ThinkProgress Logo

Climate Progress

Why are Obama and Salazar pushing a massive expansion of coal production?

Powder River Basin Distribution Legend Low Res

This weekend’s question may have no good answer.

On Tuesday, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced plans to auction off 758 million tons of coal in Wyoming over the next few months.  Then on Friday, the Bureau of Land Management explained they will be selling off another 1.6 billion tons of coal at a future date.

Salazar claims coal could play a role in the “clean energy future,” but that isn’t true, of course — except in an alternative universe where CO2 has a high and rising price and carbon capture and storage pans out — neither of which seems likely even if Obama weren’t now indifferent to serious climate action (see Harvard: “Realistic” first-generation CCS costs a whopping $150 per ton of CO2 “” 20 cents per kWh! and Studyfind leaks from CO2 stored deep underground could contaminate drinking water).

The coal represents a staggering amount of future CO2 emissions, as Wild Earth Guardians, Sierra Club, and Defenders of Wildlife explain:

Read more

The End of Overfishing in America

A key step toward sustainable marine life — but many more remain

By Michael Conathan, CAP’s Director of Ocean Programs.

Eric Schwaab, the administrator of the National Marine Fisheries Service, or NMFS, stood before a crowd of fisheries experts on Monday at the Boston Seafood Show. Schwaab had made many forays to New England””home of some of the squeakiest wheels in our nation’s fishing industry””since taking over the job about a year ago. But this time was different. He came bearing a remarkable message: We are witnessing the end of overfishing in U.S. waters.

Read more

Switch to Mobile
ThinkProgress Signup Overlay Skip and Continue to ThinkProgress Skip and Continue to ThinkProgress

Sign Up