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From Doug to Diaz

He would have needed a stage nameBrad’s not the only one who digs green building — his brother’s joining him to support a hometown eco-stadium. The groundbreaking was just the other day … you might say officials Doug a Pitt.  

Climate protesters arrested at sit-in outside Rick Boucher’s office

Capitol Police arrested 15 protesters outside the office of Rep. Rick Boucher (D-Va.) on Thursday as the debate over the Waxman-Markey climate and energy bill continued. The protesters, from the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, held a sit-in outside Boucher’s office to protest his role in getting more support into the bill for coal. Boucher, who […]

Gore mobilizes his “army” to fight for climate action and take on gravest U.S. security

As the House Energy and Commerce Committee completes its work on the Waxman-Markey climate bill, Al Gore’s army is mobilizing to support it. Gore hosted a North American Summit late last week in Nashville, convening 500 of the 2,600 volunteers he’s trained to deliver his “Inconvenient Truth” presentation. Five hundred was the maximum number that […]

Waxman-Markey: ‘80% less by 2050’ is too hard, let’s do 46%

I’ve read humongous books in my time, most memorably Cloudsplitter, Russell Banks’ magisterial cinderblock-sized novel of John Brown, the anti-slavery warrior whose “Bloody Kansas” campaign in the 1850s helped provoke the Civil War. The similarly supersized Waxman-Markey bill couldn’t be more different – not just in genre, but in attitude. Where Brown gave his life […]

Weakening amendments fail as American Clean Energy and Security Act moves through markup

The second day of markup on the Waxman/Markey American Clean Energy and Security Act (H.R. 2454) saw a series of amendments from opponents designed to weaken the green economy bill fail in a series of votes. The debate on amendments will continue today and the sessions appear on track to get the bill voted out […]

Waxman-Markey gets it right with its allocations to regulated utilities

This post is reprinted from Climate Progress. As the U.S. makes significant progress towards enacting a cap-and-trade system to control greenhouse gas emissions, some are worried that the new Waxman-Markey bill (W-M or H.R. 2454) may enable polluting utilities to reap windfall profits. We disagree. The allowance allocation provisions of this bill have been thoughtfully […]

EPA: Markup of clean energy act has lower compliance costs

This post is co-written with Sean Pool. As the House Energy and Commerce Committee deliberations continue on the American Clean Energy and Security Act, H.R. 2454, opponents have made a number of wild charges about the cost of the bill. These claims are false. A new EPA analysis found that “compared to the draft bill, […]

Waxman-Markey Rorschach blot, illustrated

I said in a post the other day that the Waxman-Markey bill is a Rorschach blot. Here’s a good way of making the point. This is the World Resources Institute’s estimate of emissions reductions under Waxman-Markey — the original draft released in April: Here’s WRI’s updated estimate for the hashed-over Waxman-Markey bill introduced to committee […]

The week in fruitloopery: jaw-dropping things Republicans are saying about climate and energy

I hope everyone’s following the Waxman-Markey hearings via C-SPAN and Twitter, specifically @kate_sheppard @climatebill and @MarkeyMemo.  If you’re not, you’re missing some vintage fruitloopery. Really jaw-dropping stuff. Here are a few videos rounded up from the last few days. Rep. “Smokey” Joe Barton (R-Texas) went on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal to say … oh, how to […]

UPDATE: Washington State University reinstates freshman reading of ‘Omnivore’s Dilemma’

Too hot for freshmen? EVEN MORE UPDATES: Now that the NYT has weighed in, I guess it’s fair to say this story broke through to the mainstream. I’ll spare you all the assurances from WSU that this Bill Marler-funded resolution proves that the driving issue really was financial. In my view, Marler graciously provided a […]