Climate Politics
All Stories
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How much will we pay to avoid serious harm to our children and grandchildren?
International climate change negotiations have centered on which countries are willing to pay, how much, and when. Putting aside bickering over who will pick up the tab, the most central question that we need to ask is: What are we willing to pay to avoid serious harm to our children and grandchildren? Some economists believe […]
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Environmental groups unprepared for ‘Swift Boating’ of climate science
Are the climate skeptics increasingly winning the battle for public opinion? On the very eve of the Copenhagen conference, there are signs that they are — and that environmental groups are allowing them to. Polls on both sides of the Atlantic over the last weeks indicate that fewer people now believe that global warming is […]
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Market oversight in the Western Climate Initiative
Though most climate policy wonks are now focused on U.S. federal legislation or the summit in Copenhagen, the Western Climate Initiative is soldiering on — and doing good work too. The WCI’s Markets Committee recently released a white paper on carbon market oversight that is worth a read. While the paper doesn’t draw many conclusions about WCI’s final […]
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How cap-and-trade markets work for acid rain and smog
Contrary to claims that cap-and-trade is untested or uproven, there are a half dozen or so operational cap-and-trade programs already functioning in the United States. Of these, the most significant are the Acid Rain Program and the NOx Budget Trading Program. Both have large vibrant trading markets, both have been extremely successful in achieving environmental aims, […]
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How carbon markets work in Europe
In spite of what you may have heard, Europe’s carbon market is working beautifully. The E.U.’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) has been operational since 2005 and we’re now getting a good look at how it functions. It turns out, it’s a remarkable success story, both environmentally and economically. Let’s briefly review the major pieces of […]
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President Obama, give us hope again … this time in Copenhagen
On Nov. 4 2008, I was an American in Brussels as I watched Barack Obama turn red states blue and win the Presidency of the United States (not to worry, I waited in a two-hour line to vote absentee before I left the States!). I’ll never forget the next morning, having coffee with a close […]
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How to make 1.7 million new clean energy jobs permanent
The challenges facing President Obama and the U.S. Congress have not gone away. Paul Krugman worries that “unemployment is likely to stay near its current level for a year or more,” because “much of the political establishment now sees stimulus as having been discredited by events, so that it’s very hard to come back and […]
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Annie Leonard misses the mark in her new video, “The Story of Cap-and-Trade”
The greenosphere is all abuzz about a new video from Annie Leonard, creator of semi-famous anti-consumerism video/book The Story of Stuff. It’s being billed as a definitive debunking of cap-and-trade, but it’s more like a perfect representation of all the confusion and misplaced focus that plagues the green left right now. Here it is: Now, […]
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Optimistic or pessimistic about the Copenhagen climate talks?
The COP15 climate conference starts next week in Copenhagen, and our panel of experts is optimistic … ish. We asked them, “What’s the mood as Copenhagen approaches?” Many say they draw inspiration from the fast-growing, increasingly diverse, grassroots global climate movement. But they aren’t under the delusion that Copenhagen will produce the comprehensive, legally binding […]
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Jonathan Safran Foer on his book ‘Eating Animals’
If you’re a meat eater, don’t read Jonathan Safran Foer’s new book Eating Animals. Unless, that is, you are a meat eater curious about the health of your body, the planet, or the animals you consume. The acclaimed author of Everything is Illuminated and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, Foer, has been an on-again, off-again […]
