Posts Tagged: emissions
News
OPINION: For 11 years, Next 10 has been measuring economic and environmental indicators in the California Green Innovation Index. This year, the data is sobering. If the current pace of emissions decline continues, we will miss our 2030 climate targets by more than thirty years.
Opinion
OPINION: Let’s play a game: what would you do with 25 million tons of organic waste annually? Here are a few tidbits to spark your imagination: Organic waste includes food and green waste, landscaping and pruning waste, lumber, fiber, sewage and sludges.
Opinion
OPINION: California has distinguished itself as a climate leader, from reducing carbon emissions to managing wildfire risk and preparing coastal cities for rising seas. But our action to date has largely stopped at the shoreline, despite the fact that some of the first and worst climate impacts are being felt in the ocean.
Opinion
OPINION: In recent weeks, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) has kicked off the process to finalize details of the state’s cap-and-trade program with public workshops held around the state. The usual suspects, from environmental advocates to industry representatives have packed hearing rooms waiting for their chance to chime in on proposed regulations.
News
The California Air Resources Board’s aggressive questioning of Volkswagen about emission test results led to the company admitting in 2015 that it used a “defeat device” designed to cover up diesel emissions that greatly exceeded legal limits. The massive fraud case — it included a $14.7 billion settlement in 2016 and $4.7 billion in civil and criminal fines this year — dramatically underscored California’s role as a national and international air-quality watch dog.
News
State Attorney General Xavier Becerra is leading California’s increasingly tense challenge to the policies of Donald Trump’s administration. It’s a role that gives him high visibility — and headaches. Becerra, in office just five months, is backed by the person who appointed him attorney general: Gov. Jerry Brown. That support is likely to translate into financial resources, too.
Opinion
OPINION: One of California’s tools in fighting climate change and promoting clean air is the emissions reduction program known as cap and trade. Cap and trade is one part of California’s broader approach to growing clean energy jobs and investment — and it works best in concert with the state’s full suite of policies.
Opinion
OPINION: They say the real estate agent’s mantra is “location, location, location.” And when it comes to crafting smart housing policy, location is key, as well. As California legislators consider more than 130 bills designed to tackle the state’s housing crisis, they should consider ways to encourage infill housing — compact housing in already urbanized land near transit, jobs, and services.
Opinion
OPINION: Recognizing the need to reduce the burdens of overregulation to spur our nation’s economy, Congress put on the top of their legislative agenda the REINS Act, which would require the House and Senate to approve any major regulation before it can go into effect. California — no stranger to abundant regulations and the increasing consolidation of power in state agencies promulgating an ever-growing list of major regulations — must also rein in overregulation the way Congress is trying to do to revitalize job creation throughout our state.
News
As a longtime former middle school teacher, Fran Pavley thought she would focus her energies on education when she got elected to the California Legislature 15 years ago.
But Robert Hertzberg, who was then Assembly speaker, gave the Southern California politician some advice. “He said we have several champions on education, we need you to focus on the environment,” Pavley said. She did.