Faster Than the Speed of Light
Good environmental policy requires knowledge of the latest scientific developments. Thus, from the NYT today: Two months after scientists reported that they had clocked subatomic particles known as neutrinos going faster than the speed of light, to the astonishment and vocal disbelief of most of the world’s physicists, the same group of scientists, known as Opera, said on Friday that it had performed a second experiment that confirmed its first results and eliminated...
CONTINUE READINGJane Jacobs, Edmund Burke, and the New Urbanism
Jason Epstein's Introduction to the 50th Anniversary edition of Jane Jacobs' The Death and Life of Great American Cities makes this powerful intellectual connection: Death and Life ... [is] about the dynamics of civilization, how vital economies and their societies are formed, elaborated, and sustained, and the forces that thwart and ruin them...Her sympathies are with the slow accretion of custom and skills, of social norms and ingenious solutions to practical problem...
CONTINUE READINGCap-and-Trade is Alive and Well
Comprehensive climate policy is going nowhere at the federal level. That's obvious. But U.S. inaction doesn't mean that the rest of the world is following the U.S. lead. Instead, around the world, countries are adopting policies to transition to cleaner energy sources and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. And cap-and-trade systems are as popular a policy option as ever. Consider the following: Domestically, California has now adopted rules and regulations to...
CONTINUE READINGBeyond “NIMBY”
Brad Plumer has a thoughtful posting about NIMBYism over at WonkBlog. He points out that local opposition in Nebraska played a big role in getting the XL Pipeline delayed. More generally, Residents in Cape Cod have tangled up an offshore wind project for years, partly because it would obstruct scenic beach views. Solar farms in the Mojave Desert, backed by the big green groups, have met with fierce opposition from local environmentalists who worry that the plants could...
CONTINUE READINGKlamath dam removal bill introduced in Congress
On November 10, Senator Jeff Merkley (D-OR) and Representative Mike Thompson (D-CA) introduced the Klamath Basin Economic Restoration Act in Congress (H.R. 3398 / S. 1851). The bill would approve two Klamath agreements and give the go-ahead to potentially remove four hydroelectric dams from the Klamath River. As we have discussed previously on LegalPlanet, this set of agreements represent a long-fought battle to restore the environmental integrity of the Klamath River...
CONTINUE READINGHow Cities and Counties Can Improve Public Transit
Flashy and expensive new transit projects, such as the Los Angeles subway or San Francisco's proposed Central Subway, get a lot of media attention. But cities and counties have a lot of discretion to improve their existing public transit systems in sometimes relatively low-cost ways. The benefits, as we discuss in a UCLA / Berkeley Law white paper on the subject (called All Aboard), include alternatives to sitting in traffic, better air quality, and improved quality of...
CONTINUE READINGNo (or at least little) net loss of jobs from regulation
We keep hearing the phrase "job-killing regulations" from the Republican side of the aisle, with environmental regulations generally at the top of their lists. Yet there has never been much evidence for the claim that government regulation is systematically bad for employment or the economy. To the contrary, scholars, this blog, think tanks (notably the Center for Progressive Reform), and even the Office of Management and Budget (which is not particularly a fan of regula...
CONTINUE READINGLooking Ahead to Durban
Unlike the Copenhagen climate conference which had enormous publicity and great expectations, the Durban conference next month is coming up very quietly. Yet, given the 2012 terminus of the Kyoto Protocol, it's a very important event. Some degree of progress at Durban is important to keep the UNFCC process alive; otherwise, the action is likely to move to smaller clusters of major countries outside of the UN process. The likelihood of such progress is unclear.There'...
CONTINUE READINGJunior appropriators can be cut off without a hearing
The Eighth Circuit has rejected a claim by farmers in Nebraska's Niobrara Watershed that their civil rights were violated when the state's Department of Natural Resources issued "Closing Notices" ordering them to stop drawing water. The farmers asserted that they were entitled to a due process hearing before the property rights granted by their state-issued surface water appropriation permits could be cut off. The court, however, found that their property rights had no...
CONTINUE READINGShould the national parks allow sales of water in plastic bottles?
In May 2010, Grand Canyon National Park announced that as of January 1, 2011, it would no longer allow sale of water in small plastic bottles at park concessions. The park hoped the ban would reduce the costs of dealing with tossed water bottles; the New York Times reports that disposable plastic bottles account for a remarkable 30% of the park's total solid waste. Grand Canyon Superintendent Stephen Martin thought he had laid the groundwork for the ban not only with p...
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