Greenpeace

President Obama has issued marching orders for the rapid national adoption of "clean coal" technology. Last week, shortly after his budget address, he ordered a high-level task force to deliver a plan within 180 days determining how "to overcome barriers to the widespread, cost-effective deployment of CCS within 10 years, with the goal of bringing 5 to 10 commercial demonstration projects on line by 2016."

Obama's executive office memorandum looks like a big victory for the coal industry, which was already handed $3.8 billion in last year's stimulus act for carbon capture and storage (CCS) research and development and deployment. He did not simultaneously order a similar plan for a big roll-out of solar or wind energy to level the playing field.

Making good on campaign promises, the president is throwing the full weight of his administration behind a moonshot effort to make coal the "clean" energy technology of choice and open a federal pathway to a profitable future for one of the nation's most polluting industries.

Three factors have cemented Obama's support for carbon capture and sequestration technology: political necessity, economic opportunity and the backing of some of the most powerful mainstream environmental organizations operating inside the Beltway.

Walking the halls of the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, it wasn't difficult to find companies making green claims. Along with 3D televisions, 3D cameras and 3D content, words like "sustainable", "efficient" and "green" were everywhere.

From energy efficiency to waste reduction to alternative energy, it’s clear that consumer electronics manufacturers want buyers and consumers to know that sustainability is an important part of their DNA. In fact, the Consumer Electronics Association worked with Nextera Energy to buy renewable energy credits to offset the conference with its 120,000 plus attendees. They also put together panels a track on technology and the environment with topics like e-waste recycling.

Reporting from Copenhagen

Copenhagen's mall-sized Bella Center, the command center for the largest climate change gathering ever convened, has exceeded its capacity, and thousands of registered civil society groups are now being asked to leave.

The move is raising the ire of non-governmental organizations (NGOs), who say they are being cut out of the process for global warming action that they, in part, built.

Their absence in the crucial final days of the conference will be a blow to poor nations who rely on NGO assistance to get their voices heard, the NGOs say, and it will keep out non-governmental experts who could quickly analyze any proposed deals, leaving the world hearing only the claims of politicians.

Coca-Cola is going HFC-free. The soft drink giant announced today that it is phasing out hydrofluorocarbons — potent "super greenhouse gases" — by requiring that all new vending machines and coolers be HFC-free by 2015.

CEO Muhtar Kent told reporters he hopes the move will catalyze a shift away from HFCs in the wider commercial refrigeration market.

If it succeeds, it could be a valuable step in the fight against global warming.

By Daniel Kessler

On Nov. 16, two Greenpeace activists from Germany and Italy and two members of the press from India and Italy, all of whom were traveling on valid business and journalist visas, were picked up and detained by Indonesian police.

They were on their way to meet the villagers of Teluk Meranti, who have been supporting Greenpeace in its efforts to highlight rainforest and peatland destruction in the Kampar Peninsula — ground zero for climate change. The police also took into custody an activist from Belgium who had been working at our Climate Defenders Camp there.

Despite the validity of their travel documents and the absence of any wrongdoing, two of the activists and both journalists are now being deported by immigration authorities on questionable and seemingly contrived grounds, even though no formal deportation permits have been issued.

Just a few days before, immigration authorities deported 11 other international Greenpeace activists who participated in a non-violent direct action in an area where Asia Pacific Resources International Holdings Ltd., or APRIL, one of Indonesia's largest pulp and paper companies, is clearing rainforest and draining peatland on the peninsula.

The new Greenpeace report Business as Usual describes "five maximum points of danger" in the House and Senate climate bills. SolveClimate is reposting each of those arguments over the course of the week.

Dear Mr. President,

What is especially dangerous, and frankly Orwellian, is that the American Clean Energy and Security Act and the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act both provide insufficient and grudging support to clean energy.

What state governments and private enterprise are doing to promote the adoption of clean energy already surpasses what the federal government is now proposing to do.

In other words, even the clean energy provisions of the bill support the status quo, the continuation of business as usual. It is farcical that both bills have the words “clean energy” in their titles. They should instead be encouraging the rapid development and deployment of clean energy — the way we once encouraged a first lunar landing.

President Obama, you told the UN General Assembly that the U.S. “will move forward with investments to transform our energy economy, while providing incentives to make clean energy the profitable kind of energy.” The climate bill undermines that aim.

The new Greenpeace report Business as Usual describes "five maximum points of danger" in the House and Senate climate bills. SolveClimate will be reposting each of those arguments over the course of the week.

“Handouts and Loopholes.” Those three words constituted the headline that The Economist used on its May 21 article on the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES). “America’s climate bill is weaker and worse than expected,” the magazine elaborated in the sub-head.

This should come as no surprise. One of the consequences of imposing a price on carbon is that it creates a new currency called carbon credits, and everyone on K Street wants to get their hands on this new money. Congress has complied with one of the biggest proposed giveaways in American history.

There are three fundamental industry giveaways that individually and together constitute an existential threat to the cap and trade system the bill is aiming to create:

The new Greenpeace report Business as Usual describes "five maximum points of danger" in the House and Senate climate bills. SolveClimate will be reposting each of those arguments over the course of the week, starting today with the threat to undermine the Clean Air Act.

Dear Mr. President,

On June 28, just after the House passed the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES), you responded to reporters questions on the state of play of in the United States by saying, “the final legislation that emerges is probably not going to satisfy the Europeans or Greenpeace.”

This report will provide you details on exactly why we are dissatisfied with the prevailing model of climate legislation pending in both chambers of Congress. Our critical assessment is that the legislation, in the crucial near term, will be a perpetuation of business as usual in our energy sector, and it will not decrease emissions in the U.S.

As Washington is abuzz today with the introduction of the Senate's version of a climate and energy bill, 25 Greenpeace activists have taken climate action into their own hands in Canada.

Slipping past tightened security by floating stealthily downriver, they gained access to Suncor's massive tar sands facility and shut down two bitumen conveyor belts. The conveyors receive bitumen from the open pit mines along the banks of the Athabasca River and transport it to the upgrader for refining.

The action is being broadcast live on the web. The images being captured on cell phone video show activists scattered in positions across the large industrial construction with the conveyor stopped.

"We're sending a message to international leaders with Copenhagen less than 70 days away," said Bruce Cox, the Executive Director of Greenpeace Canada, who spoke to SolveClimate while watching the action from an inflatable boat on the Athabasca River. "This is not just about Suncor, or Shell but about our global addiction to dirty energy."

Cox said the activists are prepared to spend the night, equipped with food and safety gear. A growing international audience is tuning into the live stream to see what the police will do.

The G20 failed to produce a climate change financing plan for developing nations at its Pittsburgh meeting this past week. It took a step forward on cutting greenhouse gas emissions by agreeing to phase out fossil fuel subsidies, but on both issues, the details were pushed aside until the next G20 finance ministers’ meeting.

That meeting isn't until November, one month before world leaders gather for the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change at Copenhagen.

European Commission President Jose Manuel Barraso and environmental groups were dismayed by the delay and warned that time is running out.

Speaking at the close of the Pittsburgh meeting, Barraso said the world’s most powerful nations aren’t moving fast enough on climate change financing and related issues to have an agreement that could replace the Kyoto Protocol ready by the start of the Copenhagen summit.

"Negotiations cannot be an open-ended process," Barraso said. "This is a test of credibility for the G20 — failure is not an option."

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