This is an updated version of an article that I did about John Laird when his appointment as California Natural Resources Secretary was not yet confirmed by the Brown administration. Below the article is my open letter to John Laird. Governor Jerry Brown on January 4 appointed John Laird, a former Assemblyman from Santa Cruz, […]
Somehow, Dave Barry always manages to make his year-in-review column funnier from year to year. And with seriousness in short supply, his look back at 2010 is about what you’d expect – very silly. What follows are some of the environment-related highlights. Read the whole thing here. Let’s put things into perspective: 2010 was not […]
Annie Leonard’s “Story of Stuff Project” has a new video out. As always, it’s cute, it’s informative, and it’s timely. “The Story of Electronics” is both geared toward getting folks thinking about better buying decisions as we approach the holiday shopping season… and getting them to think beyond that, toward better laws and more responsible […]
The ballots are cast and mostly counted, and now the post-mortem begins. What does the midterm election mean for the environment? Was this a rejection of progressives? Not so much. As Meteor Blades noted over at DailyKos, it wasn’t the Progressive Caucus that was decimated – it was the moderate/conservative Blue Dog Caucus. Only four […]
The election is almost upon us… do you know how your local candidates stack up? This year more than ever, it’s imperative that you vote wisely. There are important issues at stake this year – from global warming to renewable energy to oil, coal and fracking. A lot of folks are angry and seem to […]
Thinking of attending next weekend’s rally in Washington DC, Stephen Colbert’s March to Keep Fear Alive? Here’s a little preview of what you might be able to expect – a Colbert Report greatest hits montage on the environment. Sample quotes: On the Cape Wind offshore windfarm: “What if it breaks and we have a catastrophic […]
It’s a great headline. But it’s not related to BP’s Gulf Oil disaster – nobody involved in the biggest single pollution incident in US history has even come close to being arrested, never mind going to jail. Nope, this headline is from Hungary, where a factory’s storage facility failed last week, sending a wave of […]
BP concluded 48 hours of testing on the new cap over their busted well, and the results are good. The oil flow has stopped, pressure is stable, and there’s no evidence – so far – that the cap has blown a new leak in the underground well. “As we continue to see success in the […]
New rules proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency Tuesday will require 31 states to significantly improve their air quality for the sake of the rest of the country. The new rule which will be known as the Transport Rule will require 31 states and the District of Columbia to significantly improve their air quality by […]
A computer simulation of the possible spread of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill over the course of a full year has been released. This article originally published on Planetsave.com. Created by researchers from the School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology (SOEST) at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, the animation is not a […]
This is a pivotal week in the clean energy debate. The Senate will vote on Murkowski’s short-sighted resolution to take away the EPA’s authority to regulate pollution. As we head into this critical time, it’s not the Inhofe-cloned climate deniers who trouble me – it’s the knowing bystanders who are keeping me up at night.
Time-traveling to 2010 reveals how some of Washington’s worst-kept secrets will catch up with President Obama and cripple his climate agenda.
Kennedy was not known for his environmental politics, but what will be his legacy vis-a-vis the environment and energy? Will he be remembered for what many viewed as self-interested and elitist opposition to the proposed Cape Wind project, an offshore wind farm in Nantucket Sound, barley visible from the Kennedy’s Hyannisport compound?
Whatever the relative merits and drawbacks of biomass are, they are preferable to continuing to mine and burn coal. Until we start to bring large-scale base loading renewable capacity online, we continue inexorably on the same business as usual curve.
From policymakers, business leaders and NGOs, to students in law and graduate programs, the broad scope and forward-looking tone of Agenda for a Sustainable America would make it a valuable addition to the bookcases of anyone interested in sustainability.