In 2008 it signed a deal with PdVSA to jointly study a block in the Orinoco heavy crude belt, which the government in Caracas says holds the largest hydrocarbon reserves in the world.

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Its brawny design including double-layer cinder-block walls reinforced by heavy duty steel bars and cement piers that plunge 30 feet into the ground should allow it to withstand winds up to 200 mph.

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The law also imposed some heavy reporting requirements on the states as a condition for receiving the block grants.

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Tellingly, the government's only worry about the deal is that it could lead to a back-door introduction of heavy-handed American-style regulation a threat it will block through a change in the law.

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Shielding that would completely block those rays would be "meters thick" and too heavy to be used aboard a spacecraft, said Eddie Semones, a radiation health expert at NASA's Johnson Space Flight Center.

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