Climate Politics
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Perpetuating the myth that climate policy is all cost
A portfolio approach to climate change — a price on carbon coupled with a suite of complementary policies — can serve as a net economic boost. Put more simply: tackling climate change can help the economy. As I lamented yesterday, however, this fact tends to be obscured by the political establishment’s excess focus on carbon […]
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Each party has a clean-energy plan in U.K. election
Conservative Party’s “Vote blue, go green” logo.The United Kingdom holds its general election in two weeks, and Jeremy Lovell of Climatewire runs down the plans of the three largest parties for tackling climate change and switching to a low-carbon economy. The plans are all imperfect, but they all exist. The U.K. Conservatives don’t deny climate […]
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Raiding rainforest funds in climate legislation will turn cost projections into fantasy
An endangered unicorn protected by one of the imaginary offsets created if Kerry-Graham-Lieberman raids funds for tropical rainforests.In the ongoing negotiations over the Kerry-Graham-Lieberman bill, different polluters are clamoring for cash to compensate them for not fouling the atmosphere quite so much. One of their targets: the legislation’s set-aside funds for reducing tropical deforestation, which […]
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Colorado Springs experiments by slashing public services
Courtesy Jasen Miller via FlickrCivic-minded urbanist types like to experiment with collective projects. Apparently, so do people who don’t like civic projects, taxes, public parks, pools, police officers, or firefighters. Famously anti-tax Colorado Springs launched an astounding experiment this year: More than a third of the streetlights in Colorado Springs will go dark Monday. The […]
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Can federal courts help tackle global warming?
If Congress and the president fail to tackle global warming, can courts step in? Can federal judges allow people struggling with the losses of global warming to sue polluters directly? The idea may at first seem crazy. In a legal world obsessed with claims of judicial activism, the image of a judge taking on a […]
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Good news for Earth Day: We can reduce climate pollution and boost the economy, all at once
Putting a price on carbon pollution is an important part of tackling climate change. It’s a way of leveling the playing field, removing an unfair advantage that fossil fuels have always had over clean alternatives. However! Pricing carbon is not the only part of tackling climate change. It’s not even necessarily the most important part, […]
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USDA downplays own scientist’s research on ill effects of Monsanto herbicide
Sure, the crops are genetically engineered to withstand Roundup; but what about the soil? What would happen if a USDA scientist discovered that one of the most commonly used pesticides on the planet with a reputation for having saved millions of tons of US soil from erosion was — rather than a soil savior — […]
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Watch Interview with EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson
Time to Act? What’s Next for Climate Policy With Special Guest: Lisa Jackson On April 20 I talked with Lisa Jackson, the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency about about the upcoming climate legislation, innovation in carbon reductions and the upcoming priorities for the Obama Administration. Watch all clips with Lisa Jackson on Planet Forward>> […]
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There are reasons to be pessimistic about climate legislation
Maggie Fox of Al Gore’s Alliance for Climate Protection has an opinion piece in Politico in which she repeatedly laments the pessimism many have expressed that the Senate will finally take action on climate change legislation this year: Even before the Senate starts debating clean energy and climate legislation, the professional pessimists are saying it […]
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Retired military officers issue an order: improve school lunches!
Now that guys like these are demanding significantly more funding for school lunches, will Congress and the President listen? School lunch advocates have found a new — and certainly unexpected — ally in the battle for school lunch reform: retired military officers. A group called Mission: Readiness is holding an event today in Washington, DC […]
