Environmental Law

In The News (September 23)

By Dennis Pfaff and Kevin Livingston, Editors

• The U.S. Senate Tuesday overwhelmingly passed legislation extending federal tax credits for wind, solar and other renewable energy sources in what could be a major breakthrough  for the incentives. According to Bloomberg, the bill -- extending for eight years an investment-tax credit for solar projects and for one year a tax break for wind, and two years for some other alternative energy sources -- could go to the House for action as early as Wednesday. Leaders of the Senate Finance Committee, who supported the bill, released a detailed summary of its contents. 
• The U.S. Department of Energy has announced a solicitation for up to $8 billion in federal loan guarantees for projects that employ advanced technologies that avoid, reduce or sequester emissions of air pollutants or greenhouse gases in the area of coal-based power generation, industrial gasification, and advanced coal gasification facilities, from a DOE statement. Thelen LLP attorneys, led by Ellen Friedman, have extensively analyzed the department's loan guarantee program.
• Spurred by rising costs for energy, companies are making a new push to overcome the barriers blocking marine-generated power, with at least 100 small firms around the world working on converting the sea’s power to electricity, reports The New York Times.
• The mutual fund unit of Deutsche Bank AG has unveiled a fund for private investors in carbon dioxide emission rights and related products, to be managed by the Hamburg investment firm Acquila Capital, Reuters reports.
• A European Union energy saving program that spent up to $366 million of tax money has little proof of having made progress, a court of auditors says, according to this Reuters dispatch.
• The queen of all wind turbines is planned for Great Britain, a 10-megawatt California-manufactured giant that would be bigger than Big Ben and produce enough electricity to power 3,700 homes, reports Fortune's blog, Green Wombat. 
• Wind power's potential effect on local weather conditions is explored in this short piece in The New York Times. 
• It's election season in Canada, too, and there what was once anticipated to be a referendum on what to do about climate change has not worked out that way, with the economy muscling to the front, and Conservatives denouncing the opposition's plans as a tax hike, as analyzed by Grist.
• In the United States, there's disagreement on the campaign trail about the causes of global warming -- between Republican presidential candidate John McCain and his vice presidential running mate, Sarah Palin, reports the Washington Post. 
   

Full post as published by Climate Law Update on September 23, 2008 (boomark / email).