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Climate Change: The Resilience Option (far better than climate stasis)

By Kenneth P. Green -- October 23, 2009
Climate Change: The Resilience Option
Kenneth P. Green
What Is Better, Climate Resilience or Climate Stasis?
In general, the mainstream response to the issue of climate change has been reactive, pessimistic, authoritarian, and resistant to change. Those alarmed about a changing climate would stand athwart the stream of climate history and cry “stop, enough!” Rather than working to cease human influence on climate, they want to find a way to make the climate stand still. This focus on creating climate stasis has led to policy proposals that would have been laughed at or dismissed as wacky conspiracy theories in the 1980s. But mainstream anti-climate-change activists are proposing nothing less than the establishment of global weather control through energy rationing, regulations, and taxes, all managed by a global bureaucracy with a goal of leading humanity into a future that will become smaller, more costly, and less dynamic over time.

India’s Tripled CO2 Emissions by 2030: A ‘Carbon Constrained’ World?

By <a class="post-author" href="/about#mlewis">Marlo Lewis</a> -- September 4, 2009

India released an analysis on Wednesday projecting tripled carbon-dioxide (CO2) emissions by 2030, the New York Times reports. Taking into account five independent studies, India expects to release between 4 billion and 7 billion tons by 2030, BBC News reports, compared to 1.2 billion tons today.

India released the analysis to strengthen its bargaining position at the December Copenhagen climate summit where delegates will attempt to negotiate a successor treaty to the Kyoto Protocol. The United States and other industrialized nations contend that India should adopt binding emission limits. India refuses, arguing that mandatory restrictions would stifle the country’s economic development.

The analysis supports this position, explains Jairam Ramesh, India’s minister of environment and forests, because India’s per capita emissions in 2030 will still be much lower than that of any developed country today.…

CO2 Regulation under the Clean Air Act: Economic Train Wreck, Constitutional Crisis, Legislative Thuggery

By <a class="post-author" href="/about#mlewis">Marlo Lewis</a> -- March 19, 2009

Call it an economic train wreck, a constitutional crisis, or legslative thuggery. Litigation-driven regulation of carbon dioxide (CO2) under the Clean Air Act (CAA) is all of the above.

The Supreme Court case of Massachusetts v. EPA  (April 2, 2007) has set the stage for a policy disaster. Mass v. EPA’s second anniversary rapidly approaches, and in a Power Point presentation leaked to Greenwire last week, EPA reveals how it plans to respond to the Court. But first, some background on the case and the Pandora’s Box it has created.…

Is Cap-and-Trade Inherently Protectionist?

By <a class="post-author" href="/about#mlewis">Marlo Lewis</a> -- February 23, 2009