Articles

Trump-Musk orders and firings thrash the public interest (Note: An earlier version was published in the Feb. 27, 2025 issue of the Eugene Weekly. Reprinted here with permission.) President Donald J. Trump’s project to take a chainsaw to duly authorized and appropriated funding — and eviscerate the very federal agencies… Continue reading Climate Change & the Rule of Law

CPR Initiative’s Board Members are active on the state level as well as the national scene. Board President Donn Viviani wrote the below Op-ed in the Hawaii Star Advertiser a week before Navahine vs. Hawaii Department of Transportation was to go to trial.   Column: DOT, negotiate with youth climate… Continue reading Think Globally Act Locally

by Justin Catanoso on 13 December 2023 originally published on Mongabay Even as organizers of the UN climate summit in Dubai, known as COP28, cheered a “breakthrough” agreement “transitioning away from fossil fuels” by 2050, critics were quick to point out a “litany of loopholes” in the legally non-binding agreement that will… Continue reading COP28 ‘breakthrough’ elevates litigation as vital route to climate action

It’s not as well-known as the Clean Air Act but the 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act can and must be used to control greenhouse gases. That’s why we’re petitioning EPA. Sept. 13, 2022 Op-Ed by CPR Initiative Executive Director and General Counsel Dan Galpern. Reprinted by Permission of the Washington Monthly.

The 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26) The 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), held for the first time in Glasgow, Scotland, spanned the fortnight October 31 through November 13. About it, the piercing British columnist George Monbiot (2021) opined… Continue reading A View from Glasgow

Written by E. DONALD ELLIOTT Republished by permission of The American Spectator on December 28, 2021. Banner Image: Joe Biden speaks at UN climate change conference, November 1, 2021 (ABC News/YouTube) Democrats are apoplectic about Joe Manchin’s announcement last week that he will not support Biden’s latest spending spree, the so-called “Build… Continue reading What’s Biden’s Next Move on Climate?

This Glasgow climate summit is at full pitch now—the world leaders have mercifully packed up their boilerplate and left, and now more serious business is underway. Well, somewhat more serious business: there’s a big fight going about whether it’s appropriate for the COP dining hall to be serving haggis (which is to… Continue reading What Climate Levers are Left to Pull? An Idea From Out of Center Field

Republished with permission of Mongabay. Written by Justin Catanoso on 11 November 2021. The 2015 Paris Agreement is not a treaty between nations, but rather a voluntary accord between 194 nations signed by their legal representatives. As such, it is not deemed legally binding — preventing nations and corporations from being… Continue reading COP26: Are climate declarations and emission reduction pledges legally binding?

Written By Mary Christina Wood & Daniel M Galpern Originally Published in Environmental Law Review (Journal of Lewis & Clark School of Law) (2015) Abstract: At its core, the public trust principle encompasses the reserved and inalienable rights of citizens to a healthy environment. The principle imposes a sovereign duty… Continue reading Atmospheric Recovery Litigation: Making the Fossil Fuel Industry Pay to Restore a Viable Climate System

We have only just begun to awaken to the unfolding calamity inherent in human-induced global climate change. . . [B]inding international measures adequate to counter GHG emission trends do not yet exist. That failure is largely a function of the United States’ refusal to accept any legally binding limit on GHG emissions….

Publication
Eugene Weekly

Date
February 28, 2013

Authors
Dan Galpern

Publication
Gist

Date
September 24, 2009

Authors
Dan Galpern

Under the Independent Offices Appropriations Act, the president retains authority to direct the Environmental Protection Agency to impose a fee on greenhouse gas emissions. By Dr. James Hansen and Dan Galpern Originally published in the Boston Globe on June 1, 2021, 3:00 a.m. President Biden has inherited a welter of… Continue reading President Biden Should Impose a Carbon Fee Immediately