Eliminating oil subsidies will have little if any effect on consumer prices, explains Sima J.Gandhi. Three weeks ago, the Senate rejected a proposal to eliminate about $35 billion in tax subsidies to oil companies as millions of gallons of oil spewed into the Gulf of Mexico. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) proposed using these funds to reduce the deficit and fund state energy efficiency programs. The Sanders plan to close these loopholes lost by a vote of 35-61, with every Republican voting against it. The vote to preserve outdated subsidies that make rich oil companies richer while creating little benefit to the taxpayers who foot the bill was a victory for the oil industry and its lobbyists. Profitable and powerful oil companies, such as BP and ExxonMobil, pay lobbyists millions of dollars to scare lawmakers into believing that ending subsidies to oil companies will wreak havoc on the American economy. The evidence suggests otherwise:
Tax subsidies for oil companies don’t decrease our reliance on foreign oil.
Oil subsidies don’t save jobs.
Oil subsidies don’t help consumers at the pump.   
http://climateprogress.org/2010/07/06/turn-off-the-oil-subsidy-spigot/

- Again, when real full-cost accounting is used, our polluting ways will clearly be revealed as disastrous financially. The $120 billion versus $3 billion is striking! And if it’s your child struggling with damaged lungs, the dollars issue seems trivial. Shutting down more polluting coal plants needs to be a promise- not a threat! - Editor 
EPA: Clean-air rule would overturn Bush-era plan
The Obama administration is proposing a new rule to tighten restrictions on pollution from coal-burning power plants in the eastern half of the country. The Environmental Protection Agency said Tuesday the new rule represented its most consequential effort yet to tackle deadly pollution that contributes to smog and soot that hangs over more than half the country. The proposed reductions should save more than $120 billion a year in avoided health costs and sick days and save thousands of lives each year, Jackson said. Those benefits would far outweigh the estimated $2.8 billion annual cost of compliance, she said. Environmental groups hailed the new rule as a step toward taming pollution from coal-fired power plants. But industry groups said it will boost power prices and force many older coal-fired power plants to be closed.
For a fact sheet- http://www.epa.gov/airtransport/pdfs/FactsheetTR7-6-10.pdf
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5g90-40S6CjhfALdoGfm7_KUUn7MAD9GPS4J04

- Here at ClimateToday, we are probing more deeply into why and how we need to change, so often do not give you details of various pieces of climate/energy legislation, legal decisions, etc. If you would like a detailed weekly summary of Congress, legal decisions, etc., you can have it- go to the website below for a free newsletter.  - Editor
Weekly Climate Change Policy Update - June 21, 2010
http://www.vnf.com/news-policyupdates-477.html

The real causes of the disaster go much deeper. Having consumed most of the world’s readily accessible oil, we are now compelled to look for fuel in ever more remote places, and to extract it in ever riskier and more damaging ways. The Deepwater Horizon well was being drilled in five thousand feet of water, to a total depth of eighteen thousand feet.  This year, the United States’ largest single source of imported oil is expected to be the Canadian tar sands. Oil from the tar sands comes in what is essentially a solid form: it has to be either strip-mined, a process that leaves behind a devastated landscape, or melted out of the earth using vast quantities of natural gas.

Meanwhile, as everyone knows, no matter where oil comes from or how it has been extracted, burning it is destructive: oil combustion accounts for nearly a third of the greenhouse-gas emissions in the United States. A report issued last week by the National Academy of Sciences called on Congress to enact legislation to dramatically reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, by, among other things, “reducing oil use.”

The President needs to set higher standards - or his Administration, for Congress, and for the country. Earlier this month, an energy bill was finally unveiled in the Senate. It is deeply flawed: for a start, it would increase the incentives for offshore drilling, and preempt the E.P.A.’s ability to enforce parts of the Clean Air Act. Obama should return to the Gulf and, against the backdrop of the grotesque orange slick, explain to the public why he wants more ambitious legislation. Then he should spend the summer working to get an energy bill passed. He’s not going to get a better opportunity—or so, at least, we have to hope.
http://www.newyorker.com/talk/comment/2010/05/31/100531taco_talk_kolbert

Responding to the massive BP oil spill, Congress is getting ready to quadruple - to 32 cents a barrel - a tax on oil used to help finance cleanups. The increase would raise nearly $11 billion over the next decade.
The tax is levied on oil produced in the U.S. or imported from foreign countries. The revenue goes to a fund managed by the Coast Guard to help pay to clean up spills in waterways, such as the Gulf of Mexico. The Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund has about $1.5 billion available. Under current law, only $1 billion can be spent from the fund on a single incident. The bill would increase the spending limit to $5 billion. The bill does not address a federal law that caps liability at $75 million for economic damages beyond direct cleanup costs.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100524/ap_on_bi_ge/us_gulf_oil_tax

- Good news, but we all need to aim for zero NOW! I have owned a real home for 18 years that has never been on the grid! And it grows food all winter long, too! Advice: don’t wait until the building is completed- get your solar panels running before construction, then you don’t need generators for the power tools. - Editor
EU agrees mandate for “nearly zero energy” homes
All new buildings constructed in Europe after 2020 will have to be virtually carbon-neutral after the European Parliament gave new energy standards the last approval they needed. The standards are expected to have a significant long-term impact on the EU’s bills for gas imports for heating from Russia, Norway and Algeria, worth tens of billions of euros each year. The European Union’s mandate for “nearly zero-energy buildings” will kick in for all new public buildings in the European Union after 2018 and for all new homes and offices two years later.
Environmentalists gave the standards a guarded welcome, but said they would take effect too late and would do little to encourage the renovation of Europe’s existing housing stock. With buildings accounting for 36 percent of the EU’s greenhouse gases, improving their energy efficiency is also crucial for meeting the EU’s climate change goals.”
http://in.reuters.com/article/businessNews/idINIndia-48594720100518

QUOTE
“Countries are literally being driven out of existence-
 they are going to turn to whatever systems they can.”
Matthew Pawa, one of the lead attorneys on a pioneering lawsuit in which the Inupiat community of Kivalina, Alaska, suing 19 US oil and utility companies, including BP and ExxonMobil
 

Tuvalu v. ExxonMobil?
With the world’s top carbon-emitting nations seemingly unable to come up with a binding climate treaty, both environmental lawyers and representatives of small island nations are increasingly looking for other forms of leverage. While Micronesia’s effort did not succeed this time around, environmental lawyers hope it will encourage similar experimentation with legal tools that could be used to pressure big emitters to clean up their act.
Industries are bracing for a tide of climate lawsuits. The major insurer Swiss Re has warned that “climate change-related litigation could become a significant issue within the next couple of years.” Pawa compares this nascent field to the epic court battles over tobacco and asbestos. “It’s a process of learning by doing. Just by bringing these cases over and over again, the judiciary [and] the public get used to the idea of liability.” According to a forthcoming United Nations study, the world’s 3,000 biggest public companies could be on the hook for $2.2 trillion- more than 30 percent of their profits- if they were made to pay for the fallout of their carbon emissions.
http://motherjones.com/environment/2010/04/climate-desk-climate-change-legislation

- We have lawyers reading Climate Today, so for those who want to keep up with the latest legal information, check out “Warming Law” website. - Editor
Automakers Move to Dismiss California Preemption Lawsuit. Finally.
Automakers filed a motion to dismiss a long-running challenge to a set of California auto emission standards.   The automakers had alleged that California’s so-called “Pavley” standards for greenhouse gas emissions from motor vehicles were preempted by federal law.  In 2008, the automakers lost their case following a trial, and had appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
In New Mexico, however, auto dealers are continuing to pursue their challenge to that state’s emissions standards. It is unclear if and when auto dealers will drop this challenge.
http://theusconstitution.org/blog.warming/

- Many of our readers are transportation experts so this is a nice challenge to think about, and it appears that the door is open to new ideas. Take a crack at this one! - Editor
Financing U.S. surface transportation, a call for creativity
In the past, the Highway Trust Fund has been largely user-supported through fuel-tax revenue. However, technology and behavior have changed enough that this approach is no longer sufficient. As we move forward with surface transportation reauthorization, we need lawmakers and experts to think creatively about how we’re going to fund our transportation infrastructure in the 21st century.
http://fastlane.dot.gov/2010/03/financing-us-surface-transportation-a-call-for-creativity.html#more

A federal judge has approved a first-of-its-kind settlement requiring the government to suspend 38,000 acres of oil and gas leases in Montana so it can gauge how oil field activities contribute to climate change. At issue are the greenhouse gases emitted by drilling machinery and industry practices such as venting natural gas directly into the atmosphere. Environmentalists - who sued when the Montana leases were sold in 2008 - argued the industry has allowed too much waste and uses inefficient technologies that could easily be updated. Under the deal, the Bureau of Land Management will suspend the 61 leases in Montana within 90 days. A BLM spokesman, Greg Albright, said reviewing lease sales for climate change would be a first for the agency.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/18/AR2010031803018.html