Climate Politics

President Bush stumps for ANWR drilling and dirty-energy expansion

In a speech Tuesday, President Bush aimed to pacify Americans’ concerns about skyrocketing fuel and food prices with the assurance that it’s all Congress’ fault. Bush advocated tackling energy prices by throwing environmental protection to the winds (in not quite those words), urging Congress to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling and […]

Bush, Big Oil offer more of the same

Yesterday, David noted comments by an oil analyst who predicted $200 oil by 2012.

Today, that analyst was joined in his prediction by none other than the chief of OPEC, Chakib Khelil (who's also Algeria's energy minister). Mr. Khelil's comments were not date-specific, though this article leads me to believe he was thinking $200 oil could come much sooner than 2012.

Meanwhile, we saw more of the same from both President Bush and Big Oil.

EPA chemical-review process sucks, says GAO

U.S. EPA reviews of the health risks posed by ubiquitous chemicals are hampered by extensive nonscientist involvement, says a report from the Government Accountability Office. The EPA review process, rejiggered by the White House in 2004, is cloaked in secrecy, causes years of delay, and has lost credibility, the GAO says. The Defense Department, Energy […]

New Senate alternatives to L-W would take climate policy backwards — way backwards

George Voinovich. There’s an important story in yesterday’s edition of E&E (as always, $ub. req’d) about two alternatives to Lieberman-Warner that have recently been floated in the Senate. One comes from Sen. George Voinovich (R-Ohio) and the other — not so much a bill as a “set of principles” — from a coalition of the […]

Lieberman Warner criticism, Part 3

This is the third in a five-part series exploring the details of the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act. See also part 1 and part 2.

Let's do a thought experiment. Imagine that tomorrow morning, you wake up, reach in your pocket, and find that you suddenly have billions of dollars of cash. Before you have a moment to celebrate, you also realize that you are lying in the middle of an interstate, and there is a big truck coming. What do you do?

(a) Issue an RFP for research, development, and deployment of technologies that will help you get off the highway;

(b) Issue an RFP for research, development, and deployment of crash-retardant pajamas;

(c) Invest in wildlife conservation measures to protect the flora and fauna on the side of the highway that are about to be covered in blood, guts, and twisted metal;

(d) Set aside money for truck driver grief counseling, or;

(e) All of the above.

If you chose (e), read no farther. You have identified yourself as a person who thinks that the Lieberman-Warner approach to greenhouse-gas reduction is perfection incarnate. If, on the other hand, you think that there was a fairly important idea not even listed amongst the options above (hint: it has to do with getting your butt off the highway and/or stopping the truck), then you understand the flaws innate to the Lieberman-Warner approach.

(And if you chose a, b, c, or d ... you're one odd duck. But at least you've signaled your self-interest in high-tech solutions to simple problems!)

Polar-bear listing decision must be made by May 15, says judge

The last time we checked in with the laggardly Interior Department, it was saying it needed until June 30 to decide whether to place polar bears on the endangered-species list. But the department had better find its Decider Pants soon, as a federal judge has sided with green groups to impose a new deadline of […]

Me on a podcast

I am on this week’s podcast from PolticalAffairs.net. I’ll confess when the PA guy called me I didn’t know it was a record of “Marxist thought online,” but hey, let a thousand flowers bloom. As it happens I was talking about a market-based carbon policy, kind of an odd subject for a Marxist podcast, but […]

Two simple, effective, and diametrically opposed climate policy proposals

This is the second in a series; see part one. I said in my previous post that of the three goals of climate policy — simplicity, political buy-in, and efficiency — it is possible to get only two at once. You can get simplicity and buy-in. You can get simplicity and efficiency. But when you […]

McCain, Clinton support summer gas-tax rollback

Hillary Clinton. Photo: Marc Nozell U.S. presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and John McCain have said they support temporarily suspending the federal excise tax on gasoline and diesel fuel over the summer to ease the impacts of high fuel prices on consumers. McCain indicated he would shift revenue from other sources to cover the estimated $9 […]

U.S. should back off from biofuels to bring down food prices, says Texas guv

Has the U.S. push for biofuels contributed to rising global food prices? Well, yes, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Monday: “There has been apparently some effect, unintended consequence from the alternative fuels effort.” But, she hastened to add, “biofuels continue to be an extremely important piece of the alternative energy picture” and “we think […]