The Go Green Debate

As the Olympics near, China has embarked on several measures to improve air quality, such as limiting the use of cars and the closing of dozens of factories.

Apparently, these efforts have had little impact. The Air Pollution Index, or API, (the API measures particulate matter) in Beijing has hovered over 101, however the API must be below 101 for the athletes safety.

As a result, the Chinese are implementing an “Emergency Green Plan”, banning 90% of the 3.3M private cars from the roads, and temporarily closing even more factories.

AP reports that officials of eighteen states are suing the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) in an attempt to force it to comply with a Supreme Court ruling last April that found the EPA has authority to regulate vehicle emission.

In the petition the plaintiffs said last April’s 5-4 ruling required the EPA to decide whether to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.

The EPA has done nothing.

The petition asks the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to require the EPA to act within 60 days.

The plaintiffs in the latest court action include Coakley and attorneys general from Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and the District of Columbia, plus representatives of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection and the cities of New York and Baltimore, and several environmental organizations.

Is coal clean? Is coal cheaper & better than renewable energy? Possibly, in 10 years with a billions of dollars of research. However the coal industry still attempts to sell carbon sequestration technology.

In the small mining town of Ely, Nevada the coal industry lobby for a new construction of “clean” coal plants. The residents resist and are upset that it would double the greenhouse gas emissions of the town.

Many countries around the world have already signed the Kyoto Protocol Agreement, but the US has rejected the agreement. Why? Is it because the agreement isn’t effective?

In this episode of The Massachusetts School of Law’s Educational Forum, Professor Diane Sullivan interviews Dr. Paul R. Epstein of the Harvard Medical School, Nancy Cole of the Union of Concerned Scientists, and Kurt Olson Professor of Law at MSL about Global Warming & the Kyoto Protocol Agreement.

Presidential Candidate Rudy Giuliani answers a question from Bruce Clendenning on July 10, 2007, in Manchester, New Hampshire about how fuel efficiency standards, renewable energy, and emissions caps will be used to fight global warming.

Where does your presidential candidate stand on international treaties to cut greenhouse gas emissions like the Kyoto Protocol Agreement?

Strongly Supports =
Bill Richardson, Dennis Kucinich, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, Mike Gravel

Supports =
Christopher Dodd, John Edwards

Neutral =
Barack Obama

Opposes =
Duncan Hunter, Fred Thompson, John McCain, Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani

Strongly Opposes =
Ron Paul

California’s Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and President George W. Bush are butting heads over who has the right to regulate vehicle emissions that contribute to global warming.

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator Stephen L. Johnson announced Wednesday, December 19th that because President Bush had signed an energy bill raising average fuel economy that there was no need or justification for separate state regulation.

In an interview with Time Magazine, Governor Schwarzenegger says:

“Give me a national policy that says we’re going to take this seriously and we’re going to fight global warming. But right now, there has been none. So how can you say you cannot regulate, you cannot have your own standards, [that] we have to set a national standard, when there is no national standard?”

On November 15, 2007, Wal-Mart released a comprehensive report of its sustainability efforts, outlining initiatives and highlighting their progress since October 2005, when they promised to sharply reduce the environmental effects of its operations and of the products it sells. The report provided lots of facts and figures about their progress; however did not appease the Wal-mart critics, as a coalition of 23 nonprofit groups immediately issued their own “Civil Society Critique,” which said Wal-Mart was doing too little too late.

The Center for Global Development has unveiled it’s online database, Carbon Monitoring for Action or CARMA, which is the first worldwide database of power plants’ carbon-dioxide emissions. The database provides a detailed inventory of power plants’ CO2 emissions by region across the globe. It includes information from 4,000 utilities and 50,000 plants, shows the biggest CO2 emitters and the facilities & companies that are most green.