I am writing today to announce the closure of the New Mexico Independent. After three and a half years of operation in New Mexico, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news…
While environmental activists played their part yesterday during demonstrations at the capitol building, going so far as to dress up as solar panels and to sing the tune of “You Are My Sunshine,” their counterparts, the anti-cap-and-trade contingency who has…
Roughly one quarter of University of New Mexico students are unimpressed with the state’s flagship public school, according to a survey that questioned college students about their higher education experiences.
The midterm elections brought an unprecedented number of climate skeptics into Congress, with no incoming Republicans acknowledging the existence of man-made climate change. Environmentalists have all but given up on passing significant climate legislation in the near future, but in the long term, it may be difficult for climate skeptics to hold their ranks: Young Americans are significantly more concerned about global warming than older generations, and there are no major organizations of young climate skeptics.
Thomas Crocker, an economics Ph.D. candidate at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in the 1960s, developed one of the most innovative and controversial public policy proposals of our time, cap-and-trade. Forty-five years later, he reflects on his creation, saying he believes it’s the wrong approach to climate change.
China currently controls 97 percent of production of the world’s rare earth minerals, which are used in everyday devices, such as cell phones, DVDs, televisions and satellite communication devices as well as military’s smart bombs. A mine in California could change that, if it can overcome serious environmental concerns.
Four draft reports released Wednesday by the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling say the Obama administration was not prepared for a spill the size of the one in the Gulf, which spewed 4.9 million barrels of oil into the ocean. They detail the many stops and starts of the Unified Command, which was set up to organize response efforts. And they suggest that the administration sought desperately to keep the oil spill from becoming for Obama what Hurricane Katrina was for George Bush.
New Mexico Sen. Jeff Bingaman has sponsored a renewable energy standard bill that would mandate 15 percent of the country’s electricity come from renewable sources like wind and solar by 2021. The proposal has been co-sponsored by 33 lawmakers, including at least four Republicans. One renewable energy advocate closely involved in efforts to move the RES who is not authorized to speak on the record says backers of the bill remains “laser-focused on the lame duck.”
Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.), who unveiled this week a stand-alone bill that would require a certain percentage of the country’s energy to come from renewable sources, said today that comprehensive climate legislation won’t be able to pass the Senate in…
Sens. Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein, both California Democrats, said yesterday that they would soon introduce legislation on pipeline safety. The legislation will be modeled after the proposal sent to Congress by the Department of Transportation yesterday.
BP says it will offer oil spill victims a sum equal to or better than the compensation a protracted legal battle would yield. But to get that money, a claimant must prove “proximate cause,” or a connection between the spill and the damages they have suffered. The definition of proximate cause that the independent administrator settles on — various Gulf states define proximate cause differently — will have a major impact on who receives compensation and who does not, experts say.
The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, the federal agency that oversees the country’s 2.3 million miles of oil and natural gas pipelines, has adopted as part of its regulations all or parts of at least 29 standards written by the oil and natural gas industry.
In the 10 years since a massive natural gas pipeline explosion near Carlsbad killed a dozen people, federal regulators and lawmakers have passed a number of laws to address pipeline safety. But an investigation shows that oversight of the nation’s 2.3 million miles of pipelines is still severely lacking.
Environmental groups have participated in a series of meetings in recent weeks to press Senate staff to strengthen the renewable energy standard (RES) included in the energy bill passed by Sen. Jeff Bingaman’s (D-N.M.) Energy and Natural Resources Committee last year. The RES in the bill would require that 15 percent of the country’s electricity come from renewable sources, a standard that most environmentalists think is far too weak.
