I got something for everyone. New research confirms that natural gas drilling is polluting drinking water. Taking note of this and the previous commotion over the Cornell study, Ronald Baily at Reason harrumphs: Environmentalists Were for Fracking Before They Were Against it Whatever, says Matt Ridley. Shale is bountiful and cheap! Finally, Zeke Hausfather does a…Continue Reading…
Poor Newt. The preemptive spanks came early and hard. Even his scrap-the-EPA mantra hasn’t won over Marc Morano, who this morning emailed a blistering missive to everyone in his rolodex. UPDATE: Great post headline from Andrew Sullivan, who provides an excellent round-up of reax, including this killer campaign slogan for Newt: “Gingrich 2012: He will always…Continue Reading…
If you read Andy Revkin’s dispatch from this one-day conference in London on the Anthropocene concept, you’ll discover: I’m attending because of a quirky role I played almost 20 years ago in laying the groundwork for this concept of humans as a geological force. I’m starting to think Andy is the Zelig of the environmental…Continue Reading…
We are living in strange times. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, a conservative politician and until a few months ago, a longtime supporter of nuclear power, has vowed to shutter her nation’s 17 nuclear reactors and make renewable power, such as wind and solar, Germany’s dominant source of energy by 2030. Meanwhile, staunch British environmentalist George Monbiot, the…Continue Reading…
The lessons to be learned after reading this story by John Otis in Time magazine couldn’t be clearer. Here’s the set-up, describing the situation in Colombia: Amid 11 months of nearly nonstop rain, dykes have burst and rivers have topped their banks, inundating communities, cattle ranches, and croplands in 28 of Colombia’s 32 departments. Waterlogged…Continue Reading…
This is a cool story: David Goodrich doesn’t just think there is a global issue with climate change, he says he knows it. And he’s so sure of the problem that he is willing to bike across country educating students about it. Goodrich, 58, of Rockville recently retired as director of the Climate Observation Division with…Continue Reading…
Those two terms don’t have much in common unless you’re a 2012 Republican Presidential candidate running away from your prior positions on torture and the environment. I’m referring to former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, or T-Paw as he’s known in his home state. Via Andrew Sullivan (who is all over Dick Cheney for claiming torture…Continue Reading…
Imagine you crossed Jared Diamond and Lester Brown with a former Royal Dutch Shell economist turned-brilliant hedge fund manager. That’s the author of this stunning quarterly newsletter for GMO Capital, an investment firm that manages over $100 billion in assets. Over at Climate Central, I barely scratch the surface of Jeremy Grantham’s essay, which begins with…Continue Reading…
From one of the many (which includes academics and journalists) who get slandered by Romm: It is long overdue for the environmental community to start pushing back on Romm as he continues to stain their entire enterprise. His lies and smear tactics, which are broadly embraced and condoned, are making enemies out of friends and…Continue Reading…
Felix Salmon, a financial journalist who blogs for Reuters, attended a panel discussion earlier this week in Los Angeles at the Milken Institute, entitled, “Solving Climate Change: Plan B.” According to Salmon’s dispatch, the consensus view from the panelists was that “there’s essentially zero chance that a cap-and-trade bill will become law in the foreseeable future.” Well, that’s not exactly…Continue Reading…