By Charlotte Collins Germany’s Climate Action Plan 2050, approved in 2016, is impressive in the breadth of its environmental action. It emphasizes reducing reliance on fossil fuels across all sectors, and employing climate offsets as established in the U.N. Kyoto Protocol. (These offsets, or Emission Reduction Controls (ERCs), allow industrialized […]
By Jeffrey Hammons Introduction Over the past few months, the Michigan Public Service Commission (“MPSC”) issued a series of orders updating how it implements its obligations under Section 210 of the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act (“PURPA”).[1] These orders could spur new development of solar energy facilities in Michigan. Due […]
By Dena Adler The International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), the UN specialized body for aviation, earned international praise in October 2016 for striking a deal to cap emissions from international passenger and cargo flights at 2020 levels, but a new Sabin Center Working Paper argues that ICAO must improve its […]
Each month, Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer LLP (APKS) and the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law collect and summarize developments in climate-related litigation, which we also add to our U.S. and non-U.S. climate litigation charts. If you know of any cases we have missed, please email us at columbiaclimate at gmail dot com. […]
By Romany Webb The 23rd Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is set to begin next Monday, November 6, in the city of Bonn in western Germany. The COP will bring together representatives of 194 countries for two weeks of talks […]
By Michael Burger Earlier this week EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt issued a directive that prohibits scientists from serving on the EPA’s independent scientific advisory committees if they are currently a principal investigator or co-investigator on a research project that receives grant funding from the agency, or “if they are otherwise […]
by Justin Gundlach We know that burning fossil fuels is the main cause of anthropogenic climate change, and that climate change is the source of adverse impacts on communities and even regional and national economies. Those impacts—sometimes irksome, sometimes devastating—are increasingly obvious, and the causal mechanisms that connect them to […]
By Romany Webb Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt was again in the headlines last week after suggesting that scientists receiving agency funding may lack “independence and objectivity.” Speaking at an event hosted by the Heritage Foundation on October 16, Administrator Pruitt vowed to “fix” what he sees as […]