Climate Politics

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  • Denmark’s government throws down the gauntlet: 100 percent renewables by 2050

    Lots of people talk about the possibility of getting to 100 percent renewables by such and such a date — if every one of these reports came true, we'd be exporting surplus wind power to the asteroid belt by now. But few countries are actually doing it. Denmark is one. And Denmark would like you […]

    Christopher Mims Energy

  • Jon Stewart caused global warming

    The Daily Show – Lisa P. Jackson Tags: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook   EPA administrator Lisa P. Jackson was on the Daily Show last night, where she promised she would not regulate Jon Stewart's breathing, even though he admitted that he emits carbon dioxide. UPDATE: EVIDENTLY I […]

    Jess Zimmerman Politics

  • Dem Disease claims another victim

    Beware Dem Disease.Joseph Aldy worked for a while as a top energy aide in Obama’s White House. Apparently, while he was there he caught Dem Disease. Dem Disease is an affliction that causes sufferers to prioritize being viewed as reasonable over securing reasonable policy. The primary symptom is a Tourette’s-like inability to keep from revealing […]

    David Roberts Energy

  • Cash incentives for renewables are twice as effective as tax credits

    This post originally appeared on Energy Self-Reliant States, a resource of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance’s New Rules Project. Using the tax code rather than cash incentives to support wind and solar power costs ratepayers significantly more. I wrote about this problem last year because project developers were selling their federal tax credits to third […]

    John Farrell Energy

  • McCaskill defends vote to hurt sick kids by saying the League of Women Voters are ‘bad guys’

    Cross-posted from the Wonk Room. Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), after a recent vote to protect coal polluters at the expense of children’s health, is now attacking the League of Women Voters. The 91-year-old good-government organization is running television spots that hold McCaskill and Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) accountable for voting to block enforcement of Clean […]

    Brad Johnson Politics

  • Socolow reaffirms 2004 ‘wedges’ paper, urges aggressive low-carbon deployment ASAP

    This is a wedge issue.In 2004, Princeton professors Robert Socolow and Stephen Pacala published a paper in Science, “Stabilization Wedges: Solving the Climate Problem for the Next 50 Years with Current Technologies” [PDF]. The abstract read: Humanity already possesses the fundamental scientific, technical, and industrial know-how to solve the carbon and climate problem for the […]

    Joseph Romm Politics

  • The U.K.’s emissions targets are awesome

    Oh, United Kingdom! Whatever else can be said about your bad food and stupid weddings, this much is clear: You are world leaders in funny sci-fi, classic sketch comedy, thwarted imperialism, and now emissions reduction targets. The U.K. has committed to cutting emissions to 50 percent below 1990 levels by 2025, a target that's well […]

    Jess Zimmerman Politics

  • Is Obama’s call for more drilling bad messaging or cynical policy?

    One thing we know for certain — more domestic drilling starting now will have exactly the same impact on prices that the increased domestic drilling in the last two years had. Zilch. The U.S. Energy Information Administration has been making that precise point for years now. Even the media has started to report on this: […]

    Joseph Romm Energy

  • Critical List: Scientists’ report pushes emissions policy, Greenlanders warm to climate change

    A government report that Congress ordered back when most members believed in climate change recommends creating some — any — sort of policy to limit greenhouse-gas emissions. Newt Gingrich needs to admit his support for climate change solutions was "a brain fart," Republicans say. Democrats just wish he'd return to the '90s, where he belongs. […]

    Sarah Laskow Climate & Energy

  • Oil bigwigs whine about proposed subsidy cuts

    Five oil bigwigs spent this morning complaining to Congress that cutting subsidies to their companies would be, at the very least, "anticompetitive" (Chevron's John Watson) and at worst "misinformed and discrimnatory" (ExxonMobil's Rex Tillerson). The Senate is planning on voting this week on a bill to cut subsides to the five biggest oil companies. The […]

    Sarah Laskow Politics