Climate Change

The Debt Burden on Future Generations

According to GOP.gov, [T]he amount of debt placed on the backs of children born today is about to explode. If nothing is done, our generation will have the sad legacy of being the first to lower the standard of living of the next generation. . . . Unless drastic actions are taken to reduce spending …

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A Nation of Frogs?

It is said that, if you put a frog in a pot of boiling water, it immediately jumps out and is saved.  But if you put a frog in a pot of cold water and gradually warm it, you can boil the frog without it ever realizing that it’s being cooked. It’s not hard to …

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California Slowing Down on Cap and Trade

Yesterday, Mary Nichols slipped a bit of a bombshell  into testimony before the California Senate Select Committee on the Environment, the Economy and Climate Change.  She announced that the state’s Air Resources Board is planning to “initiate” the cap and trade program in 2012 but not “start the requirements for compliance”  until 2013.  This effectively …

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The Supreme Court on Climate Torts — A Second Look

Let’s begin with the bad news.  The plaintiffs lost, eliminating one possible tool in combating climate change.  That doesn’t seem like a big loss to me, because I’ve always thought that the defendants’ best argument was that the federal common law is displaced by the Clean Air Act.  It’s an easy argument to make based …

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Court allows California to continue developing cap and trade program pending appeal

This just in: Late today, a California appellate court granted the State’s request to stay (in other words, lift), pending appeal, the injunction issued by the lower court in Ass’n of Irritated Residents vs. CARB, the environmental justice community challenge to California’s work so far under its Global Warming Solutions Act (AB 32).  Absent any …

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Supreme Court Rejects States’ Climate Change Nuisance Lawsuit

The Supreme Court today issued its long-awaited decision in an important climate change case, American Electric Power v. Connecticut.  http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/10pdf/10-174.pdf   As expected, the Court rejected a public nuisance lawsuit that a coalition of states and private land trusts had brought against the owners of Midwestern coal-fired power plants, challenging their massive greenhouse gas emissions on …

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A Threat to National Security

Many people are unaware of the problem or else in denial, but America faces a serious, insidious threat from a source known to experts as al Qaerbon.  Working quietly, al Qaerbon has laid plans to seize miles of America’s coasts, flood farms and cities, cut off needed water in dry areas, and even undermine the …

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Air Resources Board Releases New Environmental Assessment of Cap and Trade to Comply with Judge’s Order

The California Air Resources Board (CARB) is covering all its bases in responding to a judge’s order that CARB violated  the California Enviornmental Quality Act (CEQA) in adopting its scoping plan to implement AB 32 (the state’s  climate change legislation).  As I reported last week,  CARB has  won an order from the appeals court allowing the state …

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Goodby Ski Slopes, Hello Drought

Climate change means not only changes in temperature, but changes in precipitation.  These precipitation changes are especially important in arid regions like the American West.  There is reason to be concerned about the future of Western climate, according to the latest report from ScienceNow: The Rocky Mountains have lost an unusual amount of springtime snowpack …

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