The Washington Post's Juliet Eilperin and David Farenthold report on what could be the beginning of the end for serious action this year on global warming: On Thursday, Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.) introduced a bill that would put a two-year freeze on the EPA's ability to regulate greenhouse gases from power plants. His was the latest of various congressional proposals -- from both chambers and both parties -- designed to delay or overturn the EPA's regulations. As I reported on last month, a "cap-and-trade" energy bill is on its deathbed and EPA regulation is the only game in town. To get a bit into the weeds of Rockefeller's proposal, the bill would block EPA from regulating stationary sources like coal-fired power plants that cause the vast majority of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. The proposal, though, would allow EPA to regulate tailpipe emissions from automobiles. This is an important distinction.

Here is a classic case of people fearing a world of all-powerful federal government regulators when the reality is that federal government regulators are timid and ineffectual. The New York Times' Charles Duhigg and Janet Roberts have a piece that pretty explicitly argues that two Supreme Court decisions (from 2001 and 2006) have prevented the Environmental Protection Agency from effectively enforcing the Clean Water Act. Thanks to the Supreme Court, EPA can only regulate a narrow set of "navigable waterways" meaning, "About 117 million Americans get their drinking water from sources fed by waters that are vulnerable to exclusion from the Clean Water Act."

The New York Times' John Broder reports that Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson is trying to massage the worries of coal-state Democratic Senators over the fact that EPA is expected to regulate greenhouse gas emissions beginning this year.  The Senators contend that greenhouse gas regulations "should be made ...

The New York Times' John Broder reports that environmentalists have grown upset with Barack Obama: Mr. Obama moved quickly in his first months in office, producing a landmark deal on automobile emissions, an Environmental Protection Agency finding that greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare, a virtual moratorium on oil drilling on public lands and House passage of a cap-and-trade bill. Since then, in part because of the intense focus on the health care debate last year, action on environmental issues has slowed. The Senate has not yet begun debate on a comprehensive global warming bill, the Interior Department is writing new rules to open some public lands and waters to oil drilling and the E.P.A. is moving cautiously to apply the endangerment finding. I'm not sure if this is imprecise writing from Broder or imprecise thinking from environmentalists, but it's not Obama's fault that the Senate hasn't started debate on a global warming bill. It's the Senate's fault.

[caption id="attachment_6652" align="alignleft" width="154" caption="Himalayan glaciers"][/caption] The New York Times' John Broder reports on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration wanting to create a new Climate Service similar to the National Weather Service. NOAA head Jane Lubchenco says that the Climate ...

This blog, and Understanding Government, pushes for better federal government regulation of the environment, but that almost always means more federal regulation. Here, though, is a report by the Wall Street Journal's Robert Guy Matthews that makes a fairly persuasive case that the process for obtaining mining permits is unreasonably time consuming:

A cap-and-trade bill will probably not happen this year.  However, 2010 should go down as the first year that the U.S. makes laws to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. While the Senate has dithered on cap-and-trade, the Environmental Protection Agency has moved forward plans to police the emissions that come out of car tailpipes and – eventually – from the factories and power plants that emit the vast majority of greenhouse gas pollutants. The regulations will mark the first time ever that the U.S. government has substantively responded to climate change. They will be, arguably, the most significant regulatory action that EPA has taken since passage of the 1990 Clean Air Act. But the regulations can’t come close to the impact of Congress passing cap-and-trade legislation. Unlike cap-and-trade, it is unclear what effect EPA regulations will have on industry, the energy economy and the overall level of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. Also, any regulation is expected to prompt lawsuits. EPA action might be a historic first step. But it’s still not clear if and when second and third steps might follow.

Sort of a flip side to the Obama administration raising spending levels at many regulatory agencies -- the Obama administration is not raising the spending levels of some of these agencies inspectors general. Each federal agency has an inspector general ...

The New Republic's John B. Judis has a really excellent piece that makes the case that Barack Obama has rescued federal regulatory agencies by providing these agencies both money and qualified personnel. What more money and better personnel has accomplishment so far is modest -- for example, EPA has declared it will set standards to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. However, the agency has yet to outline what those standards will be. But merely making agencies like EPA, the Food and Drug Administration and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration relevant again could make industry more inclined to follow extant safety laws and, eventually, new regulations. The larger issue is whether Obama can put the teeth back into these watchdogs in a lasting way that will extend beyond his presidency.

The White House has honored its agreement at Copenhagen to send a greenhouse gas emissions reductions target to the United Nations, reports The Washington Post's Juliet Eilperin. All countries that were part of the Copenhagen agreement have to send an emissions reduction target by Jan. 31 (that's Sunday). The question, ...