Climate Climate & Energy

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  • A Clean Energy Bargain

    Earlier today NRDC released a Policy Brief summarizing economic analysis of clean energy and climate protection legislation that we have been working on for more than a year. We know that the Senate debate on this legislation will turn largely on economic issues, so we used two well-known national energy models to examine the impact […]

    Dan Lashof Climate & Energy

  • Morocco’s unique vulnerability to climate change

    Morocco’s 2,175 miles of coastline makes it particularly vulnerable to sea level rise. With most of its economic activity near the coast, no legislation preventing building in the coastal zone and the government reportedly selling coastal land to developers at notional prices, climate change is a real threat. Small scale farmers increasingly find themselves competing […]

    Lynn Morris Climate & Energy

  • Suddenly, a few reasons to be optimistic about Copenhagen

    Suddenly, unexpectedly, there is a ray of hope in the air, hope that a significant global climate deal may yet be struck at December’s talks in Copenhagen. It could herald the start of a successful agreement, or it could dissolve just as rapidly into despair. And the coming week will do much to determine which. […]

    Geoffrey Lean Climate & Energy

  • Not your daddy’s offsets

    A new report, “Forging the Climate Consensus: Domestic and International Offsets” makes clear exactly how important a role high-quality offsets play in maintaining the integrity of climate legislation — and how they could allow an international climate agreement to achieve far stronger emissions reductions targets than would otherwise be possible. The report was issued by […]

    Glenn Hurowitz Climate & Energy

  • The end of welfare water and the drying of the West

    This essay was originally published on TomDispatch and is republished here with Tom’s kind permission. Pink snow is turning red in Colorado. Here on the Great American Desert — specifically Utah’s slickrock portion of it where I live — hot ‘n’ dry means dust. When frequent high winds sweep across our increasingly arid landscape, redrock […]

    Chip Ward Climate & Energy

  • Puget Sound saviors wage war on pet poop

    Runoff and dog poop are killing Puget Sound. On Sept. 17, a diverse coalition of 57 cities, counties, businesses, universities, and advocacy groups launched a campaign called Puget Sound Starts Here to try and deep six these and other threats to Washington State’s vast inland waterway. (Funding for the effort is coming from state and […]

    Mary Bruno Climate & Energy

  • E&E: Reid says cap-and-trade bill may wait until 2010

    Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) today said the Senate may not act on comprehensive energy and climate change legislation until next year, given the chamber’s busy fall schedule. This E&E News PM (subs. req’d) piece is mostly a “Dog Bites Man” story — especially with the key qualifier “may” — isn’t really news to […]

    Joseph Romm Climate & Energy

  • Are Chamber of Commerce President Tom Donohue’s Ties to Union Pacific Railroading the Companie

    September 16, 2009 The President of the US Chamber of Commerce, who is resisting calls from his own board members to stop fighting against federal climate policy, is being richly compensated by Union Pacific, a company which — along with some of its key businesses partners — is vigorously fighting against federal climate policy. When […]

    Joseph Romm Climate & Energy

  • Obama administration comes out in support of key international provisions in climate bill

    Todd Stern the Special Envoy for Climate Change, just testified before the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming on: The Road to Copenhagen and International Climate Agreement. His testimony (available here [pdf]) and response to several questions for the first time publicly stressed the importance of the three international investment provisions in […]

    Jake Schmidt Climate & Energy

  • Are biofuels really worse than Canadian oil sands?

    I borrowed this title from a post by John Guerrerio over on Examiner.com. When several scientific studies began publishing reports that supported the common sense contention that food-based biofuels usurp farmland the Renewable Fuels Association (which just spent almost a quarter of a million dollars last quarter on lobbying) had to cobble together some kind […]

    Biodiversivist Climate & Energy