Foreign Policy Blogs

Climate Change

Climate Change Hijacks National Security

Climate Change Hijacks National Security

Why the Slow Moving Emergency is Resetting the U.S. National Security Conversation Has climate destabilization already hijacked the national security conversation? Well, not yet – but it should and it will.  To help make my point for dramatic change in national security thought, let’s recall the old frog in boiling water ancedote. If you put […]

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President Obama Decides Time is Right for Climate Change Plan

President Obama Decides Time is Right for Climate Change Plan

As immigration legislation is prodded through the U.S. Senate then likely to collect mothballs in the U.S. House of Representatives, and major Supreme Court decisions are announced, the executive branch has garnered a portion of the headlines. Ready to take on another challenge, President Obama laid out his plan to combat Climate Change – a […]

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Will Iskandar Malaysia prove to be an eco-city model?

Will Iskandar Malaysia prove to be an eco-city model?

As COP 18 in Doha seems to have failed (as of writing) to reach a consensus on how to further climate change action for the future, Malaysia proves to be one developing country with a plan for internal action. The country has set ambitious emission reduction targets: by 2020 it has committed to cut it […]

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Round 18: Climate Talks Start in Doha

Round 18: Climate Talks Start in Doha

The United Nations climate change negotiations, or the long form: the 18th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the 8th session of the Conference of the Parties serving as the Meeting of the Parties (CMP) to the Kyoto Protocol, got underway today […]

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Coal Losing Steam

Coal Losing Steam

It is abundantly clear that if we are going to conquer our climate change demons, then we’ve got to radically reduce the burning of coal on our splendid but increasingly stressed planet.  Carbon dioxide is still the primary driver of warming and coal is still the primary source of carbon dioxide from fuel combustion. Of […]

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The Smart Money

The Smart Money

     I went to a very interesting presentation a couple of weeks ago:  The good folks at the Dow Jones Sustainability Indexes and their partners at SAM, a Zurich-based group focused on sustainability investing, took the time to enlighten several of us ink-stained wretches of the press (if I can still characterize myself as such […]

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Did You Connect the Dots?

Did You Connect the Dots?

The 350.org folks and all their thousands of friends all over the world had a big event on May 5.   Here’s the video:

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The Melting Cryosphere

The Melting Cryosphere

Here’s a look at how the Arctic has been melting.  (Click on the image to go to NASA for a full explanation of what you’re seeing here.) What we’re seeing all over the world is an accelerating rate of the thawing of permafrost, and the melting of sea ice and glaciers.  I’ve written about this […]

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Connect the Dots

Connect the Dots

I wrote the other day about how people are increasingly perceiving the connection between extreme weather and climate change.  They are, in the words of the very good folks at 350.org, “connecting the dots.”  In fact, 350.org is yet again marshaling its extraordinary powers of event planning and persuasion to get people all over the […]

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The Climate of Opinion

The Climate of Opinion

A study, Extreme Weather, Climate & Preparedness in the American Mind, just out from the excellent Yale Project on Climate Change Communication and its partner, the George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication, purports that “A large majority of Americans believe that global warming made several high profile extreme weather events worse…”  Coverage in […]

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Getting a Charge out of Driving

Getting a Charge out of Driving

The inherent gross inefficiency of the internal combustion engine surpasses even that of conventional thermal power plants.  About 5% of the energy in the fuel actually moves a typical automobile.  Battery electric vehicles, fuel-cell electrics, plug-in hybrids and others that eschew ICE technology get much more bang for the buck.  California is proving this, as […]

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Smart Grid Video

Smart Grid Video

Here’s just a quick hitter, bringing you a snappy, very well-informed, entertaining smart grid video from Accenture, the global consultancy.  

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100% Renewables (for Germany by 2050)

100% Renewables (for Germany by 2050)

I had the opportunity to go to a real stimulating talk the other day.   Jochen Flasbarth, the President of the Federal Environment Agency of Germany, had just been to the big do at the NY Times, the “Energy for Tomorrow” conference.  Flasbarth was on a panel, moderated by Tom Friedman, with worthies such as Carol […]

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Nordhaus and McKibben – Following Up

Nordhaus and McKibben – Following Up

I wanted to note some follow-up discussion to material that I have flagged here recently at the blog.  The first was my post On the Denialists from March 2nd.  The NY Review of Books has printed a reply to William Nordhaus’s refutation of the claims of the climate denialists, that I discussed at earlier post.  […]

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One Small Step for a Man

One Small Step for a Man

Okay, the U.S. may have been the first to the moon, but we have not been the first to regulate greenhouse gases.  However, we’re getting there.  California has been advancing its cap-and-trade regime among other terrific programs, we’ve got the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative in the Northeast and there are all sorts of other programs […]

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