Environmental Issues: U.S. Law & Policy
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All Documents in U.S. Law & Policy Tagged pollution
- Federal Fiscal Crisis
Analysis - Early in 2013, Congress must make budget decisions about the remainder of this year. Looming cuts threaten essential environmental programs, while tax loopholes continue to subsidize polluters.
- Relieving Pain at the Pump
Thanks to Stronger Standards, Consumers Have More Fuel-Efficient Choices
Fact Sheet - As gas prices are once again soaring, the oil industry and its allies are renewing their calls for more drilling, more pipelines, and continued taxpayers subsidies. But the reality is that greatly increased domestic drilling has failed to lower gasoline prices and had no impact on stopping the latest spike in global oil prices. The good news is that with the proposed standards that require the equivalent of 54.5 miles per gallon (mpg), new cars by 2025 will get twice the fuel efficiency and use half of much gas as today’s cars. But the best news is that drivers do not have to wait until 2025 to reap the cost savings benefits of stronger fuel efficiency standards. In fact, thanks to the first phase of these stronger standards that started in model year (MY) 2012, a bumper crop of fuel-efficient cars are in the showrooms today. Drivers can start saving money immediately by trading in their gas guzzlers for today’s gas sippers. Get document in pdf.
Documents Tagged pollution in All Sections
- Pollution from Giant Livestock Farms Threatens Public Health
Waste lagoons and manure sprayfields -- two widespread and environmentally hazardous technologies -- are poorly regulated.
News - Factory farms -- giant livestock farms that house thousands of cows, chickens or pigs -- produce staggering amounts of animal wastes. These wastes are often stored and used in ways that expose people to dangerous bacteria, toxic gases and other hazardous substances, and punish the natural environment.
- Hansa Urbana’s Cabo Cortés Project in Baja California Sur
Investor Risk Advisory
Report - The Spanish developer Hansa Urbana intends to build a large-scale tourism and real estate complex called Cabo Cortés on the southeastern tip of Mexico’s Baja California peninsula. Due to its proposed scope and scale, the project could result in irreparable harm to vulnerable protected areas and endangered species, as well as negatively impact local communities. Environmental and social sustainability is necessary not only for the protection of local ecosystems and communities, but also to ensure the long-term financial success of a coastal tourism project itself. Potential investors must be fully aware of the serious concerns and risks associated with Cabo Cortés. Get document in pdf.
- More Jobs, Less Pollution
Growing the Recycling Economy in the U.S.
Overview - Tar Sands Invasion
How Dirty and Expensive Oil from Canada Threatens America's New Energy Economy
Fact Sheet - The oil industry is currently planning a massive project to export millions of barrels more per day of dirty tar sands oil from Alberta, Canada to the United States. Tar sands strip-mining and drilling in Canada’s Boreal forest is the largest and most destructive project on Earth. The decline in oil demand and the rise of alternative energy puts North America on the verge of a phenomenally important step forward toward a new, clean energy economy. Expanding reliance on tar sands is unnecessary, undermines our progress as a nation, and is severely destructive. We have a choice: we can move forward towards a clean energy future with greater national security or remain stuck with the dirty fossil fuels of the past. Get document in pdf.
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Switchboard Blogs
- Capturing the Value of Public Transportation
- posted by Deron Lovaas, 3/21/13
- Rotten to the Corps: Public Reviews Targeted in New Bill
- posted by Deron Lovaas, 3/20/13
- Assaults on Successful State Renewable Energy Standards Continue
- posted by Peter Lehner, 3/20/13
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