California Legislature Increases Renewable Energy Mandate To 60% By 2030, Carbon-Free By 2045
SB 100 still needs Governor Brown's signature but cements state's leadership on renewables
California continues to show its climate leadership, as the state legislature yesterday passed the groundbreaking Senate Bill 100 (De León) to bump its renewable portfolio standard from 50% to 60% by 2030, while pledging to achieve a 100% carbon-free grid by 2045. The state joins Hawaii, which had set a similar 2045 goal in 2015. California is now the leader within the U.S. at deploying renewables like solar and wind (excluding hydropower). Even Hawaii's 2017 deploym...
CONTINUE READINGTrump Administration Announces Revisions of NAFTA with Strengthened Environmental Provisions
Revised Environmental Obligations in Preliminary Agreement With Mexico Appear to Track Environmental Chapter of Trans-Pacific Partnership
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) has just announced that it reached preliminary agreement with Mexico for a renegotiated NAFTA. The 24-year old trade agreement between Mexico, Canada, and the U.S. was a major topic during the 2016 presidential campaign and has been a centerpiece of USTR activity in the Trump administration. The new agreement will be called the US-Mexico Trade Agreement rather than NAFTA, though it is unclear what the future status of NA...
CONTINUE READINGWhat’s Ahead for Trump’s Pro-Coal Rule?
Be prepared: this is going to remain a live issue for at least two years.
You’ve already heard a lot about Trump’s pro-coal ACE rule. You’re likely to keep hearing about it, off and on, throughout the next couple of years, and maybe longer. I’ve set out a rough timetable below, and at the end I discuss some implications. Step 1: The Rulemaking Aug. 2018 Notice of proposed rule issued (clock for comments starts with publication in the Federal Register) Oct.-Nov. 2018 Comment period closes Oct.-Nov. (60 days after clock starts, ...
CONTINUE READINGSimon and Garfunkel’s New Environmental Video
Who Said the 60's Were Outdated?
Have a good weekend: ...
CONTINUE READINGYoga Instructors Bend Coal Industry Out of Shape
Administration's New Plan Will Do Nothing for Jobs
What could yoga tell us about the Administration's Orwellian "Affordable Clean Energy" Plan, which my colleagues have eviscerated, and whose name resembles the Holy Roman Empire? Lots, actually: in particular, that it relies upon a false promise of job creation. An important piece last year by Christopher Ingraham of the Washington Post detailed just how small the coal industry figures in the economic life of the nation. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistic...
CONTINUE READINGWhen Republicans Fought for a Clean Environment
Environmentalism Used to Be a Bipartisan Issue
It is not unreasonable and overly rigid environmental regulations and restrictions that stand in the way of the expanded use of the nation’s coal reserves. It is the reluctance, and at times the refusal, to recognize the very serious health hazards and environmental, social and cultural impacts associated with a rapid rise in coal use. These are the words of a Republican, Russell Train. Train served as the country's second EPA administrator, after William Ruckelshaus,...
CONTINUE READINGWhat is the role of CEQA in California’s housing crisis?
Ongoing research suggests that CEQA is more a symptom than the cause of the problem.
This blog post was authored by Moira O’Neill, Giulia Gualco-Nelson, and Eric Biber. Discussions about what laws and regulations might drive up housing costs continue in California. One reoccurring theme in the media is the question of whether the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) significantly contributes to the housing crisis in California by either driving up the cost of housing development or stopping residential development altogether. Because this is ...
CONTINUE READINGA Loss for Trump — and for Coal
Trump Administration Loses Yet Another Environmental Case
Understandably, most of the attention at the beginning of the week was devoted to the rollout of the Trump Administration's token effort to regulate greenhouse gases, the ACE rule. But something else happened, too. On Tuesday, a D.C. Circuit ruling ignored objections from the Trump Administration and invalidated key parts of a rule dealing with coal-ash disposal as being too weak. That rule had originally come from the Obama Administration, and the court agreed with envi...
CONTINUE READINGEPA Makes a Pit Stop at the “Chevron” Station
EPA's latest proposed rollback relies heavily on the Chevron Doctrine.
The ACE rule, The Trump Administration’s proposed rule for carbon emissions in the carbon sector, purports to regulate greenhouse gases from power plants. Its real goal seems to be minimizing the burden on coal-fired plants. Legal Planet has already carried some excellent posts about the proposal’s policy flaws. I’d like instead to talk about its legal basis. In particular, I’d like to talk about how much the rule seems to rely on the Chevron doctrine, a judici...
CONTINUE READINGDoes California need “Trump insurance”?
State legislature nears decision time over SB 49, which could protect California against federal environmental rollbacks
This Sacramento Bee article is remarkable in describing how aggressively the Trump Administration is now going after California’s efforts to protect the state’s natural resources, including its water resources (see also this LA Times article). Interior Secretary Zinke is demanding that his agency look for ways to override California water law and force more water to be distributed to farmers, at the expense of the state’s rivers and fisheries. This follows on o...
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