Climate Change

Lisa Jackson Speech

Following up on Holly’s post, here is video of the speech.  (And no, contrary to a rumor in the blogosphere, she didn’t call conservative critics “jack-booted thugs.”  Instead, as you’ll see, she commented that they used this term about EPA.) [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcNeR6-EEGc]

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Defending the “green guinea pig”

Just a quick post to point out my UCLA colleague Matt Kahn’s piece, in the Christian Science Monitor, defending California’s AB 32 climate regulations from a recent Wall Street Journal editorial (sub. req’d.) that maligns the state’s approach.   Apparently the WSJ relies on a long-debunked estimate of the costs to households from California’s program, an estimate that (among …

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The Case for Cap-and-Trade

Dan asked for a vote, and being a good Legal Planetary citizen, I responded — voting very reluctantly for cap-and-trade. The biggest difficulty, as is the case with most polls, lies in the phrasing of the question:  “all things considered” what is “the best strategy” for controlling greenhouse gases.  The problem with this locution — perhaps unavoidable …

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What is the Best Approach to Controlling Carbon? You Be the Judge.

There’s a lot of disagreement about the best approach to controlling carbon.  We thought it might be a good idea to find out what you, our readers, think about the issue.  Here’s a quick poll: [polldaddy poll=5632574]

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When Can We Attribute Extreme Events to Climate Change?

Moscow suffered from a severe heat wave in the summer of 2010, with temperatures reaching 101 degrees and an average temperature 14 degrees higher than normal for July.  What are the odds that the heat wave was due to climate change? RealClimate presents the results of an analysis that was just published in the Proceedings …

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UCLA Emmett Study Says Cool Roofs are Way Cool (and Bring Lots of Environmental Benefits)

UCLA Law’s Emmett Center on Climate Change and the Environment released a new report today called Bright Roofs, Big City:  Keeping L.A. Cool Through an Aggressive Cool Roof Program.  The report is the second Anthony Pritzker Environmental Law and Policy Brief issued by the Center. Cara Horowitz, the author of the report, used a dataset …

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California Adopts Landmark Cap-and-Trade Program

Defying the trend in the rest of the country to ignore the perils of climate change, the California Air Resources Board voted today to establish the country’s first economy-wide cap-and-trade program covering greenhouse gas emissions.  The vote  comes five years after the state passed sweeping legislation — AB 32 — to roll California’s carbon emissions …

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Cheap Solar Provides Some Reason for Climate Optimism

Solar energy is getting really cheap.  And that fact could alter the landscape of energy production and the course of climate change in ways we can only begin to imagine today. One of the conundrums of climate change  is trying to predict the future.  This difficulty in prediction may be especially true with respect to …

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More Oil and Coal, Less Nature and Clean Air

USA Today reports on a speech Perry is set to deliver about energy issues.  It’s a humdinger.  Here are the main points: •Open federal lands to more energy exploration and production, including ANWAR and lands in the Mountain West – but not the Everglades, a tribute to Florida as a primary state. More offshore drilling …

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Hit-by-Pitches and Climate Denialism

Ann’s post regarding the potential effects of climate change on the number of hit batters raises some critical issues on the national pastime.  And of course, I’d be delighted to sign up for the field study.  But climate deniers already have a ready answer. After all, they will ask: how do we know that the …

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