Monday, 25 Apr 2005

From 35,000 feet above the earth's surface, you can see awe-inspiring views of vast, open spaces. Unless, that is, you're flying over spots like Mexico City and Beijing, in which case you'll see "a great rim of grime -- as though detached from an unwashed bathtub," as British novelist Ian McEwan puts it. In a piece first published on openDemocracy.net, which is hosting an interactive global discussion on climate change, the author of Saturday, Atonement, and Enduring Love ponders what we should do with these images once back on solid ground, and how we can face up to the complexities of climate change.

Before Sunset

Language in budget bill could unravel federal environmental protections

Buried deep in the 2,000-page budget bill President Bush recently sent to Congress is a three-sentence provision that threatens to eviscerate environmental and other protections. Authored by the White House Office of Management and Budget, the provision would, if passed unamended, subject any and all federal programs to the scrutiny of a "Sunset Commission." The eight-member panel, appointed by the president, would have the power to kill any programs not "producing results." Programs deemed non-productive would "automatically terminate unless the Congress took action to continue them." "This is potentially devastating," warned Wesley Warren, who served in the OMB under President Clinton. "In short order, this could knock out protections that have been built up over a generation." The provision raises thorny constitutional questions, as it would subject congressional powers to what amounts to executive approval. Still, says Clay Johnson of the Bush OMB, "We just think it makes sense."

Shock and Thaw

New Yorker launches three-part exploration of climate change

Writer Elizabeth Kolbert must have single-handedly accelerated global warming with the jet fuel she burned visiting the Arctic, Iceland, Greenland, Alaska, and the Antarctic to research a big three-part series on climate change for The New Yorker. What did she find? Well, it's all melting. The Alaskan village of Shishmaref is going to be uprooted and moved en masse, thanks to increasing exposure to rising tides and grumpy weather. The Arctic sea ice is melting, thus reducing its reflectivity, thus absorbing more energy, thus melting faster (and so on). Greenland's ice sheet is melting, raising sea levels and possibly altering the ocean currents that keep the world's temperate zones temperate. Meanwhile, the third part of a big multi-country climate report -- the part on the actions governments need to take -- is being delayed by the U.S. delegation, which doesn't like the word "mandatory." If you haven't slit your wrists yet, get ready for part two ...

Everything Coal Is New Again

Congress seeks tax money to make defunct "clean coal" plant dirty again

For aficionados of government pork, the energy bill that recently passed the House is the gift that keeps on giving. The latest gem uncovered is a provision that would offer $125 million in loan guarantees to a "clean coal" power plant in Alaska. Now, this pork isn't going to build the plant -- that $117 million ship sailed years ago. No, this new pork is going to convert the "clean coal" plant back into an old-fashioned "dirty coal" plant that, um, works. You see, the experimental facility, originally built in the late '90s just outside Denali National Park, cost more than projected, produced power only intermittently, and was more or less a fiasco. Five years ago, it was closed down, and now it sits unused. Activists who were worried about it back when it was "clean" are even more worried now. But Alaska's congressional delegation, which squeezed the provision in, hastens to assure us that all is well. Says an aide to Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), "It's certainly not a boondoggle." Whew.

The Loan Changer

J.P. Morgan to green lending policies

Today, New York banking giant J.P. Morgan Chase will issue new lending policies with an environmental bent. Although the company denies it was pressured into the shift, the bank's pledge is similar to those made in recent months by other financial institutions like Citigroup and Bank of America that have faced pressure from shareholder campaigns and activist groups like the Rainforest Action Network. J.P. Morgan's new guidelines are expected to tie greenhouse-gas emissions to financial costs in the loan review process and set up "No Go Zones" -- areas where the bank will refuse financing for environmentally damaging industries like logging. "This is increasingly becoming the way all banks operate," says Steve Lippman of Trillium Asset Management, one of the socially responsible investment firms that helped lobby for the policy shift. "J.P. Morgan is now raising the bar for the sector."