Recent Interviews
Biden Promised to Stop Oil Drilling on Public Lands. Is His Failure to Do So a Betrayal or a Smart Political Move?
As a candidate, President Joe Biden never embraced the strict curbs on fossil fuel development that progressives sought, like a ban on fracking. But his climate plan included a clear pledge to halt any further advance of the oil and gas industry on federal lands or offshore…
Missing from Biden EV plan: State support for charging
If state regulators approve, 5,100 households in Kansas and Missouri will get one-time rebates of up to $500 over the next five years to help wire their homes for electric vehicle chargers — a missing piece in the Biden administration’s drive for EV dominance by the end of the decade…
Cop27 is in Egypt next year … but will anyone be allowed to protest?
Concern is growing over plans to host a UN climate conference in Sharm el-Sheikh next year, in what will be a crucial summit if the world is to limit global heating to 1.5C…
Canada and Mexico pose obstacle to Biden’s union-built electric vehicle plans
President Joe Biden has a difficult task today handling opposition from Canada and Mexico, America’s two largest trading partners, to his push to promote U.S. manufacturing of electric vehicles…
Can America prevent a global warming cold war?
At the 11th hour of climate negotiations in Scotland last week, the U.S. and China released a “Joint Glasgow Declaration on Enhancing Climate Action in the 2020s” outlining increased cooperation on a wide range of climate and clean energy topics…
Democrats eye curbs on fossil fuel exports as price fix
Congressional Democrats look increasingly interested in supporting a curb on U.S. oil, coal, and natural gas exports as a means of lowering energy prices at home…
Mung beans, bunnies and the Muppets: PM’s green rhetoric ‘insulting and divisive’
Boris Johnson took the stage at Glasgow as the Cop26 summit neared its conclusion last Wednesday, aiming to galvanise the conference into a deal that would stave off climate breakdown….
How Kerry’s announced US-China climate agreement falls short
The new agreement between the U.S. and China to collaborate on curbing climate change by enhancing action reducing emissions this decade lacks concrete pledges, emissions targets, or timeframes…
How to Limit Temperature Increases in the Very Near Term
If the years of devastating droughts, floods, heat waves and wildfires since the Paris climate agreement was adopted have taught us anything, it’s that we have underestimated the pace of extreme, destabilizing climate change…
Unlocking the Transition: Biden, Congress aim to fill gap from clean electricity plan’s demise
The collapse of a controversial plan to prod utilities to rapidly decarbonize has scrambled the Biden administration’s blueprint for slashing power sector emissions…
Biden apologizes for Trump-era absence on climate, pitching a robust agenda that’s on shaky ground at home
Speaking at a high-profile climate summit that attracted more than 100 world leaders, President Biden apologized Monday for the Trump administration’s inaction on climate, lending a personal note to his administration’s efforts to…
COP26: American climate credibility in question at UN summit with Biden’s agenda in flux
President Joe Biden will try to pressure other countries to take action to slow global warming at COP26, even as…
Key Moments From Day 1 of the COP26 Climate Change Summit
Meeting in Glasgow, President Biden and a host of other world leaders sounded dire warnings, but hopes for breakthrough action are muted…
How Congress can save Biden’s climate agenda
There is a scramble under way on Capitol Hill to keep the Biden administration’s emissions goals on track after West Virginia senator Joe Manchin torpedoed the climate centrepiece of the president’s multitrillion dollar spending package…
Biden under pressure not to show up to Glasgow climate talks empty-handed
The big U.N. climate conference in Glasgow, Scotland, starting Sunday is pressuring Democrats to come up with at least a framework of a deal on their climate and social spending package, as…
Methane leak near COP26 venue underscores emissions challenge
powerful greenhouse gas responsible for 40 per cent of the world’s warming over the past decade is spewing into the atmosphere from a site in Glasgow not far from where the COP26 climate summit is set to begin. Methane from a gas pipeline near…
Biden abruptly accelerates his involvement in agenda talks
For weeks, President Biden has met repeatedly with Democratic lawmakers as part of the tortuous negotiations over his agenda — but to the frustration of many, he has revealed few opinions of his own on what should remain in the plan and what should be jettisoned…
America needs a climate plan compromise
President Biden’s Build Back Better agenda is making its way through Congress via a budget reconciliation bill — a once-in-a-generation opportunity for America to reassert its leadership in combating the climate crisis…
Democrats’ landmark climate proposal teeters
The Democrats’ central climate plan in the $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation package is hanging by a thread as lawmakers return from a weeklong recess that failed to cool tense deliberations on major aspects of President Biden’s agenda…
Energy crisis tests Biden’s clean electricity agenda
The Biden administration called yesterday for continued use of natural gas, illustrating the challenging political spot facing the White House as it navigates between a global energy crisis, protesters on the left and a push for a major clean energy package on Capitol Hill…
Why the defeat of Manchin’s energy bill could be a loss for the climate
On Tuesday, when Sen. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.) announced he was pulling his proposal to expand energy development across the country from a must-pass government operations bill, many environmental…
Washington’s latest energy drama: ‘Permitting reform’
Boring and technocratic as it sounds, “permitting reform” may be just about the most significant barrier facing the clean energy revolution Joe Biden wants to bring to America. Yesterday, Congress began debating it in earnest…
Manchin’s permitting reveal
The Progressive Policy Institute is out with a new report this morning that offers some support for Manchin’s efforts and disputes some of the criticism from progressives who argue the permitting changes would…
Why Republicans support Kigali
The Senate could ratify a major climate treaty by the end of the week. And it’s being pushed across the finish line by conservative Republicans and industry. The Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol has long been a standout in…
Clean energy bosses urge permit reforms to meet US climate goals
Senator Joe Manchin to unveil bill revamping regulatory approvals for pipelines and power systems. A lobbying group has estimated that clean energy installations could be 100 gigawatts less without permitting…
Why Democrats Must Support Biden in 2024
Despite good news for Joe Biden lately, many Democrats continue to be deeply worried about his chances of reelection. These concerns are understandable given that Biden, already the oldest president in history, will be…
California hits the gas on electric cars
California regulators approved a rule today banning the sale of new gas-powered cars by 2035. The move could accelerate the electric vehicle transition and reshape the nation’s auto market, but meeting that deadline will bring…
Streamline power line permitting to achieve IRA climate goals
One of the most important goals of the clean energy and climate bill, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), passed by Congress and signed into law by President Biden is the decarbonization of the electricity system. The core of this effort is…
Joe Biden’s signature legislation passes the Senate, at last
This has been decades in the making, and it will reshape the decades ahead.” That is how Fred Krupp, a longtime champion of congressional action on climate change as head of the Environmental Defence Fund, a green group…
A look at the policies in the Democrats’ historic climate bill
The Inflation Reduction Act is the largest investment in climate policy in U.S. history, including more than $300 billion to address global warming. It also sets a goal of reducing carbon emissions by…
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