Legislating Sunlight Reflection in Latin America and the Caribbean
UCLA’s ESI Project co-hosted a science-policy dialogue with Latin American and Caribbean parliamentarians.
In early June, UCLA’s ESI Project, in partnership with the Degrees Initiative, had the exciting opportunity to address the Parliament of Latin America and the Caribbean (PARLATINO), on the emerging issue of Earth system interventions, notably sunlight reflection or SRM. As an interparliamentary body with broad reach, PARLATINO is a forum for legislators from the region’s 23 countries to discuss topics of mutual concern and collaborate on projects like developing ...
CONTINUE READINGNPR Cut Its Climate Desk. These 33 Local Climate Reporters Are Still at It
Laying off two climate journalists is a step backward for NPR. The good news is that local public radio stations are still doing climate journalism.
Well, it’s even worse than I previously reported at NPR where newsroom leaders have reduced both climate and science staff. NPR not only fired its chief climate editor and ended the Climate Desk as a standalone team but has also laid off longtime energy correspondent Jeff Brady. By my count, NPR has reduced the climate team by 22 percent and the science desk by 50 percent. Shutting the Climate Desk as a standalone team means moving the remaining journalists into...
CONTINUE READINGOMB’s New Grant Regulations: A Deeper Dive
A close look at OMB's proposed rule only heightens concerns.
Is OMB’s proposed rewrite of federal grant regulations as bad as it sounds? Sadly, the answer is yes. Below, I take a close look at some key provisions in the regulations. Some raise constitutional problems. Others are merely bad policy. The proposed rule undermines merit review, deters valuable research, and skews research toward the politics of the moment. Section 200.205(b). Federal agency merit review. This section is somewhat misleadingly titled, since it ...
CONTINUE READINGLeft-NIMBYs Take Another Loss — And This One Is Really Embarrassing
The Urban Institute Study Loved By Supply Skeptics Goes Up In Flames
As I wrote last year, the Urban Institute produced a study purporting to show that land use reforms did not substantially increase housing production. I noted that the study has become very influential, particularly among Left-NIMBYs, who want to maintain strict land use controls but not acknowledge that such controls make housing more expensive (which obviously impacts low- and middle-income people the most). If you don't like the term "Left-NIMBYs," then use "supply sk...
CONTINUE READINGOMB’s “Reforms” versus NSF’s Statutory Mission
NSF will need to do some serious explaining about how the "reforms" advance its scientific mission.
Last week, I posted about a proposed new rule that would limit the role of merit in decisions about research grants and expand the political element. I suggested that the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) probably didn’t have authority to issue the regulation. Individual funding agencies like the National Science Foundation (NSF) may have greater power. However, as I noted, laws applying to individual agencies vary greatly, and there has been no consideration...
CONTINUE READINGDoes More Energy Reporting = Less Climate Reporting?
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
If you are one of the many loyal readers of E&E News, big change is coming to your daily routine. POLITICO announced it is shuttering E&E, the standalone, subscription-based reporting outfit that it bought in 2020. “Beginning in September, we are modernizing how we deliver our energy and environmental policy journalism and launching a more focused, high-impact portfolio of daily news and intelligence products,” POLITICO's CEO Goli Sheikholesla...
CONTINUE READINGWhy Does the Trump Administration Keeping Attacking Science?
Apparently, the Administration views science as fatally infected with woke ideas and lacking much other value.
Make no mistake, the Trump Administration is engaged in a serious, carefully honed effort to undermine American science. The National Science Foundation has lost a third of its staff, while the National Institutes of Health have lost 20%. EPA’s science office is being shuttered. Trump’s proposed budget included a 54% cut for NSF, 12% for NIH, and 46% for NASA’s research. And last week, the government proposed changes to politicize research funding at the expense of...
CONTINUE READINGCalifornia Permits Pesticides the EU Has Banned
Guest contributor Julie Binot writes that farmworkers are paying the price of California's weaker pesticide standards.
Guest contributor Julie Binot is an LL.M. graduate ('26) from UC Berkeley. Controversies in France over the reintroduction of acetamiprid, a pesticide, led me to look at California’s own protections. In France, the push to reinstate the neonicotinoid insecticide, banned since 2018 over risks to bees and human health, was ultimately blocked by the Constitutional Council after a petition gathered over two million signatures. Is the grass greener (cleaner) here in ...
CONTINUE READINGWhat’s the Long-Term Plan to Decarbonize Aviation?
New CLEE Report on How to Deploy More Carbon-Neutral Electrofuels or “E-Fuels”
How can we decarbonize airplane flights? It’s a “hard to abate” sector of the economy, given that the usual transportation solutions like hydrogen or batteries will likely not work for long-distance flights, given their physics. Instead, some advocates and policymakers are betting on carbon-neutral electrofuels (or “e-fuels”) as an alternative to fossil jet fuel. E-fuels are a type of synthetic petroleum, produced by chemically combining zero-emission hy...
CONTINUE READINGStatutory Language? Who Cares About Statutory Language?
A new DOE guidance seems flatly contrary to the statute it’s acting under.
The Department of Energy has issued new guidance that cuts off rebates for people who replace a gas furnace with a heat pump. (It's called a guidance document but it's really a regulation.) Under the new guidance, the rebate will be allowed only if the heat pump replaces an electric furnace. Unless I’m missing something, the statute creating the program says the exact opposite. I suppose maybe at this stage I should find this blithe lack of concern for legality unsurpr...
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