Climate Change
Phase Changes in Public Opinion
Public opinion on an issue like climate change can sometimes flip quickly. Here’s why.
You might think that the public’s view of an issue – climate change for instance – would evolve continuously as events occur and information becomes available. That often may be the case, but sometimes public opinion can change relatively quickly. A prime example is the legitimacy of same-sex marriage, which went from being a weird, …
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CONTINUE READINGIn Defense of Live Carbon
Why Stopping Deforestation May be the Hardest and Most Important Part of the Climate Change Challenge
When contemplating the enormous challenge of global climate change, it is sometimes helpful to think about a simple model of the global carbon budget (see figure below). These admittedly reductionist schematics distinguish between sources, sinks, and reservoirs. Fossil hydrocarbons from the geological reservoir–call this dead carbon—are extracted and burned to generate energy, emitting vast amounts …
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CONTINUE READINGClimate Change and Your Family’s Future
How much climate change will you see in your lifetime? How about your kids?
If you think about yourself and the two generations after you, a lot depends on your current age, whether you already have kids, etc. To keep this from getting too complicated, let’s focus on someone who was born in the US at the start of the millennium, in 2000. To simplify, I won’t specify gender …
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CONTINUE READINGARPA-E: Surviving and Thriving Despite Trump
Trump keeps trying to kill it, but the energy innovation hub keeps on going.
In the long run, supporting energy innovation is among the most important things the federal government can do to address climate change. Naturally, Trump wants to end that. In what has become an annual ritual, his most recent budget proposal calls for eliminating the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E). The agency’s mission is to support …
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CONTINUE READINGPouring More Concrete Just Increases Traffic, Part The Millionth
In Other News, Water Is Wet
Department of Duh: Five years ago this month, a northbound carpool lane opened on the 405 freeway, between the 10 and 101 freeways, widening 10 miles of the interstate. It took half a decade to construct and cost more than $1 billion. Since then, average northbound drive times through the Sepulveda Pass have increased at all …
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CONTINUE READINGFrom Brussels to the Bay: Sustainable Finance in the EU & California
Berkeley Law Conference on Thursday, May 23rd, with State Controller Betty Yee, European Commission Director Mario Nava & CLEE’s Dave Jones
Join Berkeley Law’s Center for Law, Energy and the Environment (CLEE) and the European Union for a roundtable discussion on regulatory developments in sustainable finance and responsible investment. Hear from European Commission Director Mario Nava, of DG FISMA (the European Commission department responsible for EU policy on banking and financial services) on the state of …
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CONTINUE READINGHR 9: The First Climate Bill to Pass the House In a Decade
What you need to know about the bill.
Last Thursday, for the first time in a decade, the House of Representatives passed a climate change bill. HR 9, the Climate Action Now Act, passed on a vote of 231-190. The heart of HR 9 is section 3, which blocks the use of any federal funds to withdraw from the Paris Agreement. Section 4 …
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CONTINUE READINGInternational Conference On Electric Vehicles & Urban Residents
Register Today For UC Berkeley Law Event On June 4th & 5th, Co-Organized By University of Paris
Policy makers and industry leaders have a tough challenge making electric vehicles accessible for the world’s urban residents. Many apartment dwellers lack access to dedicated spots with electricity to charge the vehicles, while other city residents may need access to shared EVs to get around city streets. Unless EV leaders can solve these challenges, global …
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CONTINUE READINGSaved By The…Air Conditioner?
New Paper Proposes Carbon Sequestration From HVAC Systems
You have to like the idea carbon sequestration: if our ability to stop putting carbon into the atmosphere is limited, why not try taking it out? But it always seems to founder on a life-cycle analysis: it costs so much in energy to get the system working that you wind up producing more carbon than you …
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CONTINUE READINGGetting Lost In The Woods?
New Study From India Points to Dangers From Forestry Sector Emissions Trading
Despite the Trump Administration’s dedication to melting the planet, the rest of the world is gamely pushing ahead with implementing the Paris Accord, and that means programs like United Nations Collaborative Programme on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries (REDD+) and the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). The two are linked, because …
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