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Subsidies for Direct Air Capture: Lessons From the Solar Industry

The name of the climate game right now is fast, sustained progress. The world needs this both politically and technologically to effectively fight climate change. Progress was achieved both politically and technologically with the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (IRA), which allocated $369 billion to “energy security and climate change,” amounting to the United States’ largest investment in climate action to date.

Resilient Carbon

Carbon offsets allow polluters to pay someone else to reduce, avoid, or remove emissions to counterbalance their own emissions. For some, carbon accounting concerns render offsets a necessary evil to be tightly regulated on the path toward decarbonization. For others, moral and political concerns render offsets a dangerous mistake to be thrown out of the climate law toolbox.

An Unlikely Climate Hero? Experimental Populations Outside Their Historical Range

Climate change is ravaging the flora and fauna of the United States and contributes to ecosystem damage, including the conversion of Alaskan forests to savannah grasslands, rising sea levels that have destroyed the Key deer’s habitat, and warming regional temperatures that have stifled the growth of crops in the Northeast. What if there were a way for species to thrive away from the sinking coasts and changing landscapes that they have historically inhabited?

Managing Threats to Beaches From Storms and Rising Seas

More severe storms and rising sea levels resulting from the changing climate pose a threat to ecosystems along the U.S. coast. These include beaches, dunes, wetlands, and marshes, which provide significant environmental, recreational, and economic benefits. Practices to sustain these ecosystems are available, but are not well understood, face legal and financial obstacles, and have not been widely implemented. On January 25, 2023, the Environmental Law Institute hosted a panel of experts who explored measures and practices for sustaining beaches and dunes in the face of a changing climate.

Addressing the “Green Resource Curse” in Sub-Saharan Africa

The global transition to a carbon-neutral economy will bring about a surging demand for land and for minerals required in renewable energy technologies. It brings the threat of conflict between those seeking to develop these resources and those who live on the lands and risk displacement, loss of livelihood, and environmental contamination. These risks are particularly acute in Sub-Saharan Africa, though many Sub-Saharan countries have adopted legislation to prevent and peacefully resolve disputes.

SDG 15: Life on Land

In 2015, the United Nations Member States, including the United States, unanimously approved 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to be achieved by 2030. In a forthcoming book, leading legal scholars examine each of the SDGs and recommend a suite of government, private-sector, and civil society actions to help the United States achieve these goals. This Article is adapted from Chapter 15 of that book, Governing for Sustainability (John C. Dernbach & Scott E. Schang eds., ELI Press, forthcoming 2023).

Salmon, Climate Change, and the Future

This Article examines the nature of the threats that climate change poses and will continue to pose for salmon recovery, as well as possible legal responses to combat these threats. It also considers the future prospects of Pacific salmon in a world that will include significant climate change and other threats to preserving and equitably apportioning the salmon resource, whose environmental sensitivity and expansive life cycle will continue to pose substantial challenges for the foreseeable future.

Playing the Long Game: Expediting Permitting Without Compromising Protections

The Biden Administration’s efforts to promote clean energy have prompted calls for permit reform. A clean energy economy demands a global increase in mineral production, and some suggest environmental standards must be loosened. This premise fails to distinguish among causes of delay in the permitting process, and increased demand for minerals should not overshadow the productive purposes served by permitting. At the same time, there are opportunities to improve permitting without compromising health and safety standards.

Clean Air Act Regulation After West Virginia and the Inflation Reduction Act

On October 29, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari in West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency, a petition filed by several states and coal companies attacking the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA’s) regulatory authority under the Clean Air Act (CAA). The Court’s holding in this case would determine EPA’s continued ability to use the CAA—including the national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS) program—as a climate change tool.