At
Mother Jones, Jeremy Schulman and Jaeah Lee explore the measurements behind
a new report that ranks 34 major US cities by their energy-use policies:
Does your city have a plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions dramatically? Is it seeking to reduce car use through bike share programs and public transit subsidies? Does it partner with utility companies to help small businesses and homeowners save energy? And does it lobby for statewide energy-efficiency legislation?
Those are just a few of the policies that have made Boston the top-ranked city for energy efficiency, according to a new report from the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy. Portland, Ore., placed second, followed by New York, San Francisco, and Seattle.
ACEEE ranked 34 major American cities—the 25 most populous incorporated ones, plus the central cities of nine other major metropolitan areas—according to their efforts to promote energy savings. The report looked at building codes, community-wide energy initiatives, transportation policies, energy-saving programs involving public utilities, and efforts to improve the efficiency of government building. You can see where each city ranked on the map above.
The cities' scores are based largely on their implementation of efficiency policies—enforceable building standards, for instance—rather than on quantifiable reductions in energy use and emissions. During a conference call following the release of the report, ACEEE official Eric Mackres said the report focused on specific policies because the group wanted it to serve as a "playbook of actions you can take to improve efficiency." He added that "because most cities aren't as good at promoting energy efficiency as Boston and Portland, we don't have as good of data on energy savings [and] energy consumption...and as a result, we weren't able to compare all of the cities in the scorecard using those energy metrics."
Most cities did substantially worse than the top performers. [...]
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At
this link you can access an interactive version of the map above.
Blast from the Past. At Daily Kos on this date in 2005—Getting ahead of the issue on Iraq:
Elected Democrats have been rightly knocked around for having no leadership instincts, and that's nowhere more visible than on the issue of Iraq. While Democrats in DC and in races around the country want to pretend that Iraq can be trumped by health care and social security, there's just no way that's going to happen. Iraq will be issues number one, two and three on voters' minds.
Now here's the problem. Most DC Democrats I've spoken to are very much against the war, but they're afraid to say so. Afraid to look weak. Afraid that they'll be tarred as peaceniks.
Yet, despite any high-profile opposition to the war, more and more people are turning on Bush's War. And now that polling is showing the American people increasingly disenchanted with the war and agitating for a pullout, more Democrats will feel compelled to take "courageous" stances on the war, now that only 32 percent of the American people approve of it.
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Tweet of the Day:
Rick Santorum is at home in front of a mirror cry-singing Nothing Compares 2 U and ripping up a picture of Pope Francis.
— @TheNardvark
On today's
Kagro in the Morning show, GopFight!
Greg Dworkin updates the ACA rollout, noting better mental health coverage—much in the news just now—is included.
Armando on the Chuck Todd flap, and a court's rejection of NJ's bid on legalized sports betting. Gun nut/police chief Mark Kessler faces a disciplinary hearing today. An IA county pays for a #GunFAIL involving armed cops at a kids' event. A lengthy list of corrections to "Rise of the Warrior Cop."
Forbes: "Give Back? Yes, It's Time For The 99% To Give Back To The 1%."
Slate's "9 Things Wrong With
BuzzFeed's Article About 9 Potential Mass Shootings That Were Stopped by Someone With a Personally Owned Firearm."
High Impact Posts. Top Comments.