Nudging Smart Growth
There are lots of problems with Sunstein and Thaler's book Nudge, but its central premise has potentially powerful applications to a host of problems. Sunstein and Thaler posit that in many policy areas, "choice architects" can help people make better choices without impairing their actual ability to make that choice -- a philosophy that they call (misleadingly but ingeniously) "libertarian paternalism." The land use and smart growth area could serve as a fruitful ...
CONTINUE READINGLooking Back: Three Decades of an Environmental Law Casebook
Ann Carlson and I have just sent West the manuscript for the 8th edition of"Environmenal Law: Cases and Materials." (The third member of our author team, Jody Freeman, didn't participate in the revision because of her White House duties.) Some thirty years ago, Roger Findley and I started work on the first edition of the book. This seems like an apt time for some retrospective reflection. What has changed in thirty years (apart from my graying hair)? Not as much ...
CONTINUE READINGChina, Congress and Climate Change
This week brings two related and interesting stories on the prospects for domestic climate change legislation and progress in Copenhagen when the international community gathers in December to try to hammer out a post-Kyoto treaty on climate change. The first is that China's top climate negotiator is "optimistic" that the international community will reach agreement on a new treaty in Copenhagen. It's unclear what the basis for his optimism is given that he also rei...
CONTINUE READINGReport from the Field: Thailand
I'm writing this post from Thailand, where I've been attending a conference of the Thai judiciary. My presentation was on developments in U.S. climate law. It's been a very interesting trip. Thailand faces some serious environmental issues, which you can't help noticing just from breathing the air in Bangok. The traffic jams, as seen on the left, are world famous. Environmental protection has not yet caught up with growth. As the World Bank says: Rapid industria...
CONTINUE READINGCows and Climate – Putting All of That Waste To Work
In many situations, public policies supporting greenhouse gas reduction also support other environmental goals. But sometimes, different environmental policies bump up against each other. It is left for enlightened public officials to sort it all out. Here is a link to comments recently filed with the California Energy Commission by the Center for Law, Energy, & the Environment pointing out one of the bumps. The subject is the laudable goal of generating elec...
CONTINUE READINGThe need for, and challenges of, climate adaptation
When it comes to climate change, lawyers and policymakers (and scientists too) have been guilty of emphasizing greenhouse gas emission reduction, almost to the exclusion of everything else. Adapting to climate change has taken a distant back seat, even as it has become increasingly clear that the world is already committed to some pretty dramatic changes. That's beginning to change. Earlier this summer, the U.S. Global Change Research Program issued a major report det...
CONTINUE READINGNoah’s Art
Having just made my first trip to the Art Institute in Chicago, I was primed for this feature in Grist on the state of climate art. If one can judge a movement by its artists, it seems we still have a fair ways to go--though I like this Venus. Also like this slideshow of climate activists around the world....
CONTINUE READINGTrade laws and climate change regulation
Co-authored by Jesse Swanhuyser, UCLA Law class of 2011, formerly a fair trade advocate in California and Washington D.C. A prior version of this article first appeared in the Los Angeles Daily Journal, on July 23. As discussed in other posts on this blog, last month was particularly challenging for those working toward national and international climate agreements. At a summit in Italy, G8 members failed to resolve key sticking points and developing nations refuse...
CONTINUE READINGNinth Circuit reinstates Clinton roadless rule
Since the end of the Clinton era, there has been much confusion over the status of roadless areas in the national forests. Yesterday the Ninth Circuit weighed in, ruling in California v. USDA that the Bush administration had unlawfully revised the Clinton administration's Roadless Rule, and reinstating that rule. The decision, which has been welcomed by environmental groups, adds another complication to an already confusing situation. A challenge to the Roadless Rule is ...
CONTINUE READINGImproving ESA consultation
In early May, I wrote about the Obama administration's decision to take up Congress's invitation to recall the last-minute Bush revisions to the ESA's section 7 consultation rules. At the time, the new administration also requested public comment on "ways to improve the section 7 regulations while retaining the purposes and policies of the ESA." Today is the deadline for comment submission. Together with Center for Progressive Reform scholars Mary Jane Angelo and Dan Roh...
CONTINUE READING