Peter B. Meyer’s Posts

• Pee-Wee Longevity for US PV Panels

  Regulatory standards save money 0

  Posted 2 months, 2 weeks ago

  Contrary to all that we've been told by the economic pundits for decades, it is the ABSENCE of regulations and regulatory performance standards that costs consumers money, reports Business Week. This is a great case for the contribution of performance standards to overall economic efficiency.

• Walking, chewing gum

  Fighting economic decline and climate change simultaneously 1

  Posted 9 months, 2 weeks ago

  As a new administration took over in Washington in the midst of a massive economic decline, the media kept asking members of the new energy and environment team if the U.S. could "afford" their agenda in light of the economic condition of the nation. (Witness the Washington Post interview with Carol Browner.) The New York Times reported on Jan. 18:

  Given a choice between stimulating the economy and protecting the environment, 58 percent of Americans said it was more important to stimulate the economy, compared with 33 percent who chose protecting the environment. In April 2007, 36… Read More

• Advancing climate justice

  EPA Administrator Jackson's first public appearance 0

  Posted 9 months, 3 weeks ago

  Those of you who did not make it to New York on Jan. 29-30 for the 20th anniversary celebration of WE ACT for Environmental Justice, a national conference on Advancing Climate Justice: Transforming the Economy, Public Health and Our Environment, missed an inspirational high. You also missed a political milestone.

  The event marked the first public speech by new EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, who laid out the nation's new environmental-justice and climate-change priorities. President Obama echoed Jackson's sentiments and made a statement to the Muslim world by giving his first TV interview to Al Arabiya television.

  Civilized,… Read More

• Inefficiency goes into remission

  Will state emission standards kill the U.S. car industry? 2

  Posted 10 months ago

  Sunday night The New York Times published, "Obama to Let States Restrict Emissions Standards." First reaction of those concerned only with a so-called economic recovery: "this will kill what's left of the U.S. car industry!"

  Wrong! This is exactly what the domestic car industry needs. No "car czar" or other federal regulator would be able to push as hard to get more fuel-efficient and lower-emissions vehicles produced in the U.S. faster than regulation-constrained market demand.

  That $17 billion provided as emergency support to GM and Chrysler had no real strings on fuel efficiency and emissions attached. Anyone who thinks… Read More

• Does the long green conflict with going green?

  Efficiency in the Obama economic revitalization plan 0

  Posted 10 months ago

  The long green? That's money -- and you all know what "going green" is about ...

  Everyone keeps asking the members of President Barack Obama's energy and environment team if the U.S. can "afford" their agenda in light of the economic condition of the nation. (Witness the Washington Post interview with Carol Browner as one example.)

  Silly question ... and they get simplistic answers, such as "we will." It's a silly question because it assumes a conflict that isn't there, as do the typical mainstream surveys of public opinion. The New York Times reports on Jan. 18:

  Given… Read More

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Peter B. Meyer’s Recent Comments

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  The Big MO ...

  ... momentum is the issue, and waiting a year doesn't cut it ... YES, the major content may have to wait a while, but Waxman can come up with some positives now, especially if OPEC cuts oils and gas supplies further at its March meeting (which I suspect is a foregone conclusion, given current news and noise).

  Don't expect constraints on new coal plants at the federal level - the states are doing pretty well on their own. But do expect formalizing commitments to alternative energy and energy efficiency - mainly for buildings, providing construction business and lowering operating costs to homeowners to make it easier for them to pay their mortgages. Those are just too easy to pass up, and very hard to fight against.

  Those moves are consistent with Move On's push for the Clean Energy Corps proposed by Center on Wisconsin Strategy, Green for All, the Center for Economic and Policy Research, and the Center for American Progress Action Fund ... Recognition and formal initiation of the Corps, which would be a minor add-on to the stimulus bill initiative budgetarily but carries substantial symbolic weight, could help stake out important ground this year.
  On What does the stimulus fight portend for the climate/energy fight? posted 9 months ago 7 Responses

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  But 74% Said Climate Change Was a Problem

  yeah, 44% responding to the question, "Is Global Warming caused primarily by human activity or by long term planetary trends?" said planetary trends.

  That was after they responded to the question "How serious a problem is Global Warming?" with 41% saying Very Serious and another 23% saying Somwhat Serious.

  Hey, how do you answer the first question above when you've already said you think there is a problem and the question doesn't say whether it means the issue today or the factors overall?

  I grant, that sounds picky, but that's what academic survey researchers worry about. They find that leaving out a word like "today" can mean that some of the people saying "long term planetary trends" are to blame for climate change are misunderstanding the question and answering in terms of global patterns of climate change over geologic time.

  Yeah, the results are depressing, but I am more upset by the surveys that "show" people that  either/or choices are their only options than the results themselves. On Grist grades the best/worst in climate change news posted 10 months ago 2 Responses

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  Don't Get Distracted by False Survey Results!

  All these data are real - and I'm inclined to want to use available information ... but the results come form how the questions are asked - and that is the problem.

  Given an EITHER/OR choice, the respondent picks the answer that seems preferable given the fact that the two cannot be had simultaneously.

  Obviously, the worse the economy, survey respondents given a jobs - environment either/or choice will go for the jobs, or the income. Given the choice between "find new sources of energy" and "lower energy use," respondents pick the less threatening option - the first one.

  The problem here is not US citizens' attitudes, it is how decision options are presented to them ... and what they "learn" from all the PR about the surveys based on bogus either/or choices (and I include Grist among those unnecessarily giving room to false propositions about "alternatives").On Seeing the light in the Pew poll on Americans' top priorities posted 10 months ago 14 Responses

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  Where there's Now Way, there's NO WILL

  David, your observation of the "rock and hard place" all too correct. But your ignoring the interaction between the two.

   -- No, I'm not suggesting the that findings - underestimates - from the IPCC be muted at all or that they respond to the realities of inaction.

   -- the connection is inherent in the question posed: choosing between the two alternatives - the rock OR the hard place - as the locus where one is to be crushed.

  If we shift the metaphor a bit, it's not a matter of whether the upper or lower jaws is the one that bites first -- it's a question of how to get out of the jaws themselves. But we've been told there's no escape - no other route ...

  ... but there is! First steps down one path were described in part earlier this week in the Gristmill, Does the long green conflict with going green?

  The political will appears hopeless to generate because the choices are presented as "either ... or" and not as "both ... how."  The evidence that the latter is preferred is clear in politics: the "both" solution avoids immediate conflict.

  But the political solution is dismissed a matter of finding compromise positions - that's easy. We cannot negotiate a compromise with greenhouses gasses and solar emissions - we have no common ground.

  Thus we must pursue efficiency - complementarity as far as it can be stretched and avoidance of conflicts. The conflicts are often between the economists' "substitutes" that can take each other place to some as provide the basis for compromise.

  Complements, on the other hand, can do for more for the parties involved if all are pursued simultaneously. Searching for them and working to improve their complementarity is our logical choice of action, when caught in the jaws of IPCC declared needs for action and citizen resistance to change induce by political action.

  Efficiency is a dirty word in the eyes of many -- and has certainly been neglected by Washington leadership in this century. But what w eneed noiw are the most efficient initiatives possible that will both satisfy citizens' concerns for economic recovery with the planet's need foe ecological recovery from too many human-caused stresses.
  On What the Obama presidency means posted 10 months ago 26 Responses

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  CO2 Emissions Post 5/2/2007

  Twenty months of inaction, capped by the announcement from EPA Head Johnson that the agency had formally decided not to bother to do what the Suprement Court told them to do about regulating CO2 emissions ... and no criminal or civil actions are pending.On Eight years of Bush's environmental actions -- the good, the bad, and the ugly posted 10 months, 1 week ago 5 Responses