Willful Ignorance as Government Policy
The Trump Administration is systematically shutting down sources of vital information.
The Trump Administration is closing 25 scientific centers that monitor water levels across the U.S., which is vital information during floods and droughts. The centers also monitor aquifer levels and underground plumes of pollution. The government has canceled the leases for the centers, which will begin closing soon. Of course, this information is only significant if you think it’s important to deal with floods, droughts, and underground pollution. This is not an...
CONTINUE READINGModernizing Air Permitting in California
Guest Contributor Craig Segall writes that SB 318 would help clean up factories and other big industrial sources by pulling permitting practices into this century.
Almost every major industrial and power facility in California needs an air permit when it’s built or renovated. That’s a huge opportunity to rapidly advance the zero and near-zero technologies that Congress invested in in the Inflation Reduction Act, and that we urgently need to meet ever-more-pressing air quality challenges, especially as attacks from the Trump administration mount. But our tools are rusty: Unfortunately, the core of the laws governing permit r...
CONTINUE READINGGovernor Narcissist
Gavin Newsom's snub of LA Mayor Karen Bass demonstrates that he cares about only one thing: himself.
Buried deep within Evan's morose but accurate roundup at The Drain lurked this item, which tells you pretty much everything you need to know about California Governor Gavin Newsom. Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass is in Sacramento lobbying legislators for relief money in the wake of January's devastating wildfires. She probably won't get close to what she wants: the state is facing a huge budget crunch and the federal government run by sociopaths is unlikely to help the ...
CONTINUE READINGThe Chutzpah is Stunning
The Trump Administration is suing to block state climate lawsuits based on Clean Air Act Preemption.
If nothing else, you have to give credit to the Trump Administration for incredible gall. Yesterday, the Department of Justice filed suit against Michigan and Hawaii seeking to stop those states from filing lawsuits against fossil fuel companies for climate damages. The fact that DOJ is seeking to prevent even the filing of the lawsuits — without knowing the basis for the states' claims — is pretty remarkable and unusual. But it's the substance of the suits th...
CONTINUE READINGDoes Deregulation Hypercharge the Economy?
If the economics effects are that huge, you’d expect the unemployment rate reflect major regulatory or deregulatory moves. It doesn’t.
Are environmental regulations destroying jobs and crippling the economy? On March 12, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin announced on X that: “@EPA is initiating 31 historic actions to Power the Great American Comeback in the greatest day of deregulation in American history!” (EPA listed only 22, math not being a Trump Administration strongpoint,) In the attached video, Zeldin exulted that “EPA will be reconsidering many suffocating rules that restrict nearly every sec...
CONTINUE READING100 Days of Fear & Loathing in Climate World
The Drain is a weekly roundup of climate and environmental news from Legal Planet.
Are you tired of the words “100 days”? “In his first 100 days the Trump administration has slashed federal agencies, canceled national reports, and yanked funding from universities,” Grist puts it. “One hundred days of anti-environmental mayhem,” says Dan Farber at Legal Planet. My UCLA colleague Ann Carlson is quoted by the New York Times in a very comprehensive Opinion Essay that asked 35 legal scholars about Trump’s “lawless presidency during t...
CONTINUE READINGThe Politics of Geoengineering Are Getting Stranger
Of all the pollution threats out there, why are state lawmakers and U.S. EPA targeting solar geoengineering?
There are strange things happening in Climate World, in addition to all the horrifying things. Among the strangest is a surge in state bills to prohibit solar geoengineering. Just as strange is the recent shot across the bow by Trump’s EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin against one tiny startup firm that claims to be doing geoengineering. The explanation for why involves chemtrails, cloud seeding, and the populist right and left converging. First, some background draw...
CONTINUE READINGSharing the Sidewalk with EV Charging Cords
New CLEE policy brief describes an innovative EV charging solution.
In cities throughout the US, electric vehicle (EV) drivers have found a creative, low-cost way to transfer electricity from their home to the curbside. You have probably seen it by now: a charging cord peeks out from a home and sprawls across the sidewalk–either beneath your feet or over your head–before plugging into a curbside-parked vehicle. In most cities, this cheeky maneuver isn’t legal; stray sidewalk charging cords typically violate laws governing the publi...
CONTINUE READINGHousing Abundance Meets California’s Political Realities
A Senate Housing Committee debate last week was a sobering indication.
There's a lot of talk in certain policy circles these days about abundance, as a strategy to improve people's lives and lower the cost of living through better governance. Nowhere is "abundance" needed more than in California, where housing costs due to a dire long-term shortage of homes has made the state one of the most expensive to live in in the country. Although the logical response to an extreme shortage would be to build more housing of all types, that wasn't the...
CONTINUE READING100 Days of Anti-Environmental Mayhem
A flood of anti-environmental initiatives threatens to undo decades of progress.
Trump’s first term led to him being called the most anti-environmental president in U.S. history. This term is shaping up to be much worse. Regulatory rollbacks promise to be even more extensive than last time. In addition, the Administration has withheld funding for clean technology, denounced the very idea of environmental justice, and begun a campaign to gut environmental agencies. And that’s only the first hundred days of Trump’s second term. A complete ca...
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