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  • BP still stonewalling EPA on dispersant chemicals

    BP’s oil spill size cover-up started to unravel on Friday as BP finally admitted its figure of 5,000 barrels a day lowballed the true size of the spill. But another of BP’s cover-ups is still going strong. BP has already dumped over 700,000 gallons of chemical dispersant in the Gulf of Mexico – America’s public […]

  • 10 transportation steps for kicking the offshore-oil habit

    One of the most depressing aspects of the Gulf of Mexico oil leak is the idea that we’ve got no choice but to rely on offshore drilling and the stomach-turning dangers it carries. We know all the problems with importing oil from petro-dictatorships. Electric cars aren’t ready to replace fuel-combustion engines. The only option, political […]

  • Underground green economy employing millions

    UPDATE: Thousands more people are now being employed in the “restoration economy” to clean up the oil spill. Jobs are just one more reason why we need a national effort to restore the Gulf ecosystem. There’s a new economy springing up around the country — but it’s operating almost entirely in secret. It’s called “the […]

  • Four House Republicans give a nod to biking, walking

    Are Congressional Republicans moving beyond blanket opposition to the Obama administration? Here’s an interesting signal: Four GOP House members signed a letter praising Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood for putting bikers and walkers on equal footing with autos in transportation planning. Reps. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (WA), Michael McCaul (TX), Jack Kingston (GA), and Steven LaTourette (OH) […]

  • Safety ‘#1 priority,’ coal chief Blankenship assures Congress

    Poor Don Blankenship. The Massey Energy CEO had to sit quietly through a Senate hearing yesterday while the head of the United Mine Workers called his company’s safety performance “deplorable,” and West Virginia’s finger-wagging, Democratic senator, Robert Byrd cried “shame” on Massey’s “alarming record.” But in his first appearance before Congress since 29 Massey miners […]

  • Where are the oil protests? In New Orleans, they’ve finally begun

    A few days ago, Dave asked a question that seemed to strike a chord with readers. In the face of coal miner deaths, the Gulf oil leak, the corrupt regulators that enabled it, and freak weather such as the Nashville flood, he asked:      And yet where are the protests? Where are the people in the […]

  • The Climate Post: Defining moment still seeks definition

    First things first: Sens. John Kerry and Joe Lieberman last week unveiled their draft energy and climate legislation, called the American Power Act, in a Senate committee room overstuffed with lobbyists, policy wonks, journalists, and other observers. The bill’s authors must steer it through the “usual” complexity intrinsic to the climate debates, and now too […]

  • BP cover-up begins to unravel

    UPDATE: BP finally admits its 5,000 barrels per day estimate lowballs the spill. If BP America’s president can’t say for sure the BP oil spill isn’t gushing 70,000 barrels per day, how can we trust BP’s official estimate that it’s actually spilling 5,000 barrels per day? After testifying before the House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee […]

  • Why the American Power Act is not a corporate give-away

    In his insightful post, Rob Stavins makes two key points regarding the allocation of emission allowances under climate legislation like that introduced last week by Sens. Kerry and Lieberman. First, Stavins addresses head-on the concerns that some progressives have toward the allocation provisions in the bill, asking, “Is the Kerry-Lieberman allowance allocation a corporate give-away?” […]

  • BP disaster investigation must be free, clear, and complete

    President Obama is likely to sign an executive order sometime during the next several days that would create an independent commission to investigate the causes behind the tragic BP oil disaster. A thorough independent investigation is essential to understand what caused the explosion that cost 11 workers their lives, and what led to the failure […]