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Full-Text Articles in Law
Space Commercialization: The Need To Immediately Renegotiate Treaties Implicating International Environmental Law, Alexander G. Davis
Space Commercialization: The Need To Immediately Renegotiate Treaties Implicating International Environmental Law, Alexander G. Davis
San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law
Outer space is truly the final frontier for both scientific exploration and frontier-style commercialization. Given its extra-national nature, international treaties have formed the basis of space law, but these treaties predate any notion of the true potential for space commercialization. The private sector has relied on this regulation-free industry when developing its spacecraft, mission structure, and operating procedures, often to the detriment of Earth's and its surrounding environment, with space debris, i.e. space junk or space trash, and greenhouse gas emissions being the primary externalities. This Comment provides a background on the commercial space industry and applicable law and treaties, …
State Renewable Portfolio Standards: Is There A "Race" And Is It "To The Top"?, Lincoln L. Davies
State Renewable Portfolio Standards: Is There A "Race" And Is It "To The Top"?, Lincoln L. Davies
San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law
This Article proceeds in six parts. Part II offers a primer on RPSs, describing RPSs primary traits, how the laws are designed, why they are enacted, and how that relates to regulatory races. Part III overviews the literature on regulatory races, contrasting races to the bottom with races to the top. Part IV conceptualizes how state enactments of RPSs might be viewed as a race to the top. Part V examines evidence on whether RPSs can in fact be understood as a regulatory race. Using this evidence, Part V determines that state RPSs do not appear to be trending toward …
Why Not A Regional Approach To State Renewable Power Mandates?, Kirsten H. Engel
Why Not A Regional Approach To State Renewable Power Mandates?, Kirsten H. Engel
San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law
There is much to be said in favor of a regional approach with respect to renewable energy mandates. First, uniformity in the particulars of state RPS laws would assist the growing interstate renewable energy market. Second, allowing renewable power that is generated anywhere but delivered locally to satisfy the RPS of any of the states within the region, should enhance the reliability of the market for renewable power, increase the amount of intermittent power accommodated by the grid, and lower the price of renewable power. Each of these effects will strengthen the regional market for renewable power to the overall …
Solar Energy Development On The Federal Public Lands: Environmental Trade-Offs On The Road To A Lower Carbon Future, Robert L. Glicksman
Solar Energy Development On The Federal Public Lands: Environmental Trade-Offs On The Road To A Lower Carbon Future, Robert L. Glicksman
San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law
The federal government has endorsed more extensive use of the federal public lands for the production of solar power, both to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to climate change and to bolster the security of domestic energy supplies. Spurred by grant money made available under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in 2010 approved nine utility-scale solar projects on public lands in California and Nevada. These projects were designed to avoid adversely affecting the habitats of endangered and threatened species that frequent the desert southwest and cultural resources important to …
Clean Energy And The Price Preemption Ceiling, Jim Rossi
Clean Energy And The Price Preemption Ceiling, Jim Rossi
San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law
Part I of this Article provides an illustration of the feed-in tariff one clean energy innovation many state and municipal governments have enacted to encourage investment in renewable energy. In a nutshell, the feed-in tariff is a secure contract for renewable power at a set price over a term of years that provides a return to investors in these projects, such as a homeowner installing a solar panel or wind turbine. Part II of this Article describes preemption issues that have risen with feed-in tariffs under two federal statutes the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act of 1978, which requires utilities …
Administrative Absurdity: Why The Judiciary Should Uphold Epa's Use Of The Administrative Necessity And Absurd Results Doctrines Within The Tailoring Rule., David P. Vincent
Administrative Absurdity: Why The Judiciary Should Uphold Epa's Use Of The Administrative Necessity And Absurd Results Doctrines Within The Tailoring Rule., David P. Vincent
San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law
This Comment analyzes the strengths and weaknesses of the arguments advanced by EPA as well as its opponents regarding the Agencys reliance on these administrative law doctrines to tailor PSD and Title V applicability criteria. The Comment concludes with an explanation of why the judiciary will likely rule in EPAs favor in this instance.
Part I of this Comment introduces the Tailoring Rule, including its background and the emissions thresholds it seeks to implement regarding PSD and Title V programs. Part II presents EPAs legal basis for the creation and subsequent implementation of the Tailoring Rule, including the concept of …
Port And Coastal State Control Of Atmospheric Pollution, Michael W. Reed
Port And Coastal State Control Of Atmospheric Pollution, Michael W. Reed
San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law
Controlling atmospheric pollution which originates beyond national borders always presents difficult issues. The problems are multiplied when the source is a merchant vessel, registered under a foreign flag of convenience and operating seaward of state and federal sovereign limits. Nevertheless, international law provides alternative approaches through which the coastal sovereign may protect its onshore environmental interests.
The purpose of this paper is to lay out the problems, both factual and legal, and discuss means by which they may be resolved. California is used as a case study. The state has long suffered from excessive air pollution. Congress acknowledged the state?s …
Regulation, Climate Change, And The Electric Grid, Davod B. Spence
Regulation, Climate Change, And The Electric Grid, Davod B. Spence
San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law
In Part I of this essay, I outline some of the background characteristics of the electric grid, the way it is operated, and the way regulators and grid operators manage the sale and transmission of electricity across it. In Part II, I explore the opportunities and potential problems associated with integrating intermittent, renewable sources of electric generation into the grid. This discussion includes a review of a number of recent studies examining the GHG emissions effects of using fossil fueled generation to back up wind power, as well as the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission?s (FERC) recent rulemakings addressing this …
Energy And Animals: A History Of Conflict, Alexandra B. Klass
Energy And Animals: A History Of Conflict, Alexandra B. Klass
San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law
Environmental groups, federal and state agencies, and others who support the development of renewable energy have struggled in recent years with the adverse impacts of such development on animals and animal habitat. Although renewable energy development has the benefit of creating energy without the greenhouse gas emissions associated with traditional energy development, it does so through an intensive use of land, including federal public lands, thus competing with habitats for protected species and other wildlife. Conflicts between energy and animals, of course, are nothing new. Congress, agencies, and courts have attempted for decades to balance the public interest in domestic …
Effective Renewable Energy Policy: Leave It To The States?, Steven Weissman
Effective Renewable Energy Policy: Leave It To The States?, Steven Weissman
San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law
The federal system employed in the United States offers many models for cooperation between the federal government and the states in pursuit of important policy objectives. Under the Clean Air Act, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency can establish air quality standards and delegate enforcement to the states. The Coastal Zone Management Act empowers states to establish plans for management of ocean waters close to shore and to have a say related to offshore projects that are in federal jurisdictional waters. The Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977 allows coal states to set and enforce their own rules related …