Climate Politics

You know who rocks?

Majora Carter rocks.

A toxic tour, coming to a city near you

The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act -- better known as the Superfund -- was born in 1980, largely in response to the Love Canal disaster. At the time, experts thought the allocated $1.6 billion would more than cover the costs of cleaning up the sites. But today, the fund is exhausted (it officially went broke in 2003), and as of September 2007, there are 1,315 final and proposed sites with thousands more awaiting approval. So it is taxpayers, instead of the polluting companies, that are footing the bill. Still, few people -- except, perhaps, those who live near a Superfund site -- know about this toxic legacy.

Artist Brooke Singer has decided to make it relevant again. Last year, she and her team began visiting one toxic site per day, starting at a chemical plant in New Jersey, then jumping over to some zinc piles in Pennsylvania, then some landfills in Connecticut. They have cataloged all the toxics data, plus photos and histories, all on a cool visualization application called Superfund365. Visitors to the website are encouraged to contribute their own stories and images as well.

The tour will wrap up next year at the Pearl Harbor Naval Complex in Hawaii. Hopefully by that time, thanks to Singer and co., Americans will be more aware of the problem ... and of the people who live with it daily.

Renewables score big victory in the Senate

With today's green energy boom (and over 100,000 existing jobs in the wind and solar industries alone) hanging in the balance, the Senate voted this morning by an overwhelming 88 to 8 margin to attach short-term extensions of key clean energy tax incentives set to expire at the end of this year -- the Production Tax Credit that mostly goes to wind power, the Investment Tax Credit for solar, and other incentives for energy efficient appliances and the like -- to the housing bill that the Senate then went on to pass by an also overwhelming 84 to 12. (None of the presidential contenders were around for today's votes, for those keeping track of such things.)

(The overwhelming popularity of wind power was also clearly on display this morning. An effort by wind-hatin' Sen. Lamar Alexander [R-Tenn.] to double the extension to two years by cutting the subsidy to wind in half was trounced on a 15-79 vote -- fewer votes than similar efforts by Alexander have received in the past.)

Today's victory -- the first time this Congress that the Senate has approved even short-term extensions of these clean energy incentives -- is sweet, to be sure, as it underscores the strong, bipartisan support for these measures and the urgent need to extend them. However, unless the House and the Senate can bridge some key differences, this particular strategy may not ultimately result in victory on this make-or-break issue.

Gore should run!

Part XXXVI

House gives thumbs-up to conservation program

Some 27 million acres of federal land in the U.S. West and Alaska would be formally recognized as conservation-worthy under legislation passed Wednesday by the House of Representatives. The National Landscape Conservation System has been in place since 2000 to “conserve, protect, and restore these nationally significant landscapes,” and the House legislation would make the […]

Here come da judges

Leslie Carothers makes the important point that the next president’s judicial appointments will do as much to determine his environmental legacy as the bills he signs. (A point Joe Romm made a while back in a piece on McCain in Salon.)

Al Gore at TED

Al Gore addresses the TED conference, March 2008: Pretty intense. You can see how he is consciously attempting to transcend politics — he’s shooting for something bigger now.

U.K.’s Labor Party embraces nuclear but is slow to move on the big climate challenge

Ben Tuxworth, communications director at Forum for the Future, writes a monthly column for Gristmill on sustainability in the U.K. and Europe.

The British press swooned over the visit of Nicolas Sarkozy and Carla Bruni to the U.K. late last month. We're suckers for the idea of French romance, particularly mixed with wealth, sophistication, and the sort of impetuosity we "rosbifs" can seldom muster. Apparently, Bruni saw Sarkozy on TV and said to a friend, "I want to have a man with nuclear power." And what Bruni wants, Bruni gets.

It's unclear whether Sarkozy knew it was his big machinery that attracted Bruni, but a man who is willing to wear high heels to appear as tall as his glamorous spouse clearly has security issues high on his agenda. As it happens, the new entente cordiale between Sarkozy and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is based, amongst other things, on a shared passion for the atom.

Together, Britain and France will supply the world with nuclear technology, simultaneously saving the industry, creating thousands of jobs, and sorting our energy security issues. I've already explored why these arguments don't really stack up. The Labor Party's newfound zeal for nuclear power -- and Business Secretary John Hutton's recent speech in which he said expanded nuclear power could be akin to North Sea oil for the British economy -- make these interesting times to ask what the legacy of New Labor will be for the environment. It still seems as if, at some fundamental level, they just don't get it.

Climate Security Act could be worse than the 2007 energy bill

Last year the Energy Independence and Security Act put into place mandates that will in all likelihood increase GHG emissions. The Lieberman-Warner act (critiqued by Sean here) could turn out to be just as ineffective.

From an analysis [PDF] of the Energy Independence and Security Act by the NRDC:

... the requirement for renewable fuels, such as ethanol and biogasoline, will grow from 9 billion gallons in 2008 to 36 billion gallons in 2022.

So far, so good, but keep in mind that biogasoline, green diesel, algae derived biodiesel, and cellulosic ethanol have yet to be proven commercially or environmentally viable. Less than a month ago, the NRDC and our government were under the mistaken impression that our conventional biofuels produced fewer greenhouse gases than fossil fuels. And it gets worse:

Coal still has no place in clean development

You knew it had to happen: the World Bank now has the same climate sensibility as ... the Kansas House.

Scientist Jim Hansen, on the other hand, has requested a meeting with Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers, arguing for a moratorium on coal plants until carbon capture and storage technology is available. Even Wall Street looks on coal skeptically. Last Friday, the Kansas House failed to override Sebelius' veto of two new plants by only one vote. And the World Bank is considering funding a massive coal plant in India in compliance with the Kyoto Protocol's Clean Development Mechanism.

Yes, you read that correctly: a larger-than-ever coal plant in a developing giant is considered a mechanism for clean development. Why? Because it will burn more efficiently than other coal plants in India. In fact, it boasts 'supercritical' technology.