Literary Warrant [19]

• Association of American Railroads, National Rail Freight Infrastructure Capacity and Investment Study (Final Report) (September 2007)
  

  "This study is an assessment of the long-term capacity expansion needs of the continental U.S. freight railroads. It provides a first approximation of the rail freight infrastructure improvements and investments needed to meet the U.S. Department of Transportation's (U.S. DOT) projected demand for rail freight transportation in 2035. The U.S. DOT estimates that the demand for rail freight transportation—measured in tonnage—will increase 88 percent by 2035....

  "[T]he findings point clearly to the need for more investment in rail freight infrastructure and a national strategy that supports rail capacity expansion and investment."—Executive Summary.
  

• John C. Austin et al., The Brookings Institution, Great Lakes Economic Initiative, Healthy Waters, Strong Economy: The Benefits of Restoring the Great Lakes Ecosystem (September 2007)
  

  "Restoring the Great Lakes to health will create $50 billion in economic benefit for the region, a new cost-benefit analysis conducted by the Brookings Institution Metropolitan Policy Program finds.
  

  "According to Healthy Waters, Strong Economy: The Benefits of Restoring the Great Lakes Ecosystem (16 pages, PDF), efforts to improve the health of the Great Lakes will produce economic gains that are worth almost twice as much as the cost of those efforts. Funding to modernize wastewater treatment systems would reduce sewage and other contamination, which would result in improved water quality and fewer beach closings; efforts to eliminate invasive species would increase the supply of fish in the lakes and stem the dislocation of sport-fishery workers and assets; restoring and protecting wildlife habitat for birds and waterfowl would benefit naturalists and hunters; and removing contaminated sediment in areas of high concern would reclaim communities and increase property values."—Press release (September 19, 2007)
  

• Anthony H. Cordesman, Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy, The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Global Energy, Economic Interdependence, Iraq And the Gulf (September 2007)
  

  "The real issue is not taking oil for the US; it is securing oil for the global economy. The US depends on that economy for its growth and at least indirectly for part of every job in the US. It not only needs direct imports, it needs oil to flow from Gulf to all of its major trading partners: Europe, China, Japan, South Korea, and all of the other powers that trade and invest with the US. If they cannot buy oil reliably at market prices, the world economy will weaken and the US economy with it.
  

  "As the attached briefing show, the stability and security of the Gulf is absolutely critical to the world and will be for decades to come. That security also is not a matter of Iraq's oil or Iran's. It is the security of all Gulf oil and especially southern Gulf states like Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, and the UAE. If the US goes to war with a nation like Iraq, it is because of the strategic importance of the region, and the broader threat it poses, not because of the size of oil reserves that the US could only exploit profitably if it totally controlled Iraqi oil for decades."—Synopsis.
  

• Environmental Defense, Analysis of Greenhouse Gas Reductions from an Energy Bill (September 24, 2007)
  
  "A new analysis released today by Environmental Defense shows that energy legislation passed by the House and Senate would let greenhouse emissions continue to increase for the next three decades, even if the best fuel-saving and renewable energy provisions in both bills were combined in conference committee."


• Gareth Evans, President, International Crisis Group & Chair, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Scientific Forum 2007, Vienna, Nuclear Energy in the Next Quarter Century: The IAEA's Role (Concluding Report to General Conference) (September 20, 2007)
  
  "Throughout the deliberations of the Scientific Forum there was a strong sense that the matters we were discussing were at the cutting edge of the international public policy debate—with widespread current concerns about energy security, about the environmental impact of fossil fuels and renewed fears about a new surge of nuclear weapons proliferation making the whole constellation of issues about both the peaceful and non-peaceful uses of nuclear energy more alive and important than they have been for many years. There was a recurring hope evident in the presentations that policymakers would be willing to think hard about whether present policies and institutional structures and resources were really up to the multiple challenges the international community was now facing."


• Lisa Heinzerling, Georgetown University, O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law Scholarship, Climate Change, Human Health, and the Post-Cautionary Principle (Research Paper no. 4) (September 2007)
  
  "In this Article, I suggest two different but related ways of reframing the public discourse on climate change. First, I propose that we move further in the direction of characterizing climate change as a public health threat and not only as an environmental threat. Second, I argue that we should stop thinking of responses to climate change in terms of the precautionary principle, which counsels action even in the absence of scientific consensus about a threat. We should speak instead in terms of a 'post-cautionary' principle for a post-cautionary world, in which some very bad effects of climate change are unavoidable and others are avoidable only if we take dramatic steps, and soon. These points are related insofar as they together create a moral imperative both to adapt to the changes we cannot prevent and to mitigate those we can. Without these efforts, people will fall ill and many will die, and we know now that this will occur. No fancy moral theory is required to condemn, and to make every attempt to avert, this large-scale knowing killing."—Abstract.


• Justice Talking: The Public Radio Show about Law and American Life, Revisiting New Orleans: Katrina's Effect on the Legal System (September 17, 2007)
  
  "Two years after the largest natural disaster in U.S. history, New Orleans has been forced to redevelop neighborhoods, schools and most of its urban infrastructure. But what has happened to the city’s criminal justice system? Join us on this edition of Justice Talking for a detailed look at how Hurricane Katrina has affected police practices, the state and federal court systems, jails and alternative sentencing plans, and what the changes mean for citizens of and visitors to this famous city."—Overview.


• National Aeronautics and Space Association (NASA), NASA Finds Greenland Snow Melting Hit Record High in High Places (September 25, 2007)
  
  "A new NASA-supported study reports that 2007 marked an overall rise in the melting trend over the entire Greenland ice sheet and, remarkably, melting in high-altitude areas was greater than ever at 150 percent more than average. In fact, the amount of snow that has melted this year over Greenland could cover the surface size of the U.S. more than twice."


• National Parks Conservation Association, Unnatural Disaster: Global Warming and Our National Parks (September 24, 2007)
  

  "Hot, dry conditions generated by global warming can cause highly destructive wildfires in the national parks. At Yosemite National Park, warming and drought have made the wildfire season longer and more damaging. Higher temperatures at Saguaro National Park are enabling invasive grasses to displace native plants and fuel wildfires, which used to be rare.
  

  "Wildfires strain the budget of the already severely under-funded National Park Service, risk the safety of visitors and park staff, drastically alter natural ecosystems, and contribute harmful smoke to the atmosphere—making it harder to breathe in already polluted parks like Sequoia.
  

  "Congress and the Administration should act now to slow or halt global warming. If we take meaningful steps now, future generations of Americans should be able to fully experience the shared history and natural wonders protected by our national parks. If we wait too long, much will be lost."—Press release.
  

• Eric A. Posner & Cass Sunstein, University of Chicago Law School, Climate Change Justice (U. of Chicago Law & Economics, Olin Working Paper No. 354; U. of Chicago, Public Law Working Paper No. 177) (August 2007)
  
  "Greenhouse gas reductions would cost some nations much more than others, and benefit some nations far less than others. Significant reductions would impose especially large costs on the United States, and recent projections suggest that the United States has relatively less to lose from climate change. In these circumstances, what does justice require the United States to do? Many people believe that the United States is required to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions beyond the point that is justified by its own self-interest, simply because the United States is wealthy, and because the nations most at risk from climate change are poor. This argument from distributive justice is complemented by an argument from corrective justice: The existing stock of greenhouse gas emissions owes a great deal to the past actions of the United States, and many people think that the United States should do a great deal to reduce a problem for which it is largely responsible. But there are serious difficulties with both of these arguments. Redistribution from the United States to poor people in poor nations might well be desirable, but if so, expenditures on greenhouse gas reductions are a crude means of producing that redistribution: It would be much better to give cash payments directly to people who are now poor. The argument from corrective justice runs into the standard problems that arise when collectivities, such as nations, are treated as moral agents: Many people who have not acted wrongfully end up being forced to provide a remedy to many people who have not been victimized. The conclusion is that while a suitably designed climate change agreement is in the interest of the world, a widely held view is wrong: Arguments from distributive and corrective justice fail to provide strong justifications for imposing special obligations for greenhouse gas reductions on the United States. These arguments have general implications for thinking about both distributive justice and corrective justice arguments in the context of international law and international agreements."—Abstract.


• Qin Chen, Lixia Wang, Haihong Zhao, & Scott L. Douglass, Prediction of Storm Surges and Wind Waves on Coastal Highways in Hurricane-Prone Areas, Journal of Coastal Research, v.23, pp.1304-17 (September 2007)
  
  "A recent study reveals that more than 60,000 miles (96,500 km) of coastal roadways are in the 100-year floodplain in the United States and vulnerable to the attacks of water surges and storm waves generated by hurricanes. Mitigating the effects of coastal flooding requires accurate predictions of the destructive hydrodynamic forces. This study demonstrates a methodology for integrating state-of-the-art storm surge and wave prediction models as an effective tool for engineering design of coastal infrastructure and facilitation of hurricane emergency management. The methodology has the capability of resolving complex geometry and topography typical of coastal road flooding. The surge model incorporates moving shoreline conditions associated with flooding and allows for nonlinear interactions among astronomical tide, storm surge, and wave setup. The wave model takes into account the unsteadiness of wind forcing, currents, and water levels. A historical hurricane event is simulated for the landfall of Hurricane Georges (1998) on the north coast of the Gulf of Mexico. Good agreement between the modeled and measured surge hydrographs in Mobile Bay, Alabama, has been found. The advanced surge model (ADCIRC), coupled with the wave model, successfully simulates the inundation and measured high water marks along two highways adjacent to the bay. The thirdgeneration wind wave model (SWAN) coupled with the hydrodynamic model reveals the temporal and spatial variability of wave heights and wave periods in the Mobile Bay estuary and on the flooded highways. Numerical experiments were carried out to examine the response of the estuary to various forcing agents, including the offshore surge hydrograph, local wind forcing, and wave thrust."—Abstract.


• Martha G. Roberts, Timothy D. Male & Theodore P. Toombs, Environmental Defense, Potential Impacts of Biofuels Expansion on Natural Resources: A Case Study of the Ogallala Aquifer Region (2007)
  
  "Biofuels are getting a lot of attention as a way to slow global warming. But not all biofuels are created equal. Whether they help the environment depends on how they are produced. A new Environmental Defense report recommends polices that will ensure that renewable fuels live up to their promise. Specifically, our study shows that we need:
  
  
  • a low-carbon fuel standard to spur production of biofuels with low greenhouse gas emissions and
  
  
  • better protections for water and land resources that are vulnerable to increasing production of biofuel feedstocks."


• Brian Seasholes, National Center for Policy Analysis, Bad for Species, Bad for People: What's Wrong with the Endangered Species Act and How to Fix It (September 2007)
  

  "The Endangered Species Act (ESA), passed in 1973, was designed to recover species to a level at which they are no longer considered endangered and therefore do not require the Act's protection. Unfortunately, the law has had the opposite effect on many species. The ESA can severely penalize landowners for harboring species on their property, and as a result many landowners have rid their property of the species and habitat rather than suffer the consequences.
  

  "Over 1,900 species of plants and animals—1,351 domestic and 570 foreign—are currently considered by the federal government to be in danger of extinction. Once a species is listed, they are subject to a variety of conservation efforts, including federal recovery plans that can include a wide variety of measures including habitat protection. However, these conservation efforts rarely, if ever, consider the total costs of species recovery to federal, state or local governments, and especially to private landowners."—Executive Summary.
  

• Bernice Steinhardt, Director, Strategic Issues, United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Influenza Pandemic: Opportunities Exist to Clarify Federal Leadership Roles and Improve Pandemic Planning (Testimony Before the Subcommittee on Emerging Threats, Cybersecurity, and Science and Technology, Committee on Homeland Security, House of Representatives) (September 26, 2007)
  

  "An influenza pandemic is a real and significant potential threat facing the United States and the world. Pandemics are unlike other emergencies because they are not a singular event nor discretely bounded in space and time.
  

  "This testimony addresses (1) federal leadership roles and responsibilities for preparing for and responding to a pandemic, (2) our assessment of the Strategy and Plan, and (3) opportunities to increase clarity of federal leadership roles and responsibilities and improve pandemic planning. GAO used its characteristics of an effective national strategy to assess the Strategy and Plan."—Why GAO Did This Study.
  

• United Nations, Gateway to the UN System's Work on Climate Change
  
  A consolidation of news, reports, and information about UN instruments and agencies that deal with climate change.


• United States Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, Audit Division, Superfund Activities in the Environment and Natural Resources Divisions for Fiscal Years 2004 and 2005 (Audit Report 07-43) (September 2007)
  

  "As required by CERCLA, the DOJ Office of the Inspector General conducted this audit to determine if the cost allocation process used by ENRD and its contractor provided an equitable distribution of total labor costs, other direct costs, and indirect costs to Superfund cases during FYs 2004 and 2005. We compared costs reported on the contractor-developed Accounting Schedules and Summaries for FYs 2004 and 2005 to costs recorded on DOJ accounting records to review the cost distribution system used by ENRD to allocate incurred costs to Superfund and non-Superfund cases.

  "In our judgment, ENRD provided an equitable distribution of total labor costs, other direct costs, and indirect costs to Superfund cases during FYs 2004 and 2005. However, we make three recommendations to improve ENRD operations and ensure compliance with DOJ directives."—Executive Summary.
  

• United States Government Accountability Office, Natural Hazard Mitigation: Various Mitigation Efforts Exist, but Federal Efforts Do Not Provide a Comprehensive Strategic Framework (Report to the Ranking Member, Committee on Financial Services, House of Representatives, GAO-07-403) (August 2007)
  
  "The nation has experienced vast losses from natural hazards. The potential for future events, such as earthquakes and hurricanes, demonstrates the importance of hazard mitigation—actions that reduce the long-term risks to life and property from natural hazard events. GAO was asked to examine (1) natural hazards that present a risk to life and property in the United States, areas that are most susceptible to them, factors that may be increasing these risks, and mitigation activities that reduce losses; (2) methods for encouraging and impediments to implementing mitigation activities; and (3) collaborative efforts of federal agencies and other stakeholders to promote mitigation."—Why GAO Did This Study.


• WeatherBill, Inc., Temperature Trends in Major U.S. Cities (September 12, 2007)
  
  "WeatherBill analyzed 30 years of daily temperature data from the nation's most populous cities to determine longterm trends in daily average temperatures in major US cities. The study is restricted to weather data from 130 cities which, as of the 2006 Census, had more than one hundred thousand residents and maintained a National Weather Service weather station with a clean historical record of at least 30 years of daily data, either within the city proper or at a nearby location.
  
  "To isolate seasonal temperature trends for each city in question, daily average temperature data is studied for both winter (November through February) and summer (June through September) seasons. Daily average temperature is defined as the midpoint of the high and low temperatures of the day. For each city, the mean (or average) and standard deviation (or volatility) of daily average temperature are calculated for winters and summers from 1977 through 2006. A Mann-Kendall test is used to determine the statistical significance of seasonal trends in the means and standard deviations of temperature over time."—Introduction.

Literary Warrant [18]

Here are some recent publications of interest. In future posts, I'll catch up with some of the aging ones.

• American Rivers, 1,333 Unsafe Dams Threaten Nation's Communities: Unsafe High Hazard Dams Litter the US (September 6, 2007)
  

  "Congress will soon consider the Dam Rehabilitation and Repair Act of 2007 (H.R 3224) which would direct $200 million to states for improving the safety of publicly-owned dams, through either repairing or removing problem dams. To date, only 11 members have signed on to co-sponsor the bill introduced by Congressman John Salazar (D-CO).
  

  "'Dams across the country are living on borrowed time, and many of our communities are at risk,' said American Rivers’ President Rebecca Wodder. 'Closing our eyes to the problem doesn’t make it disappear; Congress needs to take action now.'"—Press release.
  

• Stephen L. Caldwell, Director, Homeland Security and Justice Issues, United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Radiation Exposure Compensation Act: Program Status (September 7, 2007)
  
  "From 1945 through 1962, the United States conducted a series of aboveground atomic weapons tests as it built up its Cold War nuclear arsenal. Around this same time period, the United States also conducted underground uranium-mining operations and related activities, which were critical to the production of the atomic weapons. Many people were exposed to radiation resulting from the nuclear weapons development and testing program, and such exposure is presumed to have produced an increased incidence of certain serious diseases, including various types of cancer. To make partial restitution to these individuals, or their eligible surviving beneficiaries, for their hardships associated with the radiation exposure, the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA) was enacted on October 15, 1990.1 RECA provided that the Attorney General be responsible for processing and adjudicating claims under the act. The Department of Justice (DOJ) established the Radiation Exposure Compensation Program (RECP), which is administered by its Civil Division’s Torts Branch. RECP began processing claims in April 1992."


• Green Party of England and Wales, Greenprint for a Renewable Energy Policy That Works (September 2007)
  "The Green Party has a comprehensive set of policies that will guarantee we achieve reductions in carbon dioxide, year-on-year, that will enable us to reduce UK emissions by 90% by 2030. As part of this programme, the best way to support and develop the renewables industry is to adopt a simple framework of guaranteed prices for exported renewable energy. Feed-in tariffs have been a runaway success in Germany and other countries, stimulating both large- and small-scale projects and kick-starting a profitable industry that supports many thousands of jobs."


• Insurance Information Institute, Facts and Statistics: Catastrophes (2007)
  
  Figures for the ten most costly world insurance losses, the ten most costly catastrophes in the United States, the top fifteen most costly hurricanes in the United States, and related phenomena.


• Jessica Milano, Progressive Policy Institute (PPI), Spoiled: Keeping Tainted Food Off America’s Tables (Policy Report) (September 2007)
  
  "Currently, Americans are protected against tainted goods by a system of redundant, inefficient programs that let too many dangerous products through the cracks. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) regulate different categories of food with disparate resources and authority. While 80 percent of the nation's overall food supply falls under the authority of the FDA—including recently recalled foods such as spinach and peanut butter—80 percent of America's food safety budget is allocated to the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) of the USDA. The confusion is exacerbated by the fact that the FSIS—which regulates domestic and imported meat, poultry, and certain egg products—requires that each exporting country have a food and safety system roughly comparable to that of the United States, while the FDA—which regulates all other foods—evaluates each individual company that applies to import food."—Press release (September 7, 2007)


• David Owen, The Dark Side: Making War on Light Pollution, New Yorker (August 20, 2007)
  
  "The stars have not become dimmer; rather, the Earth has become vastly brighter, so that celestial objects are harder to see. Air pollution has made the atmosphere less transparent and more reflective, and high levels of terrestrial illumination have washed out the stars overhead—a phenomenon called 'sky glow.' Anyone who has flown across the country on a clear night has seen the landscape ablaze with artificial lights, especially in urban areas. Today, a person standing on the observation deck of the Empire State Building on a cloudless night would be unable to discern much more than the moon, the brighter planets, and a handful of very bright stars—less than one per cent of what Galileo would have been able to see without a telescope."


• United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), Climate Change and Tourism.
  
  "The World Tourism Organization has created an information gathering web resource called Climate and Tourism Information Exchange Service, which displays data, studies, policy papers, videos and other materials as part of its effort to combat climate change. Registration (free) is required. The organization has spearheaded the study of linkages between climate and tourism, having convened the first-ever International Conference on Climate Change and Tourism in Tunisia in 2003. The second Conference will be held in Davos, Switzerland, in October."—UN Pulse (September 7, 2007)


• United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Office of Inspector General, Federal Facilities in Chesapeake Bay Watershed Generally Comply with Major Clean Water Act Permits (Evaluation Report no. 2007-P-00032) (September 5, 2007)
  
  "Overall, EPA and the States are doing well managing how major Federal facilities comply with their NPDES [National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System] permits. In EPA’s last reporting period (2004), major Federal facilities in the Chesapeake Bay watershed had a lower rate of Significant Noncompliance than other Federal and non-Federal major-permit facilities nationwide."—What We Found.


• United States Geological Survey (USGS), Future Retreat of Arctic Sea Ice Will Lower Polar Bear Populations and Limit Their Distribution (September 7, 2007)
  

  "Future reduction of sea ice in the Arctic could result in a loss of 2/3 of the world's polar bear population within 50 years according to a series of studies released today by the U.S. Geological Survey....
  

  "The newly-released USGS information, presented to the Service in the form of nine administrative reports to be open for public comment, will now be considered within the context of the Fish and Wildlife Service's one-year review. The Service will analyze it and other information provided by scientists, government agencies and the public in order to arrive at an informed and scientifically justifiable decision. That decision is due in January."—Press release.
  

• United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Influenza Pandemic: Further Efforts Are Needed to Ensure Clearer Federal Leadership Roles and an Effective National Strategy (Report to Congressional Requesters, GAO-07-781) (August 2007)
  

  "An influenza pandemic is a real and significant potential threat facing the United States and the world. Pandemics occur when a novel virus emerges that can easily be transmitted among humans who have little immunity. In 2005, the Homeland Security Council (HSC) issued a National Strategy for Pandemic Influenza and, in 2006, an Implementation Plan.
  

  "Congress and others are concerned about the federal government’s preparedness to lead a response to an influenza pandemic. This report assesses how clearly federal leadership roles and responsibilities are defined and the extent to which the Strategy and Plan address six characteristics of an effective national strategy. To do this, GAO analyzed key emergency and pandemic-specific plans, interviewed agency officials, and compared the Strategy and Plan with the six characteristics GAO identified."—Why GAO Did This Study.
  

• United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Maritime Transportation: Major Oil Spills Occur Infrequently, but Risks to the Federal Oil Spill Fund Remain (Report to Congressional Committees, GAO-07-1085) (September 2007)
  
  "On the basis of cost information collected from a variety of sources, GAO estimates that 51 spills with costs above $1 million have occurred since 1990 and that responsible parties and the federal Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund (Fund) have spent between about $860 million and $1.1 billion for oil spill removal costs and compensation for damages (e.g., lost profits and natural resource damages). Responsible parties paid between about 72 percent and 78 percent of these costs; the Fund has paid the remainder. Since removal costs and damage claims may stretch out over many years, the costs of the spills could rise. The 51 spills, which constitute about 2 percent of all vessel spills since 1990, varied greatly from year to year in number and cost."—What GAO Found.


• United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Water Resources: Four Federal Agencies Provide Funding for Rural Water Supply and Wastewater Projects (Report to the Honorable Gordon Smith, U.S. Senate, GAO-07-1094) (September 2007)
  
  "Rural areas generally lack adequate funds for constructing and upgrading water supply and wastewater treatment facilities. As a result, they typically rely on federal grants and loans, primarily from the Rural Utilities Service (RUS), Economic Development Administration (EDA), Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation), and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps), to fund these projects. Concern has been raised about potential overlap between the projects these agencies fund. For fiscal years 2004 through 2006 GAO determined the (1) amount of funding these agencies obligated for rural water projects and (2) extent to which each agency’s eligibility criteria and the projects they fund differed."—Why GAO Did This Study.


• United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), NRC Issues Mid-Cycle Letters for Nation’s Nuclear Plants (September 6, 2007)
  

  "The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has issued mid-cycle assessment letters to the nation’s 104 operating commercial nuclear power plants. The agency’s most recent assessments show all the plants continue to operate safely....
  

  "If a nuclear power plant’s performance declines, the NRC assigns additional resources to ensure the plant operator is taking the steps necessary to correct the situation. Only one plant, Palo Verde in Arizona, requires the NRC’s highest level of attention, which will include additional inspectors this fall to confirm the plant’s performance issues are being addressed. Ten plants require significant NRC attention, and another 19 plants get some additional attention. These numbers are generally comparable to last year’s mid-cycle assessments."—Press release.
  

• World Resources Institute & World Business Council for Sustainable Development, The Greenhouse Gas Protocol: Guidelines for Quantifying GHG Reductions from Grid-Connected Electricity Projects (2007)
  

  "As concern about climate change has grown, one of the key challenges facing energy-project developers, as well as legislators and other key decision-makers, has been to accurately quantify the reduced GHG emissions that result from these projects.
  

  "'These are the best guidelines available to calculate meaningful numbers for quantifying emissions reductions,' said Lars Kvale at the Center for Resource Solutions, a national nonprofit working to establish consumer-protection standards for greenhouse gas offsets. 'This will really help energy-project developers and offset-program designers who do not have the resources to run detailed grid-emissions models.'"—News release.

Literary Warrant [17]

• beSpacific, $114 Billion Funds Gulf Coast Recovery (August 28, 2007)
  
  "24 billion went to rebuild the Gulf Coast states and provide survivors with a place to live, repair damaged infrastructure, and build houses and schools in 2007. Of the $114 billion allocated for Gulf Coast recovery, 84 percent has either been disbursed or is awaiting claims. FEMA awarded $8.3 billion in public assistance funding for education, criminal justice, public works, health and hospitals, and historic and cultural resources; education and public works receive $1.3 billion apiece. As of July 2007, over 95,000 households have received aid."—DHS.


• Joel K. Bourne, Jr., New Orleans: A Perilous Future, National Geographic (August 2007)
  
  "With seas rising, storms getting stronger, and ground subsiding, another disaster like Katrina seems inevitable. Yet some residents would rather run that risk than leave the place they call home.
  
  "Hurricane Katrina, the costliest natural disaster in United States history, was also a warning shot. Right after the tragedy, many people expressed a defiant resolve to rebuild the city. But among engineers and experts, that resolve is giving way to a growing awareness that another such disaster is inevitable, and nothing short of a massive and endless national commitment can prevent it."


• Center for American Progress, New Orleans by the Numbers: A City Struggles to Rebuild (August 29, 2007)
  
  "Two years after Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, the city faces challenges as it tries to rebuild: not just those posed by mountains of rubble and the prospect of future hurricanes, but also a rebuilding effort hampered by inaction, mismanagement, and corruption." Related materials include an interactive map for identifying parish-by-parish evidence of progress.


• Federal Emergency Management Association (FEMA), Accommodating People With Disabilities In Disasters: A Reference Guide To Federal Law (Release no. HQ-07-169) (August 21, 2007)
  
  "The Department of Homeland Security's Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has released a new reference guide that outlines existing legal requirements and standards relating to access for people with disabilities. A Reference Guide for Accommodating Individuals with Disabilities in the Provision of Disaster Mass Care, Housing and Human Services is the first of a series of disability-related guidelines to be produced by FEMA for disaster preparedness and response planners and service providers at all levels."—Press release.


• Michael Grunwald et al., Hurricane Katrina—Two Years Later (Time magazine special report)
  
  "The most important thing to remember about the drowning of New Orleans is that it wasn't a natural disaster. It was a man-made disaster, created by lousy engineering, misplaced priorities and pork-barrel politics. Katrina was not the Category 5 killer the Big Easy had always feared; it was a Category 3 storm that missed New Orleans, where it was at worst a weak 2. The city's defenses should have withstood its surges, and if they had we never would have seen the squalor in the Superdome, the desperation on the rooftops, the shocking tableau of the Mardi Gras city underwater for weeks."


• Insurance Information Institute, Hurricane Katrina and Insurance: Two Years Later $40.6 Billion in Insurance Claim Dollars Aid Recovery (August 27, 2007)
  
  "The magnitude of Hurricane Katrina triggered a reexamination of how the United States deals with the financial consequences of natural disasters among insurers, reinsurers and public policymakers, which continues today, according to the Insurance Information Institute (I.I.I.).
  
  "Despite the attention focused on lawsuits filed following this catastrophic storm, the number of claims in litigation accounted for a very small percentage of the total number of claims filed and most of those are no longer in contention. The I.I.I. estimates that fewer than 2 percent of homeowners claims in Louisiana and Mississippi were disputed either through mediation or litigation.
  
  "Insurance companies have paid an estimated $40.6 billion to policyholders on 1.7 million claims for damage to homes, businesses and vehicles in six states. By contrast, Hurricane Andrew, the previous record holder, resulted in $15.5 billion in losses in 1992 ($22.2 billion in 2006 dollars) and 790,000 claims."—Press release.


• Charles Kenny, The World Bank, Sustainable Development Network, Finance, Economics and Urban Division, Infrastructure Governance and Corruption: Where Next? (Policy Research Working Paper 4331) (August 2007)
  
  "Governance is central to development outcomes in infrastructure, not least because corruption (a symptom of failed governance) can have significantly negative impact on returns to infrastructure investment. This conclusion holds whether infrastructure is in private or public hands. This paper looks at what has been learned about the role of governance in infrastructure, provides some recent examples of reform efforts and project approaches, and suggests an agenda for greater engagement—primarily at the sector level—to improve governance and reduce the development impact of corruption. The discussion covers market structure, regulation, state-owned enterprise reform, planning and budgeting, and project design."—Abstract.


• Eli Lehrer, Competitive Enterprise Institute, Watery Marauders: How the Federal Government Retarded the Development of Private Flood Insurance (Issue Analysis no. 8) (August 2007)
  
  "This paper describes how America's National Flood Insurance Program came into existence and seeks to answer the question of why private flood insurance never developed in the United States on a significant scale. It consists of three sections. The first section attempts to provide a brief theoretical framework for thinking about flood insurance. It describes what flood insurance does and presents a theory as to how it ought to work. The second section provides the early history of the flood insurance program. It outlines how the federal government first took on the responsibility of protecting the nation from flooding and how Congress failed in its first effort to offer federal flood insurance. The third section explains how America got the system of flood insurance that it has today. It explains how the Tennessee Valley Authority, U.S. Geological Survey, and a variety of local governments gathered enough risk data to make federal flood insurance palatable to Congress, how Congress implemented a program, and then stripped it of its risk-based character.
  
  "The paper reaches a simple conclusion: Flood insurance, in its current form, did not emerge as a result of market failure. While some factors, including the role of state regulation, remain undetermined, the current situation represents an example of what economists call 'government failure.'"—Executive Summary.


• National Agricultural Law Center, Congressional Research Service Reports
  
  "The Congressional Research Service is the public policy research arm of the United States Congress and solely serves Congress as a source of nonpartisan, objective analysis and research on all legislative issues. Through the Congress, the National Agricultural Law Center is periodically receiving CRS reports related to agriculture and food issues. New and updated reports will be posted here as they are obtained." Topics include: Renewable Energy, Resources—Conservation, Resources—Wildlife, and Rural Development.


• National Wildlife Federation (NWF), Hurricane Katrina Report Card (August 2007)
  
  "Two years after Hurricane Katrina much has become clear. We know that the devastation in New Orleans was less a natural than a man-made disaster. Katrina's surge into New Orleans and surrounding areas was the direct result of poorly constructed levees, an ill-conceived navigation channel, and the destruction of millions of acres of coastal wetlands. Furthermore, the storm's intensity itself was fueled by unusually warm waters in the tropical Atlantic due, in part, to global warming pollution.
  
  "How have Congress and the Administration responded to these lessons of Katrina and addressed the chief causes of its tragic aftermath? A report card is due on the federal government's response to global warming, reforming the Army Corps of Engineers and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), and restoring the wetlands along the Gulf Coast that act as a natural buffer to storms."


• Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), Survey: Nuclear Power Plant Neighbors Accept Potential for New Reactor Nearby by Margin of Nearly 3 to 1.
  
  "Eighty-two percent of Americans living in close proximity to nuclear power plants favor nuclear energy, and 71 percent are willing to see a new reactor built near them, according to a new public opinion survey of more than 1,100 adults across the United States. Source: Bisconti Research, Inc. with Quest Research Group."


• United Nations, Gateway to the UN System's Work on Climate Change (August 22, 2007)
  
  "The United Nations launched Gateway to the UN System's work on climate change that provides easier access to climate change information, such as fact sheets, news, calendar of events, and links to the pages describing the work on climate change issues by various UN System organizations and specialized agencies."


• United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Global Outlook for Ice & Snow (2007)
  
  "Ice, snow and climate change are closely linked. The Global Outlook for Ice and Snow investigates those connections, the current situation of ice and snow and the global significance of changes, now and in the years to come. The book was prepared for World Environment Day 2007 to provide an up-to-date assessment on this year's theme: Melting Ice—A Hot Topic? The Global Outlook for Ice and Snow is the second thematic assessment report in UNEP's Global Environment Outlook series."—Achim Steiner, United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, UNEP, Foreword.


• United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, Vienna Climate Change Talks 2007: AWG 4 and the Dialogue 4 (August 27-31, 2007)
  
  "Around 1,000 representatives from governments, business and industry, environmental organizations and research institutions are gathered this week for the Vienna Climate Change Talks 2007. The talks, held under the auspices of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), aim at setting the stage for the United Nations Bali Conference, next December. More information is available on the Web site, including side event details, submitted papers and webcast links."


• United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Office of Inspector General, Improved Management Practices Needed to Increase Use of Exchange Network (Audit Report No. 2007-P-00030) (August 20, 2007)
  
  "Although EPA established a partnership with the Exchange Network's governance bodies to assist them with accomplishing Network initiatives, more improvements are needed to ensure Network partners fully utilize the Network. These partners include EPA, States, tribes, territories, and other parties with whom EPA and States exchange information. EPA should improve its methods for selecting and prioritizing which data flows to implement. EPA also needs to take further steps to complete measurements of Network initiatives to ensure investments are delivering expected results. In addition, EPA needs to improve its internal system development practices to ensure EPA offices perform cost benefit analyses for new or upgraded environmental systems. Further, EPA should strengthen its policies to define when offices should utilize the Network for receiving environmental information."—What We Found.


• United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Office of Inspector General, Making Better Use of Superfund Special Account Funds for Thermo Chem (Early Warning Report No. 2007-S-00002) (August 20, 2007)
  
  "We found that Region 5 missed an opportunity to make timely and better use of the funds in the Thermo Chem special account. In 2004, Region 5 staff recommended the reclassification of approximately $2.8 million from the Thermo Chem special account. However, these funds were not reclassified because the site managers were unaware that action was needed or required. In addition, while EPA's guidance states that 'Regions' are responsible for identifying special accounts having balances that are more than anticipated future site needs, it does not specify the title of the regional official responsible for doing so or responsible for processing the reclassification."—What We Found.


• World Business Council for Sustainable Development, Energy Efficiency in Buildings: Business Realities and Opportunities (Facts & Trends) (Summary Report) (August 21, 2007)
  
  "Survey finds green costs overestimated by 300% and a need to foster zero net energy construction. Key players in real estate and construction misjudge the costs and benefits of 'green' buildings, creating a major barrier to more energy efficiency in the building sector...."—Press release.

Literary Warrant [15]

• Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), CREW'S Hurricane Katrina International Offers of Assistance Matrix (July 27, 2007)
  

  "CREW's matrix is based on 25,000 Department of State (DOS) documents it received as a result of a lawsuit filed under the Freedom of Information Act in December 2005 for records relating to the federal government's handling and acceptance of international offers of aid after Hurricane Katrina.
  

  "The matrix includes all international offers, whether they were rejected or accepted and the reasons why, if available. The documents reveal a number of disturbing responses to offers from 145 countries and 12 international organizations from around the world."—Press release.
  

• Rep. Tom Davis (R-VA), FEMA Was Not Forthright with Congressional Investigators (July 19, 2007)
  
  "Apparently, the problem of unsafe formaldehyde levels in FEMA trailers was more widespread than initially acknowledged. And FEMA's reaction to the problem was deliberately stunted to bolster the agency’s litigation position. New information recently provided to the Committee shows those statements mischaracterized the scope and purpose of FEMA's actual response to the formaldehyde reports. Recently discovered documents make it appear FEMA's primary concerns were legal liability and public relations, not human health and safety. Decisions about assistance to Gulf Coast residents seem to have been driven by the desire to limit litigation, even if that meant limiting genuine testing and risk mitigation efforts as well."—Press release.


• Environmental Law Institute (ELI), The Clean Water Act Jurisdictional Handbook, 2007 ed.
  

  "In June 2006 the Supreme Court, in a decision that split 4-1-4, produced a result in Rapanos v. United States that makes federal Clean Water Act jurisdiction over the wetlands, streams, and other waters of the United States confusing and uncertain for citizens, landowners, and regulators alike. Members of Congress have introduced new legislation to restore jurisdiction over many of the waters cast into doubt by the decision; and the Environmental Protection Agency and Army Corps of Engineers (the federal regulatory agencies) issued a joint guidance document in June 2007 attempting to guide their respective staffs. Numerous federal courts have attempted to apply the uncertain teachings of Rapanos as well.
  

  "With the support of the Turner Foundation, and the assistance of numerous experts in wetlands science and law, the Environmental Law Institute has prepared a handbook that analyzes the case law, compiles the relevant scientific studies, and provides a set of jurisdictional checklists. The Handbook will assist anyone faced with a jurisdictional question involving a wetland or stream to understand what factors will allow them to find Clean Water Act jurisdiction."
  

• Food & Water Watch, New Web Map Shows Regional Concentration of Factory Farms (July 24, 2007)
  

  "America's rural communities from coast to coast are living with the human health and environmental costs of factory farms that cram together hundreds of thousands of animals in filthy conditions, said Food & Water Watch today. The organization released a first-ever national map charting factory farms to illustrate how these facilities are concentrated in some regions of the country....

  "The Food & Water Watch factory farm map illustrates that confined animal feeding operations, the dominant form of livestock production in the United States, also known as CAFOs or factory farms, are found throughout the country. But some regions host a comparatively large share of intensive animal production—Iowa and North Carolina for hogs, California and Idaho for dairy cows, Texas and Kansas for cattle feedlots, Georgia and Alabama for broiler chickens, and Iowa and Ohio for egg production."—Press release.
  

• Green Electronics Council, The Environmental Benefits of the Purchase or Sale of EPEAT Registered Products in 2006 (June 17, 2007)
  
  "Numerous environmental benefits of buying high-performance, environmentally friendly computer equipment are highlighted in the first annual report issued by the Green Electronics Council this week. The report, called The Environmental Benefits of the Purchase or Sale of EPEAT Registered Products in 2006, states that the purchase of more than 36 million EPA approved computer desktops, laptops and monitors has led to a significant reduction in greenhouse gas emissions."—Press release (June 18, 2007)


• Harvard School of Public Health, Project on the Public and Biological Security, Hurricane Readiness in High-Risk Areas (June 18-July 10, 2007)
  

  "According to a new survey of people in high-risk hurricane areas conducted by the Harvard School of Public Health Project on the Public and Biological Security, one-third (31%) of residents said if government officials said they had to evacuate due to a major hurricane this season, they would not leave. This is an increase from 2006 when 23% said they would not evacuate.
  

  "The top reasons people give for not evacuating involve issues of safety and security. Three-quarters (75%) say their home is well-built and they would be safe there. Over half (56%) feel that roads would be too crowded, and slightly more than one in three (36%) feels that evacuating would be dangerous. One-third (33%) worry that their possessions would be stolen or damaged while one in four (27%) say they would not evacuate because they do not want to leave their pets."—Press release (July 24, 2007)
  

• Kevin Jon Heller, Opinio Juris (blog), The World's 15 Greenest Cities (July 30, 2007)
  
  Having just returned from the city ranked number 2, I can vouch for the ease of access to public transportation, a feature that complements well what I regard as Portland's preeminence, namely, its stature as the World's Hoppiest City. After three days of beer festival, one ought to leave the driving to Max and the TriMet.—DCR.


• Muel Kaptein et al., RSM Erasmus University, 2007 Report on European CSR Survey (July 2007)
  
  "While the world is clamouring for measures to combat climate change, the corporate community is actually taking a growing number of initiatives to tackle the problem. Likewise, climate change, which took 8th place on the 'social agenda' of major European companies in 2002, has now jumped to 4th place. In fact, the corporate community expects the issue of climate change to top its agenda within the next five years. This has become clear from a survey held among the 200 largest European companies this spring. The research focussed on the issue of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)."—Press release (July 16, 2007)


• Pamela Kaval, Department of Economics, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand, The Link between Perceived and Actual Wildfire Danger: An Economic and Spatial Analysis Study in Colorado (USA) (Working Paper in Economics 07/13) (July 2007)
  
  "Over the last 20 years, costs for wildfire initial attack in the U.S. have increased significantly. The increased cost relates to wildfire suppression practices as well as the growing number of wildland urban interface (WUI) homes. Requiring WUI residents to pay an annual tax for their wildfire risk would lower costs to the general taxpayer. Willingness-to-pay (WTP) for wildfire prevention, in relation to both perceived and actual wildfire danger, was the focus of this study. Colorado WUI residents had a high awareness of wildfire risk and were willing to pay over $400 annually to reduce this risk. Respondents beliefs about wildfire frequency were comparable to the original natural wildfire regimes of their areas pre-European settlement."—Abstract.


• Eileen R. Larence, Director, Homeland Security and Justice Issues, United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Critical Infrastructure: Sector Plans Complete and Sector Councils Evolving (Testimony before the Subcommittee on State, Local, and Private Sector Preparedness and Integration, Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs, U.S. Senate, GAO-07-1075T) (July 12, 2007)
  
  "As Hurricane Katrina so forcefully demonstrated, the nation's critical infrastructures—both physical and cyber—have been vulnerable to a wide variety of threats. Because about 85 percent of the nation's critical infrastructure is privately owned, it is vital that public and private stakeholders work together to protect these assets. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is responsible for coordinating a national protection strategy and has promoted the formation of government and private councils for the 17 infrastructure sectors as a collaborating tool. The councils, among other things, are to identify their most critical assets, assess the risks they face, and identify protective measures in sector-specific plans that comply with DHS's National Infrastructure Protection Plan (NIPP)."—Why GAO Did This Study.


• Angela Logomasini, Environmentalism's Legal Legacy (Issue Analysis, no. 7) (July 2007)
  
  "This paper highlights legislative expansion of environmental law. It uses several datasets to document the growth of the environmental legal legacy. First, an analysis of congressional vote scoring by the League of Conservation Voters (LCV) reveals that environmental pressure groups do relatively well even in a subset of close votes scored—winning a majority of the time in eight out of 17 congresses and winning 43 percent of these votes overall. It does indicate that environmental groups faced some real challenges in recent years, but it does not reveal how that affected public policy. The LCV scoring also shows that environmental groups are involved in policy making at a very detailed level."—Executive Summary.


• National Climatic Data Center (NOAA), Climate of 2007—June in Historical Perspective (July 17, 2007)
  
  "Warmer- and drier-than-average conditions dominated much of the United States during the first half of 2007, according to scientists at NOAA's National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. The lack of precipitation led to widespread drought which contributed to an early start to the wildfire season, mounting crop losses, and local drought emergencies. However, drought in the southern and central Plains gave way to heavy and persistent rains which led to devastating flooding from Texas to Kansas in June. Meanwhile, the global average temperature was the second warmest on record for the January-June six-month period."—Major Highlights.


• National Petroleum Council, Facing the Hard Truths about Energy: A Comprehensive View to 2030 of Global Oil and Natural Gas (Draft Report) (July 18, 2007)
  

  "'Accumulating risks to the supply of reliable, affordable energy' require an integrated national strategy, according to a major new report by the National Petroleum Council (NPC)....

  "Unique in its scope, the 18-month study of global energy to 2030 involved more than 350 experts from diverse backgrounds and organizations—the majority of them from outside the oil and gas industry....
  

  "Reviewing a broad range of more than 100 outlooks based on public and aggregated proprietary data, the Council study found that total global demand for energy is projected to grow from today’s huge base by 50-60 percent to 2030—the result of rising incomes around the world and population growth."—Press release.
  

• Peter R. Orszag, Director, Congressional Budget Office, Would a Cap-and-Trade Program Harm the Economy? (Letter to Honorable Jeff Bingaman, Chairman, Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, United States Senate) (July 9, 2007)
  
  "An effort to limit CO2 emissions in any given year would have two principal effects: It would produce long-term economic benefits (by avoiding damages in the future) but would impose economic costs in each year in which the limit was in effect (by restricting the use of fossil fuels, which emit CO2 into the atmosphere when they are burned). Although CBO's issue brief [Trade-Offs in Allocating Allowances for CO2 Emissions] acknowledged that reducing CO2 emissions would create both costs and benefits, it was not intended to quantify those benefits. Rather, the brief explicitly took the goal of reducing emissions as a given and focused on the near-term efficiency and distributional trade-offs associated with doing so under different methods of allocating emission allowances. More specifically, each allocation scenario considered in the brief would reduce CO2 emissions by the same amount and thus would produce the same long-term benefits, while imposing different near-term costs. Given the narrow objectives of the brief, the fact that it did not explicitly quantify the benefits of a cap-and-trade program should not be interpreted in any way as implying that CBO has concluded that the costs of such a program would outweigh the benefits."


• Thea Sebastian, Research Associate & Rick Piltz, Director, Climate Science Watch, NextGen Air Transportation System Progress Reports Ignore Climate Change (July 2007)
  
  "The Bush administration and FAA are currently focusing on a multi-agency effort to enable a major expansion of American air transportation. This effort—the Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen)—operates under the assumption that the U.S. aviation traffic will triple in the next 20 years. NextGen progress reports make no mention of climate change, global warming, or the carbon dioxide emissions of aircraft."—Press release (July 18, 2007)


• John B. Stephenson, Director, Natural Resources and Environment, United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Environmental Contamination: Department of Defense Activities Related to Trichloroethylene, Perchlorate, and Other Emerging Contaminants (Testimony Before the Subcommittee on Readiness, Committee on Armed Services, House of Representatives, GAO-07-1042T) (July 12, 2007)
  
  "DOD defines emerging contaminants as chemicals or materials with (1) perceived or real threat to health or the environment and (2) lack of published standards or a standard that is evolving or being reevaluated. Two emerging contaminants—trichloroethylene (TCE) and perchlorate—are of particular concern to DOD because they have significant potential to impact people or DOD's mission."—Why GAO Did This Study.


• John B. Stephenson, Director, Natural Resources and Environment, United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Environmental Justice: Measurable Benchmarks Needed to Gauge EPA Progress in Correcting Past Problems (Testimony Before the Subcommittee on Superfund and Environmental Health, Committee on Environment and Public Works, U.S. Senate, GAO-07-1140T) (July 25, 2007)
  
  "EPA generally devoted little attention to environmental justice when drafting three significant clean air rules between fiscal years 2000 and 2004. GAO's 2005 report concluded, for example, that while EPA guidance on rulemaking states that workgroups should consider environmental justice early in the process, a lack of guidance and training for workgroup members on how to identify potential environmental justice impacts limited their ability to analyze such issues. Similarly, while EPA considered environmental justice to varying degrees in the final stages of the rulemaking process, in general the agency rarely provided a clear rationale for its decisions on environmental justice-related matters. For example, in responding to comments during the final phase of one of the rules, EPA asserted that the rule would not have any disproportionate impacts on low-income or minority communities, but did not publish any data or the agency’s assumptions in support of that conclusion."—What GAO Found.
  


• Alexandra D. Syphard, Department of Forest Ecology and Management, University of Wisconsin, et al., Human Influence on California Fire Regimes, Ecological Applications, v.17, no.5, pp.1388-1402 (July 2007)
  

  "A new study quantifies how distribution of housing developments and the kinds of fire fuels at the wildland-urban interface can help predict fires in California, a state that experiences monumental fire hazards."—Press release (July 18, 2007).
  

  The full-text of the study is available to subscribers to Ecological Applications.
  

• Union of Concerned Scientists, Creating Jobs, Saving Energy, and Protecting the Environment: An Analysis of the Potential Benefits of Investing in Efficient Cars and Trucks, A 2007 Update.
  
  "Increasing the average fuel economy of America's new autos to 35 miles per gallon (mpg) by 2018 would save consumers $61 billion at the gas pump and increase U.S. employment by 241,000 jobs in the year 2020, including 23,900 in the auto industry, according to a new analysis from the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS). This study comes as the House of Representatives prepares to consider energy legislation in the coming weeks. This energy package could include debate over a bill introduced by Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Rep. Todd Platts (R-Penn.) that calls for increasing fuel economy standards by four percent per year, with guaranteed progress to 35 mpg by 2018."—Press release (July 11, 2007)


• United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD), Report on the Fifteenth Session (12 May 2006 and 30 April-11 May 2007) (Economic and Social Council Official Records, 2007, Supplement No. 9, E/CN.17/2007/15)
  
  "[D]iscussions were based on a wide range of issues related to the interlinked themes of energy for sustainable development, industrial development, air pollution/atmosphere and climate change"—UN Pulse (July 17, 2007)


• United States Department of Homeland Security, FY 2007 Homeland Security Grant Program (2007)
  
  "HSGP grants enhance the ability of states, territories, and urban areas to prevent, protect against, respond to and recover from terrorist attacks and other disasters. Including this funding, by the end of FY 2007, DHS will have invested $23 billion in local planning, organization, equipment, training, and exercises for state and local governments since September 11, 2001."—Press release (July 18, 2007). See the beSpacific link for related documents, including a National Congress for Health System Readiness report on state disaster response plans.


• United States Department of State, U.S. Climate Action Report—2006: Fourth National Communication of the United States of America under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (2007)
  

  "The United States is pursuing a comprehensive strategy to address global climate change that is science-based, fosters breakthroughs in clean energy technologies, and encourages coordinated global action in support of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
  

  "The U.S. strategy integrates measures to address climate change into a broader agenda that promotes energy security, pollution reduction, and sustainable economic development. This integrated approach recognizes that actions to address climate change, including actions to mitigate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, will be more sustainable and successful if they produce multiple economic and environmental benefits.
  

  "The United States is committed to continued leadership on climate change. Promoting biofuels, advanced fossil fuel technologies, renewable sources of energy, and advanced nuclear technologies is a key component of U.S. climate-related efforts. Since 2001, the Nation has dedicated nearly $29 billion to advance climate-related science, technology, international assistance, and incentive programs."—Executive Summary.
  

• United States Environmental Protection Agency, US-Mexico Border 2012 Program
  

  "U.S.-Mexico Environmental Program (Border 2012) is a collaboration between the United States and Mexico to improve the environment and protect the health of the nearly 12 million people living along the border. The bi-national program focuses on cleaning the air, providing safe drinking water, reducing the risk of exposure to hazardous waste, and ensuring emergency preparedness along the U.S.-Mexico border.
  

  "Border 2012 is a results-oriented program that takes a 'bottom-up' approach to addressing the environmental and public health needs of the border region. Issues and projects are identified and implemented at the local level. The program encourages stakeholder involvement through a variety of opportunities."
  

• United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Emergency Management Assistance Compact: Enhancing EMAC's Collaborative and Administrative Capacity Should Improve National Disaster Response (Report to the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, U.S. Senate, GAO-07-854) (June 2007)
  
  "EMAC, along with its accompanying policies, procedures, and practices, enables its members to overcome differences to achieve a common mission—streamlining and expediting the delivery of resources among members during disasters. While these policies, procedures, and practices have worked well for smaller-scale deployments, they have not kept pace with the changing use of EMAC, sometimes resulting in confusion and deployment delays. The EMAC network has taken steps to address several of these challenges, but additional improvements can be made in a number of areas including clarifying roles and responsibilities of EMAC members and improving existing systems that track resources deployed under EMAC. In addition, a lack of sufficiently detailed federal standards and policies has led to some reimbursement delays and additional administrative burdens."—What GAO Found.

Literary Warrant [12]

This post, like the previous LW, is going on a bit. I'll submit it now and proceed to compile another, which will consequently consist of materials that came to light before many of those included herein.

• beSpacific, GAO Releases Report Critical of EPA's 9/11 Cleanup (June 20, 2007)
  
  Includes a link to the United States Senate Committee on Environment & Public Works, Subcommittee on Superfund and Environmental Health, hearing entitled, EPA's Response to 9-11 and Lessons Learned for Future Emergency Preparedness, and to related materials.


• Marion C. Blakey, Administrator, Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), An Affirmative Obligation (June 19, 2007)
  
  "Make no mistake about this one. Although aviation represents less than three percent of greenhouse gases, we have an affirmative obligation to drive that number as low as it can go. And why not start by leveraging the great work that the U.S. military is already doing, rather than starting from scratch?
  
  "To put this all in context, we're the largest aviation market in the world. We moved 12 percent more passengers and 22 percent more freight in 2006 than we did at the turn of the century, and did this while producing 10 million tons less of CO2, using 5 percent less fuel. How’s that for improved productivity? Remember, this is in an industry that’s very focused on controlling costs and operating more efficiently . In aviation, that means reducing fuel consumption and the emissions that go along with it."


• Center for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED), Annual Disaster Statistical Review: Numbers and Trends 2006 (May 2007)
  
  "Since 1998, we have learned that a consolidated, rapidly produced statistical overview is much more than a number crunch: it is an invaluable tool for both planning and advocacy. The 2006 disaster figures remind us once more that all countries and all human populations are vulnerable to disasters.
  
  "In 2006, we observed a return to a kind of 'normality' after the major events of the last few years. Even though the disasters in 2006 have not captured as much attention as those of the recent past, it is important to remember that they have had devastating impacts. Every day, lives are irreparably damaged and destroyed by disasters. In 2006, there were 427 reported natural disasters that killed more than 23,000 people, affected almost 143 million others, and were the cause of more than US$34.5 billion in economic damages."—Introduction.


• Augustin Collete, Climate Change Consultant, UNESCO World Heritage Centre, Case Studies on Climate Change and World Heritage (2007)
  
  "This publication presents several case studies of selected natural and cultural World Heritage sites in order to illustrate the impacts of climate change that have already been observed and those which can be anticipated in the future. For each of the featured sites, some adaptation measures are also reviewed. It is hoped that these examples would not only be of interest to World Heritage professionals and practitioners but also to the public at large."—Introduction.


• Council on Foreign Relations, Energy Security: What It Means and How to Achieve It (June 21, 2007)
  A video (also available as an audio file) including panelists David L. Goldwyn, President, Goldwyn International Strategies, and Senior Associate, Energy Program, Center for Strategic & International Studies; David Sandalow, Energy and Environment Scholar, The Brookings Institution; and Thomas Wallin, President, Energy Intelligence Group, Inc. The presider is John Gapper, Associate Editor & Chief Business Commentator, New York Bureau, The Financial Times.


• European Environment Agency (EEA), Annual European Community Greenhouse Gas Inventory 1990–2005 and Inventory Report 2007: Submission to the UNFCCC Secretariat (Technical report No. 7/2007) (Version 27 May 2007)
  
  "This report is the annual submission of the greenhouse gas inventory of the European Community to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. It presents greenhouse gas emissions between 1990 and 2005 by individual Member State and by economic sector. The report shows that between 2004 and 2005 emissions in the 15 pre-2004 Member States decreased by 35.2 million tonnes or 0.8% and total EU-27 emissions decreased by 0.7%. EU-15 emissions in 2005 were 2% below base year levels under the Kyoto Protocol and EU-27 emission were 7.9% below 1990 levels."—DocuTicker summary.
  


• European Environment Agency (EEA), Land-use Scenarios for Europe: Qualitative and Quantitative Analysis on a European Scale (EEA Technical report, no. 9/2007) (ISSN 1725–2237) (2007)
  
  "Long‑term contrasting scenarios can provide context and a backdrop against which the debate on land use and our environmental future can take place. The European Environment Agency initiated the PRELUDE project (PRospective Environmental
  analysis of Land Use Development in Europe) to develop coherent scenarios that describe plausible future developments for land use in EU‑25 plus Norway and Switzerland and their potential environmental impacts for the period 2005–2035.
  
  "An analysis of historic and possible future patterns of land use and landscape changes requires good data, scientific rigour, imagination and expertise from different perspectives. The PRELUDE scenarios combine imagination, data, modelling and narratives. The narratives, or storylines, were developed in order to also illustrate the impact of possible events and developments that cannot be represented with state of the art models—and tend to be ignored in policy discussions. With the PRELUDE initiative, the EEA decided to embark on a truly participative scenario building process.... Building on different assumptions about societal, economic, political, technological and environmental change, the panel arrived at five qualitative scenarios. Each scenario implies specific land-use changes and impacts on the environment, which have been analysed and quantified by landuse experts using state‑of‑the art simulation models."—Ch. 1, Landscapes to the living: which way to the future?


• Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) & United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), ECOLEX.
  
  "ECOLEX is an information service on environmental law, operated jointly by FAO, IUCN and UNEP. Its purpose is to build capacity worldwide by providing the most comprehensive possible global source of information on environmental law. This unique resource, which combines the environmental law information holdings of FAO, IUCN and UNEP , seeks to put this information at the disposal of users world-wide, in an easily accessible service, employing modern technology. The ECOLEX database includes information on treaties, international soft-law and other non-binding policy and technical guidance documents, national legislation, judicial decisions, and law and policy literature. Users have direct access to the abstracts and indexing information about each document, as well as to the full text of most of the information provided."—What is ECOLEX?


• National Research Council (The National Academies), Major Increase in Federal Research Needed to Determine Size of U.S. Coal Reserves and Meet Increasing Challenges in Mining Safety, Environmental Protection (June 20, 2007)
  
  "Because coal will continue to provide a substantial portion of U.S. energy for at least the next several decades, a major increase in federal support for research and development is needed to ensure that this natural resource is extracted efficiently, safely, and in an environmentally responsible manner, says a new congressionally mandated report from the National Research Council. Policymakers also need a more accurate assessment of the extent and location of the nation's coal reserves, the report adds. It recommends an increase of about $144 million annually in new federal funding across a variety of areas."—Press release.


• National Resources Defense Council, Addicted to Oil: Ranking States' Oil Vulnerability and Solutions for Change (June 2007)
  
  "This paper ranks U.S. states on two critical areas related to America's continuing addiction to oil. First, their oil vulnerability—that is, how heavily each state’s citizens are affected by increases in oil prices. Second, states are ranked on their implementation of solutions to reduce their oil dependence—what measures they are taking to lessen their vulnerability and to bolster America's security. The data yield two clear conclusions:
  
  
  • Oil dependence affects all states, but some are hit harder economically than others.
  
  
  • While some states are pioneering solutions, many are taking little or no action. In fact, about one-third of states are not taking any steps to reduce their oil dependence.


• National Transportation Enhancements Clearinghouse, Enhancing America's Communities: A Guide to Transportation Enhancements (March 2007)
  
  "Enhancing America's Communities showcases 15 projects that illustrate the power of Transportation Enhancements to catalyze community revitalization and provide for an enhanced transportation experience.
  
  "The Congress included Transportation Enhancements (TE) in the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA) in 1991 to signal its intention to provide funding for a broad array of projects designed to maximize the potential of transportation to invigorate communities. The Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient
  Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users (SAFETEALU), enacted in 2005, represents a continuing commitment by Congress to focus on more than just the provision of 'ribbons of concrete.' With more than 20,000 projects on the ground around the country, transportation enhancements have proven that transportation projects can do more than efficiently move people. They can simultaneously improve local economies, enhance the environment, and create central community places."


• Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), U.S. Army to Contract Out Environmental Staff (June 20, 2007)
  
  "The U.S. Army is poised to begin contracting out its environmental, natural and cultural resource staff positions, according to agency documents released today by ... PEER. The Army is proceeding despite advice from its own lawyers that privatizing these functions violates the basic conservation law governing Defense Department operations.".—Press release.


• Reconnecting America & the Center for Transit-Oriented Development, TOD 101: Why Transit-Oriented Development And Why Now? (2007)
  
  "Transit-oriented development or TOD is typically defined as more compact development within easy walking distance of transit stations (typically a half mile) that contains a mix of uses such as housing, jobs, shops, restaurants and entertainment. At Reconnecting America we believe projects should also achieve the goals listed here. TOD is really about creating walkable, sustainable communities for people of all ages and incomes and providing more transportation and housing choices (including townhomes, apartments, live-work spaces, and lofts). These neighborhoods provide for a lifestyle that's convenient, affordable and active, and create places where our children can play and our parents can grow old comfortably."—What is Transit-Oriented Development and Why Should You Care?


• UN-Energy/Africa, Energy for Sustainable Development: Policy Options for Africa (Publication to CSD15) (2007)
  
  "Over the last four decades, the gap between energy supply and demand in Africa has been growing. Projections by experts in the field forecast that this gap will continue to grow, and the livelihood of more Africans will continue to be critically impaired by energy poverty, that will seriously slow down the socioeconomic development of the continent. Energy has been supplied in insufficient quantity, at a cost, form and quality that has limited its consumption by the majority of Africa's population, making the continent the lowest per capita consumer of modern energy of all regions of the world. The challenges are indeed daunting, and more than ever, a concerted effort by all actors is required to achieve any significant progress.
  
  "Most UN agencies and programmes have endeavoured to address some aspects of the African Energy challenge in their work programmes. In this UN-Energy/Africa flagship book, key issues related to policy, regulation, renewable energy development, energy access in urban, peri-urban and rural areas, regional strategies for addressing energy poverty, power sector reforms, energy planning, and energy finance are addressed by various UN agencies and programmes, with the objectives to highlight the main challenges and provide some policy guidelines to accelerate energy supply and access in Africa."—Overview.


• United Nations Dag Hammarskjöld Library, United Nations Documentation: Research Guide—The Environment (June 2007)
  
  "To enable researchers to identify key UN bodies working in the area of the environment as well as related documentation, a special chapter has been added to the Research Guide which also includes: a listing of important meetings which have taken place over the years; full text links to multilateral treaties; a listing of key reference tools issued by the Organization; and tips for identifying environment documentation using UNBISnet and the Official Documents System of the United Nations (ODS)."—Press release (May 2007)


• United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Office of Inspector General (OIG), Overcoming Obstacles to Measuring Compliance: Practices in Selected Federal Agencies (Evaluation Report No. 2007-P-00027) (June 20, 2007)
  
  "Federal regulatory agencies with missions and obstacles similar to EPA use statistical methods to generate compliance information. They use this information to monitor their enforcement and compliance programs and demonstrate program results. These Federal programs extensively use statistical methods to identify and analyze risk, set goals, develop strategies to manage the most significant risks, and report their accomplishments. While the programs we reviewed face similar obstacles as OECA [EPA's Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance], they use practical approaches to overcome these obstacles that OECA could potentially apply to its programs."—What We Found.


• United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Energy Efficiency: Important Challenges Must Be Overcome to Realize Significant Opportunities for Energy Efficiency Improvements in Gulf Coast Reconstruction (Report to Congressional Addressees, GAO-07-654) (June 2007)
  
  "Reconstruction in the Gulf Coast creates a significant opportunity for incorporating energy efficiency improvements that could produce long-term energy costs savings in residential and commercial buildings. The sheer magnitude of the reconstruction effort and Louisiana's and Mississippi's recent adoption of more energy-efficient building codes makes this an opportune time for incorporating energy efficiency improvements in the rebuilding efforts. In partnership with a DOE national laboratory, GAO analyzed energy cost savings opportunities and estimated that adopting these newer building codes could reduce residential energy costs in these two states by at least $20 to $28 million per year, depending on the extent of the rebuilding efforts in these states. Furthermore, the analysis also showed that annual energy expenditures for commercial buildings—hospitals, schools, offices, and retail buildings—built to newer energy standards could be about 7 to 34 percent lower than buildings built to older standards. There also are opportunities for consumers to make additional energy efficiency improvements to both building types by replacing old, damaged equipment."—What GAO Found.


• United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Hurricane Katrina: EPA's Current and Future Environmental Protection Efforts Could Be Enhanced by Addressing Issues and Challenges Faced on the Gulf Coast (Report to Congressional Committees, GAO-07-651) (June 2007)
  
  "While EPA provided useful environmental health risk information to the public via flyers, public service announcements, and the EPA Web page, the communications were at times unclear and inconsistent on how to mitigate exposure to some contaminants, particularly asbestos and mold. Further, the usefulness of three key reports on EPA's environmental sampling in New Orleans—developed with, among others, the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality to address potential health risks from exposure to floodwaters, sediments, and air—was limited by a lack of timeliness and insufficient disclosures about EPA's sampling program. For example, EPA did not state until August 2006 that its December 2005 report—which said that the great majority of the data showed that adverse health effects would not be expected from exposure to sediments from previously flooded areas—applied to short-term visits, such as to view damage to homes.
  
  "Mitigating several challenges EPA faces addressing Hurricane Katrina could better protect the environment in the future. First, EPA did not remove hazardous materials from national wildlife refuges in a timely manner as part of its response in part because disaster assistance funding generally is not used for debris cleanups on federal lands. Second, because states generally have authority over landfill decisions, EPA does not have an effective role in emergency debris disposal decisions that could cause pollution. Finally, lack of clarity in federal debris management plans and protocols precluded the timely and safe disposal of some appliances and electronic waste."—What GAO Found.


• United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Wildland Fire Management: Lack of Clear Goals or a Strategy Hinders Federal Agencies’ Efforts to Contain the Costs of Fighting Fires (Report to Congressional Requesters, GAO-07-655) (June 2007)
  
  "The Forest Service and Interior agencies have initiated a number of steps to address key operational areas previously identified as needing improvement to help federal agencies contain wildland fire costs, but the effects on containing costs are unknown, in part because many of these steps are not yet complete. First, federal firefighting agencies are developing a system to help them better identify and set priorities for lands needing treatment to reduce fuels, but they have yet to decide how they will keep data in the system current. Second, federal agencies have taken some steps to improve how they acquire and use personnel, equipment, and other firefighting assets—such as implementing a computerized system to more efficiently dispatch and track available firefighting assets—but have not yet completed the more fundamental step of determining the appropriate type and quantity of firefighting assets needed for the fire season. Third, the agencies have clarified certain policies and are improving analytical tools that assist officials in identifying and implementing an appropriate response to a given fire, but several other policies limit the agencies’ use of less aggressive firefighting strategies, which typically cost less. Fourth, federal agencies, working with nonfederal entities, have recently taken steps to clarify guidance to better ensure that firefighting costs are shared consistently for fires that threaten both federal and nonfederal lands and resources, but it is unclear how the agencies will ensure that this guidance is followed."—What GAO Found.


• Beth Wellington, Commentary on the Clean Water Protection Act (June 25, 2007)
  
  This brief LLRX.com commentary provides background about H.R. 2169, and includes links to organizations of supporters and opponents.


• Yet Wah Seto, Edmund, et al., Spatial Distribution of Traffic Induced Noise Exposures in a US City: An Analytic Tool for Assessing the Health Impacts of Urban Planning Decisions, International Journal of Health Geographics, v.6 (doi:10.1186/1476-072X-6-24) (June 21, 2007)
  
  "In this paper we present a GIS-based model for evaluating the spatial distribution of traffic-induced noise in an urban environment. Applying the model to the City of San Francisco, we find that the potential risk of annoyance is large, and varies considerably between neighborhoods. This work has implications for building design and construction in new urban neighborhoods, particularly urban infill that may increase density in environments with preexisting noise problems. It also highlights the need for transportation alternatives, as automobiles are the major source of community noise. Finally, the work has implications for environmental justice, as we show that areas of high population density suffer disproportionately from the impacts of urban noise. The relatively simple model presented here may be used to evaluate changes in noise exposures and annoyance as one tool in a larger toolbox for Health Impact Assessments of transportation and land use planning."—Conclusions.