What if we could reduce CO2 emissions without raising taxes? What if a carbon-neutral source of renewable energy could be grown on American soil and generate all the power the United States needed? What if one plant could bolster the economy, provide nutritious food, bio-degradable plastics, durable fiber, carbon-neutral energy, and save the world from […]
Category: Energy & Environmental Policy
Texas has seen its driest conditions in nearly a century. High winds, high temperatures and low humidity equate to a recipe for disaster. The fire in Southwest Austin on Sunday destroyed 11 houses, damaged 10 more badly, and scorched over 100 acres, according to the Travis County Fire Department. This was a rare occurrence […]
On Friday, April 8, the U.S. Congress dodged a government shutdown by striking a budget compromise, undoubtedly crushing the dreams of the news outlets gleefully throwing countdown clocks and “what if?!” statements around. What the media have largely failed to cover, however, are the follow-up discussions that continue to adjust the budget. One of […]
In recent articles, I’ve been arguing that America has a teenager’s worst attitude about climate change: We need to stop slouching to our rooms and slamming doors shut, and start engaging developing countries on the issues that matter to them, like adapting to climate change within those countries’ borders and mitigating it within our […]
For the last week and a half, I have been in Ethiopia, conducting research on climate change and adaptation. Rambling around Addis Ababa and the Central Rift Valley has been an exercise in patience and flexibility, but also enormously informative and enjoyable. Ethiopia is a country that has been particularly hard-hit by climate-related disasters, […]
If Americans are confused about anything lately, it seems that climate change and global warming are probably somewhere at the top of that list. While Republicans are set up as the enemies of climate regulation and Democrats as the defenders of the environment, survey data shows that many Americans are skeptical about climate change, especially the […]
Members of both chambers of the U.S. Congress are pushing bills that will dramatically slash what little funding the U.S. spends on climate change research and action. This includes major funding cuts for the EPA and other environmental initiatives across the States, as discussed in last week’s Baines Report. To this I say… So […]
In this, the age of budget deficits, no political party wants to be caught being the one without any budget cuts to advocate. President Obama handed down a budget that promised to cut troubled programs or programs that had not been able to deliver results, to achieve what one administration official told the Associated […]
In July 2010, Ethiopia’s Environment Protection Authority declared it would have a carbon-neutral economy by 2025. What? An entire country? Carbon neutral? While I know that developing countries emit considerably less carbon than countries like the United States do, this is a hard claim to swallow, especially in such a short timeframe. Indeed, it […]