President Trump has taken a lot of flack for pulling out of the Paris climate accords, claiming they were a bad deal for the country he leads. Perversely, the problem with the global climate treaty may not be that Trump's action made the potential for devastation worse, but rather that the effects of climate change are already on track to be so... Paris climate accords look more and more like fantasy; the reality could be far worse
President Trump has taken a lot of flack for pulling out of the Paris climate accords, claiming they were a bad deal for the country he leads. Perversely, the problem with the global climate treaty may not be that Trump's action made the potential for devastation worse, but rather that the effects of climate change are already on track to be so... 
While the name of EPA administrator Scott Pruitt is often preceded by "embattled" these days, his agency is now on record as rejecting its own recommendation of just 16 months ago. It concluded in July 2016 that the auto industry had handily met lower carbon-emission limits from 2012 through 2017—at lower cost and with more conventional... 
EPA administrator Scott Pruitt would be controversial even if he hadn't flown to Morocco in December (first-class, on the taxpayer dime) to lobby the country on the benefits of liquified natural gas while living in a condo owned by a lobbyist for the country's largest LNG exporter. He is likely the first EPA head to axe scientists from the... 
The omens have been accumulating for months, as bits of information dribble out of the regulatory rumor mill in Washington, D.C. Now we have the most concrete reports yet that the U.S. EPA plans to modify exhaust emission limits for vehicles in model years 2022 through 2025. The EPA delivered its draft Final Determination document to the Office of... 
Last Tuesday, EPA administrator Scott Pruitt said the agency does not intend to let California set the agenda for national emission limits on vehicles. He suggested to Bloomberg the EPA plans to cut emission rules aggressively to respond to carmakers' pleas for easing of the corporate average fuel economy rules for 2022 through 2025 that they had... 
![Exhaust emissions from tailpipe [photo: Simone Ramella, 2005, used under Creative Commons 2.0]](https://images.hgmsites.net/tmb/exhaust-emissions-from-tailpipe-photo-simone-ramella-2005-used-under-creative-commons-2-0_100644014_t.gif)
Well, that's awkward. At its annual media briefing on Wednesday, Volkswagen Group executives said the costs of meeting new emission tests in the EU, lowering carbon emissions globally, and launching multiple new electric models would eat into the company's profits. With the company's diesels in disfavor even in Europe and unlikely to reappear in... 
The first major emission controls on motor vehicles were introduced in 1975 with the advent of the catalytic converter. Today's cars emit less than 1 percent of the three "criteria" pollutants that came out of their tailpipes half a century ago. They emit relatively so little carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, and hydrocarbons that the collective... 
![Electric-car wells-to-wheels emission equivalencies in MPG, Mar 2018 [Union of Concerned Scientists]](https://images.hgmsites.net/tmb/electric-car-wells-to-wheels-emission-equivalencies-in-mpg-mar-2018-union-of-concerned-scientists_100646029_t.gif)
More good news about electric cars in the U.S.: the emissions associated with the electricity used to charge them have fallen. Again. Based on the latest data on powerplant emissions from the EPA, an electric car on the road in the U.S. now has average emissions as low as an 80-mpg car. DON'T MISS: Electric cars cleaner than any gas-only car for... 
![Global carbon dioxide emissions, 1850-2030 [CO2 Information Analysis Center, World Energy Outlook]](https://images.hgmsites.net/tmb/global-carbon-dioxide-emissions-1850-2030-co2-information-analysis-center-world-energy-outlook_100631742_t.gif)
The most recent detailed studies on the likely warming of Planet Earth are grim indeed, suggesting that we are collectively at "very high risk" for the most extreme effects of climate change. To stem that, mankind collectively will have to reduce its ongoing emissions of carbon dioxide radically and immediately. Now, one longtime advocate of...