By 
By Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium blogger
(reposted with permission)
Joe Miller, Sarah Palin’s choice candidate for one of Alaska’s Senate seats, does not believe in climate change. That didn’t bother Alaska voters this week as Miller bested Senator Lisa Murkowski in the state’s Republican primary. If that weren’t worrisome enough, it also emerged that the fossil fuel industry spent eight times more than environmental groups on lobbying in 2009, the year the House passed the climate change bill. It’s been a bad year already for environmental causes, and as the November election edges closer, progressives might want to start working overtime to regain momentum on climate and energy issues.
Subscribe to this site's RSS feed.
By
Amidst the devastation that is, or perhaps was, the Gulf Coast, an immense spill in China, thousands of abandoned offshore wells continuously leaking, and the effects of GHG-driven climate change becoming increasingly apparent, one could have thought that now is the time for climate legislation. But alas, no – as evident in the wake, (and I mean wake) of the Senate’s failure to pass any sort of climate or energy bill before they headed off for August recess/vacation. This failure due to the fact that not one Republican would support such legislation, claiming it would raise taxes, raise electricity bills, kill jobs and force more manufacturers to take their factories overseas; just as they did more than ten years ago with the Kyoto Protocol.
Continue Reading The Power and Energy of the Fossil Fuel Industry
Subscribe to this site's RSS feed.
By
I recently attended the following ClimateOne event with Joe Romm, publisher of ClimateProgress and a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress. Romm addresses inaction in Congress on climate, and the inadequacy of the scientific community to deliver their message in the face of the powerful and organized disinformation campaign arrayed against it. A topic we will take up later in a subsequent post.
Subscribe to this site's RSS feed.
By
By Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium blogger
(reposted with permission)
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) released an energy and oil spill bill this week that has no carbon cap, no renewable energy standard, and no chance of changing the course of America’s energy future. And yet, despite Senate setbacks, the clean energy economy is growing.
Subscribe to this site's RSS feed.
By
Republicans have undermined climate and energy legislation, but more modest provisions focused on accountability and a proactive approach to oil spills still have a good chance of being passed into law this summer.
On July 23 2010, Senate majority leader Harry Reid acknowledged that due to Republican opposition, Democrats would not be able to secure the required number of votes to pass the energy and climate bill before recess. This means the Senate will not be able to tackle the climate bill until September at the earliest. Congress could still employ a variety of measures including supplemental appropriations, jobs packages and a scaled back energy bill.
Continue Reading Climate Change Legislation Thwarted, Oil Spill Legislation Still Alive
Subscribe to this site's RSS feed.
By
By Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium blogger
(reposted with permission)
Yesterday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) introduced a limited energy bill that responds to the oil spill and promotes energy efficiency. Reid’s action is a signal that the Senate will not pass climate legislation before November, although Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) said that a climate bill could come up in the lame-duck session following the election.
Subscribe to this site's RSS feed.
By
Senate majority leader Harry Reid, along Massachusetts Senator John Kerry, announced today they are abandoning attempts to bring a comprehensive energy and climate legislation to the Senate floor for debate. Cap and trade, at least for now, is dead in Congress.
Continue Reading News Break: Cap and Trade Dead in the Senate
Subscribe to this site's RSS feed.
By
Christians Figueres, the new Executive Secretary for the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) addresses the press on the status of international climate negotiations and offers a five-step outline of actions governments should take at the COP16 climate conference in Cancun later this year.
Subscribe to this site's RSS feed.
By
The race for the clean energy future comes to Washington, DC today—only symbolically if the US doesn’t seize the moment. Energy ministers from 20 countries that account for over 80% of the world’s global warming pollution are in the US to discuss how to speed up the deployment of clean energy throughout the world, as a part of the Clean Energy Ministerial. The subplot of the meeting will be which of these countries will come out sprinting and which ones will begin by jogging in the race for the clean energy future.
Subscribe to this site's RSS feed.
By
By Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium blogger
(reposted with permission)
This summer, Americans are cranking up their air conditioning. At the same time, Senators are letting climate legislation cool its heels in Washington. Ultimately, both of these summer trends are contributing to climate change. Air conditioning dumps greenhouse gases into the environment, and without climate legislation that caps the country’s carbon emissions, America’s share of global carbon levels will only continue to grow.
Subscribe to this site's RSS feed.
Subscribe to Updates
Subscribe to this site's RSS feed.
