Guest Blogger Ken Alex: Methane, Black Carbon, and HFCs
Post #5 in a Series on California Climate Policy by Ken Alex, Senior Policy Advisor to Gov. Jerry Brown
[This is the fifth post in a series expressing my view of why California’s actions on climate change are so important and how they will change the world. The introductory post provides an overview and some general context.] One of the most important actions we can take to combat climate change is to halt the emission of short-lived climate pollutants (SLCPs). Once again, California is leading world action. The most prevalent climate pollutant, of course, is c...
CONTINUE READINGInternational Court of Justice recognizes and values ecosystem services (sort of)
In a judgment announced on February 2nd, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for the very first time decided a compensation claim for environmental damage. Equally important, it took a close look at whether ecosystem goods and services are compensable under international law. The decision is both carefully considered and deeply frustrating. There have, of course, been international proceedings in the past addressing the issue of whether and how much to compensate...
CONTINUE READINGThe politics of Trump’s offshore leasing proposal
Widespread political opposition at the state level poses major obstacles to federal plans
This post is the second in a three-part series looking at the Trump Administration’s announcement of plans to vastly increase offshore oil and gas drilling. The first post, here, focused on the legal context for those announcements. In this post, I’ll discuss the political context. In my last post, I’ll conclude with an analysis of the prospects that the announcement will lead to substantial changes in offshore oil and gas development in the United States. ...
CONTINUE READINGThe Administration’s offshore oil and gas leasing proposal
Offshore leasing system requires long, complex legal process before drilling can occur
A few weeks ago the Trump Administration announced a new proposed plan to drastically increase the amount of offshore areas available for leasing for oil and gas development – essentially opening up almost all of the waters off of the lower 48 states. The announcement at the time attracted a lot of media attention, but I wanted to put the announcement in some context. Despite the initial hype about the order, I’d like to explain in a little more detail precisely...
CONTINUE READINGThe Obesity Epidemic
Obesity is bad for public health, bad for the environment. What can be done?
[There was a technical problem with the version of this posted earlier.] Obesity is an issue that gets sporadic media attention. But it’s a serious problem, and it’s getting worse. An ever-increasing proportion of the population suffers from obesity. If present trends continue, over half the U.S. population will be obese in another twenty years or so. This trend is especially troubling because individual obesity is difficult to reverse. There is no easy answer ...
CONTINUE READINGCanada and Mexico Aren’t Waiting for Us
Like the rest of the world, they're moving ahead on the climate change issue even without us.
[for unknown reasons, this didn't post correctly earlier, though it did go out to email subscribers] Our national government is trying to beat a hurried retreat from addressing climate change. But our neighbors in Canada and Mexico are pressing forward. Both of them need to do more, but nevertheless they contrast very favorably with our own government’s policies. And they have made no bones about their disapproval of Trump’s policies. When he announced his plan to...
CONTINUE READINGCommemorating the California Air Resources Board’s 50th Anniversary
Celebrating CARB's Past Achievements; Charting Its Future Course
Recently, the U.C. Davis School of Law's California Environmental Law & Policy Center hosted a major conference on the UCD campus commemorating the California Air Resources Board's 50th anniversary. The event, which drew nearly 400 attendees, was the result of a terrific, three-way collaboration between CELPC, UC Davis' Institute of Transportation Studies and CARB. (Here's a link to the full conference proceedings: http://cal-span.org/unipage/?site=cal-span&o...
CONTINUE READINGCalifornia Legislature Contemplates Banning Internal Combustion Engines By 2040
AB 1745 by Assm. Phil Ting (D-San Francisco) would follow similar policies in Norway and the United Kingdom
Countries like China, Norway and the U.K. have made headlines recently with plans to ban the sale of internal combustion engine passenger vehicles by 2040 or soon thereafter. Is California next? Governor Brown expressed interest in the state following suit, to maintain its mantle as a global electric vehicle leader. And now Assemblymember Phil Ting (San Francisco) has introduced AB 1745 to ban registrations of new internal combustion engines by 2040. As a legal mat...
CONTINUE READINGRenewable New England
The New England states include Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine, with a total population of 8 million. These states are all small in acreage but have larger populations than many western states – for instance, tiny Rhode Island has a larger population than the Dakotas, Wyoming, Montana, or Alaska. In terms of energy policy, probably the most important thing to know about all these states is that they belong to RGGI, the N...
CONTINUE READINGWildfires and the Cost of Electric Service
It turns out, electric transmission is not as cheap as we thought it was.
Economists detest externalities – those nasty hidden costs that businesses don’t face when they sell polluting or dangerous products and services, but that are instead imposed on the public or the environment. And economists are right to be concerned. A polluter that does not pay the cost for its pollution is likely to keep polluting. A company that does not bear the cost of things it does that endanger the public is likely to keep endangering. So what should we t...
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