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China In Context: Energy, Water, And Climate Cooperation, Elizabeth Burleson Jan 2010

China In Context: Energy, Water, And Climate Cooperation, Elizabeth Burleson

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.


Siting Green Infrastructure: Legal And Policy Solutions To Alleviate Urban Poverty And Promote Healthy Communities, Alexandra Dapolito Dunn Jan 2010

Siting Green Infrastructure: Legal And Policy Solutions To Alleviate Urban Poverty And Promote Healthy Communities, Alexandra Dapolito Dunn

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Green infrastructure is an economically and environmentally viable approach for water management and natural resource protection in urban areas. This Article argues that green infrastructure has additional and exceptional benefits for the urban poor which are not frequently highlighted or discussed. When green infrastructure is concentrated in distressed neighborhoods—where it frequently is not—it can improve urban water quality, reduce urban air pollution, improve public health, enhance urban aesthetics and safety, generate green collar jobs, and facilitate urban food security. To make these quality of life and health benefits available to the urban poor, it is essential that urban leaders remove …


Biofuels: Potentials, Problems & Solutions, Richard L. Ottinger Jan 2009

Biofuels: Potentials, Problems & Solutions, Richard L. Ottinger

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Biofuels have the exciting potential of mitigating the grave threats of global warming, reducing the world's dependence on imported oil from insecure sources and of reducing the skyrocketing costs of oil that are threatening to undermine the world's economies and devastating the people in non-oil producing, developing countries. For the people in these countries, biofuel offer a promising road to enhance development since they use local materials, can provide local jobs, and do not require the import of expensive equipment and expertise. Brazil has been the pioneer in the use of biofuel, allowing it to eliminate its oil imports, becoming …


Energy Security, Green Job Creation, And Youth Innovation, Elizabeth Burleson Jan 2009

Energy Security, Green Job Creation, And Youth Innovation, Elizabeth Burleson

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.


Wind Power, National Security, And Sound Energy Policy, Elizabeth Burleson Jan 2009

Wind Power, National Security, And Sound Energy Policy, Elizabeth Burleson

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Wind-generated electricity in the United States has grown by more than 400 percent since 2000. According to the Department of Energy, 6 percent of US land could supply more than one and a half times the current electricity consumption of the country. Yet, challenges remain in matching demand for electricity with supply of wind as well as achieving grid parity. Careful wind turbine and transmission line siting can occur through cooperation between federal, state, tribal, and civil society participation in decision-making. Tribal wind initiatives have shown that developing wind power can also benefit rural communities. Congress should pass a national …


Using Local Knowledge To Shrink The Individual Carbon Footprint, Katrina Fischer Kuh Jan 2009

Using Local Knowledge To Shrink The Individual Carbon Footprint, Katrina Fischer Kuh

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Entire texts have been devoted to exploring the meaning of the term “lifestyle” and sociological understandings of lifestyle are complex and nuanced.For present purposes, however, a more simple articulation of the term will suffice. Lifestyle can mean “mode of living,” including “patterns of action” and “patterns of ways of living.” Without rendering judgment, one observation that can fairly be made about the current lifestyles and associated behaviors of Americans is that they indirectly and directly lead to the emission of a high volume of greenhouse gases (“GHGs”).7 Although an American diplomat is said to have remarked in preparing for …


Foreword: Energy And The Environment: Empowering Consumers, Katrina Fischer Kuh Jan 2009

Foreword: Energy And The Environment: Empowering Consumers, Katrina Fischer Kuh

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The conference Energy and the Environment: Empowering Consumers brought together legal scholars, attorneys, scientists, philosophers, journalists, sociologists, elected representatives, and agency experts. This symposium issue of the Hofstra Law Review presents a selection of papers from conference participants that, together, illustrate some of the opportunities, challenges, and diverse questions that arise in the effort to deploy energy and environmental law and policy to embrace individual consumers and combat climate change.


Energy Policy, Intellectual Property, And Technology Transfer To Address Climate Change, Elizabeth Burleson Jan 2009

Energy Policy, Intellectual Property, And Technology Transfer To Address Climate Change, Elizabeth Burleson

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.


Solar Energy: New York City Sets Pace In Adopting Sound Policies, John R. Nolon, Jessica A. Bacher Aug 2008

Solar Energy: New York City Sets Pace In Adopting Sound Policies, John R. Nolon, Jessica A. Bacher

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Through state legislation and local land use powers, municipalities in New York have authority to facilitate solar energy usage and reduce carbon emissions. This article analyzes several specific New York and municipal legislative provisions enabling New York’s municipalities to encourage or discourage solar energy. Interestingly, many of the tools discussed in this article are variations of pre-existing traditional land use tools such as, variances, subdivision design requirements, or fee exemptions.


The Externalities Of Nuclear Power: First, Assume We Have A Can Opener . . ., Karl S. Coplan May 2008

The Externalities Of Nuclear Power: First, Assume We Have A Can Opener . . ., Karl S. Coplan

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The nuclear power industry has latched on to global warming as an argument for its renaissance. Although even industry proponents acknowledge that the problem of disposing of spent nuclear fuel remains unsolved, the industry routinely assumes this problem will be solved in the future. Unfortunately, this is the same assumption made by nuclear energy proponents at the beginning of the nuclear industry fifty years ago. We haven’t solved the nuclear waste problem in the past half century, and there is no reason to think we will be more likely to do so in the next one. Like the shipwrecked economist …


A Review Of Barriers To Biofuel Market Development In The United States, Karl R. Rábago Jan 2008

A Review Of Barriers To Biofuel Market Development In The United States, Karl R. Rábago

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

In recent years, biofuel markets have begun a resurgence. At one time, biofuels were the only way humanity obtained useful energy, but they were almost totally displaced by fossil fuels during the last century. Now, due to a range of drivers, they have begun a small but seemingly solid comeback. This Article reviews the remaining barriers to full commercial success for biofuels in the United States with an emphasis on transportation fuels. While recent success has been impressive, markets for transportation biofuels are hardly “self-sustaining” in the purest sense of the concept. The author does not seek to disparage the …


A Strategy For Developing Stationary Biodiesel Generation, Karl R. Rábago Jan 2006

A Strategy For Developing Stationary Biodiesel Generation, Karl R. Rábago

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This paper discusses the drivers of change in the electricity system and the opportunities presented for biodiesel electric generation in this context. This paper also introduces the primary issues facing increased utilization of biodiesel—both those that challenge increased use of the fuel and those that support this use. Finally, the paper presents key elements of a strategy for realizing the potential of an electric generation infrastructure that incorporates more distributed biodiesel generation in the near term and even more distributed energy resources over the longer term.


Energy Efficiency: The Best Immediate Option For A Secure, Clean, Healthy Future, Richard L. Ottinger Jan 2006

Energy Efficiency: The Best Immediate Option For A Secure, Clean, Healthy Future, Richard L. Ottinger

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The imperatives for reducing the world’s dependence on fossil and nuclear fuels have multiplied manifold in recent years with the advent of worldwide terrorism. These new dangers come in addition to the imperatives of addressing the dire consequences of global warming and devastating pollution that accompany the use of these fossil fuels. Reducing dependence on these unsafe and unreliable energy resources should be a top global priority. Implementation of proven energy efficiency technologies offers the world the fastest, safest, most economic and most environmentally benign way to alleviate these threats. This article outlines available efficiency measures, their economic advantages and …


The Intercivilizational Inequities Of Nuclear Power Weighed Against The Intergenerational Inequities Of Carbon Based Energy, Karl S. Coplan Jan 2006

The Intercivilizational Inequities Of Nuclear Power Weighed Against The Intergenerational Inequities Of Carbon Based Energy, Karl S. Coplan

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This essay explains that such encouragement of nuclear energy production as a “solution” to fossil fuel-induced climate change will create environmental problems equally as grave as those posed by a carbon-based energy economy. Both nuclear energy and fossil energy impose enormous environmental externalities that are not captured by the economics of energy production and distribution. While emissions trading schemes seek to harness market-based efficiencies to accomplish pre-determined reductions, they neither seek to nor succeed in capturing the environmental externalities of energy generation. By creating a set of incentives without capturing all of the externalities, these trading schemes will simply distort …


Energy-Efficiency: The Best Option For A Secure, Clean, Healthy Future, Richard L. Ottinger Jan 2005

Energy-Efficiency: The Best Option For A Secure, Clean, Healthy Future, Richard L. Ottinger

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The risks of dependence on traditional fuels have never been greater or more obvious. Modern civilization and the world economy are facing imminent and clear threats of worldwide terrorism. The oil producing countries of the Middle East are increasingly unstable, confronting the world with potentially calamitous energy and economic disruptions. Domestically, our limited refining capacity creates shortages when demand is high and increases prices even when petroleum supplies are plentiful. Yet most of the world is in a state of denial, happy to bask in the illusory security of temporary Saudi oil production increases. Moreover, these new dangers sit on …


Renewable Energy Sources For Development, Richard L. Ottinger Jan 2002

Renewable Energy Sources For Development, Richard L. Ottinger

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Renewable energy resources hold great promise for meeting the energy and development needs of countries throughout the world. This promise is particularly strong for developing countries where many regions have not yet committed to fossil fuel dominance. Solar photovoltaic and solar thermal technologies are particularly advantageous for serving the two billion people in rural areas without grid electricity. Modern biomass energy is attractive because it uses locally available agricultural wastes. Wind energy and small hydroelectric resources also are mature technologies well suited to developing countries. Such renewable resources are far more economical than traditional energy resources, especially where the costs …


Global Climate Change Kyoto Protocol Implementation: Legal Frameworks For Implementing Clean Energy Solutions, Richard L. Ottinger Jan 2000

Global Climate Change Kyoto Protocol Implementation: Legal Frameworks For Implementing Clean Energy Solutions, Richard L. Ottinger

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This paper describes the measures that have been and can be taken and the legal mechanisms by which successes have been achieved in reducing greenhouse gases. Examples are given of success stories from around the world, but these examples are just demonstrative. Many hundreds of programs have been pursued successfully around the world in both industrial and developing countries. What does emerge, however, is clear evidence that global warming can be effectively addressed and that many significant steps have been taken profitably in both the public and private sectors, offering significant business, export and job opportunities, and that much can …


Least Cost Electricity For Texas, Karl R. Rábago Jan 1992

Least Cost Electricity For Texas, Karl R. Rábago

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The effects of consuming fossil fuels have disproportionately elevated human importance by the collective impact made on the world environment. Even the most buoyant optimist can be depressed by adding the global climactic changes of the greenhouse effect to a list that already includes air pollution, water pollution, soil contamination, health effects, balance of trade deficits, declining technological competitiveness, and vanishing natural resources. In Texas the primary source of electricity, and a major source of environmental problems, is the combustion of fossil fuels. This article introduces the reader to some of the environmental, economic, and regulatory challenges involved in responding …


What Comes Out Must Go In: Cooling Water Intakes And The Clean Water Act, Karl R. Rábago Jan 1992

What Comes Out Must Go In: Cooling Water Intakes And The Clean Water Act, Karl R. Rábago

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

It is time to measure progress under section 316 of the Clear Water Act, the one section of the Act that focuses not on discharges, but on intakes. Part II of this Article discusses the environmental hazards in more detail and explains how cooling water intakes produce them. Part III of this Article examines the history of regulation and nonregulation under section 316(b) of the Clean Water Act, describes the development of the "common law" concerning the regulation of cooling water intakes, and explores the effect of EPA's regulatory actions and omissions on state regulatory efforts. Part IV assesses the …


Energy And Environmental Challenges For Developed And Developing Countries, Richard L. Ottinger Jan 1991

Energy And Environmental Challenges For Developed And Developing Countries, Richard L. Ottinger

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Energy for development utilizing traditional supply investments, estimated to cost $1.4 - $4 trillion through 2010, will be unaffordable both for recipients and lenders. The capital required, even if obtainable, would squeeze out capital for all other development requirements and would pose unacceptable environmental and cleanup costs. Upgrading existing energy supply systems would cost a fraction of new supply. Energy efficiency and environmentally benign renewables can at least halve new supply capital requirements and avoid their environmental costs. Least cost planning by lenders and recipients, on the basis of total system life cycle costs, for both energy and non-energy related …


Least-Cost Utility Planning And Demand-Side Management: A Bibliography, Richard L. Ottinger Jan 1988

Least-Cost Utility Planning And Demand-Side Management: A Bibliography, Richard L. Ottinger

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The Pace Energy Project has undertaken to compile this annotated bibliography of books, articles and other research materials devoted to least-cost utility planning and demand-side management. This introduction describes the organization and methodology of the bibliography. To aid the user who may be unfamiliar with this field, these remarks also survey the factual background underlying the issues in each subsection of the bibliography, and the interrelationships between these utility reform issues.