Climate Change

Critical Insights on the Mineral Boom

In the race for critical minerals, the challenges, tradeoffs, and potential winners are becoming clear. Insights from the Emmett Institute’s “Powering the Future” symposium.

A couple hundred miles north of the Las Vegas strip at Rhyolite Ridge you’ll find a dusty yellow wildflower called Tiehm’s buckwheat that grows nowhere else in the world. But this flower sits atop a massive, untapped lithium reserve that would help the U.S. transition to cleaner energy. Now, what if you had to choose …

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Replacing McConnell

If the GOP flips the Senate, who will lead them on environmental issues?

Who will lead the Senate in 2025?  The odds are that it will be a Republican. Democrats have a slim margin and face some close races, while all the GOP seats seem secure. That makes the question of who will replace Mitch McConell as GOP leader all the more important for climate and energy policy. …

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How to Cooperate with China on Climate

A conversation with Joanna Lewis about what has worked, and what hasn’t, when it comes to bilateral climate cooperation with China.

China is the world’s largest producer of both CO2 emissions and green technology to cut those emissions. It installed more solar panels last year than the U.S. has in its history, and yet keeps building coal-fired plants too. And Chinese officials just announced that the country will accelerate the construction of solar, wind and hydropower. …

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States May Be Warming to Green Amendments

At least 10 states, including New Jersey and California, are considering constitutional guarantees to a clean environment and stable climate after Montana’s landmark climate trial.   

Last week, New Jersey lawmakers and a variety of stakeholders crammed into a statehouse committee room for a relatively rare legislative hearing. This 2-hour hearing centered on New Jersey’s proposed green amendment, which committee chair Senator Bob Smith described as “a very controversial topic” as he gaveled in the meeting. This green amendment would add …

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The global conversation about solar geoengineering just changed at the UN Environment Assembly. Here’s how.

National flags at UNEA6 in Nairobi

Duncan McLaren and Olaf Corry reflect on the implications of the UNEA-6 non-decision on solar radiation modification for research and governance

As we wrote in part 1, a Swiss-led proposal to the UN Environment Assembly (UNEA) to establish an expert group on solar radiation management (SRM) proved divisive and was eventually withdrawn. Here we explore why, and what that means for any global conversation about SRM. SRM has long generated concerns that, as a powerful lever …

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Countries failed to agree first steps on solar geoengineering at the UN. What went wrong?

National flags at UNEA6 in Nairobi

Duncan McLaren and Olaf Corry observed as diplomats in Nairobi wrestled with a resolution on solar radiation management

In the last weeks, diplomats from all over the world were negotiating more than twenty draft resolutions at the UN Environment Assembly (UNEA). The Assembly is a biennial intergovernmental meeting which sets the global environmental agenda. It also sets the strategy for the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), and outlines policy responses to address emerging environmental …

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The SEC’s Watered-Down Climate Rule

Now that the SEC has approved its limited climate disclosure rule, the spotlight is back on California’s more stringent disclosure laws that still need backing.

After months of discussion, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) voted 3-2 to adopt climate reporting standards that will mandate publicly-traded companies disclose some of their greenhouse gas emissions. The SEC’s rule was proposed way back in 2022, and the initial draft would have required companies to disclose their “Scope 3” supply chain emissions, …

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Actually, EV Sales Are Right on Track

Don’t believe the current anti-EV spin.

There is a lot of talk about weak consumer demand for EVs — doleful from greens, triumphant from others. Maybe US carmakers have hit a few speed bumps –not surprising when trying to rapidly ramp up a product that’s new to most consumers.  But the reality is actually quite reassuring in terms of the U.S. …

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Misusing Carbon Removal as a Climate Response

Carbon removal is an alluring idea. That also makes it a tempting façade for bad policies.

It seems clear that in some form, carbon removal is going to be an important component of climate policy, especially later in the century to deal with carbon levels that overshoot the targets in the Paris Climate Agreement. The problem is not with the concept but with its misuse.    One of the risks that …

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RFK Jr. Joins the War on Climate Scientists

RFK Jr. has filled a top campaign position with an anti-vaccine activist named Del Bigtree who has called global warming “an enslavement system.”

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. made headlines when a Super PAC supporting his presidential bid ran a pricey Super Bowl ad, stealing the look of a famous 1960 spot for his uncle John F. Kennedy. But he got far less attention for another move that says a lot about his campaign: He has tapped Del Bigtree …

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