Tag

climate change

Podcast

Democrats’ blueprint for action on climate change

A new report from Democrats on the House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis calls for comprehensive actions by the U.S. Congress to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. as quickly as possible, make communities more resilient to climate change, and build a durable and equitable clean energy economy. Called “Solving the Climate Crisis: The Congressional Action Plan for a Clean Energy Economy and a Healthy, Resilient and Just America,” the 550-page report contains hundreds of recommendations. Some call it the most far-reaching report on climate change to ever appear on Capitol Hill. In this edition of Columbia Energy Exchange, I reached the chair of the House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis, Rep. Kathy Castor, a Florida Democrat, soon after the report was released by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Rep. Castor. It was the second appearance on…

Continue reading
Podcast

Building coalitions for energy stimulus

Governments around the world are consumed now with the challenge of responding effectively to the coronavirus pandemic, including providing adequate healthcare and alleviating the economic impact of the crisis. But policymakers in Washington and other capitals will eventually need to find ways to stimulate a recovery of their economies to put back to work the legions of people who are now unemployed. In this edition of Columbia Energy Exchange, host Bill Loveless talks to Ernest Moniz about the role that energy sectors can play in reinvigorating the U.S. economy, especially those sectors responsible for the early stages of a low-carbon transition that’s taken place over the last decade, and the importance of building coalitions to support such options. Moniz is well known to listeners as a former U.S. secretary of energy during the Obama administration and a key architect of…

Continue reading
Climate, Environment, Podcast

On climate, Denmark looks past its size to address crisis

It’s a small country with big ambitions when it comes to climate change. The new government in Denmark plans to overhaul entirely the way it conducts climate policy, with a goal of reducing emissions by 70 percent by 2030 compared to 1990. And it says it’s doing so based on what science tells us, not what political expedience would suggest. In this edition of Columbia Energy Exchange, I talk with Dan Jørgensen, Denmark’s Minister for Climate, Energy and Utilities since June. Minister Jørgensen was elected to the Danish parliament in 2013 and served as minister for food and agriculture between 2013 and 2015. He was also a Member of the European Parliament from 2004 to 2013, and has taught at universities in Denmark, France and the United States. Now, he’s in charge of an ambitious climate policy put in place…

Continue reading
Podcast

Coal communities face fiscal ruin

The coal industry continues to tumble in the U.S. as electric power plants turn increasingly to natural gas and renewable energy as their fuels of choice. And that decline might only worsen for coal mining and the communities that rely on it if Washington someday adopts strong policies to reduce carbon emissions associated with climate change. In this edition of Columbia Energy Exchange, I pay a visit to Adele Morris, a senior fellow and policy director for climate and energy economics at Brookings Institution. Adele and Noah Kaufman, a research scholar at the Center on Global Energy Policy, and Siddhi Doshi, a senior research assistant at Brookings, have written a new paper from the center that looks at the danger of fiscal collapse in coal-reliant communities. What they tell us is that while climate risks to corporations have received scrutiny in…

Continue reading
Watch

Whither the Green New Deal?

There’s a lot of speculation and disagreement over the Green New Deal and what it means for U.S. policies addressing climate change. But one thing is for sure: it’s stimulated more discussion of the topic than we’ve seen in years. And that’s a good thing! I had the pleasure of discussing the GND on the TV program “White House Chronicle” hosted by my dear friend and former competitor (when he owned The Energy Daily and I edited McGraw Hill’s Inside Energy) Lewellyn King and joined by the “dean” of energy reporters in Washington, Peter Behr of E&E News. We had a good time sorting out what this GND movement means for policymaking in the U.S. and future of the nation’s energy apparatus. Watch here.

Continue reading
Podcast

Future brightens for Chile as energy leader

Big changes are taking place in Chile when it comes to energy, with a strong push for renewable energy in recent years. And there’s more to come, according to the country’s president, Sebastián Piñera. In this edition of the Columbia Energy Exchange podcast, I sit down with Susana Jiménez, Chile’s energy minister, who’s overseeing her government’s plan to change significantly the way the nation produces and uses energy. In the process, she aims to make her nation a model for not only South America but also the world. The fifth largest consumer of energy in South America, Chile is only a minor producer of fossil fuels and therefore has relied heavily on energy imports That’s changing, however, as Chile looks increasingly to solar, wind and other forms of renewable energy. In fact, renewable energy now accounts for about 18% of…

Continue reading
Podcast, Uncategorized

Climate policy starts hereFeatured

The Green New Deal is one of the hottest topics in Washington right now, as it should be. But putting together legislation is a difficult task, especially amid the partisan politics taking place on Capitol Hill today. In a “Columbia Energy Exchange” podcast, I talk to the lawmaker at the start of this process: Rep. Paul Tonko, D-N.Y. Tonko chairs the House Environment and Climate Change Subcommittee, the first start for making climate policy in Congress. Hear him describe what lies in store for climate policy making and the impact of the Green New Deal movement on this effort. You’ll find the podcast here https://bit.ly/2Gfu2Ll.

Continue reading
Podcast

Taking stock of ESG risks for U.S. utilities

Environmental, social and governance (ESG) risks are becoming increasingly important to judging the credit worthiness of electric utilities, especially as climate change makes their work more challenging. On this episode of the Columbia Energy Exchange, host Bill Loveless talks to Jim Hempstead, a managing director in Moody’s Global Project and Infrastructure Finance Group. In his role at Moody’s, one of the largest credit ratings firms in the world, Jim helps oversee the North American Regulated Utility and Power Team. He also heads Moody’s working group in charge of ESG issues in the Americas. In the conversation with Bill, Jim makes clear that defining ESG standards is still very much a work in progress for the credit rating firms and the companies they assess for credit worthiness. Nevertheless, ESG metrics are an important means of evaluating the utility sector where shifts…

Continue reading
Podcast

A Boston formula for clean tech success

Innovation has resulted in remarkable advances in clean energy technology, like solar and wind energy systems that are becoming increasingly competitive in the U.S. And more breakthroughs are coming, as ambitious scientists, engineers and entrepreneurs make headway on products and services that will change the way we produce, use and save energy. But getting a good head start on innovation is challenging for pioneers, who often lack the wherewithal to design, build and test their inventions. That’s where institutions like Greentown Labs can play a big role. In this edition of the Columbia Energy Exchange, I visit Greentown Labs in Somerville, Mass., and meet with its CEO, Emily Reichert to talk about the outlook for clean technology in the U.S. and what programs like hers can do to help entrepreneurs get a good head start. Greentown Labs bills itself as…

Continue reading
Climate, Podcast

Absent national policy, U.S. climate action takes many forms

Leaders from around the world will gather in San Francisco Sept. 12-14 to celebrate the achievements of states, regions, cities, corporations and others at the sub-national level with respect to climate action. Organizers of the Global Climate Action Summit say the meeting will also serve as a launch pad for deeper commitments to put the world on track to prevent dangerous climate change and realize the historic Paris agreement – even as the U.S. government under the Trump administration takes a different course. On this edition of Columbia Energy Exchange, I talk to Carter Roberts, the president and CEO of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) in the United States. WWF is one of the partners in the Global Climate Action Summit, along with other groups including C40Cities, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Ceres and the United Nations Foundation. Among the topics we touched on are…

Continue reading