Climate Change
Climate Change Lesson #6: Every Crisis is an Opportunity
This is the sixth in a series of short homilies about the lessons of climate change. It’s not clear who first observed that every crisis is an opportunity. Probably it’s in the Bible somewhere, if not the story of Gilgamesh. But a crisis, painful as it may be, does present opportunities for innovation. In the …
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CONTINUE READINGClimate Change Lesson #5: Send Not to Ask For Whom the Bell Tolls
This is the fifth in a series of short homilies on the lessons of climate change. As far back as Sierra Club v. Morton, Justice Blackmun quoted John Dunne, but Dunne’s words seem equally apropos today, particularly for climate change: No man is an Iland, intire of itselfe; every man is a peece of the …
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CONTINUE READINGNew EPA Greenhouse Gas Rulemaking Not Quite What it Seems
EPA is proposing to tailor the major source applicability thresholds for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions under the Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) and title V programs of the Clean Air Act (CAA or Act) and to set a PSD significance level for GHG emissions. This proposal is necessary because EPA expects soon to promulgate regulations …
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CONTINUE READINGClimate Change Lesson #4: Small Ordinary Things Add Up in a Big Way
This is the fourth in a series of short homilies about climate change. In terms of climate change, the contribution of any one automobile, light bulb, or felled tree is microscopic. Put enough of these together and you can change the temperature of the world for centuries to come. It’s hard to believe – and …
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CONTINUE READINGIt’s the Enforcement, Stupid!
We rightly celebrate large legislative environmental victories like the passage of the Clean Air Act, the Endangered Species Act and the National Environmental Policy Act. Europeans, too, are proud of accomplishments such as the establishment of the European Union Emission Trading System to address greenhouse gas emissions through cap and trade and the passage of sweeping legislation, …
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CONTINUE READINGClimate Change Lesson #3: Everything is Connected to Everything Else
This is the third in a series of short homilies about the lessons of climate change. Barry Commoner called this the first law of ecology. Because “everything is connected to everything else,” he said: the system is stabilized by its dynamic self- compensating properties; these same properties, if overstressed, can lead to a dramatic collapse; …
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CONTINUE READINGHey planet, we owe you one!
According to the Global Footprint Network, today is Earth Overshoot Day. We have already used up as many resources in 2009 as the planet can produce in a single year. The rest of the year represents deficit spending. “It’s a simple case of income versus expenditures,” said Global Footprint Network President Mathis Wackernagel. “For years, …
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CONTINUE READINGClimate Change Lesson #2: Watch Out for Those “Unknown Unknowns”
This is the second in a short series of homilies on the lessons we can learn from climate change. Donald Rumsfeld famously distinguished between knowns, known unknowns, and unknown unknowns. He didn’t take the occasion to provide sharp analytical distinctions, but the difference between known unknowns and unknown unknowns is very much like a difference …
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CONTINUE READINGDavid Nawi Appointed to High-Ranking USDOI Post
U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar has named a respected California environmental lawyer to serve in a key, newly-created Department of Interior post. Salazar appointed David Nawi as his Senior Advisor to the Secretary for California and Nevada. In his announcement selecting Nawi, Secretary Salazar stated, “The current water crisis and land management challenges …
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CONTINUE READINGClimate Lesson #1: It’s a Small World After All
This is the first in a short series of homilies on the lessons we can learn from climate change. Thirty years ago, in the early days of environmental law, it seemed that most environmental problems were local. Pollution came from cities and bedeviled the residents of those same cities. Wilderness areas suffered from human incursions, …
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