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• SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- Federal officials on Friday approved a plan that sets aside 445 square miles of public land for the development of large-scale solar power plants, cementing a new government approach to renewable energy development in the West after years of delays and false starts.
• At a news conference in Las Vegas, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar called the new plan a "roadmap ... that will lead to faster, smarter utility-scale solar development on public lands."
• The plan replaces the department's previous first-come, first-served system of approving solar projects, which let developers choose where they wanted to build utility-scale solar sites and allowed for land speculation.
• The department no longer will decide projects within the zones on a case-by-case basis as it had since 2005, when solar developers began filing applications. Instead, the department will direct development to land it has identified as having fewer wildlife and natural-resource obstacles.
• The government is establishing 17 new "solar energy zones" on 285,000 acres in six states: California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Colorado and New Mexico. More than half of the land -- 153,627 acres -- is in Southern California.
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• SIDNEY, Ohio (AP) -- The crowds tell the story. As Election Day nears, Mitt Romney is drawing large and excited throngs.
• Look to dusty Iowa cornfields, rain-soaked Virginia parks, the muddy fields of the Shelby County Fairgrounds, where a crowd of 9,500 -- almost half of this western Ohio town -- gathered among the barns and stables on a frigid October evening this week to glimpse the Republican presidential contender.
• "Where else would we want to be?" said one of the shivering faithful, Judy Cartwright, a 71-year-old nurse from Sidney. "I want to see the next president of the United States."
• Romney's debate performance against President Barack Obama last week -- and his energetic appearances following it up -- have fueled a rise in enthusiasm on

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