Obama’s (first) big speech on global warming is going to come sooner than expected.

And all the nonsensical media reporting on how the administration is supposedly backing away from a sense of urgency on the climate issue — urgency on passing the clean air, clean water, clean energy jobs bill and getting a global deal — should be dispelled by reading today’s House testimony from our top climate negotiator, Todd Stern (here, excerpted below).  Every word in that testimony is signed off on by the administration, so when Stern presses Congress for a bill ASAP and says Obama is committed to action, that comes from the White House.

E&E News PM reports:

President Obama will speak on global warming later this month during a special U.N. summit in New York where world leaders will try to jump-start talks on a deal that succeeds the Kyoto Protocol.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs today confirmed Obama’s role in the Sept. 22 event that comes on the eve of general debate in the 64th session of the U.N. General Assembly.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has called presidents and prime ministers together for the climate meeting in an attempt to “mobilize the political will and vision needed to reach an ambitious agreed outcome based on science at the U.N. climate talks in Copenhagen.”

Obama’s role in the U.N. session is sure to spark widespread international attention, especially after eight years of resistance to significant steps on climate change under former President George W. Bush’s administration.

Obama is expected to appear alongside a handful of other government leaders and climate activists during a morning session that opens the U.N. climate meeting.

I think he’ll still need to give a more political speech before the Senate vote. When will that vote be? A key administration witness testified in front of a House Committee today that it really needs to be before a certain big international climate conference in Europe this December:

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File this under Duh!

Nukes Will Be Part of Senate Energy Bill, Boxer Says

Barbara Boxer, the chairwoman of the Senate’s Committee on Environment and Public Works, said today “there will be a nuclear title in the bill,” reports our colleague Siobhan Hughes at Dow Jones Newswires.

While nuclear power may not be the make-or-break issue for the Senate bill””the health care debate probably takes that honor””it is a crucial part of attracting Republican support for new energy measures. Whether it’s enough is still anybody’s guess.

Led by Tennessee’s Lamar Alexander, Senate Republicans have been clamoring for more federal support for nuclear power. Indeed, Sen. Alexander doesn’t miss a chance to tout nuclear power as an emissions-free power source on par with wind or solar power.

Ms. Boxer didn’t elaborate on her comments, Dow Jones notes. Previously, she’d said that a higher cost for carbon-which would make coal-fired plants less attractive and nuclear plants more attractive-would do the trick. More support for nuclear power could take many shapes such as expanded federal loan guarantees or the inclusion of nuclear power in renewable-energy standards.

Yes, the nuclear title will mostly be MDT (Money Down the Toilet) stuff, but other than the taxpayers actually doling out $10 billion (or more!) per plant, I can’t see many nukes being built no matter what is in the nuclear title because they just cost too damn much (see “Nuclear Bombshell: $26 Billion cost “” $10,800 per kilowatt! “” killed Ontario nuclear bid“) — no matter what EPA and some other models say.  Nukes appear to be the minimum price for admission for some moderate Democrats and a few Republicans (“Lamar Alexander (R-TN) calls nuclear “the cheap clean energy solution,” renews GOP call for 100 new nukes, which would cost some $1 trillion“) — particularly McCain.

I take this as a good sign that Boxer is it really trying to start with a bill that could ultimately be passed.  I’d also expect a modified ‘price collar’, which could be both a useful addition to the bill and a key way to get more votes, depending on how it is written.

I don’t, however, think you are going to see nuclear power included in the renewable energy standard — but you might see an addition to the standard that goes beyond the renewable and efficiency standard and includes low carbon energy.

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Although the House-passed clean air, clean water, clean energy jobs bill doesn’t have a big focus on the transportation sector, it does achieve real benefits in oil savings at low cost (see “EIA analysis of climate bill finds 23 cents a day cost to families, massive retirement of dirty coal plants and 119 GW of new renewables by 2030 “” plus a million barrels a day oil savings“).  Some people have asked me for more detail on this, which I provide courtesy of this guest post from Jeremy Symons, Senior Vice President, Conservation and Education, National Wildlife Federation (bio here).

The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA’s) recent analysis of the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES) includes the first government estimates of the legislation’s impact directly on oil imports.  A number of models, including the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, have determined that ACES would save significant amounts of oil, but EIA is the first to project the specific impact on oil imports so that we can more directly assess the security and financial implications.

Overall oil imports would decline by 590,000 barrels per day by the year 2020 under ACES, according to EIA .  This is roughly equivalent to the total amount of oil we imported from Iraq in 2008 (620,000 barrels per day).  Over the next twenty years, America would save $650 billion on foreign oil (cumulatively through 2030).  This is in constant 2007 dollars, and is calculated by applying EIA’s forecast of oil prices to EIA’s projected savings in oil imports.

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Pretty much the only bright spot in the Michigan job market is clean energy jobs, as the NYT reported today:

Since 2005, the number of green jobs in Michigan has grown by 8 percent, while construction jobs have declined 20 percent and manufacturing jobs have fallen 14 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

And that explains the excitement over even a seemingly modest piece of good news:

The announcement of a new plant employing just 100 workers might seem like a long shot to attract the chief executive of General Motors, two senators and a raft of state and local officeholders from across Michigan.But in a state that has lost 800,000 jobs this decade, 18 percent of its work force, the Aug. 13 official opening of a G.M. factory to build electric-car batteries in Brownstown, about 20 miles southwest of Detroit, was a can’t-miss event.

The picture on the right is GM’s former CEO Rick Wagoner introducing the Chevrolet Volt battery pack at the North American International Auto Show on Monday.

“The phrase ‘new plant’ isn’t one we’re used to hearing these days,” said John Cherry, Michigan’s lieutenant governor, as he stood inside the sprawling, empty building in this industrial town about 20 miles south of Detroit.

Any new factory would be celebrated in this state, which has been hit harder than most by the recession.

But the one in Brownstown held particular significance because it was another small step in Michigan’s efforts to revive its economy with “green” manufacturing.

The state has moved aggressively to offset the drain of traditional auto manufacturing jobs by promoting Michigan as the place to invest in alternative energy projects.

Of course, in the not too distant future the only jobs left will be green.  That’s why smart states like Michigan — and smart presidents like Obama — are pushing to ensure that the United States becomes the world leader in what will certainly be the biggest job creating industrial sector of the century.  Here’s more on what the state is doing:

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NOAA’s National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center released its monthly El Ni±o/Southern oscillation (ENSO) Diagnostic Discussion:

A weak El Ni±o continued during August 2009, as sea surface temperature (SST) remained above-average across the equatorial Pacific Ocean (Fig. 1). Consistent with this warmth, the latest weekly values of the Ni±o-region SST indices were between +0.7°C to +1.0°C (Fig. 2). Subsurface oceanic heat content anomalies continued to reflect a deep layer of anomalous warmth between the ocean surface and the thermocline, particularly in the central Pacific. Enhanced convection over the western and central Pacific abated during the month, but the pattern of suppressed convection strengthened over Indonesia. Low-level westerly wind anomalies continued to become better established over parts of the equatorial Pacific Ocean. These oceanic and atmospheric anomalies reflect an ongoing weak El Ni±o.

A majority of the model forecasts for the Ni±o-3.4 SST index suggest El Ni±o will reach at least moderate strength during the Northern Hemisphere fall (3-month Ni±o-3.4 SST index of +1.0°C or greater). Many model forecasts even suggest a strong El Ni±o (3-month Ni±o-3.4 SST index in excess of +1.5°C) during the fall and winter, but current observations and trends indicate that El Ni±o will most likely peak at moderate strength. Therefore, current conditions, trends, and model forecasts favor the continued development of a weak-to-moderate strength El Ni±o into the Northern Hemisphere fall 2009, with the likelihood of at least a moderate strength El Ni±o during the winter 2009-10.

This should be enough to drive us to record temperatures, but there is typically a few month delay between an El Ni±o and the full global temperature impact.  So if this is only a moderate El Ni±o but it lasts through the winter, then it may be 2010 that is the record.  For more details on the implications, see here.

The progressive and clean energy has finished putting together a major effort to fight for clean air, clean water, and clean energy jobs.  I had first reported the first green shoots of this effort at the end of July.  As the Washington Post now reports:

A coalition of environmental, labor, veterans and religious groups formally launched a national lobbying campaign Tuesday aimed at mobilizing grass-roots support for passage of a Senate climate bill this fall.

The group — dubbed Clean Energy Works — marks perhaps the most ambitious effort yet to enact legislation that would cap greenhouse gas emissions linked to global warming. The coalition has enlisted organizers in 28 key states to help build support for a cap-and-trade bill, and is scheduled to launch paid television ads this week. It also plans to bring 100 veterans to Washington this week to lobby, and has held town halls and rallies in several states.

“Public support for clean energy legislation is overwhelming,” said David Di Martino, the group’s spokesman. “Unfortunately, an army of special interests are doing everything they can to block comprehensive energy reform. This campaign will mobilize the voices of those millions of Americans who want to put us back in control of our economy, our security, and the future of our planet.”

Many in the status quo media remain eager to spin even positive stories negatively.  Here is the Politico:

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