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New CEQ head Nancy Sutley on transit and green jobs

I am loving the level of transparency and interactivity from the Obamites so far, but I must say, this is directionally heartening but somewhat short on specifics. Sutley likes transit, green jobs, and efficiency. But what's the administration going to do about them?

A detailed look at building, industry, transportation, and land-use greenhouse-gas emissions

Greenhouse gases come in two basic flavors: carbon dioxide from fossil fuels, and emissions from land use -- agriculture, forests, peat bogs, and waste management. Fossil fuels are primarily used for energy in three sectors: buildings, industry, and transportation. Transportation is almost entirely oil-based -- according to the International Energy Association, about 0.1 percent of transportation energy currently comes from electricity.

Just to make things complicated, people use fossil fuels to make electricity to use in buildings and industry. Well, actually, we use fossil fuels to make electricity -- and -- we use fossil fuels to make heat to use in buildings and industry. In my previous post, I presented some pretty exciting tables summarizing this global state of affairs (and the accompanying Google workbook). Now, in part 2, a detailed look at building, industry, transportation, and land-use emissions:

A knuckle-dragging senator teaches Vilsack that size matters

In yesterday's post about the Vilsack hearing, I missed one small but remarkable bit of drama (notable at an event marked by lack thereof).

Turns out that Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) delivered a sarcastic and, well, imbecilic little monologue comparing "small" organic farmers to the real men who run 10,000-acre wheat plantations in the plains of his state. Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) had dared suggest that the USDA should think about supporting the work of family-scale organic farmers. That led Roberts to offer up a definition of "small farmer" for Vilsack's edification:

That small family farmer is about 5'2", and I'm looking to see if Mr. Leahy is sitting here, from Vermont, and he's a retired airline pilot and sits on his porch on a glider reading Gentleman's Quarterly -- he used to read the Wall Street Journal but that got pretty drab -- and his wife works as a stock broker downtown. And he has 40 acres, and he has a pond and he has an orchard and he grows organic apples. Sometimes there is a little more protein in those apples than people bargain for, and he's very happy to have that.

Even renewable energy should be used and produced efficiently

There's an old saying in biology that poison is dose-dependent, recognizing that everything is poisonous at the right dosage. Drinking a glass of crude oil will make you sick ... but so will drinking 50 gallons of water. Atmospheric CO2 concentrations of 600 ppm would radically change life as we know it on the earth ... but so would atmospheric oxygen concentrations of 500,000 ppm O2.

This isn't meant to suggest that all poisons are equal, but simply to recognize that there is nothing so good that it won't kill you at a high enough concentration. And what is true for chemicals we may ingest is no less true for public policies we may embrace. From police budgets to formal education, what's good in moderation is problematic in abundance.

And yet when it comes to energy and environmental policy, we continue to presume that our generation is smart enough to know the silver bullets, even while we lambaste our predecessors for failing to comprehend the full scope of the silver bullets of their day.

Magnetically levitated wind turbines

Some surprisingly cool green tech, brought to you by ... Jay Leno?

(via Jetson Green)

Half of oil and gas CFOs say we are peaking

It's amazing enough that the normally staid International Energy Agency recently said we've run out of time. Now Business Wire reports:

According to a new survey by BDO Seidman, LLP, one of the nation's leading accounting and consulting organizations, 48 percent of chief financial officers (CFOs) at U.S. oil and gas exploration and production companies agree that the world has reached its peak petroleum (liquid hydrocarbon) production rate or will reach it within the next few years, while another 52 percent disagree with that statement.

I think the headline is wrong, though:

Energy CFOs Are Split on World's Peak Petroleum Production Rate, According to BDO Seidman, LLP.

Chief Financial Officers at exploration and production companies are arguably the most cautious "show me the money" people in the entire energy business. The news is not that they are split. The news is that half think we are peaking or soon will.

Coming together to work toward a sustainable food and farm future

On Wednesday, former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack began his confirmation hearing to become the 30th U.S. secretary of agriculture with the promise to be a forward-looking leader who would make the USDA a 21st century agency. While his nomination has been unpopular among some members of the sustainable-agriculture community, there is hope that under his guidance the USDA can grow into a very different agency than it has been during the past four decades, when it's been run by secretaries such as Earl Butz.

As the next head of the USDA, Vilsack will be charged with revamping a sprawling agency that has an annual budget of $89 billion and more than 92,000 employees, a task that he is uniquely qualified to do.

In Iowa, which my family has called home for six generations, Vilsack is known to be a smart, capable administrator who has been willing to listen to the concerns of family farmers and rural advocates. While attending a Practical Farmers of Iowa conference this past weekend, where many of the state's most progressive and sustainable farmers gathered, there was almost universal agreement that Vilsack is capable of much more at the national level than he was as the governor of a former red state, where almost any progressive policy he would have put forward would have been blocked by a Republican-controlled Iowa House and Senate.

CAFOs and GMOs

That said, many are still upset over Vilsack's 1995 vote as a state senator to repeal local control (H.F. 519), which stripped local elected officials from having a say in where confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs) are located. His promotion of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) has concerned members of the sustainable-ag community even more. They fear that his closeness with agribusiness companies will only prolong U.S. farm policies benefiting corporate agribusiness at the expense of family farmers.

Here in Iowa, while we have been disappointed with many of our political leaders, we are pragmatic and understand when it is important to work with them and when it's time to hold them accountable.

New York Times creates dedicated environmental reporting team

This is extremely kick-ass news: The New York Times is creating a dedicated unit of eight reporters, with their own full-time editor, to cover environmental stories.

Columbia Journalism Review has all the details:

That editor is Erica Goode, a former behavior and psychology reporter turned Health editor who has been at the Times since 1998 and spent her last year in Baghdad covering the Iraq War. Her impressive team comprises Andrew Revkin and Cornelia Dean from Science, Felicity Barringer and Leslie Kaufman from National, Elisabeth Rosenthal from Foreign, Mia Navarro from Metro, and the Washington bureau's Matthew Wald, who writes for the paper's Energy Challenge series (another multi-department project).

Sutley promises to be 'voice for the environment' in Obama White House

Nancy Sutley, President-elect Obama's pick to head the White House Council on Environmental Quality, faced tough questions from several senators about whether she will play second fiddle to Carol Browner, the Clinton-era EPA chief who has been tapped by Obama to serve as climate and energy czar.

During her confirmation hearing before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, Sutley insisted that CEQ "would retain all its statutory responsibilities and its role as an adviser to the president on environmental issues." She said her office "will play an important role in coordinating the efforts of the federal government to build a cleaner environment and a sustainable economy and future for our nation," and said that CEQ will be "the voice for the environment" in the White House.

Some of her comments were prompted by questions from James Inhofe (Okla.), the committee's ranking GOP member and resident climate-change skeptic. "I am quite concerned that the chair's role has been diluted by the addition of former EPA administrator Carol Browner as White House climate and energy czar," Inhofe said. "The law states that the CEQ chair is to report directly to the president on environmental policy. I sincerely hope that Ms. Browner's new position will not undermine the statute's intentions nor overshadow the chair's autonomy and judgment."

Sutley sought to allay those concerns, asserting that the council would oversee critical environmental issues like the implementation of the National Environmental Policy Act. But she also argued that there will be plenty of climate and energy work to go around.

Obama's EPA nominee promises to embrace science and act on climate issues

Lisa Jackson, Barack Obama's nominee to head the Environmental Protection Agency, got a warm reception from both sides of the aisle at her Wednesday hearing before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, facing little of the tough questioning her critics had hoped for.

In her testimony, Jackson promised that "scientific integrity and the rule of law" would be her guiding principles at the agency. "I understand that the laws leave room for policymakers to make policy judgments," said Jackson. "But if I am confirmed, political appointees will not compromise the integrity of EPA's technical experts to advance particular regulatory outcomes."

She was given an especially warm welcome from Environment and Public Works Chair Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), who called the hearing "a turning point for the EPA and the Council on Environmental Quality." Boxer has faced off regularly with current EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson, who has in the past refused to testify before her committee. "I'm reminded of Sleeping Beauty ... who needs to be awakened from a deep and nightmarish sleep," said Boxer. "I am confident we can wake up the EPA and the CEQ to their critical mission of protecting health and the environment."

The Republicans on the committee, including climate-change skeptic James Inhofe (Okla.), were also largely complimentary. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) called Jackson "imminently qualified."

A New Climate

Jackson said her early priorities would include reevaluating California's request for a waiver to set tougher tailpipe CO2 emission standards and following the Supreme Court's directives from the Massachusetts v. EPA climate-change decision.