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Not So Ancient History – How CEI (and friends) Nixed Early Action Crediting (on three separate occasions)
I’m posting three relatively obscure items by which CEI and friends killed a mischievous Trojan Horse strategy for Kyoto-style regulation variously known as credit for early action, credit for voluntary…
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TCEQ to EPA: Don’t Mess with Texas
In a blistering letter published earlier in the week, the head of Texas’s environmental agency and the State’s attorney general told the U.S. Environmental Protection…
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Rockefeller Bill – Is It Good Enough?
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Will the Party of No Foil the Half-Baked Greenhouse Machiavellis?
Many have already written the obituary for the Kerry-Lieberman bill and other cap-and-trade legislation in the current Congress. In today’s Politico, however, columnist Darren Samuelsohn…
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Blowout Prevention Act – Will Rs Get Buyer’s Remorse? (Modified July 18, 2010)
Last week, the House Energy and Commerce Committee unanimously approved H.R. 5626, Chairman Henry Waxman’s Blowout Prevention Act. Here’s the version of the bill…
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“[Cap-and-trade] is not in my vocabulary” — Reid
“Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid will bring a sweeping energy and climate bill to the floor as early as the week of July 26, including…
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Mommy, Are We Beyond Petroleum Yet?
No, Sylvester, not even close! As noted in a previous post, on Earth Day (April 22), a Navy F/A-18 Hornet fighter jet became the first…
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Greenhouse Protection Racket
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Enron & BP: Global Warming as the Great Distraction
In a three–part post over at MasterResource.Org, my colleague Robert L. Bradley, Jr. shows that BP has much in common with Enron. Both companies aggressively sought rents (politically-contrived…
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Blowout Prevention Act Would Blowout Domestic Oil Production
Yesterday, the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Energy and Environment held a hearing on H.R. 5626, the Blowout Prevention Act of 2010. Although…
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Blowout Prevention Act — or Oil Production Prevention Act?
That’s the question I address today on the free-market energy blog, MasterResource.Org. This morning, the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Energy and Environment is holding…
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Bio Jet Fuel — the Real $600 Toilet Seat?
The custom-designed $600 toilet seat for P-3C Orion antisubmarine aircraft — often depicted as the epitome of government waste — is an urban legend.
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Sen. Inhofe demolishes energy independence rationale for cap-and-trade
Sen. James Inhofe’s daily Environment & Public Works Press Blog is a source I check early and often. The posts, which are more like essays than…
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Judge rules Obama deepwater drilling ban “arbitrary and capricious”
Yesterday, Judge Martin Feldman of the Eastern Louisiana District Court lifted the Obama administration’s six-month moratorium on all oil and gas drilling in the…
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Brava, Sen. Murkowski
Last Thursday, by a vote of 53-47, the Senate rejected S.J.Res.26, Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s resolution of disapproval to overturn EPA’s endangerment rule. Although Sen.
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No, It’s Not About Oil; Besides, Oil Is Good!
It is a measure of the weakness of the case against Sen. Murkowski’s resolution of disapproval (S.J.Res.26) that opponents keep trying to change the subject.
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No, Sen. Durbin, Choice Not Between Real Science and Political Science
Sen. Durbin claims S.J.Res.26 presents the Senate a choice between “real science” and “political science.” Not by a country mile. See my previous posts on…
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More Demagoguery from Sen. Boxer
Sen. Boxer now compares Sen. Murkowski’s resolution to an attempt to repeal the Surgeon General’s famous report in 1964 linking cigarette smoking to cancer. She…
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Sen. Boxer’s Demagoguery Knows No Bounds
Sen. Boxer (D-Calif.) is now speaking against the Murkowski resolution (S.J.Res.26). Her demagoguery knows no bounds. She asks us to imagine a hundred Senators, who are not…
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Auto Dealers Demolish White House/Auto Alliance Rationale for Opposing Murkowski Resolution
Today, the Senate will debate and vote on S.J.Res.26, Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s resolution of disapproval to overturn the legal force and effect of EPA’s…
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Statement of Marlo Lewis on S.J.Res.26, Sen. Murkowski’s resolution to overturn EPA’s endangerment finding
On Thursday (June 10, 2010), the Senate will vote on Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s resolution of disapproval (S.J.Res.26) to overturn the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s…
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Thank You CBD: Another Reason to Nix EPA Endangerment Finding
Twice during the past six months, the eco-litigators at the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) have underscored the political necessity for Congress to overturn EPA’s endangerment finding. Yes, that…
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Did Congress Intend for EPA to Regulate CO2 through the Clean Air Act?
On June 10, the Senate will debate and vote on S.J.Res.26, a resolution of disapproval sponsored by Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska to stop…
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Lindsey Graham: “It’s not a global warming bill to me.”
Today’s Greenwire (subscription required) includes an edited transcript of an interview with Lindsey Graham (R-SC) that recalls Bill Clinton’s famous line, “It all depends on…
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Another Oldie But Goodie: Mark Mills 1998 CO2 Compliance Burden Study
In the interest of ensuring public access to climate-related documents that may be hard to find, I am posting here the original, June 1998 study…
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An Oldie But A Goodie: John Christy’s Letter to Lisa Jackson on Fuel Economy Regulation
Well, it’s not really so old. I’m referring to a March 10, 2009 letter by atmospheric scientist John Christy to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson. I…
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Hidden EU Analysis: Biofuels Can Produce More CO2 Emissions Than Fossil Fuels
Reuters reports that it used freedom of information laws to obtain a copy of text that was stripped from a December 2009 European Union…
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What’s the Cost if Congress “Fails” to Enact Cap-and-Trade?
That is the question posed this week on National Journal’s energy experts’ blog. My answer, available here, is that “failure” will have multiple benefits: —…
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My Commentary on James Hansen’s Huffington Post Column
Is tax-and-dividend (aka “carbon fee and green check”) a morally compelling alternative to cap-and-trade? Is it the path to presidential greatness? Will it be good…
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Murkowski Resolution — A Constitutional Imperative
Today on MasterResource.org, the free-market energy blog, I explain how EPA, by granting the California waiver, finding endangerment, and perhaps even by pulling its…
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Can 30 Million Frenchmen (and Women) Be Wrong?
“France today abandoned all plans to introduce a carbon fuel tax aimed at combating global warming,” the Daily Mail reports. The article continues: …
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Gas pain needed to meet emission targets, Harvard study says
A new Harvard University study (Analysis of Policies to Reduce Oil Consumption and Greenhouse-Gas Emissions from the U.S. Transportation Sector) offers a sobering assessment of…
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Climate Alarm Declining – Gallup
Gallup’s annual update of Americans’ attitudes on things environmental found that 48% of Americans believe the seriousness of global warming is generally exaggerated, up…
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Kerry-Graham-Lieberman: The Tax Formerly Known As Cap-and-Trade
My colleague Julie Walsh flags a funny statement by Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT), quoted earlier this week (Mar. 9) in Greenwire (subscription required). Although Lieberman,…
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What Happens If Congress Blocks EPA?
That’s the topic of this week’s National Journal energy blog. In my contribution, I argue that EPA has been playing a mischievous game that endangers democracy,…
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Does Climategate Undermine the Scientific Integrity of EPA’s Endangerment Finding? You Betcha.
Instead of exercising its “judgment,” as required by Sec. 202 of the Clean Air Act, to determine whether greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions endanger public health…
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Debunking the Smear Campaign against the Murkowski Resolution
In recent weeks I have penned four columns debunking the smear campaign against Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s (R-AK) Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolution of disapproval…
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Who are the biggest CO2 emitters?
I am posting Benchmarking US Air Emissions (2006), a joint report by Ceres, NRDC, and PSEG, because it apparently is no longer available on the Internet,…
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Moveon.Org’s Disinformation Smear Campaign
Moveon.Org is running a series of TV ads accusing Senators Blanche Lincoln (D-AR), Ben Nelson (D-NB), and Mary Landrieu (D-LA) of “working to roll…
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Audi Super Bowl Ad: Working Both Sides of Street? (Updated Feb. 10, 2010)
(Revised Feb. 10, 2010. My conclusion was rushed, because I wanted to leave the office before the snowstorm suspended bus service from D.C.-area metro stops. Revisions…
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My Two Cents on AmazonGate
Climategate, Himalayagate, Pachaurigate, and now NOAAgate — it’s hard to keep up with all the relevations and allegations buzzing around some of the biggest…
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Murkowski Resolution on Endangerment: Separating the Reality from the Spin
Last Thursday, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), ranking member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, introduced a resolution of disapproval, under the Congressional…
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Will Cass Sunstein stick up for small business, or bless EPA’s legal hair splitting?
Today, Reps. Lamar Smith (R-TX), Sam Graves (R-MO), Trent Franks (R-AZ), and Lynn Westmoreland (R-GA) sent a letter to Office of Information and Regulatory…
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A Skeptic’s Desultory Philippic (or how I was not Al Gore’d into submission – with apologies to Paul Simon)
A pithy column in Foreign Policy by the Breakthrough Institute’s Ted Nordhaus and Michael Schellenberger says that “twice-fooled” Democrats, who have been “BTUed” by two Democratic administrations,…
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Enron: Lobbyist for both Kyoto and Wind Farm Mandates
Dr. Rob Bradley, CEO of the Institute for Energy Research, documents in Political Capitalism how fraud and corruption at Enron were the inevitable consequence of a business strategy…
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Will Congress protect the economy and the Constitution from Mass. v. EPA?
In this two–part post on MasterResource.Org, the free-market energy blog, I argue that the EPA’s proposed Tailoring Rule is a temporary, legally questionable, and…
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Waxman-Markey’s impact on housing prices — more than your average postage stamp
Proponents of the Waxman-Markey (W-M) cap-and-trade bill assure us it will cost the average household less than a postage stamp a day. The Heritage…
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EPA’s Tailoring Rule: A Temporary, Legally Dubious, and Incomplete Antidote to Massachusetts v. EPA’s Legacy of Absurd Results
Today, I submitted a comment on EPA’s proposed Prevention of Significant Deterioration and Title V Greenhouse Gas Tailoring Rule. The gist of my…
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Barton Or Bust! How to Stop Mass. v. EPA from Wrecking the Economy
Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX), ranking member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, announced today that he plans to introduce a “resolution of disapproval” to…
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Is “several degrees” of warming “virtually certain,” as NASA claims?
Earlier this week, at an American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco, NASA unveiled new data on atmospheric greenhouse gases (GHGs), notably carbon dioxide…
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RGGI: A tax is a tax is a tax
President Obama and other cap-and-trade advocates assured us they had “learned from Europe’s mistakes” and would auction all emission permits rather than hand them out at no charge to favored…
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NAAQS Petition Confirms Mass v. EPA Is Bottomless Well of Absurd Results
Yesterday, the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) and 350.org petitioned the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to establish National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for carbon…
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Why Hiding Computer Code Is Lethal to Climate Science
This post is a follow up to my previous on why Climategate is the real war on science. My earlier post commented on Willis…
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Climategate — the Real War on Science?
The huge pile of emails purloined or leaked from the Climate Research Unit (CRU) last week does indeed “give every appearance of testifying to concerted…
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Real Climate Spin
Real Climate.Org is chief defender of "consensus" climatology on the Internet. One of its enduring missions has been to defend the dubious, indeed discredited "Hockey…
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More on Secy. Chu’s convoluted climate economics
In recent testimony before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, energy secretary Steven Chu makes a convoluted case for S. 1733, the Clean Energy…
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Climate Policy Imperils China, India
Jonathan Pershing, head of the U.S. delegation at the UN climate talks in Barcelona, says China should cut its CO2 emissions 50% by 2050. Reuters…
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Secretary Chu’s Befuddled Economics
Revised 10/28/09 At the first Senate Environment and Public Works Committee hearing on S. 1733, the Kerry-Boxer “Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act,” Department of Energy Secretary…
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Kerry-Boxer’s not-so-hidden fangs: Why its bite is worse than its bark
Today, on MasterResource.Org, the free-market energy blog, I examine the Kerry-Boxer bill’s not-so-hidden fangs. Like its House companion bill, Waxman-Markey, Title VII, Part A…
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Kerry-Boxer’s not-so-hidden fangs
Next week, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee will hold three hearings on S. 1733, the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power…
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Waxman-Markey: A $3.6 trillion gas tax
Senators Kit Bond (R-MO) and Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) have just released a report, Climate Change Legislation: A $3.6 Trillion Gas Tax, which estimates…
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Data deflates threat-multiplier hype
The new, more 'nuanced' rationale for energy rationing is that global warming will aggravate several pre-existing environmental and health threats that cause or contribute to…
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California federal court dismisses global warming common law nuisance lawsuit
My weekend is starting out fine, thanks to this happy news. Peter Glaser, an environmental attorney with Troutman Sanders, just sent around his analysis. Here it…
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Reps. Issa and Sensenbrenner issue report on the politics of EPA’s endangerment finding
Updated 10/16/09 Today [Oct. 15, 2009], Rep. Darrell Isa (R-CA), ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and Rep. James Sensenbrenner,…
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Free-market commentary on the Kerry-Graham cap-and-trade oped
Updated 10/16/09 Over the weekend, Sens. John Kerry (D-MA) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) co-authored an oped in the New York Times titled, “Yes We…
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Mass v. EPA’s legacy of “absurd results”
Last week I posted several excerpts from EPA’s “Tailoring Rule,” which confirm that the Supreme Court, in Massachusetts v. EPA (April 2007), set the stage for…
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Secretary Chu Crosses the Line; Should Resign
Yesterday, energy secretary Steven Chu told reporters at a solar energy conference in Washington, D.C. "it's wonderful" that Apple Inc., Exelon, Nike, PG&E, and…
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“Advanced” biofuels lag behind mandate
EISA mandates the sale of 100 million gallons of advanced biofuel in 2009 and 200 million gallons in 2010. But, Matt Carr of the Biotechnology…
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EPA “Tailoring Rule” confirms Mass v. EPA set the stage for administrative quagmire and economic disaster
Attorney Peter Glaser, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, CEI and other free market groups warned that regulating GHG emissions from new motor vehicles would have…
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Nike quits the Chamber. When will the sanctimony end?
Today’s Greenwire (subscription required) reports that Nike, the sports shoe king, is resigning its position on the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Board of Directors. Nike…
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PG&E, Exelon, Duke — progressive companies or energy-rationing profiteers?
Divide et Impera — divide and conquer — is perhaps the oldest strategic maxim of war, politics, and diplomacy. Businesses succumb to it time and…
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Is 350 the New 450?
In today’s New York Times, Lauren Morello of ClimateWire asks, “Is 350 [parts per million] the New 450 [ppm] When It Comes to Capping Carbon Emissions?”…
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John Broder’s spin job on Alan Carlin
In today’s New York Times, John Broder strains to belittle Alan Carlin, the “whistle blower” whose skeptical comments on EPA’s proposed endangerment finding the…
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No data, no science
In “The Dog Ate Global Warming,” published yesterday in National Review Online, Cato Institute scholar and climatologist Patrick J. Michaels delivers a body blow to the “science…
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PNAS: Peer Review or Old Boy Network?
On February 25, 2009, Dr. James Hansen of Columbia University’s Earth Institute and Dr. John Christy of the University of Alabama in Huntsville testified on…
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Carbon dioxide by any other name would fertilize as well: Myron Ebell quoted in Climatewire
Today’s ClimateWire (subscription required) carries an analysis by reporter Lauren Morello that begins: Say goodbye to “greenhouse gases.” Say hello to “carbon pollution” and “heat-trapping gases.” Morello…
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Rent-seeking utilities: you reap what you sow
Yesterday, in State of Connecticut et al. v. American Electric Power et al., the 2nd U.S. Court of Appeals decided that states and other…
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Yvo de Boer’s low/inflated expectations
In today’s E&E TV interview with Monica Trauzzi (http://www.eenews.net/tv/), UNFCCC Executive Secretary Yvo de Boer did not balk at Trauzzi’s statement that, “Senate Majority Leader Harry…
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Will climate change cause water wars? Will Waxman-Markey enhance U.S. energy security? No and No.
Last week, on the free-market energy blog MasterResource.Org, I posted a two-part column on climate change and national security. In a nutshell, I argued…
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Enviros flail over FOIAed Treasury documents
A headline in yesterday’s evening edition of Greenwire (subscription required) declares: “Treasury; enviros go on offensive against media reports of cap-and-trade costs.” In fact, enviros went on…
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Climate policies endanger U.S. national security
The global warming scare campaign goes through phases. Warmists are collectivists, and they buzz like a hive. The overall narrative of doom does not change, but every couple…
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NIMBY for me, not for you — Robert Kennedy, Jr.’s selective embrace of renewable energy
As the Governator was widely quoted as saying, "If we cannot put solar power plants in the Mojave Desert, I don't know where the hell…
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India’s CO2 emissions to triple by 2030
India and China talk the Al Gore talk of climate Armageddon and the necessity for urgent action — yet their emissions keep going up and…
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EPA proposes illegal rule
Yesterday, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sent a draft proposed rule to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) that would exempt small emitters of…
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No, Greenpeace did not predict an ice-free “Arctic” by 2030
A factoid is rapidly making the rounds in climate skeptic circles. By a factoid, I mean “A piece of unverified or inaccurate information that is presented to the…
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Policy Peril Segment 10: It’s a Moral Issue
Today’s excerpt from CEI’s film, Policy Peril: Why Global Warming Policies Are More Dangerous Than Global Warming Itself, offers a free-market perspective on Al Gore’s proclamation, at the…
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Policy Peril Segment 9: Big Business
Today’s excerpt from CEI’s film, Policy Peril: Why Global Warming Policies Are More Dangerous Than Global Warming Itself, rebuts the argument that regulatory climate policies can’t…
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Policy Peril Segment 8: Coal (updated 08/26/2009)
Today’s excerpt from CEI’s film, Policy Peril: Why Global Warming Policies Are More Dangerous Than Global Warming Itself, is on the global warming movement’s anti-coal…
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Policy Peril Segment 7: Fuel economy standards
Today’s excerpt from CEI’s film, Policy Peril: Why Global Warming Policies Are More Dangerous Than Global Warming Itself, is on two global warming policies Congress…
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Policy Peril Segment 6: Cap and Trade (Updated August 25, 2009)
Today’s excerpt from CEI’s film, Policy Peril: Why Global Warming Policies Are More Dangerous Than Global Warming Itself, is on cap-and-trade. What is cap and trade? Cap-and-trade…
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Policy Peril Segment 5: Is the Science Debate “Over”? Updated 08/17/09
Today’s post in my series of commentaries on excerpts from CEI’s film, Policy Peril: Why Global Warming Policies Are More Dangerous Than Global Warming Itself,…
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Policy Peril Segment 4 – Sea Level Rise
In An Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore warns that global warming could raise sea levels by 20 feet, and he implies that this could…
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Policy Peril Segment 3 – Hurricanes (updated 8/19/09)
Is global warming making hurricanes more destructive? Did global warming contribute to the devastation of New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina? Would Kyoto-style energy rationing help avert future weather-related catastrophes?…
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Policy Peril Segment 2: Air Pollution
Last Friday, I launched a blog series on CEI’s film, Policy Peril: Why Global Warming Policies Are More Dangerous Than Global Warming Itself. The film is our…
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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…