A business opportunity for climate skeptics
There are still a lot of people who believe that climate change is not occurring: Something like between 10 and 20% of Americans fall into this category (depending on when the polling occurs). For those of our readership who do not believe it is occurring, I have a business proposition. Over the last several years, a number of national insurance companies have drastically increased the rates they charge for property insurance in communities near the coastline, particu...
CONTINUE READINGWhat Happens After Election Day?
We’re only two weeks away from the election. What will happen in terms of the environment if Obama wins? What happens if Romney wins? The difference is dramatic. If Obama wins. . . The results of an Obama victory are fairly predictable. There are a number of new regulations that are now wending their way through the process. If you’re interested, the Congressional Research Service summarizes the important pending regulations here. Given the slow pace of ...
CONTINUE READINGOne Reason the Election Matters for the Environment: The Supreme Court
Supreme Court appointments are among the most durable of Presidential actions. A fifty-year-old appointee could well be on the Supreme Court until 2040 or longer. As an AP story this morning points out, the election could dramatically change the balance on the Supreme Court: With four justices in their seventies, odds are good that whoever is elected president in November will have a chance to fill at least one Supreme Court seat. The next justice could dramatically a...
CONTINUE READINGSaving Public Transit: Finding the Money
We all know that public dollars are scarce, especially for public transit. As the federal government scales back its investments in the nation's buses and trains, local governments are stepping up. Los Angeles in particular has innovated a way to leverage their existing sales tax revenue for transit to start building more projects sooner. Gloria Ohland of the advocacy group Move LA tells the story in this video. [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwqqpgMpqYk&...
CONTINUE READINGIs geoengineering inevitable?
There’s been a lot of attention paid to a geoengineering “experiment” conducted recently in the North Pacific. A team distributed iron into the ocean: This is a form of geoengineering because, in many parts of oceans around the world, iron is the main nutrient that limits the growth and productivity of phytoplankton. If you add more iron in these areas, then there will be substantial blooms of plankton. The photosynthetic activity from those plankton wou...
CONTINUE READINGThe trouble with resource shuffling
Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Chairman Jon Wellinghoff recently voiced concern that California's cap-and-trade program could lead to unforeseen consequences that would upset energy markets. He was speaking about resource shuffling, and echoing a letter his fellow Commissioner sent to the California Air Resources Board (CARB) in August. What is resource shuffling? According to CARB, they will know it when they see it: “Resource Shuffling” means any pl...
CONTINUE READINGDoes the Electoral College Cause Lousy Climate Change Politics?
Dan and I have lamented the failure of the current national "debate" (if it be called that) to raise the issue of climate change, the greatest environmental threat that humanity has ever faced. But why is that? One can assign the blame to many institutions, and I have, but one might have been overlooked: the electoral college. Both the Romney and Obama campaigns are criss-crossing swing states in an effort to extract that last little bit of commitment from uncommitt...
CONTINUE READINGThe True North Strong and Dumb
A few months ago, Rhead set a Legal Planet record for attracting comments: 33 (mostly hostile) reactions on a relatively straightforward post about how Canada had achieved the gold medal for "fossilhood", i.e. most antagonistic to a climate treaty. Well, it appears as if Rhead has understated the matter: Federal Conservatives are downplaying concerns over Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s newly-selected boss for Environment Canada and the bureaucrat’s knowledge about ...
CONTINUE READINGClimate Change and Tonight’s Debate
A key issue is missing from the list of topics for tonight's debate. Climate change is a global problem with global impacts, ultimately requiring a global solution. Climate change is a threat multiplier from the point of view of national security, intensifying the risk of international conflict and terrorism. (See here for more.) It has been a subject of U.S. diplomacy for more than twenty years, and it fully deserves a place in tonight's foreign affairs debate. The ...
CONTINUE READINGThe Damage Caused by Climate Change Induced Natural Disasters
Joe Romm has posted a mildly interesting post on the damage from natural disasters. A couple of thoughts. 1. Ignoring the last year of the data, the reported Figure 15 shows that in the average year that North America suffers roughly 15 billion dollars worth of damage from natural disasters. I have two evil points to make. First, given that unemployment is high such damage actually creates a demand to rebuild (so Mother Nature is a Keynesian stimulus). Second...
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