subsidies
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How our food system is destroying the nation’s most important fishery
To understand our impact on nature, there is truth in the saying, “everything is connected.” Few situations illustrate this concept as dramatically as the agricultural wastes from the Midwest that contribute so seriously to the aquatic dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. Human activities and natural phenomena occurring on land masses combine to impact […]
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How much will nuclear cost U.S. citizens?
Percent by which President Obama’s latest budget proposal would increase taxpayer-backed loan guarantees to build new nuclear reactors: 300 Amount the Department of Energy under President Bush originally proposed spending on loan guarantees for nuclear reactors: $18.5 billion Amount the Obama administration is now proposing to spend: $54 billion Number of new reactors that Energy […]
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Digging into Obama’s 2011 budget on energy and the environment
The Obama administration released its 2011 budget proposal today and the internets are choked with stories about it. The four biggest green stories are EPA funding, fossil-fuel defunding, nuke and clean energy spending, and the cap-and-trade placeholder. EPA regs are funded The EPA’s budget (PDF), which jumped up by 34 percent least year, will decline […]
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Obama’s nuclear generation gap
During the energy portion of his first State of the Union address last week, President Obama called for “building a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants in this country.” That raises a question: Exactly what generation of nuclear power is Obama talking about — and what makes it an improvement over the generation […]
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The death knell for comprehensive cap-and-trade
I’ve resisted writing the obligatory “what Scott Brown’s victory means for the climate bill” post, mainly because the real answer is Nobody Knows and Everyone’s Full of Sh*t. What pundit wants to say that? Certainly everyone in the DC Village agrees that the Mass. special election was the Biggest Thing Evar (unlike, say, the Oregon […]
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Fossil jujitsu to save climate talks?
This has always been the big duh of climate and clean energy policy: How ‘bout we start by ending subsidies to fossil fuel development? Clean energy reform is hard enough, swimming against the killer tides of free carbon dumping, car-centered development, and oil-soaked politics. Can we pleeze stop adding insult to injury by targeting scarce […]
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Long term climate finance: FOUND!
We are pleased to report from Copenhagen that after years of searching, long term funding for climate finance has been found…but the question is whether we can pry it out of Big Oil and Coal’s hands. The pledge by G20 nations championed by the US is potentially a huge new source of funds for developed […]
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Fossil fuel subsidies dwarf clean energy subsidies; Obama wants to eliminate them
One often hears opponents of clean energy say that renewable sources are too expensive; they can’t get by without subsidies; they can’t compete in a “free market.” One of the many reasons this is a daffy argument is that there is no such thing as a free market, certainly not in energy. Existing energy sources, […]
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Obama to propose ending fossil fuel subsidies in Pittsburgh?
According to a leaked letter, the Obama administration is set to propose ending fossil fuel subsidies next week at the Pittsburgh G20. The letter, authored by Michael Froman who is an Obama advisor on international economic affairs, calls on the G20 to eliminate all fossil fuel and electricity subsidies, as a “logical step in combating […]
