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Jim Cason, the GOP mayor of Coral Gables, Florida, wants us to talk about climate change: “‘We’re looking to a future where we’re going to be underwater, a great portion of South Florida,’ Cason said. ‘For all of us down here, this is really not a partisan issue. We see it. We see the octopus in the […]

As President-elect Donald Trump continues to shape his cabinet, we are seeing plenty of indications of how agencies like the Department of Energy, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and even the State Department will approach energy and environmental policy. Trump’s stated policy preferences and those of his nominees threaten to upend decades of progress toward […]

President-Elect Donald Trump has selected Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt as his Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-MT) as his Interior Secretary, and former Texas governor Rick Perry as his Energy Secretary. The Center for Progressive Reform (CPR) has released statements on the picks. Robert Glicksman, CPR Board Member, on Department […]

Efficient, professional law enforcement is a cornerstone of effective and responsible environmental protection. It is the cop on the environmental beat. While some regulated firms will likely continue to comply with environmental requirements in the absence of vigorous, evenhanded enforcement, other companies will certainly proceed to pollute America’s air, water, and land with reckless arrogance. […]

This blog post is based on the Introduction to my forthcoming book, Clean Power Politics: The Democratization of Energy (Cambridge University Press, 2017). One year ago, 195 nations met in Paris and signed what has been hailed as an historic climate agreement.1 To date, 116 parties have ratified the convention, and it went into force […]

Over the last couple of months, a pair of actions taken by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) demonstrate the glacial pace of federal stormwater management policy under the Clean Water Act. In October, EPA rejected a series of petitions by a group of environmental organizations to expand regulatory protections for certain urban waterways. Then […]

Environmentalists are understandably wringing their hands over the likely post-election demise of the Clean Power Plan, the Obama administration’s rule to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from power plants, which are the nation’s single biggest source of carbon emissions. But, with or without the Clean Power Plan (the Plan), the states hold the cards to a […]

Ever since Richard Nixon’s vice president, Maryland’s own Spiro Agnew, described the nation’s ink-stained journalists as “nattering nabobs of negativism,” attacks on the media have been reliably base-pleasing material for conservative politicians. But Donald Trump is in a category all his own. For most pols, attacking the press is a way to deflect criticism. For […]

Last week, the Center for Progressive Reform co-hosted a symposium with the University of Maryland School of Law entitled "Halftime for the Bay TMDL." The symposium was supposed to be about what states, cities, counties, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), industry, and citizens can do to accelerate progress in the second half of the […]