Climate Politics

From citizens of nation states to citizens of the world

((equity_include)) This is a guest essay by Saleemul Huq, head of the climate change group at the International Institute for Environment and Development and a member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. This essay is part of a series on climate equity. —– Perceptions of climate change — and what must be done to […]

New partnership hopes to jumpstart global carbon market

A whole slew of countries and states have signed on to a new International Carbon Action Partnership, with a goal of sharing knowledge about and standardizing best practices for what they hope will become a global cap-and-trade system. Participants include members of the Western Climate Initiative and Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, as well as various […]

In times of crisis, we get what we pay for

A week of intense wildfires in southern California displaced the news from front pages, but the drought in the southeastern states rages on, despite a few welcome but too-brief rain events. As sources of drinking water slowly exhaust themselves, under pressure from growing demand and lagging supply, one wonders why governments in the region don’t […]

Keeping tabs on who’s backing America’s Climate Security Act

If all goes as planned, the full Senate Environment and Public Works Committee will begin hearings on the Lieberman-Warner America's Climate Security Act in the next week or two. The bill's first real hurdle will be making it through that committee.

Right now, there's little reason to expect that any Republican on the committee other than John Warner (R-Va.) himself will vote for it. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) spoke critically of it at the first subcommittee hearing last week, and Sen. George Voinovich (R-Ohio) took to the podium of the National Press Club two days later to pillory the bill:

Inhofe challenger the real deal

As a coda to DR's political obituary of Inhofe, let me add that I spent a few hours with challenger Andrew Rice last Thursday. My takeaway? Game on.

He's smart and charismatic, and he has a compelling story. He understands politics.

He's also picked a great opponent. In politics, people are more motivated by hate than love, and, well, there's not a lot of people whose name don't begin with Exxon or end in Mobil with Inhofe on their Valentine's list. Inhofe's 'definite re-elect' numbers are in the pits.

I spent some time around Jerry McNerney when he took on Pombo. Bless his heart, he had a lot of wonderful qualities, but Rice strikes me as a better public speaker and campaigner.

Here's my prediction: Rice will make it competitive. Then this race is going to get nationalized.

A new int’l org works toward a global carbon market, leaves U.S. federal gov’t out

Interesting. Across the transom comes news of a new treaty, the International Carbon Action Partnership, signed today by a collection of countries and U.S. states that have implemented carbon cap-and-trade systems. The idea is to share knowledge and work to standardize best practices in order to facilitate the growth of a global carbon market. From […]

Snappy comebacks for the climate do-nothing set who’s using China as an excuse

On a hot day this summer, Chinese President Hu Jintao and a group of state leaders appeared at a public function wearing short-sleeved shirts, rather than their normal business suits. According to the state press, the casual attire wasn't just a new fashion statement: China's top brass were leading by example, encouraging Chinese workers to dress in light clothing in order to reduce the use of air conditioners in office buildings.

Fashions do change. Outright denial of global warming is out of vogue. Instead, the climate change do-nothing set is sporting this season's new line: "Why should we bother trying to fight climate change when China won't do anything to reduce its emissions?" (Conservative communications consultant Frank Luntz even insists that the "'international fairness' issue is an emotional home run." Emotional home run? One might ask what a win looks like in his game?)

How to counter this flawed logic? Hu Jintao's climate-fighting wardrobe choices aside, here are three ways:

Will antiquated mining law’s reform export devastation?

Update [2007-10-28 9:18:56 by Erik Hoffner]: Looks like Jason and I were on the same page when we submitted our nearly identical posts on this the other day: his is below. I'll pare mine down to just this:

In part, the law's rewrite would raise taxes and fees to clean up an estimated 500,000 abandoned mines that leak cyanide, lead, mercury, etc., into watersheds. But the big question is whether this reform can survive the inevitable challenge from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

Reid is from the hard rock mining state of Nevada, and is the son of a gold miner, but surely he can see that we need to stop giving away our natural resources, right?

The wrinkle, though, is encapsulated here in a Casper-Tribune article on the topic:

Edwards calls for moratorium on new industrial ag feedlots

I was going to ask why this didn’t get more play, but then I remembered I had forgotten to post on it for a week, so I guess I’m part of the problem. Anyway, Edwards apparently called for moratorium on new or expanded CAFOs. Is this not a big deal? As far as I know, […]

Major mining reform proposed

This editorial in Friday's NYT highlights some major new reforms being proposed that could finally begin to make U.S. mining policy more rational and in line with environmental goals. It is the first truly excellent piece of environmental legislation that this Congress has considered passing. While sponsored by a key Democratic senator, it may actually suffer defeat because of a Democrat, Harry Reid, majority leader, whose home state of Nevada is closely tied to the mining industry. This is one of those times when a call to your own senators and Mr. Reid himself (202-224-3542) would be worth the effort. Opportunities like this don't come around too often; in fact, this archaic law has been wreaking havoc since 1872.