Entrepreneurs Bringing Clean Light to Poor Nations. By Lisa Friedman, ClimateWire, 10/20/10. “The poorest people on the planet together spent almost $40 billion last year on kerosene and other rudimentary and dangerous fuel-based lighting. Scientists say fuel-burning lanterns release 190 million tons of carbon dioxide each year: about the equivalent of 30 million cars. Now leaders in the field of solar portable lighting believe they can push kerosene lamps out of markets in much of the developing world and make a profit while they're at it… “Lighting Africa, based in Kenya, tries to help the private sector provide clean and affordable lighting on the electricity-starved continent. The organization -- like the Lumina Project, which is based out of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory -- is part of a small but growing field of market-based initiatives targeting what economists call the ‘bottom of the pyramid’ consumers… The portable solar lighting company D.Light… has delivered solar lamps to about 1.7 million customers at an average price of $20 apiece. The company's goal is lighting the homes of 50 million people by 2015.”
Norway Says Green Taxes Spur Economic Growth. By Alister Doyle, Reuters, September 13, 2010. "Green taxes are among ways to spur jobs and economic revival despite less focus on environmental solutions since the U.N.'s Copenhagen summit in 2009, Norway's Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said on September 13… 'We see a very close link between climate issues and economic recovery. Investments in green technology are part of the solution,' he said."
L.A. Mayor, Latino Activists Take On Oil Companies Over Proposition 23. By Margot Roosevelt, LATimes, September 1, 2010. "Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa on Tuesday rebuked Valero Energy and Tesoro, which operate refineries in Wilmington, for bankrolling a measure that would effectively scuttle the state's efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions. 'Go home, Texas oil companies,' Villaraigosa urged at a news conference aimed at encouraging voters to oppose Proposition 23, a November ballot initiative to suspend California's 2006 climate change law until the state's unemployment rate drops. 'We won't compromise our environmental and health standards so you can make more money,' he said... A coalition of 60 Latino, African American and Asian groups, calling itself Communities United Against the Dirty Energy Proposition, issued a statement saying that Proposition 23 "will hurt low-income communities and people of color first and worst... We will lose against the Dirty Energy Proposition unless we mobilize voters of color and low-income voters."
Obama to Break Up Minerals Management Service. By John M. Broder, NYTimes, May 12, 2010. "The Obama administration on Tuesday proposed breaking up the agency responsible for both policing the oil industry and acting as its partner in drilling activities, seeking to end a decades-old relationship between industry and government that has proved highly profitable -- and some say too cozy -- for both. The administration has been under pressure to address weaknesses in federal oil regulation since the BP well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico three weeks ago. On Tuesday, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said he planned to cut the agency that oversees the industry, the Minerals Management Service, in two. One office would be responsible for public safety and environmental enforcement and the other in charge of leasing and revenue collection. Details of the proposal are still being worked out."
Obama Proposes Bill to Lift Caps on Offshore Spill Liability. By Mike Soraghan, Greenwire, May 12, 2010. "President Obama put his weight today behind legislative efforts to lift liability caps for oil spills. The administration is sending a wide-ranging spill-response package to Capitol Hill that includes raising the $75 million cap on economic damages. It would also seek to accelerate assistance to people left unemployed by the spill, expand eligibility for food stamps and raise an 8-cent-per-barrel oil tax by 1 cent. The cap on natural resource damages would be raised from $500 million to $750 million. Some lawmakers have said the cap on economic damages, such as lost wages or canceled hotel bookings, should be raised to $10 billion. But the administration did not offer its recommendation as to what the cap should be."
Gulf-Coast Fishermen Fear for Their Livelihood. By Kate Howell, Greenwire, May 3, 2010. "Louisiana's coastal wetlands support a $2.4 billion fishing industry by providing breeding areas and nurseries for fish, crabs and shrimp. They also set the table for migrating waterfowl and other birds. The spill is likely to affect this and the next generation of wildlife because it is spawning season, and oil kills fish larvae. It is being seen as an ecological disaster. It is an economic catastrophe, too. Shrimpers have been waiting through the long months of one of the toughest winters on record for their harvest to begin this month. In the past few weeks, they have been pouring money into boats and equipment for a season that usually starts in mid-May and lasts through summer...
"Fishermen and boat captains crowded onto narrow bleachers and rows of folding chairs on April 30 in the gym of the Boothville-Venice School... as Vince Mitchell of O'Brien's Response Management, hired by BP to run its vessel opportunity program, explained a payment and fuel-reimbursement plan. Boats larger than 45 feet will earn $2,000 a day, he said, while those between 30 and 45 feet will earn $1,500 a day and those smaller than 30 feet will earn $1,200 a day... Many were skeptical about signing papers that Mitchell and BP offered at the end of the program, saying they were afraid of not grasping all the nuances of the contract language... not signing the contract because [they] did not want to be shut out of potential future claims for loss of livelihood... But others signed... One said, 'These chemicals are toxic, and we're not thrilled to go out there with it, but we may not have a choice... This is nasty-looking stuff. I don't want to mess up my boat -- I just painted it. The last thing I want to do is to tear my equipment up.' But, he added, 'Who else knows these wetlands better than us?'"
Byrd Calls for Revisiting West Virginia's Relationship with Coal. By Ken Ward Jr., Charleston Gazette-Mail, May 5, 2010. "Sen. Robert C. Byrd on Wednesday called for a reconsideration of West Virginia's relationship with coal mining, saying the industry can't be allowed to dominate the state's politics while causing needless deaths and environmental damage. 'Coal brings much needed jobs and revenue to our economy,' the West Virginia Democrat wrote in a new commentary. 'But the industry has a larger footprint, including inherent responsibilities that must be acknowledged by the industry.' Byrd issued the piece in response to the nation's worst coal-mining disaster in 40 years, the April 5 explosion that killed 29 miners at Massey Energy's Upper Big Branch Mine in Raleigh County. 'As we seek to understand how and why the Upper Big Branch disaster occurred, we might also re-examine conventional wisdom about the future of the coal industry in our state,' Byrd said. The new commentary comes five months after Byrd issued another strongly worded statement that urged the coal industry to 'embrace the future,' by accepting the need for action to stem global warming and not demonizing citizens who want to curb mountaintop removal mining... And, Byrd said that... 'If the process of mining destroys nearby wells and foundations, if blasting and digging and relocating streams unearths harmful elements and releases them into the environment causing illness and death, that process should be halted and the resulting hazards to the community abated... The old chestnut that 'coal is West Virginia's greatest natural resource' deserves revision. I believe that our people are West Virginia's most valuable resource. We must demand to be treated as such.'"
Obama's Second Chance on the Predominant Moral Issue of This Century. Commentary by James Hansen, HuffPost, April 5, 2010. "President Obama, finally, took a get-involved get-tough approach to negotiations on health care legislation and the arms control treaty with Russia -- with success. Could this be the turn-around for what might still be a great presidency? The predominant moral issue of the 21st century, almost surely, will be climate change... Our fossil fuel addiction, if unabated, threatens our children and grandchildren, and most species on the planet...
The fundamental requirement for solving our fossil fuel addiction and moving to a clean energy future is a rising price on carbon emissions. Otherwise, if we refuse to make fossil fuels pay for their damage to human health, the environment, and our children's future, fossil fuels will remain the cheapest energy and we will squeeze every drop from tar sands, oil shale, pristine lands, and offshore areas. An essential corollary to the rising carbon price is 100% redistribution of collected fees to the public -- otherwise the public will never allow the fee to be high enough to affect lifestyles and energy choices. The fee must be collected from fossil fuel companies across-the-board at the mine, wellhead, or port of entry. Revenues should be divided equally among all legal adult residents, with half-shares for children up to two per family, distributed monthly as a 'green check'. Part of the revenue could be used to reduce taxes, provided the tax reduction is transparent and verifiable. The rising carbon price will affect almost everything. Congressman John Larson defined an appropriate rising fee. $15 per ton of carbon dioxide the first year and $10 more per ton each year. Economic modeling shows that carbon emissions would decline 30% by 2020. The annual dividend then would be $2000-3000 per legal adult resident, $6000-9000 per family with two or more children. About 60% of the public would receive more in the green check than they pay in added energy costs. People will set their net cost or gain via their energy and other consumer choices...
"The National Religious Coalition on Creation Care (NRCCC) is working with the Citizens Climate Lobby (CCL), the Price Carbon Campaign (PCC), and economists at the Carbon Tax Center (CTC) to help promote this honest and effective energy and climate policy. The public, if well-informed, can be expected to support this policy. But so far Congress has been steamrolled by special interests... Can the cacophony of special interests be overcome? There is one way: the president must get involved. He must explain the situation to the public and use his bully pulpit to persuade Congress to do what is right for the nation and future generations. He must explain that a rising carbon price is needed to phase out our fossil fuel addiction. The dividend will provide the public the means to move to a clean energy future, stimulating the economy... Perhaps posterity may remember that Obama reduced the number of nuclear-tipped missiles, or that he added 10% of Americans to the health care rolls. But if he dreams of being a great president, he needs to take on the great moral challenge of our century." Dr. James Hansen is director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, but he writes on this policy-related topic as a private citizen.
Building a Green Economy. Commentary by Paul Krugman, NYTimesMag, April 11, 2010. "The debate over climate economics looks very different from the inside than it often does in popular media. The casual reader might have the impression that there are real doubts about whether emissions can be reduced without inflicting severe damage on the economy. In fact, once you filter out the noise generated by special-interest groups, you discover that there is widespread agreement among environmental economists that a market-based program to deal with the threat of climate change -- one that limits carbon emissions by putting a price on them -- can achieve large results at modest, though not trivial, cost. There is, however, much less agreement on how fast we should move, whether major conservation efforts should start almost immediately or be gradually increased over the course of many decades. In what follows, I will offer a brief survey of the economics of climate change or, more precisely, the economics of lessening climate change. I'll try to lay out the areas of broad agreement as well as those that remain in major dispute. First, though, a primer in the basic economics of environmental protection... [End of article] We know how to limit greenhouse-gas emissions. We have a good sense of the costs -- and they're manageable. All we need now is the political will."
Amazon Rancher Sentenced for Ordering the Killing of U.S. Nun. By Tales Azzoni, AP, April 13, 2010. "A Brazilian rancher's conviction for the murder of a U.S. nun in the Amazon could help discourage attacks on rain forest activists that for decades have largely gone unpunished, environmentalists and legal officials said Tuesday. Vitalmiro Moura was sentenced to 30 years for ordering the killing of 73-year-old Dorothy Stangin 2005 because she blocked him and another rancher from taking over land the government gave to farmers. Hundreds of activists have been killed in Brazil in the last 20 years -- but only about 80 triggermen, usually paid by powerful ranchers with land claims at stake, were behind bars before Tuesday. Moura is the only so-called mastermind of one of the killings to join them, raising hopes that the climate of impunity in the Amazon is finally nearing an end."
Prodding Blacks To Think About Green. By Don Terry, Chicago News Cooperative, March 5, 2010. "No one can accuse Naomi Davis of lacking ambition. She wants simultaneously to rebuild black America and save the planet -- one neighborhood at a time. She knows she cannot do either alone. Her plan is to recruit and train an army. A green army. That is why Ms. Davis, a petite, 54-year-old lawyer turned environmental evangelist, was squeezing her way through a crowded South Side nightclub [on a] Monday night, passing out energy-efficient light bulbs... to anyone who would sign her e-mail list... 'Instead of waiting for the people to come to us, we go to them, wherever they are,' she said. 'We're going into the bars, the parks, the churches, the schools, the stores with this new green-economy education. We have to spread the word. Otherwise, people of color are going to be left behind.'
"Ms. Davis is the founder and president of Blacks in Green, a three-year-old trade association and education and advocacy group based in Chicago that 'teaches the benefits of the new green economy to communities of color through classes, programs, activities and enterprises.' She is part of a new generation of black and Latino environmentalists who hope to revitalize their battered neighborhoods, struggling suburbs and rural towns with green-collar jobs and businesses. Of the $787-billion federal stimulus package, about $80 billion was allotted for clean energy and other green initiatives. Ms. Davis said her goal was to ensure that black people 'and other people of color have our share' of the money going to green jobs and businesses, ranging from solar energy projects and wind farms to the construction and renovation of office buildings and apartment towers to make them environmentally sound. Ms. Davis also preaches do-for-self to go along with her gospel of green. 'The move toward eco-friendly development, and the jobs it creates,' she said, 'is an opportunity for blacks and other minorities to take more control of their destiny. In that sense, it is a way to move forward for communities that often feel left behind by economic opportunity.'"
Harvard Study: $7-a-Gallon Gas Required for Significant Reductions in Transportation Emissions. Policy Brief by W. Ross Morrow, Henry Lee, Kelly Sims Gallagher, and Gustavo Collantes, Energy Policy, Belfer Center (Harvard Kennedy School), March 2010. "Reducing oil consumption and carbon emissions from transportation is a much greater challenge than conventional wisdom assumes. It will require substantially higher fuel prices, ideally in combination with more stringent regulation... Reducing CO2 emissions from the transportation sector 14% below 2005 levels by 2020 may require gas prices greater than $7/gallon by 2020... While relying on subsidies for electric or hybrid vehicles is politically seductive, it is extremely expensive and an ineffective way to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the near term...Aggressive climate change policy need not bring the economy to a halt. Even under high-fuels-tax, high-carbon price scenarios, losses in annual GDP, relative to business-as-usual, are less than 1%, and the economy is still projected to grow at 2.1-3.7% per year assuming a portion of the revenues collected are recycled to taxpayers."
Oil Production Sagging in Mexico. By Clifford Kraus and Elisabeth Malkin, NYTimes, March 9, 2010. "To the Mexican people, one of the great achievements in their history was the day their president kicked out foreign oil companies in 1938. Thus, they celebrate March 18 as a civic holiday. Yet today, that 72-year-old act has put Mexico in a straitjacket, one that threatens both the welfare of the country and the oil supply of the United States. The national oil company created after the 1938 seizure, Pemex, is entering a period of turmoil. Oil production in its aging fields is sagging so rapidly that Mexico, long one of the world's top oil-exporting countries, could begin importing oil within the decade. Mexico is among the three leading foreign suppliers of oil to the United States, along with Canada and Saudi Arabia. Mexican barrels can be replaced, but at a cost. It means greater American dependence on unfriendly countries like Venezuela, unstable countries like Nigeria and Iraq, and on the oil sands of Canada...
"Mexico probably still has plenty of oil, especially beneath the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico, but Pemex lacks the technology and know-how to get it out. Inviting foreign companies into the country to help is one of the touchiest propositions in Mexican politics. As the Mexican government struggles to find a way forward, production keeps falling. The basic problem is simply that Mexico's readily accessible oil is used up -- pretty much the same thing that happened to the United States when production began falling in the 1970s. Output from Mexico's giant Cantarell field, in shallow waters near the eastern shore, has plunged by 50% in recent years. Output at the country's other large field is expected to begin falling in the next year or two. Historically, oil has supplied 30 to 40% of the Mexican government's revenue."Palm Oil Defenders Speak Out in Indonesia. By Jerome Rivet, AFP, March 1, 2010. "It is blamed for everything from deforestation to threatening the extinction of the orangutan, but palm oil is a vital source of income for many developing countries, the crop's producers say. In Indonesia, the world's largest palm oil producer, where the plant provides work for three million people, the government is keen to promote the benefits of the crop. Gatot Irianto, research director at Indonesia's Ministry of Agriculture, pleaded with producers, scientists and NGOs meeting on the holiday island of Bali in late February to reconsider the plant's reputation... Most experts agree that demand for palm products such as cooking oil, margarine, soaps, cosmetics and resins, will continue to increase and better management is the only way to reduce its environmental impact... Jean-Charles Jacquemard, an engineer at CIRAD, the French Centre for Agricultural Research said palm oil was too profitable for producers in Asia and Africa to abandon, regardless of pressure from the West. 'It is a plant which has many benefits for them. It produces a large amount of oil per hectare, three to six times more than rapeseed or sunflower,' he said. 'Its cultivation uses relatively little fertilizer -- around eight kilogrammes (18 pounds) per tree per year.' In Indonesia, 40% of production comes from small producers who, by farming between 10 and 20 hectares, 'are able to live decently and send their children to university,' he said."
Forward From Copenhagen: Recognizing Climate Change as a Justice Problem. By Tom Athanasiou, EarthIsland, Spring 2010 issue. "Almost two decades after I started working on climate change, I was happily astounded to witness the crystallization, on the streets of Copenhagen, of a grassroots movement that was both energetic and sophisticated, and to see global civil society groups working in solidarity with the leaders of the world's poorest and most vulnerable nations to press a collective agenda. And I can tell you something else: Our chances of preventing climate catastrophe rests in large part on the ability of this new alliance to communicate to the world's richest and most powerful peoples that the emissions emergency is, above all things, a crisis of justice.
"As everyone knows, the Copenhagen talks failed to catapult us into the ambitious global mobilization we need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. But this was never going to happen anyway... [But,] the emergence of a semi-organized bloc of 'Most Vulnerable Countries' (MVCs) is news that will stay news, and not just because of the tension between the MVCs and 'emerging economies' like China and India. The larger issue is that the MVCs have come to know themselves as frontline states, and in so doing have irrevocably transformed the global politics of climate crisis. It goes without saying that, in the coming battles, the most vulnerable will reserve much of their ire for the wealthy countries of the North... Copenhagen, for all its disappointments, marked a turn. The need for an emergency mobilization is obvious, and with it a set of challenges that can no longer be denied. These will get clearer in the years ahead, but the essential situation is before us: With the atmosphere's ability to absorb carbon critically limited, we face the greatest resource-sharing problem of all time. For all its complexity, the core of this problem can be stated simply enough: What kind of a climate transition would be fair enough to actually work? The climate problem is and remains a justice problem. It's more than this, of course, but justice is nonetheless the key. If we fail to solve it in time, it will be in large part because we refused to see it as such." Tom Athanasiou directs EcoEquity (ecoequity.org), an Earth Island Institute-sponsored project, and is a member of the Greenhouse Development Rights authors' group.
Major U.N. Report to Argue for Ending Subsidies to Major Polluting Companies. By Juliette Jowit, Guardian, February 10, 2010. "The cost of pollution and other damage to the natural environment caused by the world's biggest companies would wipe out more than one-third of their profits if they were held financially accountable, a major unpublished study for the United Nations has found. The report comes amid growing concern that no one is made to pay for most of the use, loss and damage of the environment, which is reaching crisis proportions in the form of pollution and the rapid loss of freshwater, fisheries and fertile soils. Later this year, another huge UN study -- dubbed the 'Stern for nature' after the influential report on the economics of climate change, by Sir Nicholas Stern -- will attempt to put a price on such global environmental damage, and suggest ways to prevent it. The report, led by economist Pavan Sukhdev, is likely to argue for abolition of billions of dollars of subsidies to harmful industries like agriculture, energy and transport, tougher regulations and more taxes on companies that cause the damage.
"Ahead of changes which would have a profound effect - not just on companies' profits but also their customers and pension funds and other investors -- the UN-backed Principles for Responsible Investment initiative and the United Nations Environment Programme jointly ordered a report into the activities of the 3,000 biggest public companies in the world... The study, conducted by London-based consultancy Trucost and due to be published this summer, found the estimated combined damage was worth US$2.2 trillion (£1.4tn) in 2008 - a figure bigger than the national economies of all but seven countries in the world that year. The figure equates to 6-7% of the companies' combined turnover, or an average of one-third of their profits, though some businesses would be much harder hit than others."
World Economic Forum Ends With Little Consensus, But Pledges for Humanitarian Aid. By Tim Weber, BBC, January 31, 2010. "The World Economic Forum in Davos, the annual meeting of some of the world's most powerful business leaders and politicians ended with few new plans or real achievements. There was agreement though that job creation and free trade had to be key ingredients of any economic recovery. Larry Summers, economics adviser to US President Barack Obama, probably coined the most memorable phrase of this year's Davos when he said the world was experiencing a 'statistical economic recovery, but a human recession'... Arguably the most tangible result of Davos was probably a series of commitments to humanitarian causes. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and his wife Melinda made the most spectacular announcement, pledging $10 Billion over the next 10 years to help research, develop and deliver vaccines for the world's poorest countries. Many business leaders also made detailed promises on how they or their companies would help Haiti to cope in the aftermath of the earthquake. This was not a normal year for Davos - it had few outcomes, but an intensity of discussion and debate that is unusual even for this high-powered event."
Conning the Climate: Inside the Carbon-Trading Shell Game. By Mark Shapiro, Harpers, February issue. "Carbon trading is now the fastest-growing commodities market on earth. Since 2005, when major greenhouse-gas polluters among the Kyoto signatories were issued caps on their emissions and permitted to buy credits to meet those caps, there have been more than $300 billion worth of carbon transactions. Major financial institutions such as Goldman Sachs, Barclays, and Citibank now host carbon-trading desks in London; traders who once speculated on oil and gas are betting on the most insidious side effects of our fossil fuel-based economy. Over the next decade, if President Obama and other advocates can institute a cap-and-trade system in the United States, the demand for carbon credits could explode into a $2 to $3 trillion market, according to the market-analysis firm Point Carbon...
"Carbon exists as a commodity only through the decisions of politicians and bureaucrats, who determine both the demand, by setting emissions limits, and the supply, by establishing criteria for offsets. It was the United States that sculpted the cap-and-trade system during the Kyoto negotiations, before pulling out of the accord and leaving the rest of the world to implement the scheme. Since then, most of the world's major political, financial, and environmental interests have aligned themselves with the idea, because of its potential to generate profits out of adversity and to avoid the difficult economic decisions posed by climate change. Now the Obama Administration and the Democratic Congress -- along with most American companies, which see cap-and-trade as the friendliest regulation they could hope for -- want to rejoin the world and multiply the market. That market is, in essence, an elaborate shell game, a disappearing act that nicely serves the immediate interests of the world's governments but fails to meet the challenges of our looming environmental crisis."
