It is an issue that just won’t go away…Our incredibly hot summer seems to have re-focused attention on doing something regarding climate change. 

James E. Hansen, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, in Friday’s Washington Post, announced the release of a new study.  The title of Mr. Hansen’s op-ed piece shows what the

With prospects dead for federal cap and trade climate change legislation, the focus for market mechanisms to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions shifts to the states.  Meanwhile, as discussed in my last post,  EPA is left moving forward with its command and control regulations to reduce GHGs under the Clean Air Act.

After the defeat of Proposition 23, California’s

While the political and policy focus is clearly on the Country’s struggling economy, caught within that debate is U.S. policy on climate change.  As the economy continued to languish this summer, any hope of a cap and trade bill emerging from Congress died. 

The bill was a victim of a Congress that created a Christmas tree of

By all accounts, Republicans are set to enjoy major gains in both the House and Senate following midterm elections.  Speculation is that the Republicans could likely regain control of the House and could even get close in the Senate.

What implications could this change in the political landscape have for climate change regulation?

We have already

After this summer’s anti-climatic end to federal climate change legislation, some thought that perhaps there would be a temporary end of the discussion of climate change regulation.  However, recent weather events (wildfires in Russia, floods in Pakistan and an ice sheet breaking off Greenland) and extreme heat have reinvigorated the debate. 

Here is some highlights

There was a lot of anticipation this summer about the scope of the energy bill coming out of the U.S. Senate.  Would the Senate try and tackle climate change?  Would it develop a national renewable portfolio standard? 

The bill was released yesterday and the answer was "no" on both accounts. 

The White House kept a glimmer of hope that

U.S. EPA has released its CAIR replacement program called the "Transport Rule."  In a previous post I discussed EPA’s efforts under the Transport Rule to address the Court’s ruling striking down the CAIR rule.  After listening to a presentation by EPA, the structure of the Transport Rule is a little clearer.

The major issue identified by the Court