Climate Politics

Tancredo’s fictions

Republican presidential candidate Tom Tancredo was asked, "what’s the latest work of fiction you’ve read?" His answer: An Inconvenient Truth. Guess that goes on his fiction shelf right next to Darwin’s Origin of Species. More at Tancredo Watch.

‘Eco-terrorism’: Are they really terrorists?

A federal judge will hear arguments tomorrow, and her ruling will have enormous implications. It’s one of those forks in the road: do we continue down the path toward a police state, or unclench our post-9/11 butts a little and remember that sometimes a misguided a**hole with a dogma and a book of matches is […]

Ah ha

California is suing the federal government over weak fuel-efficiency standards. No wonder the Bush administration made a big to-do of announcing its tepid alternative fuels plan today (even though nothing would happen with it until 2008). Rove’s trying to capture the news cycle. (thanks LL) Update [2007-5-14 13:49:14 by David Roberts]: Pure coincidence! Q The […]

This is getting old

Next month, German Chancellor Angela Merkel will convene a summit of the G8 countries, which will issue a joint declaration on climate change. Here’s how that’s going: A draft proposal dated April 2007 that is being debated in Bonn, Germany, this weekend by senior officials of the Group of Eight includes a pledge to limit […]

‘Eco-terrorism’: the latest

This is some scary sh*t.

Won’t run for Congress, but will shill

It’s official: Richard "Dick" Pombo (R-Nowhere) will not be attempting to reclaim the House seat he lost to Rep. Jerry McNerney (D-Calif.). The nation may breathe a sigh of relief. (McNerney’s probably effed anyway, though — after all, it’s still an extremely conservative district.) You may recall that upon losing Pombo went almost immediately through […]

Oh, Canada

So, it's an interesting time to be an environmentalist in Canada. On one hand, we have a federal government whose green policies were described as "a complete and total fraud ... designed to mislead the Canadian people" by no less than the Goreacle himself.

In this case, however, one of the sometimes-maddening aspects of Canadian politics is of some benefit. You see, natural resources (including all energy sources) are matters of provincial jurisdiction in Canada. This is problematic if you want to see a national plan on fossil fuels, because as a political reality you'd have to get all 10 provincial premiers to sign on -- and that's like herding cats. But it does have its virtues on some days, and yesterday the Toronto Star reported that the government of Ontario (Canada's most populous, most industrial province) is set to announce a far more ambitious green plan than the one announced by Ottawa.

DC lobbying effort May 12-16

Citizens from Appalachia were at the UN's meeting on sustainable energy policy this week to challenge the clean-coalers, and were received really well by the other delegates. Coal advocates were hard-put to refute the evidence that coal kills communities. Now the effort moves to D.C. from May 12-16 for the 2nd Annual Mountaintop Removal Week lobbying effort.

Organized by Appalachian Voices, the effort will advance the Clean Water Protection Act toward passage and help end mountaintop removal coal mining. Call your senator or rep to support this effort and/or take action here. 'Cuz when you blow off a mountain's top and dump it in the valley, it's gonna foul the water a wee bit. This bill is as much about social justice as it is about the environment.

That’s what his support for CTL shows

The LA Times has a long story about the growing conflict over coal-to-liquid (CTL) fuel. This is the most important paragraph in the piece, though it is inexplicably buried at the bottom: A new study has concluded that turning coal into liquid fuel yields 125% more carbon dioxide than producing diesel fuel and 66% more […]

The dots

An energy consultancy firm says that state ownership and resource nationalism are the big threats to global oil supply. In other news, Russian President Vladimir Putin this week obliquely compared U.S. foreign policy to that of the Third Reich.