Climate Politics
All Stories
-
Warm in NH
Time has a nice little story on the "Eight Keys to New Hampshire." Number six: global warming. It may be Al Gore’s ultimate political triumph: climate change as a key election issue. Everywhere they go throughout the state, candidates from both parties field questions about global warming from voters who are looking for more than […]
-
Canadian government rejects panel’s advice to implement carbon tax
Regarding an expert panel’s solicited advice that Canada strongly consider implementing a carbon tax: The Conservative government is just not that into it.
-
Are Obama and Edwards promising ponies?
Hillary Clinton is getting in lots of trouble for some recent comments, but I suspect that while her message is politically doomed, there’s some truth to it. Some background: At the debate, Clinton said that candidates shouldn’t be creating "false hopes" among the American people. After the debate, Obama commented that that was like MLK, […]
-
Does AB 32 call for maximizing emission reductions or minimizing costs?
California’s pioneering climate legislation, the Global Warming Solutions Act, or AB 32, caps the state’s emissions at 1990 levels by 2020. That’s the headline, anyway. But the bill contains other interesting statutory language. For one thing, 1990-levels-by-2020 is referred throughout the bill as a limit, not a target. The implication would seem to be that […]
-
New Hampshire prediction, guaranteed accurate to the tenth decimal
Obama by 8, McCain by 3. Clinton in second, Edwards in third. Romney in second, Huckabee in third.
-
China announces ban on super-thin plastic bags, fees for others
China has announced a ban on super-thin plastic bags in the country as well as a fee for other plastic bags, both beginning on June 1. The ban was prompted by the usual plastic-bag concerns of rampant unsightly litter and the wasted resources used to produce it all. “Our country consumes huge amounts of plastic […]
-
An interview with Andrew Rice, the Democrat challenging GOP Sen. James Inhofe
Andrew Rice. No national politician has done more to antagonize the environmental community than James Inhofe, Republican senator from Oklahoma. As chair of the Senate Environment Committee in the last Congress, and now as its ranking minority member, he has waged war on environmental legislation and acted as a one-man firewall stopping efforts to address […]
-
Increased CO2 in the atmosphere exacerbates the effects of air pollution
The primary reason EPA head Stephen Johnson rejected California’s waiver request is that the state did not face "extraordinary and compelling conditions" as defined under the Clean Air Act. The idea is that CO2 affects the entire atmosphere equally, so California didn’t face any particular dangers from it. Turns out, not only is that shoddy […]
-
Canada should consider adopting carbon tax, says panel
Canada should strongly consider adopting a carbon tax along with an emissions cap-and-trade system, a panel of experts advised the government today. The panel had been asked for advice on how Canada could meet its goal of reducing emissions by 45 to 65 percent of 2003 levels by 2050. Environment Minister John Baird put the […]