Legislation
Is Brazil Ready for COP30? No One Is Ready for COP30
The Drain is a weekly roundup of climate and environmental news from Legal Planet.
It’s officially less than 6 months until COP30 — when tens of thousands of people will descend on the Brazilian city of Belém for the annual UN climate conference — and no one is ready. For one thing, Belém is an impoverished city of 2.5 million that can’t build enough hotels for the 50,000 expected delegates …
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CONTINUE READINGNo, DOE, You Can’t Roll Back Product Efficiency Standards
Congress wanted greater energy efficiency over time and banned rollbacks.
The Department of Energy is proposing to rescind key energy efficiency requirements. It is beyond ironic that it is attempting to do so at a time when the President has proclaimed an energy emergency. Trump says the grid is struggling desperately to meet surging power demand. That’s a strange time to eliminate regulations that are saving energy. DOE’s action is also illegal, because the law in question has a provision prohibiting rollbacks. Congress wanted efficiency standards to get tougher over time and included an anti-rollback provision to make sure of that.
CONTINUE READINGBrazil Steps Ahead of the U.S. on Climate Policy
A new emissions trading system is a major step for Brazilian climate policy.
Hopefully, Brazil’s actions will encourage other countries, particularly in South America, to take similar actions. The EU and California have been leaders in this arena, but carbon trading systems are now beginning to get traction outside of the developed world in China and now Brazil. That’s an encouraging sign.
CONTINUE READINGCalifornia Lawmakers Vote on Energy Affordability Soon
Senate Bill 254 is the most ambitious energy affordability legislation proposed in recent years.
Energy affordability has been a huge focus in Sacramento as the deadline nears for bills to move out of policy committees. Over the past three years, customers of the largest investor-owned electric utilities (IOUs) in the state have seen their rates rise by an average of 5-41%, with nearly one in five households behind on …
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CONTINUE READINGModernizing Air Permitting in California
Guest Contributor Craig Segall writes that SB 318 would help clean up factories and other big industrial sources by pulling permitting practices into this century.
Almost every major industrial and power facility in California needs an air permit when it’s built or renovated. That’s a huge opportunity to rapidly advance the zero and near-zero technologies that Congress invested in in the Inflation Reduction Act, and that we urgently need to meet ever-more-pressing air quality challenges, especially as attacks from the …
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CONTINUE READINGThe Politics of Geoengineering Are Getting Stranger
Of all the pollution threats out there, why are state lawmakers and U.S. EPA targeting solar geoengineering?
There are strange things happening in Climate World, in addition to all the horrifying things. Among the strangest is a surge in state bills to prohibit solar geoengineering. Just as strange is the recent shot across the bow by Trump’s EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin against one tiny startup firm that claims to be doing geoengineering. …
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CONTINUE READINGHousing Abundance Meets California’s Political Realities
A Senate Housing Committee debate last week was a sobering indication.
There’s a lot of talk in certain policy circles these days about abundance, as a strategy to improve people’s lives and lower the cost of living through better governance. Nowhere is “abundance” needed more than in California, where housing costs due to a dire long-term shortage of homes has made the state one of the …
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CONTINUE READINGHunting Methane Using Satellites
Joint UC Berkeley – UCLA Law report aims to help policymakers harness the methane data revolution.
A stream of data about methane—a potent greenhouse gas—is now constantly being beamed down from space. New methane satellites provide a powerful data capability for governments who want to demonstrate leadership in climate policy. To equip policymakers with necessary information on satellite methane data, UC Berkeley Law’s Center for Law, Energy and the Environment (CLEE), …
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CONTINUE READINGSenate Parliamentarian Confirms that California Waivers Are Not Subject to the Congressional Review Act
Will Republicans honor her determination?
As I have previously written, the Trump Administration is attempting an end run around the administrative process it is supposed to follow if it intends to revoke the waiver California received for three important programs to cut air pollutants from cars and trucks. You can find the details about this end run around — using …
CONTINUE READINGThe Death of CEQA?
Not quite, but Assemblymember Wicks’ new bill would severely limit CEQA for housing.
“Legislative bombthrower” is one of those cliched – and thus overused – metaphors. And California State Assemblymember Buffy Wicks (D-Richmond) has no reputation as one. But with her latest effort, AB 609, it seems like she is enjoying her Molotov cocktail shaken, not stirred. Wicks’ bill – now cosponsored with several other Assemblymembers – is …
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