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Jerry Brown keeps getting heckled by anti-fracking protesters

by y0afvun Posted on December 3, 2013

Jerry Brown keeps getting heckled by anti-fracking protesters

By

Steve Rhodes

California Gov. Jerry Brown (D) is finding the fracking issue to be increasingly irritating. Or more to the point, he’s finding anti-fracking activists to be increasingly irritating.

Brown is a long-time environmental champion with a strong record of advancing clean energy and climate action, but he doesn’t mind the fracking that’s going on in his state. In fact, he kinda likes it.

The San Jose Mercury News reported a month ago on Brown’s “most extensive remarks yet defending his administration’s fracking policy”:

Brown said he saw no contradiction in calling climate change “the world’s greatest existential challenge” Monday while refusing to impose a moratorium on fracking …

“In terms of the larger fracking question — natural gas — because of that, and the lowered price, the carbon footprint of America has been reduced because of the substitution of natural gas for coal,” Brown said. “So this is a complicated equation.” …

Asked whether fracking should be banned, as Monday’s protesters were demanding, Brown said: “What would be the reason for that?”

Environmental activists who are calling for a moratorium list plenty of reasons: water pollution, air pollution, methane leakage from fracking operations, and the folly of continuing to rely on fossil fuels instead of focusing on a switch to clean energy.

And the enviros have a lot of company. A number of Hollywood celebs are calling for a ban. Famous foodies too. Last month, 20 leading climate scientists sent Brown a letter arguing that his support for fracking runs counter to his efforts to fight climate change. More recently, 27 former advisers to Brown wrote a letter asking him to impose a moratorium on fracking until more study is conducted into its environmental impacts.

janinsanfran

To make sure he doesn’t forget all this anti-fracking fervor, activists now trail the governor around the state reminding him. The Sacramento Bee reports:

Environmentalists frustrated with Brown’s permissiveness of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, have followed the Democratic governor to events throughout the state since September, heckling him for his approval of legislation establishing a permitting system for the controversial form of oil extraction.

The protests have become an awkward sideshow for the third-term governor, highlighting the deepening division between Brown and environmentalists — a reliably Democratic constituency — as he prepares for a re-election bid next year.

Could fracking be a decisive issue in the 2014 governor’s race? Fifty-eight percent of California voters support a moratorium on fracking until more environmental studies are done, according to a June poll. But those voters probably won’t have a viable anti-fracking candidate to support instead.

And Brown’s fracking stance could make him more appealing to moderate Democrats and independents, argues Jack Pitney, a government professor at Claremont McKenna College. “There are probably people out there who are thinking, ‘Well, if the environmentalist wackos are mad at him, he must be doing something right,’” Pitney told The Sacramento Bee.

But the environmentalists, wacko and otherwise, aren’t going to be dissuaded. “It’s a growing grass-roots movement across the state,” Rose Braz of the Center for Biological Diversity told the Bee. “It’s not going to go away. It really is not until the governor acts to halt fracking.”


Source
Jerry Brown followed to events, heckled by California environmentalists over fracking, The Sacramento Bee
Fracking and reducing climate change: Can Jerry Brown have it both ways?, San Jose Mercury News

Lisa Hymas is senior editor at Grist. You can follow her on Twitter and Google+.

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Jerry Brown keeps getting heckled by anti-fracking protesters

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Dems Say Boehner Blocking Farm Bill, Wants More Food Stamp Cuts

by Onopriyll7 Posted on November 27, 2013

Mother Jones

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Over the past month, the House and Senate have been working to come up with a compromise farm bill—the five-year piece of legislation that funds agriculture and nutrition programs. The main sticking point is the level of cuts to the food stamp program. House Republicans want to cut $40 billion from the program, while the Senate wants to trim $4 billion. Last week, the talks fell apart, and the two sides are fighting over why.

A Democratic aide tells Mother Jones that House Speaker John Boehner shot down several informal compromise farm bill proposals because the food stamps cuts were not deep enough. Boehner’s spokesman denies this.

The Democratic aide says the joint House-Senate panel that is trying to work out a deal presented Boehner with a few proposals that contained food stamps levels close to what the Senate wants. Even though Rep. Frank Lucas (R-Okla.)—the chairman of the House agriculture committee and a top member of the compromise panel—was willing to give a lot of ground to the Senate on food stamps, he says, Boehner rejected the proposals. “Boehner is playing spoiler,” he adds. “That’s why negotiations fell apart.”

Another source familiar with the negotiations echoes the Dem aide’s claim, saying that the House leadership has Lucas on a tight leash. Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), who is on the compromise committee, told Congressional Quarterly the same thing last week. “I’m hearing that the speaker still keeps inserting his people into the process,” and that House members on the farm bill compromise panel “have to go and check with the speaker’s people who say they want this and this and this. I hear that’s one of our major problems.”

But a spokesman for Boehner says the assertion that Boehner shot down the food stamps proposals “is absurd.” He adds that “the Speaker has full confidence” in Lucas and the rest of the House GOP team that is working out a compromise farm bill. On Friday, Lucas said negotiations stalled because of differences over the crop subsidy provisions in the legislation.

If Boehner did reject the compromise committee’s food-stamp proposals, he adhered to something called the Hastert rule—an informal measure used to limit the power of the minority—which says that a “majority of the majority” party must support a bill before it is brought up for a vote. It was first used by former House speaker Dennis Hastert in the mid-90s.

Boehner may not use the Hastert rule on the farm bill, but time is running out to reach an agreement. The two sides were supposed to have a final compromise bill on the House floor by December 13. A Senate agriculture committee aide says that negotiations are technically still ongoing, but the deadline may be pushed into next year. The farm bill is already more than a year behind schedule.

If fruitless negotiations end up delaying a farm bill for another year, Democrats may be the unlikley winners. Some Dems have been considering voting against any compromise farm bill in order to kill the bill. If that happens, food stamps would continue to be funded at current levels.

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Dems Say Boehner Blocking Farm Bill, Wants More Food Stamp Cuts

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FEC: We Won’t Treat Tea Partiers Like Jim Crow-Era NAACP Supporters

by pedzacastrzala87 Posted on November 21, 2013

Mother Jones

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By a 3-2 vote, the Federal Election Commission on Thursday rejected a national tea party group’s request to stop disclosing its donors under an exemption that originated with protections given to the NAACP and its members who faced violence during the Jim Crow era.

Here’s the background: The Tea Party Leadership Fund is a year-and-a-half old political outfit that has received $2.5 million in donations from some 600 contributors. The Fund makes independent expenditures and also contributes directly to candidates, including Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Reps. Paul Broun (R-Ga.) and Steve Gaines (R-Mont.). Earlier this year, the Fund handed the FEC 1,400 pages of what it said was evidence of “harassment, threats, and reprisals” against the group and its donors. Citing all that evidence, the group asked the FEC for an exemption so that it no longer had to disclose its donors and other vital campaign finance information.

This exemption has been granted only rarely by the FEC: The most prominent recipient is the Socialist Workers Party, which has received this exemption for several decades after showing considerable evidence of threats and harassment of their supporters. (The NAACP’s exemption was granted by the Supreme Court in 1958, which set a precedent for future exemptions.)

The decision over whether to give the Tea Party Leadership Fund the same exemption has been closely watched by campaign finance advocates and election lawyers. Some feared granting the exemption could set a precedent allowing many other political committees who felt harassed to get the same treatment, gradually eroding the nation’s disclosure laws. “If the FEC allows it, it’s a very slippery slope of this group and that group and this group all getting exemptions, too,” says one Democratic campaign finance lawyer.

Opponents of the Tea Party Leadership Fund’s request also argued that what the group considered harassment was far less severe than what the NAACP and Socialist Workers Party faced. “This tea party group comparing itself to the NAACP of old, whose membership feared for its lives and its livelihoods, would fail the laugh test if their request was not so offensive and so outrageous on its face,” Paul S. Ryan, a lawyer with the Campaign Legal Center, said on Wednesday.

At Thursday’s meeting, the FEC’s commissioners split on the matter. Republicans Matthew Petersen and Caroline Hunter agreed with the tea party group, citing the scandal over the IRS’ targeting of tea party groups applying for tax-exempt status. The Democrats broke the other way. Chair Ellen Weintraub quoted Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia’s 2010 comment that “running a democracy takes a certain amount of civic courage”; tea party donors, she said, needed to show that courage. Democrat Ann Ravel, meanwhile, agreed with the Campaign Legal Center’s argument that the Tea Party Leadership Fund’s evidence of harassment paled in comparison to what the NAACP and Socialist Workers Party experienced.

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FEC: We Won’t Treat Tea Partiers Like Jim Crow-Era NAACP Supporters

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Democrats Finally Getting Ready to Kill the Filibuster

by Elva Diller Posted on November 20, 2013

Mother Jones

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Republicans have now made clear that they’re willing to filibuster all of President Obama’s nominees to the DC circuit court. This is not because they have any specific objections to them, but simply because they want to preserve the court’s conservative majority even though they lost the election. Greg Sargent reports that this is such a sweeping position that Harry Reid no longer thinks there’s any chance of brokering a compromise on the matter. The only option left, according to a senior leadership aide, is to go nuclear and do away with the filibuster entirely:

“Reid has become personally invested in the idea that Dems have no choice other than to change the rules if the Senate is going to remain a viable and functioning institution,” the aide says….Asked if Reid would drop the threat to go nuclear if Republicans green-lighted one or two of Obama’s judicial nominations, the aide said: “I don’t think that’s going to fly.”

Reid has concluded Senate Republicans have no plausible way of retreating from the position they’ve adopted in this latest Senate rules standoff, the aide says. Republicans have argued that in pushing nominations, Obama is “packing” the court, and have insisted that Obama is trying to tilt the court’s ideological balance in a Democratic direction — which is to say that the Republican objection isn’t to the nominees Obama has chosen, but to the fact that he’s trying to nominate anyone at all.

Reid believes that, having defined their position this way, Republicans have no plausible route out of the standoff other than total capitulation on the core principle they have articulated, which would be a “pretty dramatic reversal,” the aide continues.

But does Reid have the votes? The New York Times reports that Republican obstruction has finally gotten so outrageous that even previously cautious Democrats are now supporting Reid’s position:

Mr. Reid, of Nevada, has picked up crucial support from some of his more reluctant members recently. Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont and the longest-serving member of the Senate today, who is chairman of the Judiciary Committee, has endorsed putting limits on the filibuster despite his history of being protective of Senate institutions. The two senators from California, Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer, said separately on Tuesday that they were leaning toward a rules change.

….The stakes seem higher this time for many Democrats. Many of them strongly believe that if Mr. Obama is not able to appoint any judges to the court — Republicans have rejected four of the five nominees he has submitted — it will retain its conservative bent for decades. It is a crucially important court for any White House because it often decides cases that relate to administration or federal agency policies.

At various points over the past year, Republicans have refused to confirm any nominees to the NLRB so that it would lose its quorum and be unable to pass new rules; they have refused to confirm any chairman of the CFPB in order to prevent it from functioning at all; they have threatened to destroy America’s credit unless Obamacare was defunded; and now they’re refusing to confirm any nominees to the DC circuit court in order to preserve its conservative tilt. Reid eventually managed to cut deals on the NLRB, the CFPB, and Obamacare, but as Feinstein says, “We left with a very good feeling there would be a new day. Well, the new day lasted maybe for a week.”

Add all this up—the NLRB, the CFPB, the debt ceiling extortion, and the DC court filibusters—and it’s now clear that Republicans have no intention of allowing Obama to govern normally. Instead, they have adopted a routine strategy of trying to nullify legislation they don’t like via procedural abuse. As Sargent puts it:

The GOP position is not grounded in an objection to Obama’s nominees or to the function of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals; it’s grounded in the argument that Obama should not have the power to make these appointments to the court at all. As Jonathan Chait argues, Republicans may not have even thought through the full implications of the position they’ve adopted. But Dems have, and taking it to its logical conclusion, they believe Republicans have presented them with a simple choice: Either they change the rules, or they accept those limits on Obama’s power. And that really leaves only one option.

Yep.

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Democrats Finally Getting Ready to Kill the Filibuster

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Big Coal, Republicans go after Obama’s energy nominee, saying he’s too green

by Abraham Lowe Posted on September 18, 2013

Big Coal, Republicans go after Obama’s energy nominee, saying he’s too green

By

rbinz.com

Ron Binz

Ron Binz is an experienced electricity regulator who understands the important role that wind and solar power are playing as they pour electrons into grids across the country. He was the lead author of a paper last year that described how boosting renewable energy infrastructure could hedge against fossil-fuel cost increases, aging equipment, and other risks.

“This is no time for backward-looking decision making,” he wrote in that paper [PDF], published by the nonprofit Ceres. “It is vital — for electricity consumers and utilities’ own economic viability — that their investment decisions reflect the needs of tomorrow’s cleaner and smarter 21st century infrastructure and avoid investing in yesterday’s technologies.”

So no frickin’ way is this guy qualified to oversee the nation’s power lines! Am I right?

No, of course I’m not right. But that’s what the coal sector is arguing as it desperately rallies Republican opposition to President Obama’s nomination of Binz to head the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. The New York Times reports that the “fight over Mr. Binz has been unusually public, considering that the job at stake is at an agency most people cannot name.” From Bloomberg’s coverage of a Senate confirmation hearing held on Tuesday:

Senator Lisa Murkowski [R] said she won’t support the confirmation of President Barack Obama’s choice to lead the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, raising uncertainty about the agency’s future leadership.

“At this point in time, I’m not prepared to support your nomination,” Murkowski, of Alaska, told Ron Binz at the end of his confirmation hearing before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee in Washington today. …

Her decision not to support Binz, combined with an uncertain vote from Democratic Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, casts doubt over whether Binz, 64, will survive the nomination process. Binz, a former chairman of the Colorado Public Utilities Commission, has been the object of a public-relations battle between free-market and coal-industry groups, who want to block his nomination, and clean-energy organizations who support him.

Greenwire steps back and explains the opposition:

Nominated to replace outgoing FERC Chairman Jon Wellinghoff, Binz has become a lightning rod, pitting libertarian-leaning groups, the coal industry and some senators — including Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) — against clean energy advocates and former FERC commissioners.

His foes say Binz would be key to the Obama administration’s plans to tackle climate change through regulatory actions that end-run Congress. Binz’s agenda, they say, would give all the breaks to wind and solar and elbow out fossil fuels.

Ben Cole, a spokesman for the libertarian-leaning American Energy Alliance, said Binz’s agenda would constitute the “third leg” of Obama’s climate plan, which also includes U.S. EPA’s clampdown on greenhouse gas emissions at power plants and the administration’s limiting of access to federal lands for oil and gas drilling.

Obama’s decision to go around Congress on climate change and Binz’s “troublesome” advocacy for renewable energy sources have sparked a confirmation fight that’s raised the profile of FERC from a sleepy regulatory agency, Cole added.

In the face of all this hubbub, Binz has turned to an unlikely ally. The Washington Times reports that he emailed BP officials, asking them for “any intelligence or advice” regarding the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. “You’re welcome, or not, to put in a good word for me with any of the members with whom you have a relationship.”

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.Find this article interesting? Donate now to support our work.Read more: Business & Technology

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Big Coal, Republicans go after Obama’s energy nominee, saying he’s too green

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Democrats will soon have a big, fat fight over fracking

by Jane Adams Posted on August 19, 2013

Democrats will soon have a big, fat fight over fracking

By Lisa Hymas

Shutterstock

Most Democratic politicians say nice things about renewable energy and less-nice things about coal and earnest things about the need for climate action. But when it comes to fracking for natural gas, Dems and enviros are increasingly at odds.

Exhibit A: President Obama. He’s provided unprecedented support for clean energy. He’s making moves to curb pollution from coal-fired power plants. He’s saying climate change is a top priority for his second term. But he’s just fine with fracking. His administration has yet to impose any regulations on the process; it’s only offered weak draft rules so far. It recently approved plans for a third project to export fracked natural gas. Obama thinks natural gas is part of the climate solution, a bridge fuel that will help us make the transition from coal and oil to renewables, as he made clear in his big climate speech in June:

We should strengthen our position as the top natural gas producer because, in the medium term at least, it not only can provide safe, cheap power, but it can also help reduce our carbon emissions. …

The bottom line is natural gas is creating jobs. It’s lowering many families’ heat and power bills. And it’s the transition fuel that can power our economy with less carbon pollution even as our businesses work to develop and then deploy more of the technology required for the even cleaner energy economy of the future.

Even California Gov. Jerry Brown (D), a long-time booster of clean energy and climate action, is open to fracking.

But as anti-fracking activism heats up around the country, pro-fracking Dems might find themselves increasingly at odds with their base. As we near 2016, any Democrat who wants to replace Obama might have to start singing a different tune.

National Journal reports on the fracking fight shaping up within the Democratic Party:

Led by President Obama, most Democrats have tried to occupy a careful middle ground on the natural-gas industry that’s transforming the U.S. energy economy. But that balance might not last much longer, as environmentally conscious “fracktivists” look for ways to press their case that the potential for pollution outweighs the jobs created by the mushrooming shale-gas drilling industry. …

Some environmental leaders and so-called fracktivists are hopeful the party will turn against the industry. And they have some reason for optimism. Already, Democratic governors and presidential prospects Andrew Cuomo and Martin O’Malley have upheld moratoriums on the controversial process in New York and Maryland, suggesting the issue could emerge as a potent one in a presidential primary. And this summer, the Pennsylvania Democratic State Committee passed a resolution calling for all drilling to temporarily halt in the Keystone State. The resolution was nonbinding, but it was nonetheless significant in a state seen as ground zero for the country’s natural-gas boom and where Democrats have been friendly to the industry.

However, any political shift within the Democratic Party won’t come easily. And many party insiders and operatives think it won’t come at all—because the booming industry offers too many economic benefits to too many groups, including members of the Democratic coalition. … Among them are unions that stand to benefit from building the pipelines. …

“For the first time in my memory, you have a real live issue where environmentalists are lined up on one side, and pretty much the entire rest of the Democratic coalition is lined up the other side,” said Matt McKenna, an energy lobbyist for MWR strategies.

As National Journal suggests, watch Cuomo and O’Malley for signs of which way the wind is blowing.

And, of course, watch Hillary Clinton. In a speech on energy last year, she noted approvingly that “natural gas production is surging” in the U.S., but she hasn’t said much else lately that would give us any clues into her thinking. We’ll tell you when she does.

Lisa Hymas is senior editor at Grist. You can follow her on Twitter and Google+.

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Democrats will soon have a big, fat fight over fracking

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Youngstown, Ohio, voters on fracking: “Yes, please”

by trasze2aja Posted on May 8, 2013

Youngstown, Ohio, voters on fracking: “Yes, please”

By John Upton

Jason Shenk

On Tuesday, voters in Youngstown, Ohio, gave the fracking industry carte blanche to continue pumping chemicals into the ground beneath them and pumping natural gas out.

A city charter amendment that would have outlawed hydraulic fracturing in the city was rejected by voters, with the unofficial final vote tally showing 3,821 votes against and 2,880 in favor. The ballot measure would also have banned new pipelines in the city and prevented oil-field waste from being transported through the city.

A fracking boom is underway in Ohio, especially in its east, where Youngstown is located. But the boom has not brought with it many jobs for Ohioans, despite promises otherwise, as most of the work is being done by specialists who’ve come in from other states. It has, however, brought with it water pollution problems.

Opposition to the ballot measure was spearheaded by a business-backed group calling itself Mahoning Valley Coalition for Job Growth and Investment. That group was formed especially to defeat the ballot measure, and it easily outspent the measure’s backers. In campaigning, the business group had described the ballot measure as unconstitutional, far-reaching, and unenforceable, and claimed it would send the wrong kind of message to the business community.

From the Youngstown Vindicator:

Susie Beiersdorfer, a member of the Community Bill of Rights Committee that supported the amendment, said, “It’s a sad day for democracy. With the resources we had, it was an incredible effort, but we were outspent by the opponents.”

But this isn’t the end for the committee, many of whom also are members of Frack Free Youngstown.

“We’re going to have to work a little harder the next time,” said Beiersdorfer, who also won the Green Party’s primary Tuesday for Youngstown council president. “We’ll be back. We’ll regroup and figure out what we’re doing. We’re going to continue to fight to protect health and public safety.”

“With tonight’s vote, the people of Youngstown have announced that the city is open for business,” Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber President Tom Humphries said in a statement after the votes were tallied. Mahoning County Democratic Party Chairman David Betras said the results demonstrated “the voters had no sympathy for those who want to hold us back.”

The city is open alright — wide open and ready for the injection of fracking chemicals.

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Youngstown, Ohio, voters on fracking: “Yes, please”

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Climate hawk Markey wins primary, moves one step closer to Senate

by donseoo Posted on May 2, 2013

Climate hawk Markey wins primary, moves one step closer to Senate

By Claire Thompson

Martha Coakley campaignMarkey, one step closer to the U.S. Senate.

On Tuesday, Rep. Ed Markey handily won the Democratic primary for Massachusetts’ special election to fill the Senate seat recently vacated by Secretary of State John Kerry. In June’s general election, Markey will go up against Republican candidate Gabriel Gomez, an ex-Navy SEAL, son of Colombian immigrants, successful businessman, and political outsider who has never held office.

Markey, one of the most passionate environmentalists in Congress, coauthored the big climate bill that passed the House in 2009 but failed in the Senate. A 20-term House veteran, he ran on his long liberal track record, but he also got a boost from green backers. The League of Conservation Voters spent nearly $850,000 in support of his campaign. Meanwhile, San Francisco rich-guy do-gooder Tom Steyer spent more than $400,000 on “online ads and microtargeting,” according to Mother Jones; many of those ads attacked Markey’s primary opponent, South Boston “conservative” Democratic Rep. Stephen Lynch, for his support of the Keystone XL pipeline. And it doesn’t look like Steyer plans on closing his pocketbook after this early victory, MoJo reports:

Steyer says he will use his fortune, estimated at $1.4 billion, to drag the issue of climate change into the spotlight in American politics and to combat the influence of climate change deniers and the oil lobby. He’s taking a similar approach to the climate issue that New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg takes on gun control: supporting candidates who see things his way and attacking those who do not. “Really, what we’re trying to do is to make a point that people who make good decisions on this should be rewarded, and people should be aware that if they do the wrong thing, the American voters are watching and they will be punished,” Steyer told the Hill.

Long active in California politics, the Markey-Lynch race was Steyer’s first big foray as an outside spender into a marquee Congressional race. …

Steyer has yet to say if he’ll go after Gabriel Gomez in the general election. But he’s one for one so far, and given every indication he plans to spend a lot more money in the months and years ahead.

Markey is now the favorite to win Kerry’s Senate seat. Gomez wears “his lack of Washington politics as a badge of honor,” says Mother Jones, and “cast himself as the new face of the Republican Party.” But despite Americans’ hunger for change in Congress, it’s hard to imagine a deep-blue state like Massachusetts picking a Mitt Romney-esque transplant from the business world over a trusted longtime representative. Still, after Republican Scott Brown’s unexpected win in a 2010 special election, no one’s taking anything for granted.

The Christian Science Monitor reports that in an early April poll, 51 percent of voters picked Markey and 36 percent favored Gomez in a matchup between the two candidates. After Elizabeth Warren’s high-profile defeat of Brown last November, Massachusetts could have a powerfully progressive team in the Senate if Markey wins.

Claire Thompson is an editorial assistant at Grist.

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Anthony Foxx, Charlotte’s transit-friendly mayor, tapped to be transportation secretary

by Gwenn Record Posted on April 29, 2013

Anthony Foxx, Charlotte’s transit-friendly mayor, tapped to be transportation secretary

By John Upton

City of Charlotte

Anthony Foxx in front of one form of transportation: an electric vehicle.

Today President Barack Obama will nominate the mayor of Charlotte, N.C., to the post of transportation secretary.

If confirmed by the Senate, Anthony Foxx will succeed Ray LaHood, who is stepping down from the position. Early media reports paint the Charlotte mayor and former city council member as a bright up-and-coming leader who has prioritized public transportation projects in the city that he has led for almost four years.

From The Washington Post:

[A] White House official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the announcement had not been made, said, “As mayor of one of America’s most vibrant cities, Anthony Foxx knows firsthand that investing in world-class infrastructure is vital to creating good jobs and ensuring American businesses can grow and compete in the global economy.”

Foxx, whose city hosted the Democratic National Convention last year, has pushed to expand public transit options for Charlotte while serving as mayor. The city has started building the Charlotte Streetcar Project, one of several electric trolley systems underway in the country, and is expanding the LYNX light-rail system so it can reach the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.

Christopher Leinberger, a professor at the George Washington University School of Business, said Foxx and his team worked closely with Charlotte business leaders to develop economic hubs around the city’s light-rail system.

From The New York Times:

Mr. Foxx, who was raised by a single mother and his grandparents, became the first black student body president at Davidson College and earned a law degree from New York University. He worked as a lawyer for a private firm as well as for the House Judiciary Committee and the Justice Department before returning to Charlotte to begin his career as an elected politician.

He has said that during his four years as mayor, he has turned around an economically afflicted city, adding 13,000 jobs, making Charlotte more hospitable to business and hosting the Democratic National Convention last year.

While Mr. Foxx does not have a transportation background, he did work as mayor to extend a light-rail line, open another runway at the airport, complete a major highway widening, improve a major bridge and bring streetcars back to Charlotte.

Not only a fan of public transit, Foxx also appears to be enamored with electric vehicles. Last year, he unveiled EV charging stations around the city.

John Upton is a science aficionado and green news junkie who

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U.S. nuclear companies fight new safety measures

by MalenMajure469 Posted on March 4, 2013

U.S. nuclear companies fight new safety measures

By John Upton

Constellation Energy Group

Nine Mile Point Nuclear Station in New York could use a couple radiation filters.

How much should a nuclear power plant operator spend to prevent radiation from spewing into the air during an accident, à la Fukushima and Chernobyl?

The answer, according to staff of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, is $20 million per reactor. That’s the price tag for a filter that could be fitted to a reactor’s vent to capture radiation during an accident.

Many reasonable people might think that $20 million is a reasonable price to pay to prevent the potential contamination of the air and land with deadly radiation. Germans apparently think so: Such filters are installed at all nine of that country’s nuclear reactors. Japan gets it: After the Fukushima meltdown, the nation is requiring radiation filters to be installed on all reactors. All quite reasonable.

But the executives running America’s nuclear power plants don’t seem to be so reasonable. As NRC commissioners prepare to vote as soon as this week to adopt or reject their staff’s recommendation that they mandate the use of such filters in some of the nation’s oldest reactors, industry is lobbying in opposition. The problem? Companies don’t want to spend the money. From Bloomberg:

A proposed requirement that U.S. nuclear-power plants add $20 million devices to prevent radiation leaks, one of the costliest recommendations stemming from meltdowns in Japan two years ago, has attracted a flurry of last-minute lobbying.

The U.S. nuclear industry opposes the rule, which would require almost a third of the nation’s reactors to install a special filter on vents designed to prevent an explosive buildup of gases. Exelon Corp., which owns more U.S. reactors than any other company, estimates each filter would cost $20 million, meaning the Chicago-based company could end up paying $220 million to equip its units. …

The industry prefers a plant-by-plant approach to the question of whether filters are necessary.

Needless to say, not everybody thinks that power plant operators should be allowed to save money at the potential expense of human health and lives. From the same article:

Supporters of the measure say it is overdue and consistent with what the rest of the world is doing. Japan announced last year that filtered vents will be required on its reactors. Other nations that use or are considering filtered venting systems on their reactors include Taiwan, Spain, Switzerland, Finland, Sweden, France and the Netherlands, according to the NRC.

“The tens of millions of Americans who live near the affected reactors located in 15 states should not face additional delays,” a dozen Democratic senators led by Barbara Boxer of California and Ron Wyden of Oregon wrote in a Feb. 20 letter [PDF] to NRC Chairman Allison Macfarlane.

So stay tuned to find out whether the NRC, under the new leadership of Macfarlane, will prioritize energy-company penny pinching or protection of humanity.

John Upton is a science aficionado and green news junkie who

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U.S. nuclear companies fight new safety measures

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