Interior hits the pause button again
Cross-posted at CPRBlog. As he had promised, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar today issued a new decision memorandum suspending certain deepwater drilling operations. Today's decision replaces the moratorium that the federal District Court in New Orleans enjoined on June 22, and which the Fifth Circuit declined to reinstate last week. As I made clear in my post on the Fifth Circuit decision, I think both the District Court and the Fifth Circuit were wrong on the first ...
CONTINUE READINGTravel Is Broadening–2010 Edition
Having just returned from a trip to Northern Europe, a couple of experiences resonate with me that, I hope, are worthy of sharing here. The first relates to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, British Petroleum, and the distinct ways in which BP's role and responsibility for the spill are viewed, depending on one's geographical roots. My recent travels took me to Great Britain and then on a journey to the Baltic region of Northern Europe, during which I was accompanied by ...
CONTINUE READINGGood crisis, bad crisis
The Gulf oil spill illuminates two aspects of crisis response: the strength and the limits of its power to motivate reflexive, rapid action. Crisis can motivate too much or too little. Consider first the limits of crisis as a driver of action. It's long been commonly thought that high-profile events were important in catalyzing the adoption of strong environmental legislation -- killer smogs for air pollution regulation, the Santa Barbara oil spill for water pollution...
CONTINUE READINGEnvironmental Property Rights (Part IV)
Previous posts have introduced the concept of environmental property rights, given a number of examples of such rights, and explained how various kinds of EPRs that appear quite different are actually closely related. Today's post argues the EPRs could actually change constitutional rulings in favor of the environment. I develop this argument in detail in a recent paper, but here is the basic argument for three important constitutional issues: standing doctrine...
CONTINUE READINGYucca Mountain dispute goes to Nuclear Regulatory Commission
The tangled saga of the proposed high-level nuclear waste disposal facility at Yucca Mountain is going to have at least one more chapter. In June 2008, President Bush's Department of Energy filed an application for a license to construct a high-level repository at Yucca Mountain. In March 2010, President Obama's Energy Department sought to withdraw that application with prejudice, meaning that it could not be refiled. Nevada applauded that move, but not everyone did. The...
CONTINUE READINGAre Heat Waves Related to Climate Change?
Andrew Leonard had a great post on Salon this week arguing -- essentially -- that liberal bloggers are wimps when it comes to connecting extreme climate events like heat waves to climate change. By contrast, he notes, conservatives eagerly throw barbs at Al Gore any time it snows in D.C.: climate denier James Inhofe's grandchildren apparently built an igloo last winter and proclaimed it "Gore's New Home." Leonard notes both that conservatives have been glaringly q...
CONTINUE READINGEnvironmental Property Rights (Part III)
An environmental property right (EPR) can be defined as an enforceable interest deriving from an environmental asset such as air quality or an undisturbed forest. EPRs are diverse and varied. Most EPRs are derived from statute rather than the common law, and many are of recent vintage. Some EPRs are marketable; others are not. Fundamentally, environmental property rights fall into major two categories. Some involve the power to prevent a third-party from impairing...
CONTINUE READINGStay denied in appeal of offshore moratorium decision
Cross-posted at CPRBlog. A three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit heard argument today on the Obama administration's request that it stay the District Court's injunction of the 6-month deepwater oil development moratorium, and by a 2-1 vote quickly rejected the request. The moratorium halted any new drilling, and the granting of any new permits for drilling, in depths beyond 500 feet based on the Secretary of Interior's finding that "deepwater drilling poses an unaccep...
CONTINUE READINGClassic Villaraigosan Environmental Policy
EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson was in Los Angeles today, announcing an official EPA finding that Compton Creek, a portion of the Los Angeles River, is a "navigable water" of the United States. This finding means that Compton Creek can receive the protection of the Clean Water Act: most prominently, it means that any attempts to fill it or otherwise degrade it must receive a Section 404 permit from the US Army Corps of Engineers. It's an important protection: a nice...
CONTINUE READINGFHFA strangles PACE clean energy financing program
Yesterday, the Federal Housing Finance Administration, the agency that regulates bankrupt mortgage insurers Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, issued a letter effectively destroying the promising energy efficiency and renewable energy financing program called Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE). I blogged about Fannie and Freddie's lender letters on the PACE program a few weeks ago. PACE operates as a traditional local government assessment on properties: governments raise ...
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