said, sparking more concern about Chinese consumer goods. The Food and Drug Administration issued the warning after toothpaste containing diethylene glycol, or DEG, was detected in a shipment seized at the border and in products sold at two stores. DEG is used in solvents and antifreeze. Toothpaste is the latest product from China to have triggered safety concerns. Similarly contaminated toothpaste has been seized across Latin America and follows a major pet food and livestock feed scare. (Reuters)

Google Inc. said it is acquiring Feedburner Inc., bolstering the Internet advertising leader's capacity to distribute both media and advertising to blogs via Internet syndication technology. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, a Google spokesman said. Feedburner is a pioneer in the market for delivering updated information to other websites using technology known as Really Simple Syndication. Customers include The Wall Street Journal, BBC, and Amazon.com Inc. (Reuters)

Tribune Co. has reached a tentative settlement of a long-standing tax dispute with the Internal Revenue Service that will return to the company about $350 million in federal and state taxes and interest that the company paid out after a court decision in 2005, according to sources familiar with the situation. The dispute stemmed from two 1998 deals in which Times Mirror Co., former corporate parent of the Los Angeles Times, sold its Matthew Bender legal publishing unit and a stake in another legal publisher to Reed Elsevier Group for $1.6 billion and its Mosby Inc. health publishing group to Harcourt General Inc. for $415 million. (Los Angeles Times)

SanDisk Corp., the world's largest maker of flash-memory cards, said a US judge ruled STMicroelectronics NV didn't infringe a SanDisk patent and that another is invalid. The US International Trade Commission judge's decision that semiconductor maker Geneva-based STMicroelectronics didn't infringe the patent is subject to review by the full six-member commission in Washington. SanDisk was asking for a ruling that would block imports of flash-memory chips made by STMicroelectronics. (Bloomberg)

James Ottaway Jr., 69, whose family controls 6.2 percent of the voting rights at Dow Jones & Co., said he was disappointed the Bancroft family decided to meet with Rupert Murdoch and may sell the company. "I'd certainly prefer they not even talk to him," Ottaway said. "It's a step toward a deal, but meeting with him doesn't necessarily lead to negotiations or an agreement." Bancroft family members said they will consider selling the company. The Bancrofts had opposed Murdoch's $5 billion offer since it was disclosed a month ago. (Bloomberg)

Online payment service PayPal was inaccessible to users for three hours due to technical problems, company officials said. The website was not functioning properly from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m., Pacific time, because of problems with its database, said Amanda Pires, a spokeswoman for PayPal. Pires said no private data was compromised and called such service interruption "very rare," but the company was investigating the issue. (AP)