Environmental Politics

"Norman Bay, Cheryl LaFleur Confirmed at Federal Energy Regulatory Commission"

"Australia's lower house of parliament on Monday voted to scrap the country's controversial carbon tax, setting up a final showdown in the Senate as early as Tuesday to decide the scheme's fate."

"A proposal by House appropriators to carve out $442 million of the Interior Department and U.S. EPA budgets to pay for rural county services has raised concerns among lawmakers of both parties that it could sap money from other important agency functions, including land conservation, wildfire prevention and clean water."

"On Monday, the Heartland Institute convened its Ninth International Climate Change Conference in Las Vegas. A Chicago-based, non-profit free-market think tank with a $6 million annual budget, Heartland has been hosting conferences for those dubious of the science confirming human-caused climate change since 2008."

"NORTHFIELD, Mass. — Standing on a dirt road outside his aging barn, Walter Jaworski, a former veterinarian turned cattle rancher in this rural part of north-central Massachusetts, points south across his 200 acres of forest and pasture to a nearby tree line. If things don’t go his way, he says, that’s about where a new natural gas pipeline will slice through his land on a 180-mile journey from central New York to a transmission hub north of Boston."

"A coalition of green groups plan to urge President Obama and senators to oppose a bill reauthorizing the Export-Import Bank over its roll-back of restrictions for financing overseas coal plants."

"The Senate killed a bipartisan bill Thursday designed to boost hunting and fishing protections — a victim of a long-running war over amendments that came in the shadow of gun politics."

"A new barrage of TV ads criticizing state lawmakers over environmental issues will begin airing this week, this one singling out House Speaker Thom Tillis."

"Over the past five years, the Obama administration has repeatedly called for cutting fossil fuel subsidies in the form of tax breaks and other incentives. But the amount of money the federal government forfeits through subsidies has increased steadily over that time period, reaching $18.5 billion last year, according to a new report from the environmental group Oil Change International."

"Coal has assumed out-sized importance in the upcoming election as a devastating sequence of mine shut downs and job losses in eastern Kentucky have put the region up for grabs"