NEPA Saves the World!
Well, not really. But in some circumstances it might have helped. Consider the civil unrest now roiling Turkey. It began over protests against the government's plan to turn a much-beloved, historic urban park into a mosque and shopping mall. But as many news reports have indicated, the point was not simply the plan, but the high-handed and authoritarian way in which the government, and particularly Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, simply decreed that it was...
CONTINUE READINGWhich City Has the Best Parks? Trust for Public Lands Releases Annual ParkScore Ranking.
The Trust for Public Land (TPL) recently released its annual ParkScore index, which ranks the park systems of the fifty largest U.S. cities. As with all scorecards, the methodology is imperfect and the metrics are somewhat crude; but seeing how U.S. cities compare across uniform parameters is a good starting point for a larger conversation about what is important to us as a society in urban planning, parks, recreation, and environmental justice. In the ParkScore inde...
CONTINUE READINGNot Enough Money in the Pipeline
When regulators approve rates for a utility such as Pacific Gas & Electric Company (PG&E), they are making their best guess as to how much money the company will need to cover various kinds of activities. The utility starts out the process by offering its position on how much it will need for things like salaries, or rent, or activities designed to ensure gas pipeline safety. Pipeline safety has been the subject of especially close scrutiny for the last two years...
CONTINUE READINGThe Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Council’s “Draft Comprehensive Plan for Restoring the Gulf Coast’s Ecosystem and Economy” does not actually include any restoration projects.
Everyone knows that life is just a little bit slower in the South; as it turns out, so is ecosystem restoration. On this date three years ago, you likely were continuing to monitor distressing television footage of the Deepwater Horizon/BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, wondering if the millions of barrels of oil gushing out of the Macondo Well would ever stop. A headline from the June 3, 2010 edition of the New York Times read Plan for Relief Wells Spurs Hope ...
CONTINUE READINGThe Curious Case of Positive Train Control
In a recent column, George Will uses positive train control as a poster child for the evils of government regulation, while also complaining about the "democracy deficit" of agency regulations. Actually, his two points contradict each other. Positive train control is really an example of democracy in action rather than bureaucratic excess -- an automated safety system specifically mandated by Congress and moving forward in its present form only because Congress gav...
CONTINUE READINGAlex Hall’s Work on Climate Change and Los Angeles
My UCLA colleague Alex Hall has developed a model for predicting future climate conditions across Los Angeles areas such as Venice vs. Pasadena. Take a look at Tables 2 and 3 of this report. As an economist, I'd like to make a point for lawyers to think about. Take a look at Table 3 and note that Professor Hall predicts very few extra 95 F degree days in Venice and Santa Monica relative to other parts of Los Angeles. This suggests that the land zoning codes in ...
CONTINUE READINGCan We Learn About Climate Change Adaptation Efforts Today From Historical Lessons from 500 Years Ago?
I am married to an economic historian and I have co-written a Princeton Press book on economic history but I do not believe that long run history is relevant for thinking about how we will adapt to climate change. In this blog post, I discuss recent work by Geoffrey Parker as he sketches stories from hundreds of years ago and hints that they foreshadow our future. But, past failures to adapt provide little guidance about our future when today we are; 1. urbanized, ...
CONTINUE READINGThe Market for Lemon Solar Panels
George Akerlof won the Nobel Price for his work on the market for lemons and the role that asymmetric information and adverse selection plays in mucking up markets. His favorite example is the used car market. The seller knows more than the buyer about the vehicle's true quality. Used vehicle owners are more likely to sell if their vehicle is low quality so this means that the average quality of the select set of vehicles that owners want to sell is lower than the ...
CONTINUE READINGObama’s Tactics on Greenhouse Gas Regulations Come Into View
Last week, Ann wondered why the Obama Administration has withdrawn proposed rules on greenhouse gas emissions from stationary sources, worrying that time might run out of the possibility of getting them written in time for the end of Obama's second term. The two reasons proffered -- 1) susceptibility to legal attack; and 2) waiting until the Senate confirms EPA-nominee Gina McCarthy -- seemed extremely weak, even for a hyper-risk-averse administration such as this one...
CONTINUE READINGWrite Your Own News Story
Just fill in the blanks, and you can save yourself the trouble of reading newspaper accounts about any new EPA action. New EPA Regulations Spark Controversy The Environmental Protection Agency today announced tough new regulations on [name of industry]. According to the agency, the regulations will save thousands of lives by reducing dangerous levels of [name of substance] pollution. The total cost of the regulations is estimated at $[number] billions. The regulatio...
CONTINUE READINGJoin Our Mailing List
Climate policy is changing rapidly. Stay in the loop with expert analysis via email Monday - Friday.
