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Policy Peril Segment 1: Heat Waves
As announced last Friday, each day this week and next I’ll post an excerpt of CEI’s film Policy Peril: Why Global Warming Policies Are More…
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Policy Peril: Looking for an antidote to An Inconvenient Truth? Your search is over. Updated 8/10/09
When Al Gore’s film, An Inconvenient Truth (AIT), came out in 2006, I expected to see some hard-hitting criticism by scientists of Gore’s unfounded alarmism and by economists of…
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Reports of the death of climate skepticism are greatly exaggerated
Is the science debate on global warming “over”? Politicians, pundits, and academics never tire of repeating “the debate is over” mantra. They could not be…
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Will Climate Thuggery Capture the SEC?
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) may require corporations to assess and disclose the impacts of global warming and climate change policy on their bottom…
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Can EPA ban gasoline? Can Obama enact Kyoto II without Senate ratification?
A recent report by New York University school of Law’s Institute for Policy Integrity suggests as much. See my commentary on Masterresource.Org.
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Does the ethanol mandate increase CO2 emissions?
That may seem counter-intuitive, because burning ethanol merely puts back into the air the carbon dioxide (CO2) that corn crops recently pulled out of it, whereas burning gasoline…
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Waxman-Markey: Coercion for its own sake
Most media coverage of H.R. 2454, the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (ACES), focuses on the bill’s cap-and-trade program and the free rationing…
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NBCC/CRA study estimates Waxman-Markey would reduce employment by 2.3 million jobs in 2015
The National Black Chamber of Commerce (NBCC) today released a study by Charles River Associates (CRA) on the economic impacts of H.R. 2454, the American…
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Insightful commentary by Keith Hennessey on Obama’s fuel economy rules
In this insightful, informative post, Keith Hennessey, formerly the senior economic advisor to President G.W. Bush, cautions that Obama's new fuel economy rules could destroy 50,000…
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New fuel economy rules will make cars more costly, less safe, trigger regulatory cascade
At some point today, the EPA and the Department of Transportation (DOT) will propose a first-ever joint regulation to establish first-ever greenhouse gas (GHG)…
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Waxman-Markey: What’s new, what’s old?
Today, Reps. Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Ed Markey (D-MA) released a new 932-page version of their cap-and-trade bill and a summary explaining how emission…
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Digital economy increases emissions: Mark Mills gets last laugh
Back in 1999 and 2000, a fierce debate raged as to whether digital networks and devices increase or decrease electricity consumption and emissions. Does the…
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“Bush holdover” is career civil servant hired during Clinton
Team Obama was embarrassed earlier this week when a leaked interagency memorandum acknowledged that EPA’s proposed finding that greenouse gases endanger public health and welfare could…
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Suitable for framing: Barton op-ed on Waxman-Markey
Energy and Commerce Ranking Member Joe Barton (R-TX) hits a home run in this oped, which says everything you need to know about the Waxman-Markey cap-and-tax…
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Annual biofuel subsidies will hit $60 billion in 2022 — Earth Track
Doug Koplow of Earth Track, assisted by researchers with Friends of the Earth, has produced a new study, A Boon to Bad Biofuels, on the…
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How long will Sen. Barrasso’s “hold” on Regina McCarthy hold?
Maybe forever! On April 30, Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY) placed a hold on the nomination of Regina McCarthy as Assistant Administrator of the EPA Office of Air and…
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Eco-sailors rescued by oil tanker
“An expedition team which set sail from Plymouth [England] on a 5,000-mile carbon-emission free trip to Greenland have been rescued by an oil tanker,”…
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So, Mr. Waxman, how much global warming will your bill avert?
MAGICC reveals that an 83% reduction in U.S. emissions “will only produce a global temperature ’savings’ during the next 50 years of about 0.05ºC.”…
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Flex-fuel mandates: throwing bad regulation after bad
Rent-seeking–the whoring after market-rigging rules and subsidies–is a true addiction, an appetite that grows with feeding. For the ethanol lobby, it’s not enough that government props up…
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Is Texas the new California?
Texas, once known for its oil tycoons and cattle barons, is now a stage on which renewable-energy moguls preen and strut. But whereas demand for Texas oil…
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Comedic highlights of the Waxman-Markey bill hearing
File these vignettes among the endless list of political inanities that would be uproariously funny if the potential economic fallout were not so toxic. Yesterday, in…
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“We don’t need no stinking baseload,” FERC Chairman
Okay, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Chairman Jon Wellinghoff didn’t actually say America doesn’t need coal-fired and nuclear power plants. He stopped short of openly embracing the …
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Endangerment finding: Legislative Hammer or Suicide Note?
The CO2 litigation campaign that begat Massachusetts v. EPA turns out to be too clever by half. As Roger Pielke, Jr. and Michael…
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Waxman-Markey litigation shell game
When I first eyeballed the 648-page draft cap-and-trade bill, authored by Reps. Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Ed Markey (D-MA), I was perplexed, even stunned. Secs. 831-834 of…
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Climate alarmists call for more groupthink
Nothing is more Orwellian than quoting Orwell to attack freedom of thought and discussion. Today’s ClimateWire (subscription required) provides a case in point. “Scientists need…
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Could carbon capture and storage keep the lights on in a carbon-constrained future?
Only if the costs decline dramatically, a recent Congressional Research Service report suggests, as I discuss here. Currently, the costs of carbon capture…
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What would it take to reduce CO2 levels to 350 ppm?
“Climate 350”–for 350 parts per million (ppm) of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere–is fast becoming the new mantra of Gorethodox believers in climate doom and…
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Senate votes to kill cap-and-trade?
Well, not overtly, but the Senate voted 89-8 for an amendment to the Fiscal year 2010 budget resolution (S. Con Res. 13), introduced by…
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Bad News: Scientists Make Cheap Gas from Coal
This funny headline is the title of a column in the March 26 issue of Wired Science. “Scientists have devised a new way to…
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U.S. Chamber unveils NIMBY Watch Web site
Last week, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce unveiled a NIMBY-Watch Web site called Project No Project . With case studies from more than 30 states, Project…
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Alarmists turn blind eye to global warming benefits–again
Tomorrow, the House Foreign Affairs Committee will hold a hearing on the national security threats from melting Arctic ice. Greenwire (subscription required), the Online environmental news…
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CO2 regulation under the Clean Air Act: Economic Train Wreck, Constitutional Crisis, Legislative Thuggery
Last week, EPA leaked a Power Point presentation revealing that the agency plans on April 30 to propose a finding that “air pollution” from emissions…
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Carbon mitigation schemes are inherently protectionist
Thanks, Fran, for blogging on the carbon tariff threat to the peace and prosperity of the world. We should all remember that carbon…
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Hansen belittles models, carbon trading, Kyoto; calls for coal-destroying carbon tax
Last week’s House Ways & Means Committee hearing on “scientific objectives for climate change legislation” contained much grist for skeptical mills. Dr. James Hansen did…
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GM Volt may not be cost-effective for consumers, study says
A study by Carnegie Mellon finds that the Chevy Volt, GM’s rechargeable battery-driven car designed to go 40 miles on electricity, is “not cost effective in any scenario,” Bloomberg…
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Despite lack of warming, alarmists predictably predict warming worse than predicted
As you may have heard, there has been no net warming of the planet since 2001, and no subsequent year was a warm as 1998…
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Is cap-and-trade inherently protectionist?
Yes, for three reasons. (1) Companies in carbon-constrained countries will demand carbon tariffs to “level the playing field” vis-a-vis firms in non-carbon constrained countries. (2)…
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Will carbon market woes tilt U.S. pols towards carbon taxes, CAA regulation?
In today's Guardian, Juliana Glover reports that carbon permit prices in Europe's Emission Trading System (ETS) have crashed from €31 last summer to €8…
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Will Lisa Jackson turn the Clean Air Act into a gigantic de-stimulus package?
Earlier this week, in a letter to Sierra Club climate council David Bookbinder, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said the Agency would reconsider, via…
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NADA report proves California waiver would create regulatory patchwork
A front-burner issue facing Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lisa Jackson is whether to grant a waiver under the Clean Air Act allowing the California…
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Travesty–Rep. Inslee’s behavior at Energy & Commerce hearing
I just watched the Energy & Commerce Subcommittee hearing on “The Climate Crisis: National Security, Public Health, and Economic Threats.” Committee rules allow the…
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State AGs Give EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson (recycled) bum advice
In a letter dated 5 February 2009, 17 state attorneys general (AGs) plus three other non-federal officials urge EPA Administrator…
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European Environment Agency–stuck in a mental rut
In a report titled “Beyond Transport Policy,” the European Environment Agency (EEA) bemoans the fact that European transport sector CO2 emissions increased by 26% during…
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USDA Pushing EPA for More Ethanol in Gasoline
On Tuesday (Feb. 10), USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack urged EPA to increase the quantity of ethanol blended into gasoline from the current amount–10% ethanol per…
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We don’t need no stinking safety valve!
If elected President, Barack Obama will give EPA the green light to regulate carbon dioxide under the Clean Air Act, Bloomberg.com…
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Putting my money where Chevron’s mouth is
Chevron has plastered a series of posters all over the Washington, D.C. metro system as part of an…
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Carbon audit: Can we turn this threat into an opportunity?
Section 117 of the just-passed bailout bill requires a "carbon audit" of the tax code. The provision requires the Secretary of the Treasury,…
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One foot on the accelerator, one on the brake
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Which costs more, gasoline or ethanol?
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