Lost in the Ozone Again
Particularly given Governor Perry's presidential candidacy, I thought it would be interesting to see how Texas is doing on air pollution. Perry's record has been controversial, but the Texas environmental quality agency has a graph showing improvement in ozone levels over the past decade: However, in considering this graph, it's important to realize that over the preceding fifteen years, LA had drastically reduced the number of bad ozone days (from 150 days per year...
CONTINUE READINGEnviro Videos
Public Policy Degree, a site aimed at policy students, has assembled fifty YouTube videos relating to the environment. Besides being fun, it may give the more tech-savvy teachers among our audience some resources to include in presentations. I noticed that one of the videos is by former Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm, who is now teaching here....
CONTINUE READINGStop the Presses: Los Angeles is Public-Transit Friendly (well, sort of)
The Brookings Institute has a new study out (and a really nifty interactive website) that ranks cities around the country on their public transit friendliness. Los Angeles comes out near the top of the list by one important measure: resident access to public transit, defined as living close to a transit stop. 96% of LA residents meet Brookings' criteria on that front, making the city number 2 in the country for access. The figure confirms what anyone living in Lo...
CONTINUE READINGThe Environmental Journalism Issue in the Presidential Race
There is one enormously striking thing about the New York Times article that Dan references in the post below. The article details how virtually all the Republican candidates have essentially declared war on the Environmental Protection Agency, claiming that environmental regulation is responsible for job losses and sluggish growth. It also quotes people from Republicans for Environmental Protection attacking the party's current view. (One wonders whether the memb...
CONTINUE READINGThe Environmental Issue in the Presidential Race
With the partial exception of Mitt Romney, all of the Republican presidential candidates are negative about EPA. According to the NY TImes, Opposition to regulation and skepticism about climate change have become tenets of Republican orthodoxy, but they are embraced with extraordinary intensity this year because of the faltering economy, high fuel prices, the Tea Party passion for smaller government and an activist Republican base that insists on strict adherence to th...
CONTINUE READINGRick Perry Should Be Confined to a Padded Room, Chapter One
Governor Rick "Crotch" Perry is somewhat of an expert at saying inane things, a trend that has accelerated since he declared his Presidential candidacy. He flirts with secession, he accuses the Fed Chairman of treason, he was against cervical cancer before he was for it, he wants to repeal the 17th Amendment, he claims that there is a super-secret Constitutional clause allowing Texas to secede, bank regulation is unconstitutional, Social Security is unconstitutional,...
CONTINUE READING“Please Don’t Murder Me”
Musical accompaniment to Justin's post below. "I cut my deck to the Queen of Spades, but the cards were all the same": [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hhqyg_dTaTg] More information here....
CONTINUE READINGGuest Blogger Justin Pidot: The Gray Wolf Delisting Revisited
Last week, Holly posted an excellent discussion of the latest wranglings in the Fish & Wildlife Service’s ongoing effort to delist the gray wolf in the mountain west. I share her discomfort with Congress’s decision to reinstate the delisting decision through an appropriations rider. But stepping back from the arcane separation of powers questions dominant in the legal case, I think we ill-serve the Endangered Species Act and biodiversity conservation more...
CONTINUE READINGParking in Los Angeles Creeps into the 21st Century
The Los Angeles Times reports that the City has decided to inject at least a little rationality into its parking policy: in April, the City will begin ExpressPark, which will focus on a 4.5 square-mile zone in the city's downtown, and will set parking rates based upon demand. It will use sensors and other technology to measure demand at about 6,000 sidewalk meters and 7,500 spaces in public parking facilities such as the Convention Center. Officials will adjust the cost...
CONTINUE READINGIs USTR Trying to Increase China’s Carbon Emissions?
Our friends Daniel Firger and Michael Gerrard at Columbia Law School's Center for Climate Change Law have written a useful new paper analyzing two important pending WTO climate cases. Of these, the more important appears to be DS 419, in which the United States is challenging China's wind energy subsidies. Firger and Gerrard note that the factual record remains unclear pending future briefing, but at first blush, the entire action appears bizarre. First, the United ...
CONTINUE READINGJoin Our Mailing List
Climate policy is changing rapidly. Stay in the loop with expert analysis via email Monday - Friday.
