Energy
Biden’s Dilemma: Limiting Carbon from Existing Power Plants
It’s not that the policy choices are that hard. It’s the 6-3 Supreme Court.
Coal- and gas-fired power plants are a major source of U.S. carbon emissions. The Obama Administration devised a perfectly sensible, moderate policy to cut those emissions. The Trump Administration replaced it with a ridiculous token policy. The D.C. Circuit appeals court tossed that out. Now what? It wouldn’t be hard to redo the Obama policy …
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CONTINUE READINGIf Liberals Were the Ones Who Favored Fossil Fuels. . .
Here’s what the conservative response might look like.
Conservatives often come to the defense of fossil fuels and disdain renewable energy. Is that really consistent with their principles? Let’s imagine what conservatives might say if the table were turned, Suppose liberals proposed government support for fossil fuels. The conservative response might look something like this: Another Liberal Boondoggle Now they want to prop …
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CONTINUE READINGInstitutional Capacity Building for the Energy Transition
State agencies will need help to deal with a fast-changing energy system.
The COVID pandemic has provided a vivid picture of what happens when ill-prepared governments are suddenly hit with huge responsibilities. Underfunded state and local public health agencies were overwhelmed, while governors and local officials found themselves struggling to obtain and distribute vital supplies, from respirators to vaccines. Efforts to accelerate the transition away from carbon, …
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CONTINUE READINGHow Much Should Texas Invest in Grid Resilience?
The Texas blackouts provide a case study in how to think through resilience issues.
As we begin to think through the long-term response to the Texas blackout, there’s a lot we don’t yet know. The ultimate issues are how much resilience we need against events like this and how we should obtain it. It’s helpful to lay out the kinds of questions we need to be asking as we …
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CONTINUE READINGThe Big Chill
What went wrong in Texas and what can we learn from it?
The rolling blackouts in Texas were national news. Texas calls itself the energy capital of the United States, yet it couldn’t keep the lights on. Conservatives were quick to blame reliance on wind power, just as they did last summer when California faced power interruptions due to a heat wave. What really happened? It’s true …
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CONTINUE READINGExpertise versus Politics Under Biden
Experts will no longer be pariahs under Biden. But will their voices be heard?
One of the abiding issues in governance is the balance between democratic leadership and experts. We don’t want government solely by technocrats. Nor do we want government steered solely by ideology and politics, as under Trump. Biden will be a vast improvement, but there’s still some question about whether he’ll get the balance right. I …
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CONTINUE READINGThree of Yesterday’s Stories of Climate Progress
There was Biden’s Executive Order, of course. And two other things. Or maybe three.
Yesterday, I read three encouraging stories about the U.S. and climate change. One was about action by the federal government, one about action by the states, and one about action by the private sector. The biggest news was from the federal government, in the form of Biden’s Executive Order on Tackling the Climate Crisis at …
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CONTINUE READINGA Big Win for Climate Regulation
The DC Circuit overturns Trump’s effort to hamstring regulation of carbon from power plants.
The D.C. Circuit issued an opinion today knocking out Trump’s Affordable Clean Energy rule. The Trump rule was a rollback of Obama’s keystone climate initiative, the Clean Power Plan. The majority opinion plus dissent take up 185 pages, and I won’t try to describe it all here. Briefly, here’s what the appeals court ruled and …
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CONTINUE READINGRenewable Energy in the Southwest
Despite Trump, the needle has kept moving in the right direction.
The sun is intense in the desert Southwest. During the Trump years, the federal government has hard worked to promote fossil fuels. Trump also has been no friend of renewable energy. This has not stopped progress toward a cleaner energy mix in Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah. Arizona Arizona’s current power mix is about …
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CONTINUE READINGWhat’s At Stake
Here’s a quick crib sheet on the climate change and the election
Here’s a quick reminder about the environmental stakes in the election. I’ve tried to stick with the facts here — you’re free to decide which way the cut. ISSUE TRUMP BIDEN Problem of climate change ” I don’t know that it’s man-made… I don’t wanna give trillions and trillions of dollars.” Biden “has long appreciated …
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