The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has a new report out claiming that fossil fuel is “mispriced” and that eliminating subsidies to the fossil fuel industry and adding carbon taxes could cut greenhouse gases by 13 percent.

“Energy subsidies are pervasive and impose substantial fiscal and economic costs in most regions.
On a pre- tax basis, subsidies for petroleum products, electricity, natural gas, and coal reached $480 billion in 2011(0.7 percent of global GDP or 2 percent of total government revenues). The cost of subsidies is especially acute in oil exporters, which account for about two thirds of the total. On a post-tax basis which also factors in the negative externalities from energy consumption — subsidies are much higher at $1.9 trillion (2½ percent of global GDP or 8 percent of total government revenues). The advanced economies account for about 40 percent of the global post-tax total, while oil exporters account for about one third. Removing these subsidies could lead to a 13 percent decline in CO2 emissions and generate positive spillover effects by reducing global energy demand.”

To fully understand how dramatically politicians in this country will move in the coming decade you need to look at the unique political positions of Millennials. On a range of top issues this generation is decidedly more progressive than the rest of the country. Even more important, as this generation gets older it is not moving towards the center, but growing more firm in its positions.

Mother Jones Magazine has uncovered a new twist in the fight against the Keystone XL pipeline. As it turns out, the authors who drafted the environmental review of the Keystone XL pipeline worked for Transcanada, Koch Industries, Shell Oil, and other oil corporations that stand to benefit from building the Keystone XL. Not only did the State Department know about these conflicts of interest, they redacted this information from public filings in attempt to conceal the truth.

Chris Stewart, a Republican from Utah, was recently appointed Chair of the House subcommittee on Science.

This means that Congressman Stewart now has dominion over the EPA, climate change research, and “all activities related to climate.”

The climate change site, DeSmogBlog has found that Environmental Resources Management, the consulting firm behind the Keystone XL Pipeline environmental impact assessment, has been at the center of controversial pipeline projects in the past.

Activists working against the 2002 planned construction of British Petroleum’s Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline in Turkey, singled out Environmental Resources Management (ERM) for what they saw as ERM “grooming” the BP pipeline for construction. Like the Keystone XL pipeline assessment, ERM’s assessment of the Turkish pipeline was seen as flawed and drafted in a way that gave all but the green light for the pipeline to be constructed.

Two Sundays ago, I traveled to the nation’s capital to attend what was billed as “the largest climate rally in history” and I haven’t been able to get the experience — or a question that haunted me — out of my mind. Where was everybody?

First, though, the obvious weather irony: climate change didn’t exactly come out in support of that rally. In the midst of the warmest years and some of the warmest winters on record, the demonstration, which focused on stopping the Keystone XL Pipeline — it will bring tar-sands oil, some of the “dirtiest,” carbon-richest energy available from Alberta, Canada, to the U.S. Gulf Coast — was the coldest I’ve ever attended. I thought I’d lose a few fingers and toes while listening to the hour-plus of speakers, including Senator Sheldon Whitehouse from Rhode Island, who were theoretically warming the crowd up for its march around the (other) White House.

The State Department has downplayed the environmental impact of the Keystone XL pipeline.

Greetings fellow inhabitants of Earth. We, the Committee to End the Future, a purposely shadowy global organization of extremely wealthy and powerful people wish to thank you for your cooperation in completing the final round of our “Great Game.”

It seems while environmentalists were getting arrested at the White House for protesting against the building of the Keystone Pipeline President Obama was golfing with two prominent oil and gas businessmen.

It was a relief to hear more than a passing reference to climate change in President Obama’s State of the Union Speech, including promises of more support for wind and solar power. But the oil industry heard nothing to even cause even a smidgen of concern.