Climate Change
The Sotomayor Hearing and the Climate Nuisance Case
The NY Times reports that one issue in the confirmation hearing may be a case involving climate change. The plaintiffs sued under the federal common law of nuisance for injunctive relief against public utilities for their carbon emissions. The case has now been pending before a panel including Judge Sotomayor for several years. It’s definitely …
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CONTINUE READINGSetbacks for Coal
Two setbacks for coal this week: First, the Georgia Court of Appeals issued an order that will result in further delay of the Longleaf coal-fired power plant proposed for Early County, Georgia. Second, U.S. EPA notified the state of Kansas and Sunflower Electric Power Corp. that a new air quality permit will be required before …
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CONTINUE READINGBad News for Climate Reductions, Troubling Prospects for Copenhagen
President Obama’s failure at the G-8 summit to get the largest developing countries to agree to set goals to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 was only one piece of bad news this week for efforts to attack global warming. Although the House of Representatives narrowly passed the Waxman-Markey bill last week, prospects in the …
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CONTINUE READINGCould Obama have wrung China climate concessions from Hu in Italy? We’ll never know
Jonathan’s recent post about the intersection of religion and environmentalism failed to foreshadow the most important way in which religion may have impacted environmental policymaking this week: by scuttling key climate talks associated with the G8 meeting in Italy. As reported here, the meeting succeeded in securing a pledge from G8 nations to reduce their …
CONTINUE READINGScience, the public, and policy
The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press today released the results of a survey (full report here) of American scientists and the public. The survey lands at a time when both scientists and politicians are actively questioning how science can play a more effective role in the policy process, so it’s not …
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CONTINUE READINGPolar bear fact and fantasy
There was an interesting juxtaposition of news about the polar bear recently, one that illustrates the divide between working research scientists trying to grapple with the impacts of global warming and the skeptics who insist that climate change either is not occurring or is not a problem. The Polar Bear Specialist Group, launched in the …
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CONTINUE READINGEdith Jones Declares War on America’s Coastline
Edith Jones, the 5th Circuit Chief Judge who makes wingnuts swoon, is at it again, this time in Severance v. Patterson, a Takings test case brought by the Pacific Legal Foundation. For environmentalists, Severance is also a test case in who is going to have to pay for coastal damage from climate change. Edith Jones …
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CONTINUE READINGForecasting climate votes in the Senate
Nate Silver, the statistician who gained prominence in the last election cycle with his predictions for the presidential race, has modeled the prospects of the Waxman-Markey climate bill in the Senate. The analysis is necessarily based on a number of assumptions, such as that the bill doesn’t change in its progress to the Senate floor. …
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CONTINUE READINGDebating the Economics of Climate Change
A blog with the great title of Greed, Green and Grains (by environmental economist Michael J. Roberts) reported an interesting national bureau of economic research debate on the economics of climate change. The debaters were Pindyck (MIT) and Weitzman (Harvard). It seems increasingly clear that the key factors driving economic conclusions are the treatment of …
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CONTINUE READINGPlastic Trees Revisited
Thirty-five years ago, Larry Tribe wrote an article called “Ways Not to Think About Plastic Trees,” probing the foundations of environmental law. The article prompted an equally interesting response from environmental philosoper Mark Sagoff. The issue was whether we should preserve nature simply for its utility to humans or whether it had other types of …
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