Culture & Ethics
Eight Profiles in Courage
Eight Republicans voted to pass the Waxman-Markey bill in the House. Some conservative groups are already threatening to punish them for this deviation from party orthodoxy. (That sort of self-destructive retaliation used to be typical of the Democrats, who used it as part of their arsenal of weapons for shooting themselves in the foot.) A …
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CONTINUE READINGDo Religion and Environmentalism Mix?
I’m in Ohio this week for the biennial “Kallah” of ALEPH, the organizational home of the Jewish Renewal movement. This has led to an interesting question about the relation of religion and environmentalism. I’m taking a class given by Arthur Waskow on what he calls “eco-Judaism,” which is a pretty self-explanatory phrase: Waskow believes that …
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CONTINUE READINGCool Cars For California
Those California environmental regulators: there they go again… This past week, California’s Air Resources Board adopted first-ever regulations requiring auto manufacturers to include sun-reflecting window glass for all cars and light trucks sold within the state. The new rules take effect in 2014. It turns out that conventional vehicle windows waste a lot of energy. …
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CONTINUE READINGNew EPA air toxics report presents sobering assessment of cancer risk
A new U.S. EPA report released today presents a scary picture of our exposure to hazardous pollutants in our air. The National-Scale Air Toxics Assessment for 2002, which analyzed health data based on chronic exposure to air toxics for 124 pollutants for which those data are available. (The assessment’s name is potentially confusing; the report …
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CONTINUE READINGNotes From Japan
A few environmental observations from my family vacation in Tokyo. The first is an obvious one: Tokyo’s public transportation system is a marvel. Several American cities have admirable subway systems but what is so impressive about Tokyo’s is the sheer area it covers. It’s the largest subway and train system in the world. No American …
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CONTINUE READINGHolding Our Breath for a Test Rule for Carbon Nanotubes
Researchers recently reported new findings regarding potential occupational hazards associated with carbon nanotubes. These nano-scale cylinders have a variety of forms (single-walled and multi-walled, coated and uncoated, and so on.) They are widely available and used in a variety of manufacturing, medical and electronic applications. Previously, much attention was focused on whether when inhaled, nanotubes …
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CONTINUE READINGFutureGen Back on Track
The U.S. Department of Energy announced today that it will restart FutureGen, a large-scale demonstration project to determine the feasibility of capturing and sequestering carbon dioxide generated from coal-fired power plants. As Dan described in an earlier post, the Bush Administration had cancelled FutureGen based on cost-overruns, overruns that turned out to be based in …
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CONTINUE READINGGreen Buildings: LEEDing to Trouble?
Green construction is all the rage among legislatures, regulators and the building industry. Incentives and mandates abound at the federal, state and local level, but so too do risks of failure to meet the certification standards when all the dust settles after construction is complete. The Harvard Law School Environmental Law and Policy Clinic recently …
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CONTINUE READINGScientific integrity at EPA
Lisa Jackson was up on Capitol Hill yesterday, telling the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works how her EPA will protect scientific integrity. The webcast is available here. In her written testimony, Jackson said: While the laws that EPA implements leave room for policy judgments, the scientific findings on which these judgments are based …
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CONTINUE READINGLuke Cole, Environmental Justice Activist, Killed in Car Crash
I’m very sorry to report the news that Luke Cole, long-time environmental justice advocate, was killed in a car accident this week in Uganda. Luke had taken a sabbatical from the Center for Race, Poverty and the Environment , which he headed, to travel the world (he was also my law school classmate and friend). …
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