EPA’s Regulatory Retrospective Review Information Site

US EPA http://www.epa.gov/improvingregulations/ [EPA site] EPA is beginning a new periodic retrospective review of our existing significant regulations to determine whether any such regulations should be modified, streamlined, expanded, or repealed, so as to make the Agency’s regulatory program more effective or less burdensome in achieving the regulatory objectives. As called for by President Obama [...]

Safety Evaluation Report Related to Disposal of High-level Radioactive Wastes in a Geologic Repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada — Volume 3: Repository Safety After Permanent Closure

US Nuclear Regulatory Commission http://www.scribd.com/doc/49039638/Yucca-Mountain-Safety-Evaluation-Report-Volume-3 [From Heritage Foundation blog, The Foundry]  As a result of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, The Heritage Foundation today obtained the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s (NRC) Yucca Mountain Volume III Safety Evaluation Report (SER). This document is critical because it contains the NRC’s conclusions regarding the scientific and technological [...]

America’s Great Outdoors: A Promise to Future Generations

US EPA, White House Council on Environmental Quality, Dept. of the Interior, Dept. of Agriculture http://americasgreatoutdoors.gov/report/ [National Parks Traveler blog] Noting that the Interior Department has billions of dollars in maintenance backlogs, the chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee says now is not the time to embark on more spending to expand the public [...]

Integrated Assessment of Black Carbon and Tropospheric Ozone: Summary for Decision Makers

UN Environment Programme, World Meteorological Organization http://www.unep.org/gc/gc26/download.asp?ID=2197 [From Press Release] Using existing technologies and institutions to cut two local air pollutants can save millions of lives and avoid tens of billions of dollars of crop losses annually, while halving regional warming for 30 to 60 years.  This will reduce the risk that the Arctic, Himalayas [...]

Coal Combustion Residuals Impoundment Assessment Reports

US EPA http://www.epa.gov/epawaste/nonhaz/industrial/special/fossil/surveys2/index.htm As part of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s ongoing national effort to assess the management of coal combustion residuals (CCR), EPA is releasing the final contractor reports assessing the structural integrity of impoundments and similar management units containing coal combustion residuals, commonly referred to as “coal ash,” at facilities.  Most of the [...]

How U.S. Federal Climate Policy Could Affect Chemicals’ Credit Risk

World Resources Institute / by Shally Venugopal, Amanda Sauer and Kyle Loughlin http://tinyurl.com/62hteze This study, conducted with Standard & Poors Rating Services, examines how climate change policy drivers could be incorporated into the evaluation of credit quality. It analyzes two types of federal climate policy scenarios – (1) a market-based GHG emissions reduction policy as [...]

Energy Emergence: Rebound & Backfire as Emergent Phenomena

Breakthrough Institute / by Jesse Jenkins, Ted Nordhaus, and Michael Shellenberger http://thebreakthrough.org/blog/Energy_Emergence.pdf [Summary] Energy efficiency is widely viewed as an inexpensive way to reduce aggregate energy consumption and thus greenhouse gas emissions. Many national governments, the International Energy Agency, and the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change have each recommended energy efficiency measures as [...]

Draft Inventory of U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Sinks: 1990-2009

US EPA http://tinyurl.com/467rcez [From Executive Summary] An emissions inventory that identifies and quantifies a country’s primary anthropogenic sources and sinks of greenhouse gases is essential for addressing climate change. This inventory adheres to both 1) a comprehensive and detailed set of methodologies for estimating sources and sinks of anthropogenic greenhouse gases, and 2) a common [...]

Asia Green City Index

Economist Intelligence Unit http://tinyurl.com/6g6gv94 [Yale Environment 360] Singapore has emerged as Asia’s greenest city thanks to a host of ambitious environmental programs and green initiatives, according to a new report. The Asia Green City Index — conducted by the Economist Intelligence Unit and funded by Siemens — evaluated the environmental performance of 22 Asian cities [...]

National Land Cover Database Updated

US Geological Survey http://tinyurl.com/4am4l3o The latest edition of the National Land Cover Database (NLCD 2006) is now publicly available. This massive database updates our knowledge of the Nation’s land cover and documents precisely where land cover change has occurred between 2001 and 2006. NLCD is used for thousands of applications in such diverse investigations as [...]