Regulation
A poor grade for California’s new Rigs-to-Reefs law
Ever gaze up from a Southern California beach and wonder about the fate of the oil and gas rigs dotting the horizon? Fellow blogger Sean Hecht has just published, with UCLA’s Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, an assessment of California’s new law governing “rigs-to-reefs” conversions–and suggests that lawmakers have much more work to do …
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CONTINUE READINGMore Thoughts About Conservative Climate Perspectives
Climate issues are essentially factual, not ideological. We naturally all come to those issues with our own perspectives. That’s fine, so long as our ideological lenses merely color the facts rather than blocking them from view entirely.
CONTINUE READINGThat Warm Fuzzy Cap-And-Trade Feeling
Cara asks if cap-and-trade skeptics like me still get excited at California’s Mini-Me version. The short answer (for me, at least) is yes. I’m all in favor of California rolling out its own version, and my hope has always been that the California Air Resources Board could develop a successful program that EPA could eventually …
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CONTINUE READINGJerry Brown and the Environment
During the campaign, Jerry Brown stressed environmental issues. His campaign website has a very extensive list of proposed environmental policies. It’ no surprise that he favors AB 32 and renewable energy, as well as vigorous enforcement of other existing environmental laws. Some of the other policies are a little less familiar. Here are some that …
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CONTINUE READINGProp 23 and What It Says (Or Doesn’t) About Californians’ View of Climate Change
What conclusion should we draw from the drubbing that California gave to Prop. 23, the ballot measure that would have overturned our landmark Global Warming Solutions Act? Andrew Leonard at Salon applauds our voters for affirming “their commitment to tackling the challenge of climate change and our dependence on fossil fuels.” But Sean, in his …
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CONTINUE READINGDoes Proposition 26 Undermine California’s Climate Change Law?
No. Not at all. Legally, we are still all systems go for AB 32, the Global Warming Solutions Act. First, take a look at the careful analysis that Cara, Sean, and Rhead produced a couple of weeks ago. It notes one extremely important fact about Proposition 26: its retroactive provisions only go back to January 2010, and AB 32 was …
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CONTINUE READINGElection review: what message did voters send about the environment, and how will politicians react?
It’s natural, in reflecting on the recent election, to ask whether and to what extent the results reflect public values about protection of the environment. (Well, at least for me, since I spend my time thinking about these things.) My answer: not much. But the election’s impacts on environmental issues will still be significant. While …
CONTINUE READINGThe California Attorney General race and the environment
This New York Times article notes why the California Attorney General’s race is very important for our state and national environmental and energy policies. As a close observer of that office’s work on environmental issues and as a former California deputy attorney general myself, I believe the reporter is surely correct. This race will matter from …
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CONTINUE READINGRepublicans vow to attack federal climate change efforts
The New York Times reports that senior Republicans are saying they will aggressively attack our administration’s environmental and climate change initiatives if their party wins a majority in the House of Representatives. EPA will be on the defensive, using its resources to defend against these attacks rather than move forward with regulatory initiatives that both …
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CONTINUE READINGWhy Maureen Gorsen is wrong: Prop 26 will undermine environmental regulation
Followers of this blog know that, yesterday, UCLA Law released an analysis of Proposition 26’s impacts on state funding for environmental and public health programs. Today, the Yes on 26 campaign struck back with a press release in which Maureen Gorsen suggested that we failed to understand Prop 26 and ignored facts. (The Yes on …
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