Climate Change

Fighting Global Warming in a Chilly Judicial Climate

A 6-3 conservative court is bad news for climate action. Here’s a threat assessment.

With Romney’s announcement this morning that he would support consideration of a nominee before the election, it now seems virtually certain that Trump will be able to appoint a sixth conservative Justice. How will that affect future climate policy?  Here is a preliminary threat assessment. The answer varies, depending on what policies we’re talking about. …

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Large-scale carbon removal: How do we phase out big industries?

While we’re designing policy for scaling up carbon removal, we should think about the eventual need to ramp it down.

Authored with Edward A. Parson Just a few years ago, carbon removal wasn’t seen as something that could be realistically scaled, observed Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska).  “It is now becoming clear that technologies to permanently remove carbon dioxide from the air and the ocean are not only real, but they are needed and they are …

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When Republicans Supported the Environment: Bush 41

The GOP wasn’t always the sworn enemy of environmental protection.

Younger people today probably know about George Herbert Walker Bush (R) as the father of George W. Bush and (perhaps) as the architect of the first Iraq War. But he also had some notable environmental achievements to his credit. Here are some of his accomplishments: Air Pollution Law. The 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments were …

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California’s Burning. What’s the Link to Climate Change?

Dark orange skies above San Francisco, at 10am on Sept. 9 2020

Answering your denialist friends

It’s a hard day to work in California, what with all the burning.  Those closest to the fires and smoke are evacuating (or being rescued), or are among the brave men and women fighting in inferno-like conditions to increase fire containment.  But even those of us far away and physically safe from the fires are …

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Rebuilding Environmental Protection

It will take years to fully recover from the damage of the Trump era. We will need some new ideas.

After almost four years of Trump, federal environmental protection is in about the same shape as Western Europe at the end of World War II, filled with bomb craters and destruction.  If the election turns out in Biden’s favor, he will be faced with the task of rebuilding from the smoking ruins. Here are some …

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Housing Solutions Fizzle In California’s Legislature

A rundown on the failures (and few successes) this session

Housing policy is at the center of all of our major societal problems in the United States: Care about racial justice? Restrictive housing and land use policies are responsible for our deeply segregated towns and cities. Climate change? Bad housing policies are the reason why so many people are forced into long, emission-spewing commutes, because …

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Taking Technology Seriously in Global Environmental Politics

Global Environmental Politics cover

A special issue on new technologies is now available

I am proud to announce a special issue of Global Environmental Politics on new technologies, edited by Simon Nicholson of American University and me, is now available. We write in the introductory essay: Human beings are at once makers of and made by technology. The ability to wield tools was an essential ingredient in propelling an …

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Time to Get Serious about Climate Change and Oceans

Science can unlock powerful tools to fight climate change and ocean acidification, but only if we fund research and govern it well.

  In the Before Time, I spoke with a few ocean scientists on climate issues, and I heard a common refrain. Climate change receives little attention or funding, considering the magnitude of the problem; climate impacts on oceans get even less; and marine carbon removal gets almost none at all. Humans are short-lived terrestrial creatures. …

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Hurricanes, Wildfires, Climate Change and the Republican “Platform” and Convention

No Acknowledgment of the Biggest Environmental Existential Threat We’ve Ever Faced

Hurricane Laura is  barreling down on Louisiana and Texas, bringing with it “unsurvivable storm surges” and “life-threatening hazards” to parts of the Gulf Coast.  Louisiana Governor Jon Bel Edwards is imploring residents to evacuate: “This is a very serious storm — I don’t think I have ever held a press conference to take something as seriously …

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Guest Contributor Naomi Wheeler: States and Cities Should Prioritize Equity While Building Grid Resilience

Power grid masts

Learning from Grid Resilience Threats and Opportunities in California and New York

Electrical grids across the country face a complex series of overlapping threats to grid resilience in 2020. Wildfires and hurricanes have become the new normal as climate change intensifies the magnitude of extreme weather events. These destructive events create widespread systemic shocks for electrical grids already facing several underlying vulnerabilities. In a recent research report, …

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