What's New List Serve Post Display

California Air Resources Board News Clips for November 3, 2009. 

This is a service of the California Air Resources Board’s Office
of Communications.  You may need to sign in or register with
individual websites to view some of the following news articles.

Altamont Landfill's Gas Fuels Garbage Trucks. A company that
manages landfills has a new source of fuel for its garbage trucks
- rotting trash. At the Altamont Landfill near Livermore, Waste
Management Inc. has installed a $15.5 million system that
collects gas given off by decomposing garbage and turns it into
fuel. The company unveiled the system on Monday. Built by German
engineering company the Linde Group, the project strips
impurities from the gas, chills it to 260 degrees below zero and
turns it into a liquid. Specially equipped garbage trucks burn it
as fuel. Posted.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/11/03/BUM81AE52U.DTL&type=printable
http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20091102-717218.html
http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2009/11/03/business-general-industrials-us-waste-management-green-trucks_7079558.html
http://www.mercurynews.com/business-headlines/ci_13696048

Pay-By-The-Mile Auto Insurance Advances In California. Car
insurance by the tankful? Not quite, but California moved a step
closer last month to pay-as-you-drive policies that could allow
motorists to buy insurance like they do gasoline – a little at a
time. Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner released regulations
permitting and authorizing mileage verification for
pay-as-you-drive, without dictating what form such plans must
take. The goal is to use per-mile pricing to entice Californians
not to drive so much, thus easing air pollution, relieving
traffic congestion and lowering the number of traffic collisions.
Posted.
http://www.sacbee.com/capitolandcalifornia/v-print/story/2300940.html

A Rosy View Persists In Copenhagen -- 'A Lot Can Be Achieved'.
Copenhagen -- The job of Denmark's Connie Hedegaard, as
chairwoman of the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in
December, is to lead negotiators from some 190 countries toward a
deal that would replace the Kyoto Protocol. With only three weeks
before the conference begins, there is a crescendo of voices
around the world declaring that her job is impossible. Hedegaard
disagrees. Posted. 
http://www.eenews.net/climatewire/2009/11/03/1/

Merkel On Climate Change, And The Partisan Divide. German
Chancellor Angela Merkel urged Congress and the Obama
administration to take bold steps to address global warming
Tuesday, even as Senate Democrats and Republicans feuded over
whether to press ahead with their chamber's version of a climate
bill. Speaking at a joint session of Congress, Merkel described
climate change as one of the "great tests" of the 21st century.
Posted.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/capitol-briefing/2009/11/merkel_on_climate_change_and_t.html

Heavy Energy Users Reject Current Senate Climate Bill.
Energy-intensive manufacturers took aim at the Senate climate
bill yesterday, rejecting its current form as insufficient to
keep jobs and production in the United States. "There's no way
that we could support it in its present construct," said Cal
Dooley, president of the American Chemistry Council, in a press
call with the aluminum, steel and forest products industries. The
four groups critiqued S. 1733, the "Clean Energy Jobs and
American Power Act," for not giving them enough allowances, on a
relaxed enough schedule, to adjust to a carbon policy. Posted.
http://www.eenews.net/climatewire/print/2009/11/03/5

Dems To Ignore GOP Boycott Of Climate Bill. Washington --
Democratic leaders of a key Senate committee vowed Monday to
forge ahead with climate change legislation despite a planned
boycott by Republicans on the panel. Sen. Barbara Boxer,
D-Calif., said the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee
she heads would begin working on the global warming bill today -
with or without the Republicans. Posted.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/11/03/MNLB1AE5J1.DTL&type=printable

Senate Panel's Climate Markup in Holding Pattern. A partisan
standoff over Senate global warming legislation clouded the start
of the Environment and Public Works Committee's markup of the
sweeping proposal today with just one Republican in attendance.
Chairwoman Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and several other Democrats
began the markup with opening statements begging Republicans to
participate and questioning the sincerity of their boycott.
Posted.
http://www.nytimes.com/gwire/2009/11/03/03greenwire-senate-panels-climate-markup-in-holding-patter-82243.html?pagewanted=print

Europeans Press US For Climate Deal. Washington — European Union
leaders are looking for momentum on a global climate change deal
out of a summit with President Barack Obama on Tuesday. The White
House meeting comes just a month ahead of a global meeting on
climate change in Copenhagen as world leaders negotiate a
follow-on agreement to the Kyoto Protocol. Posted.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5j70T55-6ovy42md_QM2jbhMgiCxwD9BO72TG0

GOP Warns Boxer On Climate Bill. The top Republicans on six
committees with jurisdiction over the Senate climate bill have
sent a letter to Environment and Public Works committee Chairman
Barbara Boxer urging her to back off of her decision to force the
bill through the committee without Republican participation. 
Democrats will need bipartisan support to overcome a possible
filibuster of the legislation when it reaches the full Senate.
Sen. John Kerry, (D-Mass.), and Lindsay Graham, (R-S.C.) have
been working to build GOP support for the bill. Posted.
http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=B6A9F67F-18FE-70B2-A89397350842E891

GOP Senators Absent At Start Of Climate Debate. Washington --
Republicans boycotted the start of committee debate Tuesday on a
bill to curb greenhouse gases, protesting that the bill's costs
have not been fully examined. The action put a spotlight on the
difficulties Democratic leaders face in moving climate
legislation this year. Republican Sen. George Voinovich of Ohio
attended the session for 15 minutes to explain the GOP's argument
for staying away. Posted.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2009/11/02/national/w161504S00.DTL&type=printable

Republicans Walk Out Of Senate Hearing On Climate-Change Bill.
GOP senators demand a full EPA analysis of the measure, which
could take five weeks. Democrats say the EPA's partial study is
sufficient. Republicans today boycotted the start of a Senate
hearing on climate-change legislation. The Republican members of
the Environment and Public Works Committee are demanding a full
Environmental Protection Agency analysis of the climate bill.
Posted.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-climate-gop-boycott4-2009nov04,0,3318325,print.story

Mt. Kilimanjaro Ice Cap Continues Rapid Retreat. The ice atop
Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania has continued to retreat rapidly,
declining 26 percent since 2000, scientists say in a new report.
Yet the authors of the study, to be published Tuesday in the
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, reached no
consensus on whether the melting could be attributed mainly to
humanity’s role in warming the global climate. Posted.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/03/world/africa/03melt.html?_r=1&sq=climate%20change&st=cse&scp=10&pagewanted=print

TV Energy Regulations Will Harm Innovation. How much energy does
the average flat panel TV use? Given the intensity of the
California Energy Commission's efforts to ban many popular
big-screen televisions from California homes, you might be
surprised to learn that the average flat-panel TV uses less
energy (142 watts) than two regular 75-watt household lightbulbs.
Listening to the commission’s rhetoric over the last few months,
you also might believe that your entertainment center is causing
an energy crisis. Posted.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/11/03/ED7H1AE46C.DTL&type=printable

Feds Say Muni Workers Let Fuel Spill Into Bay. Muni workers
disabled an alarm system that would have notified them that at
least 39,000 gallons of diesel fuel were leaking from a refueling
station and endangering the bay, according to a complaint
released Monday by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The
federal agency is seeking a $250,000 settlement from San
Francisco stemming from the 2005 incident for violating the Clean
Water Act. Posted.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/11/03/BAN91AE2U9.DTL&type=printable

Editorial: MTA's Train Wreck Of A Deal. A rail-car contract with
Italian manufacturer AnsaldoBreda has finally run off the rails.
Ignoring the advice of this page, transit experts and both the
current and former heads of the Metropolitan Transportation
Authority, the MTA board in September awarded a $300-million
contract to Italian company AnsaldoBreda to build 100 rail cars
at a new factory it promised to construct near the Los Angeles
River. Posted.
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-railcars3-2009nov03,0,5119021,print.story

Relationships in Global Warming. Viewpoint. It seems these days
that everyone has bought into the idea of global warming.
Congress is busy debating a cap and trade bill and the Kyoto
Protocol has become the international standard for dealing with
greenhouse gasses. Environmentalists are predicting the end of
life on the planet if we do not do anything about it.  So,
perhaps the lone voice in the darkness should ask the question
“Is it true?”  There is a lot of hype about carbon dioxide
content in the atmosphere and its effect on the planet’s
temperature. Posted.
http://www.ocbj.com/industry_article_pay.asp?aID=142068

Ain’t It 'Cool' News? CARB’S Latest Embarrassing Scheme.
"There's no trick to being a humorist" - Will Rogers once said -
"when you have the whole government working for you." Even though
he observed this decades ago, Rogers' quote sure says a lot about
the comedy club of contemporary California.  And it would be
downright funny if it wasn't so seriously troubling. Posted.
http://foxandhoundsdaily.com/print/5697

BLOGS

Old Ships Exempt From New Pollution Rules. Shutterstock A new
rule requires freighters operating in coastal and inland waters
to use low-sulfur diesel fuel, but some are exempt. The United
States Environmental Protection Agency has opted to exempt 13
Great Lakes steamships from a new rule requiring freighters
operating in coastal and inland waters to move to low-sulfur
diesel.  Posted.
http://greeninc.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/11/02/old-ships-exempt-from-new-pollution-rules/?pagemode=print