Solar array being installed at Mt. Abram ski resort

A western Maine ski resort is installing an 803-panel solar array it says should eventually provide 70 percent of the resort’s annual electricity needs.

Jamie Schectman, the marketing director of Mt. Abram ski area in Greenwood, said the project is expected to produce more than 280,000 kilowatt-hours annually.

Activist investor urges Yahoo to purchase AOL

In a letter on Friday, activist investor Jeffrey Smith urged Yahoo Inc. to buy another fallen Internet star, AOL Inc., and take steps to reduce the future taxes on the company’s lucrative stake in China’s Alibaba Group. He also chastised the company for spending $1.3 billion to acquire an Internet blogging service and more than two dozen other startups during the past two years with little to show in return so far.

Obama moves to close loopholes on payday loans

Aiming to restrict lenders who prey on members of the military, the Obama administration on Friday moved to close legal loopholes that have placed hundreds of thousands of service members at risk of excessive payday and other short-term loan fees.

Under current law, lenders cannot charge members of the military more than 36 percent interest. But the loans covered by the law are so narrowly defined that lenders, many of them located near military bases, can make simple adjustments to get around its provisions.

Final rules likely won’t take effect until next year; the public and interest groups have 60 days to comment on the plan.

Use of portable electronics OK’d on European airlines

European skies may soon be alive with the sound of small talk with new safety rules allowing the use of all portable electronics, including cellphones, at any time during flights.

Under the guidelines issued Friday by the European Aviation Safety Agency, European airlines can allow passengers to use electronics during the entire flight, without putting them into “airplane mode.”

Standing in the way is the difficulty of getting a cellphone signal at high altitudes, and also how passengers will react to the thought of sitting next to a chatterbox across the Atlantic.

– From news service reports