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What’s Been Killing U.S. Coal?

Legal Planet

From 1960 to 2005, coal use grew more or less steadily by 18 million tons per year. Politically, what has happened to coal jobs may be more salient. It then tread water for a few years and began a steep decline in 2008, going from half of U.S. electricity to about one-fifth today.

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The Winding Path of Australian Climate Policy

Legal Planet

As in the US, Australia’s climate policy was long a victim of a lengthy period of divided government and political upheaval. In 2022, the Labor coalition passed a law mandating that Australia cut greenhouse gas emissions 43% below 2005 levels by 2030 and reach net-zero by 2050. More is needed, but hopefully the tide has turned.

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Germany’s Role in Climate Policy

Legal Planet

The Federal Cabinet adopts its first climate target, a 25-30% cut in carbon emissions by 2005 under 1987 levels. My foray into Germany climate policy left me with unanswered questions: What was the politics behind Germany’s history of climate action? trillion tons.] How much of a role did the Green Party play?

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The politics of (bad) policy design: French solar panels and Northern Irish boilers

Environmental Europe

As one previous post on this blog detailed, the current political turmoil in Northern Ireland was sparked by a subsidy for renewable energy production. Though it is tempting to blame political carelessness, the ongoing RHI scandal prompts a broader reflection about renewable energy policy instruments. data: SOeS ). speculative ones.

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Grid Investments are Critical to Our Clean Energy Future

Union of Concerned Scientists

Last November, the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) released an interdisciplinary study exploring the various pathways to meeting US goals to cut heat-trapping emissions economywide 50 to 52 percent below 2005 levels by 2030 and achieve net-zero emissions no later than 2050. The good news?

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New EPA Proposal to Augment Methane Regulations Would Help Achieve an 87% Reduction From the Oil and Gas Industry by 2030

Inside Climate News

oil and gas sector by 87 percent below 2005 levels by the end of the decade, the agency said. The proposed rules, announced Friday at COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, would strengthen and expand pending regulations that were first proposed in November 2021. Combined, the new rules would reduce methane emissions from the U.S.

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Predictions of IRA’s Success Solidify

Legal Planet

Despite the IRA’s substantial assist to emission cuts, we will need additional policies to push emissions 50% below 2005 levels. A mid-August 2022 report from a Princeton research group, concluded that IRA would close two-thirds of the remaining emissions gap between current policy and the nation’s 2030 climate target (50% below 2005).

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