Climate Politics

Saudis agree with McCain: Cut gasoline taxes!

If anything should put a stake through John McCain's absurd gas tax holiday idea, it's that the Saudi King advocates it, too!

As I have previously noted, the only ones who benefit from the gas tax are the oil companies and the petroleum producers. Case in point, the biggest producer just said:

Next month, the Saudis will be pumping an extra half-a-million barrels of oil a day compared to last month, bringing total Saudi production to 9.7 million barrels a day, their highest ever level. But the world's biggest oil exporters are coupling the increase with an appeal to western Europe to cut fuel taxes to lower the price of petrol to consumers.

Why do they want the West to lower fuel taxes? They want to be able to raise their own prices and/or they want higher demand for their primary product.

Republicans expanding their drill base, at least to other Republicans

While Dick Cheney’s busy cheerleading for increased domestic drilling from the White House, House Republicans have been cooking up yet another bill to open up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to drilling. The bill, which they’re calling the “American Energy Independence and Price Reduction Act,” would “direct the Secretary of the Interior to establish […]

CEI deniers praise Andy Revkin, diss Tiger Woods

I'd like to thank the Competitive Enterprise Institute for publishing such an unintentionally informative and amusing newsletter. Rarely has the anti-scientific nature of global warming denial been so well stated in a mere two sentences:

A scientist who says that the atmosphere is warming, and cites certain physical processes, is still a scientist. A scientist who argues that people must take certain acts to avoid disaster has become a priest.

In other words, "A doctor who diagnoses your diabetes using medical tests is still a doctor. A doctor who tells you to exercise, change your diet, monitor glucose levels, and/or take insulin to avoid acute complications has become a priest."

Council on Foreign Relations releases new report on climate change and U.S. policy

The Council on Foreign Relations released a new report this week on how the United States should approach foreign policy as it relates to climate change. “Confronting Climate Change: A Strategy for U.S. Foreign Policy,” as one might expect, indicates that the U.S. needs to come up with a mandatory emissions reduction plan if it […]

Boucher and Upton introduce bipartisan legislation to invest in carbon sequestration technology

House Energy and Air Quality Subcommittee Chairman Rick Boucher (D-Va.) and ranking minority member Fred Upton (R-Mich.) introduced industry-backed legislation on Wednesday to invest billions of dollars in carbon capture-and-sequestration (CCS) technology. The bill [PDF] is intended to “accelerate the development and early deployment of systems for the capture and storage of carbon dioxide emissions […]

Peter Barnes’ carbon policy proposal would not spur the economic changes we need

I should preface by saying that I am a fan of Peter Barnes. He's an emeritus board member of Redefining Progress. He's a smart and thoughtful guy. But I'm not a fan of his cap and dividend idea, mostly from an economic perspective.

First, the idea that a price on carbon would be transformative, and that we should do that first and then come in with other complementary policies later, is dangerously wrong. Transportation and building heating/electricity are the two largest contributors to carbon emissions, accounting for well over half the total. The price elasticity on transportation fuels is very low, as we've seen. With gas prices up $2 per gallon in the last three years, we're now finally seeing small reductions in driving, somewhere in the neighborhood of 4%. $2 per gallon of gas is roughly the equivalent of $200 per ton of carbon, a price impact that the failed Lieberman Warner bill wouldn't have brought until beyond 2040, if then.

Home energy use is not only terribly price inelastic (people light and heat their homes out of habit and necessity, not on the basis of price), so that we'd need very high prices to induce behavior changes, but is also characterized by a terrible market failure in information, where people have no idea what appliance costs them what in terms of electricity. As everyone should now be aware, rental units are subject to other serious energy market failures due to renter/owner split incentives and the liquidity constraints of many renters.

Budget office wants to reduce disaster funds for West Coast fisherfolk

The federal government, having failed to support salmon to the point that California’s fishing season was shut down altogether, may now yank support from fisherfolk. The Office of Management and Budget is requesting that the $170 million put aside as disaster funding for the West Coast salmon industry be reduced to $100 million to offset […]

New Yale green site draws attention to state climate efforts

I think various Grist contributors have linked over there a few times already, but I’ve been remiss in not explicitly noting the debut of environment360, the new online publication from the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies. It’s come out of the gate with a bang, with pieces from high-profile writers like Bill McKibben, […]

Challenging the militarization of U.S. energy policy

This essay originally ran on TomDispatch; it is reprinted here with Tom's kind permission.

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American policymakers have long viewed the protection of overseas oil supplies as an essential matter of "national security," requiring the threat of -- and sometimes the use of -- military force. This is now an unquestioned part of American foreign policy.

On this basis, the first Bush administration fought a war against Iraq in 1990-1991 and the second Bush administration invaded Iraq in 2003. With global oil prices soaring and oil reserves expected to dwindle in the years ahead, military force is sure to be seen by whatever new administration enters Washington in January 2009 as the ultimate guarantor of our well-being in the oil heartlands of the planet. But with the costs of militarized oil operations -- in both blood and dollars -- rising precipitously, isn't it time to challenge such "wisdom"? Isn't it time to ask whether the U.S. military has anything reasonable to do with American energy security, and whether a reliance on military force, when it comes to energy policy, is practical, affordable, or justifiable?

How energy policy got militarized

The association between "energy security" (as it's now termed) and "national security" was established long ago. President Franklin D. Roosevelt first forged this association way back in 1945, when he pledged to protect the Saudi Arabian royal family in return for privileged American access to Saudi oil. The relationship was given formal expression in 1980, when President Jimmy Carter told Congress that maintaining the uninterrupted flow of Persian Gulf oil was a "vital interest" of the United States, and attempts by hostile nations to cut that flow would be countered "by any means necessary, including military force."

U.K. looking to seduce communities into hosting nuke-waste facility

The British government has begun searching in earnest for a community willing to host a new underground nuclear waste burial site. The winning community would not only be, de facto, the hottest place in Britain, but it could also be the lucky recipient of … infrastructure funds! Britain’s environment secretary, Hilary Benn, launched into seduction […]