Culture & Ethics Archives - Page 15 of 54

Culture & Ethics

The Rise of the Low Carbon Consumer City

Matthew Holian and I have just released a new NBER Working Paper. The “big idea” is that similar to a REESE’S Peanut Butter Cup we merge together two separate economics literatures. Glaeser and I have written about low carbon cities in the United States and China. Glaeser has published on “consumer cities” and …

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How the EPA Saved America

If you don’t follow political blogs, you may not have noticed Kevin Drum’s outstanding story about how the decrease in crime over the last 20 years can largely be attributed to the sharp drops in lead ingestion. When I first heard the theory, I thought it was too good to be true, but Kevin’s story …

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SeaWorld Doesn’t Care THAT Much

As the father of an eight-year-old, I am painfully aware of the attractions of charismatic megafauna. Over the weekend, I took Rose to SeaWorld, pretty much the capital of charismatic megafauna, for an overnight with her YMCA youth group. We slept with the penguins, and saw lots of other — well, charismatic megafauna. The highlight …

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The Last Rockefeller

Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), the current chair of the Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee has announced his retirement. Rockefeller is 75, and faced a tough re-election fight in West Virginia, which has gone from being the state of John L. Lewis to the state of Mitt Romney — it went for Romney last year by …

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Envisioning the Earth

Here are some cool images from earth satellites. Fans of Benoit Mandelbrot may detect a fractal quality to many of them. The subject of this particular photo ois the Namib-Naukluft National Park, which includes Namibia’s Namib Desert. Here, southwest winds have created the tallest sand dunes in the world, with some dunes reaching 300 meters in …

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Looking Ahead to 2050

Since New Year’s Eve is both a time for nostalgia and for looking ahead, it seems appropriate to see what the world will look like at mid-century. The world will be facing considerable challenges then. The population will be bigger. The United Nations predicts that the world population will grow by 2 billion to 9 …

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The Coase Theorem and Matt Damon’s New Fracking Movie

The law and economics movement has been studying the Coase Theorem for a long time. In this cross-post, I discuss its relevance for Matt Damon’s new fracking movie “Promised Land”.

Do GMO Salmon Pose an Environmental Threat?

GMO fish are one step closer to sale in the U.S., reports the LA Times: After more than a decade in regulatory limbo, genetically engineered Atlantic salmon that grow faster than their naturally born counterparts moved closer to American plates, with the publication Friday of a government report that found the fish wouldn’t hurt the …

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Environmental Highlights of 2012

Reelection of President Obama, defeating Mitt Romney who had promised a major deregulatory push and massive expansion of fossil fuels. Election of new pro-environmental Senators such as Chris Murphy (Conn.), Tammy Baldwin (Wisc.), and Liz Warren (Mass.) D.C. Circuit upholds EPA endangerment finding and rules for new stationary sources of greenhouse gases. California holds first …

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Attitudes Toward Climate Change, Environmental Science, and Clean Energy

A new AP poll reports a sharp increase in the number of people who believe that climate change is happening and will be a problem for the United States. The biggest change was among the significant group of people who say they don’t trust scientists. Here’s the summary from AP: 4 out of every 5 …

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‘Schedule F’ Would Be Bad—Even for Trump

My time in the Biden administration shows that Project 2025’s proposal to purge civil servants would be bad policy for everyone.

Why You Should Read CA’s ExxonMobil Plastic Lawsuit

California’s lawsuit against ExxonMobil for lying about plastic recycling is the latest example of the state using old-fashioned legal tools to address more modern harms.

The Dirty Truth Behind a Feel-Good Energy Story

The San Francisco 49ers just became the first NFL team to buy sustainable aviation fuel. But that move is overshadowed by Big Oil sponsorships in sports.

Community Solar: Compensation

Who gets the money? Compensation mechanisms are where a lot of the power of these programs resides, but naturally, also the debate.

Understanding China’s National Energy Security Strategy

How should the US compete with Chinese green development?

New Law Reaffirms Local Authority to Ban Oil Drilling

AB 3233, part of a trio of bills that the governor just signed, paves a clear path for local phase-out efforts.

Governor Newsom Should Veto These Four Bills

Four seemingly modest bills — AB 1122, AB 1296, AB 637 and AB 3179 — are sneaky legislative efforts to threaten California’s world-leading clean transportation investments.

Climate Policy After the 2024 Election

In this UCLA Emmett Institute webinar, panelists discussed the climate implications of the 2024 election from the state, national, and international perspective.

The Walz-Vance Debate and Environmental Policy

After Hurricane Helene, Vance and Walz were pressed on climate change during the VP debate. Here’s everything they said on energy and the environment.

A Good Day to Drop Big Oil

Major league sports teams like to talk about sustainability measures on Green Sports Day, which is Oct. 6. They should do something about their fossil fuel sponsors.

Culture & Ethics

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TRENDING

The U.S. Supreme Court denied an emergency stay in West Virginia v. EPA, a challenge to EPA’s rule. Our UCLA Law clinic submitted a brief on behalf of grid experts in the case at the D.C. Circuit.

People complain about faceless bureaucrats. At least in part, that could be fixed.

Marjorie Taylor Greene is wildly wrong about government scientists controlling hurricanes. There is a rich history of weather modification experiments that make that false claim more dangerous.

The polls could be systematically off, not just due to random error. That’s a worry with climate models as well.

Ballot measures in Washington and California are especially important but others are worth noting.

The Katoomba Group is celebrating 25 years of pioneering new approaches to realizing value in nature. Here’s what we’ve learned.

If the California car waiver survives a possible Trump presidency, we may have the overruling of Chevron to thank.

We’re witnessing the collision of extreme weather, climate science, national news and politics. The question of “Who pays for climate disasters?” is about to become even more important.

These two states are often portrayed as epitomizing two possible futures. But the differences are more nuanced than you think.

Multiplying proposals for ice restoration face geopolitical obstacles