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Cycling group Critical Mass celebrates 15th anniversary, keeps on pedaling

The cycling group Critical Mass turns 15 years old this month! It all began in San Francisco in September 1992 as a bunch of bike commuters getting together for a ride, and quickly turned into a global cycling phenomenon with chapters in most major cities worldwide, as well as many smaller locales. The last Friday […]

U.S. conservation land may soon end up in your gas tank

Well isn’t this delightful (sub rqd): The Agriculture Department may allow farmers to plow up land in conservation agreements to plant row crops, despite a record corn crop this year, fueled by the ethanol industry’s thirst for the feedstock. Acting Secretary Chuck Conner told reporters this week that USDA is considering releasing some land currently […]

New study shows turtle populations on the decline

Loggerhead sea turtle nesting subpopulations in the North Atlantic are on the decline, according to a new study released by the National Marine Fisheries Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

The study, a five-year status review for loggerhead sea turtles required by the Endangered Species Act, confirms what Oceana has been telling the federal government all along.

If there is to be any real chance for restoring sea turtle populations, the federal government is going to have to take major steps to protect sea turtles from commercial fishing gear, including increased time and area closures and increased monitoring on commercial fishing fleets.

The road to disodium inosinate is paved with good intentions

Mea culpa. That’s the only way I can honestly write anything about getting older kids to eat healthy foods. Because I’ve been a sucker for the look my 11-year-old gets on her face if I plop down a bowl of nuclear-orange SpongeBob mac-and-cheese in front of her. Sheer joy: that’s the only way to describe […]

Highlights from Brundtland, Zenawi, and Blair; lowlights from Paulson

Notable quotes from the plenary on "Economic Growth in the Face of Resource Scarcity and Climate Change":

Gro Harlem Brundtland, former Prime Minister of Norway and United Nations Special Envoy on Climate Change: "Industry needs political signals and long-term ones. And it's not sufficient that individual countries set their own [goals] without connecting it to a global system."

Meles Zenawi, Prime Minister of Ethiopia: "This is about property right ... it's about a scarce resource, which is how much pollution the atmosphere can take," and about allowing countries that don't need the resource to sell shares to countries that do.

Tony Blair, former Prime Minister of the U.K.: "You're not going to get a global deal that is the same strategy operating in every country ... you will end up with a series of different strategies, probably based on cap and trade, and then a linking system."

Hank Paulson, U.S. Treasury Secretary: I'm not going to quote anything Hank Paulson said here, because it's all been obfuscatory Bush administration claptrap and, next to the three people on stage with him, everything coming out of his mouth sounds ignorant and mendacious.

Ethiopian leader lays out the real inconvenient truth on climate

Meles Zenawi, prime minister of Ethiopia, laid out the, ahem, inconvenient truth: That countries like his suffer because of what countries like ours have done, and that a world-wide cap-and-trade treaty would have to allow countries like Ethiopia to sell carbon allocations to countries like the United States.

He says the funds would be used to invest in green energy. Of course, they could also end up spent on Ethiopia's continuing quest to take over Somalia, so, it seems, there would have to be some oversight here.

Broadly speaking, though, this is a justice problem, and one that will be politically difficult to solve. Blair made the point earlier that if you say that solving global warming requires less consumption, you'll lose the argument. But if you suggest more accurately that saving the Earth from climate change will create new consumption choices, and that making the right ones will help the environment, then people will be convinced.

Creating the will to subsidize a real green revolution in the developing world will certainly require a similar analysis and framing.

Tony Blair on climate guilt and Hank Paulson on knowledge

Tony Blair: "The problem with global warming is that you feel guilty about enjoying it."

Yes indeed.

Less charming is this from Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson: Asked by Tom Brokaw whether Bush's determination on climate change is shared by Republicans on Capitol Hill, he replied, "I think there's a wide variety of knowledge on Capitol Hill."

Writes Ezra, "Yep, many different knowledges, some of them true, some of them false, spread broadly. And they call the Left post-modern."

Tony Blair downplays the importance of political will in the U.S.

Tony Blair, oddly, just downplayed the importance of political will in the United States, and then, in an aside, said he thinks "the political will is there."

I think he's been talking to George Bush too much. Building American political will is the key challenge facing us if we want to see a global mitigation regime emerge.

Still, the topic of the plenary is "Economic Growth in the Face of Resource Scarcity and Climate Change," and on that point, Blair pointed out that the U.K.'s economy has grown en route to meeting its Kyoto goals. Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland, the former prime minister of Norway, explained how such growth has also happened in her own country. Both encouraged government action in the United States and worldwide. So there is good news to report.

Bill Clinton calls for countries to follow Japan’s lead

Bill Clinton introduced the morning plenary today by, once again, honoring the companies and people who've committed to the Clinton Global Initiative to take steps to increase energy efficiency and decrease greenhouse-gas emissions.

But he touted one dubious statistic: If China, India, and the United States were to become as efficient as Japan, that would decrease global greenhouse-gas output by 20 percent. That statistic is based on this study by the McKinsey Institute and I think it's true only if, in an era of enhanced efficiency, the 2.5 billion people in China, India, and the United States didn't respond to resulting lowered energy costs by actually consuming more energy.

Still, it would be a huge step forward, and I suppose it's better that Bill Clinton's up there making this all seem possible, rather than pointing out the obvious challenges.

Over 500,000 more toys recalled due to lead

Another round of recalls was issued yesterday for over 500,000 children’s toys or accessories that were found to exceed allowable lead levels, including more Thomas the Tank Engine paraphernalia and the now conspicuously gloomy Happy Giddy Gardening Tools from Target. Federal regulators were quick to point out that this recall won’t be the last. “After […]