Interior to pull mountaintop mining rule
UPDATE 4/29: AP reports that the Justice Department's filing requests that the rule be vacated and remanded on the grounds that it was not preceded by ESA consultation. (Hat tip: PLF on ESA). Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced today that his department would ask the court hearing a challenge to a key Bush-era rule on mountaintop mining to vacate the rule and remand it to Interior. The rule, issued by the Office of Surface Mining in December under the Surface Min...
CONTINUE READINGThe fat lady is warming up — make that singing
UPDATE 4/28: The Secretaries of Interior and Commerce have announced that they are revoking the Bush administration's midnight rule on ESA section 7 consultation. They apparently are not revoking the special rule on the polar bear (as they were also authorized to do under the omnibus spending bill). We will have more when the formal decision is released. The New York Times reports that the Department of Interior has sent revisions to the ESA section 7 consultation rules...
CONTINUE READINGPutting a Price on Carbon: Is It Needed? Is It Enough?
In Sunday's New York Times, Thomas Friedman made the case for putting a price tag on carbon: Price matters. Without a fixed, long-term, durable price on carbon, none of the Obama clean-tech initiatives will achieve the scale needed to have an impact on climate change or make America the leader it must be in the next great industrial revolution: E.T., or energy technology. At this stage, I’d settle for any carbon price mechanism — cap and trade, fee-bates, carbon tax ...
CONTINUE READINGUpdating the Delta litigation line-up
The era of collaboration and cooperation that CalFed briefly brought to management of California's water system is well and truly over. Lawsuits are multiplying like rabbits, promising to provide full employment for water and natural resource lawyers in California for the foreseeable future. For those of you scoring at home, here are some of the latest additions to an already crowded field. Central Delta Water Agency v. US FWS: Plaintiffs, in-Delta water users, chall...
CONTINUE READINGShocking News About the Fossil Fuel Industry
Guess what? The fossil fuel industry has been deliberately lying to the public about climate change. According to the Washington Post: "The Global Climate Coalition, a group of representatives of the oil, auto and coal industries, spent years telling the public that the link between human activity and climate change was too uncertain to justify U.S. participation in the Kyoto Protocol, a 1997 treaty aimed at curbing greenhouse gas emissions. In 1995, however, a 'pri...
CONTINUE READINGMore Free On-Line Courses
These classes are very popular with Berkeley students. They've had thousands of downloads already. Law 270.7 - Renewable Energy & Alternative Fuels - Steve Weissman (Fall 2008): http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=214AD3BA0B8D3FBA Law 270.6 - Energy Regulations and the Environment - Steve Weissman (Spring 2008): http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=8256AD22B9C1CE53 Law 271 - Environmental Law and Policy - Holly Doremus (Spring 2008): http://www.youtub...
CONTINUE READINGAre we too obsessed with climate change?
Slate has an interesting piece by Brendan Borrell arguing that the current laser-like focus on climate change may be getting in the way of effective conservation measures. As he tells it, being green today "is all about greenhouse gases," to the point that people have forgotten about plain vanilla habitat destruction. That, he thinks, is still by far the greatest threat to biodiversity. Some of Borrell's claims seem a bit overblown, or perhaps misdirected. He complains ...
CONTINUE READINGSome good news from Afghanistan
With the help of the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Wildlife Conservation Society, and others, Afghanistan is in the process of creating its first national park, Band-e-Amir, a region of lakes and waterfalls among the mountains in Bamiyan province. The effort is not without challenges, including an extraordinarily remote location, leftover land mines, and local residents nervous about potential restrictions on fishing and grazing. But park advocates hop...
CONTINUE READINGCalifornia Adopts Low-Carbon Fuel Standard
Good. The California Air Resources Board has adopted the nation's first mandate to lower the carbon in fuel. As these things go, it's pretty mild: a 10% reduction in carbon footprint by 2020. That hasn't stopped the oil industry from complaining, of course, stating that CARB is "moving too fast." When will it not be moving too fast? When the Gulf Coast is underwater? I expect that there will be lawsuits, but at first blush, pre-emption does not seem to be a problem: th...
CONTINUE READINGCars, Obama and Climate Change
There's big news coming out of Washington and Detroit this week about the fate of U.S. automakers. Rumors surfaced yesterday that G.M. will furlough its U.S. factories for most of the summer due to declines in auto sales. And the Obama Treasury Department is said to be pressuring Chrysler to prepare for bankruptcy, to be filed as early as next week. I have long wondered whether the financial woes of the auto industry would lead the Obama Administration to back a...
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