Mayor Villaraigosa Betrays Environmentalism AGAIN
A few days ago, I noted that Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa likes to talk a good game when it comes to Greening the city, but conveniently abandons plans when they become politically difficult or require anything like a normal attention span. I was more right than I thought. I mentioned that the Mayor had hired visionary planning director Gail Goldberg, but never supported her when she needed it. Well, now it turns out that Goldberg has “retired” effectiv...
CONTINUE READINGEnvironmental Property Rights: Part I
This is the first of a four part series on environmental property rights (EPRs). EPRs are property rights that are designed to help protect the environment. They are either rights to prevent environmental degradation or limited rights to impair the environment. A couple of examples may help explain the concept. 1. The Public Trust Doctrine. Perhaps the EPR with the deepest historical roots is the public trust doctrine, which limits the development rights of publ...
CONTINUE READINGSome Thoughts About “The Pursuit of Happiness”
Without ever really stopping to think about it, I always assumed that the right to the pursuit of happiness meant freedom from governmental restrictions on your activities. (Since Thomas Jefferson was the author and was always extolling the life of the yeoman farmer, I guess I pictured this as the legal right to cut down part of the forest and start your own little farm.) So, in modern terms, it seemed to mean that the government can't stop you from "doing your own t...
CONTINUE READINGDeath of a water bond?
In an about-face, Arnold Schwarzenegger and California legislative leaders have called for removal of the $11.1 billion water bond from the November ballot and trying again in 2012. The legislature agreed last fall to put the measure on the ballot as part of what was billed as a comprehensive water reform package. Now, faced with substantial opposition to the bond, and an economic climate that's not likely to be friendly to any big bond measure, some of the same people w...
CONTINUE READINGOffshore drilling and endangered species — Part 2
Cross-posted at CPRBlog. Yesterday I wrote about the shortcomings of ESA consultation on the Deepwater Horizon and other offshore oil rigs. Today I take up the implications of the spill itself under the ESA. At least one ESA lawsuit has already been filed, and at least partially resolved. The Animal Welfare Institute, Center for Biological Diversity, Turtle Island Restoration Network and Animal Legal Defense Fund filed a complaint on July 1, accusing BP and the Coast...
CONTINUE READINGClimategate Bites the Dust
It was a faked, trumped-up scandal from the beginning, and now it's official nonsense: An American scientist accused of manipulating research findings on climate science was cleared of that charge by his university on Thursday, the latest in a string of reports to find little substance in the allegations known as Climategate. This comes on the heels of a House of Commons investigation clearing British scientists of any wrongdoing. Of course, in the Times story, the re...
CONTINUE READINGOffshore drilling and endangered species — Part 1
Cross-posted at CPRBlog The media have paid a lot of attention to the cavalier attitude of the former Minerals Management Service (now called the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation, and Enforcement) toward the National Environmental Policy Act (I blogged about it here and here and Dan weighed in here). Less has been said, so far, about the Endangered Species Act. (One conspicuous exception is Keith Rizzardi's ESA Blawg, which called on May 29 for a review o...
CONTINUE READINGClimate Kabuki in New Delhi — the Shock of Recognition
India's Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh announced Monday that New Delhi will take the lead on establishing a global carbon budget at the Cancun climate talks. I think that this is good news, but probably not for the reasons we might initially suspect. We might think that it's good news because it shows that India is taking the climate problem seriously. But look at what Ramesh is saying about a global carbon budget: India cannot and will not accept any agreement...
CONTINUE READINGAdministration delays next step on offshore drilling plan
Finally, some news about offshore oil drilling that contains no nasty surprises. The Obama administration has announced that it will delay public meetings on the plan for expanded offshore drilling it unveiled shortly before the Deepwater Horizon disaster. The planned "scoping" meetings, which had originally been announced for June or July in Alaska, the south Atlantic, and the Gulf Coast, were supposed to start the environmental review process for the 2012-2017 offsho...
CONTINUE READINGHow Green is High-Speed Rail?
Life cycle costs can be a buzz kill. Just when you think you've got a great environmental solution, such as going paperless and doing everything digitally, or installing double-paned windows to make a home more energy efficient, you find out that manufacturing these supposedly environmentally-friendly technologies can create waste that offsets some of their "green" value. The same may be true for high-speed rail. A new study by Mikhail Chester and Arpad Horvath of the...
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