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  • Eat Tofu, Save a Planet

    Apparently now going green means only eating greens. Advice from Lord Nicholas Stern: Meat is a wasteful use of water and creates a lot of greenhouse gases. It puts enormous pressure on the world’s resources. A vegetarian diet is better. I think it’s important that people think about what they are doing and that includes what they are eating. I am 61 now and attitudes towards drinking and driving have changed radically since I was a student. People change their notion of what is responsible. They will increasingly ask about … More

    Global Warming Roulette

    Spin the wheel and whatever number the ball lands on will be the new tipping point we must get below; if not, catastrophic global warming to cause 2012-style disasters on our planet. A few years ago the upper limit on carbon dioxide was 450 parts per million (ppm), which meant an 80 percent cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Now it’s 350 ppm: In the past four years, climate scientists, led by NASA’s James Hansen, have dramatically altered the goal. To avoid the collapse of the continental ice-sheets and … More

    Where in the World is Global Warming a Priority?

    Not in the small island nation of Vanuatu even though its government lists addressing global warming as a top priority. Take one of Vanuatu’s residents, Torethy Frank, who asked a researcher for the Copenhagen Consensus Center, “What is global warming?” Her bigger concerns? Torethy and her family of six live in a small house made of concrete and brick with no running water. As a toilet, they use a hole dug in the ground. They have no shower and there is no fixed electricity supply. Torethy’s family was given a … More

    Good and Bad in President Obama’s Global Warming Speech at MIT

    President Obama traveled to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology today to deliver a speech on climate change. Part of the speech focused on innovation and the benefits of entrepreneurial risk taking while the other focused on government investments for renewable energy and the importance of climate change legislation. There was both good and bad parts of President Obama’s speech. The good: “Dr. Moniz is also the Director of MIT’s Energy Initiative, called MITEI. And he and President Hockfield just showed me some of the extraordinary energy research being conducted at … More

    Reducing Your Carbon Paw Print

    Who knew when Bob Barker advised his television audience to, “Help control the pet population. Have your pets spayed or neutered,” that he was fighting global warming? The eco-pawprint of a pet dog is twice that of a 4.6-litre Land Cruiser driven 10,000 kilometres (6,214 miles) a year, researchers have found. Victoria University professors Brenda and Robert Vale, architects who specialise in sustainable living, say pet owners should swap cats and dogs for creatures they can eat, such as chickens or rabbits, in their provocative new book Time to Eat … More

    Today’s Calamity: A Second Call for Transparency

    Our Tuesday rendition of Cap and Trade Calamities discussed how only the EPA was given the semi-draft form of the Boxer-Kerry cap and trade bill to model the economic effects. The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Data Analysis, along with several other organizations (including other government organizations) that modeled the Waxman-Markey cap and trade bill, do not have access. We have another call for transparency – this time from the House side. On October 2, Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee Henry Waxman sent a letter to Heritage’s David … More

    Cap and Trade: A $3.6 Trillion Gas Tax

    Here in Washington, people are discussing two things: Jim Zorn’s job security as the Washington Redskins’ head coach and health care, in that order. But there’s a $3.6 trillion gas tax on the table that already passed the House and is making its way through the Senate, and cap and trade has Americans all over the country concerned. The $3.6 trillion gas tax figure, which includes gasoline and diesel gas, comes from a new report from Senators Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) and Kit Bond (R-MO) on the effects of climate … More

    Green Jobs? Mandated Wind and Solar? Cap & Trade? We’ll Pass on that Showcase

    Members of Congress like to play games and they like to spend money. What better analogy to use to describe Congress’s proposed green energy policies than the Price is Right? As Congress seeks to implement policy that would create green jobs by mandating renewable energy projects, three cautionary European tales suggest the U.S. should take a second look at cap and trade and renewable energy mandates. We’ll take you through a Price Is Right showcase style tour of three failed renewable energy initiative. Our first stop takes us to Germany … More

    Today’s Calamity: A Call for Transparency

    As you read this, the Environmental Protection Agency is modeling the economic impacts of a semi-draft form of the Boxer-Kerry cap and trade legislation. “Environment and Public Works Chairwoman Barbara Boxer said a bill EPA is analyzing should be marked up in her panel by the second week in November. An EPA official said the agency has pledged to deliver the cost analysis Friday, in time for a three-day set of hearings starting Oct. 27.” We’d do it too. But we can’t. According to Congressional Quarterly, the senators “produced a … More

    Gearing Up for the Copenhagen Climate Conference

    Cap and trade is nowhere near dead but it’s not the only weapon in the arsenal against capping carbon dioxide emissions. Another significant threat to United States energy policy is the possible climate treaty that could supplant the Kyoto Protocol as the new treaty to combat global warming. Just as scary, if not more so, is how an international treaty could affect U.S. sovereignty. In preparation for the December 7-18 summit, The Heritage Foundation will be covering all the details – up to, during, and after the conference. From energy, … More