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ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE STATE GUIDANCE FOR CLEAN POWER PLANNING
The document outlines strategies for US states to ensure that the Clean Power Plan does not disproportionately burden low-income communities and communities of color. It emphasizes the need for 'high impact' engagement, the conduct of formal Environmental Justice (EJ) analyses, and the avoidance of carbon trading mechanisms that may allow power plants to avoid on-site pollution reductions. The guide also advocates for a 'Just Transition' that provides economic development and job training in communities heavily dependent on fossil fuels.
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Document type: Guide
Global Warming and the U.S. Presidential Election, Spring 2016
The report finds a deep partisan divide in climate perceptions, with supporters of Democratic candidates (Sanders and Clinton) and some Republican candidates (Kasich and Trump) generally believing global warming is happening, while Ted Cruz supporters are the most skeptical. While a broad majority of voters support renewable energy research and tax rebates for energy efficiency, support for carbon taxes and strict emission limits on coal plants drops significantly among Republican supporters, particularly those of Ted Cruz. Global warming is viewed as a very important voting issue primarily by Sanders and Clinton supporters, whereas it ranks low for supporters of Republican candidates.
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Document type: Report
Politics & Global Warming
The report finds that while 73% of registered US voters believe global warming is happening, there is a significant divide between conservative Republicans and other political groups. Most voters support clean energy research and carbon regulation, and are more likely to vote for a presidential candidate who supports climate action than one who opposes it.
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Document type: Report
Global Warming and the U.S. Presidential Election, Spring 2016
The report reveals a deep partisan divide in climate change perceptions. Supporters of Democratic candidates (Sanders, Clinton) and some Republican candidates (Kasich, Trump) generally believe global warming is happening, whereas a majority of Ted Cruz supporters do not. While there is broad support across most candidate groups for renewable energy research and tax rebates for energy-efficient products, significant gaps exist regarding carbon taxes, CO2 regulation, and the importance of climate change as a voting issue.
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Document type: Report
Politics & Global Warming
The report finds that while a majority of US registered voters believe global warming is happening and support various clean energy policies, significant ideological divides persist. Democrats and liberal/moderate Republicans generally align with the mainstream public in supporting climate action, whereas conservative Republicans remain the most skeptical group, though they have shown the largest increase in belief that global warming is occurring over a two-year period. Public awareness of the scientific consensus on human-caused warming remains very low across all political groups.
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Document type: Report
Energy Services: Energy efficiency and embedded generation – 2016 Market Intelligence Report
The report examines the growth of the South African energy services market, driven by rising electricity costs and energy security concerns. It highlights significant growth in rooftop PV, opportunities for energy efficiency in municipal wastewater treatment and public buildings, and the role of Energy Service Companies (ESCOs). The document also details the regulatory landscape, including tax incentives like the 12L allowance and the Western Cape's specific initiatives to reduce energy demand.
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Document type: Report
Agriculture: Market Intelligence Report 2016
The report argues that rising input costs, water scarcity, and international market pressure are driving a transition toward green agriculture in South Africa. It highlights specific opportunities in energy efficiency, solar PV, conservation agriculture, precision agriculture, biological control, and biogas, while noting barriers such as high import costs, regulatory delays, and a lack of technical skills.
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Document type: Report
PUTTING A PRICE ON CARBON: ENSURING EQUITY
The document analyzes how carbon taxes or cap-and-trade programs affect U.S. households through expenditures, income, and revenue allocation. While carbon pricing can be regressive in terms of energy expenditures—disproportionately affecting low-income households and coal-dependent regions—the authors argue that the overall impact is determined by how the government uses the revenue. By targeting a small portion of revenue (approximately 10-12%) toward low-income households and coal communities, policymakers can offset burdens and ensure these vulnerable groups are not driven deeper into poverty. The brief compares various revenue uses, such as lump-sum rebates, labor tax swaps, and capital tax swaps, concluding that the policy is not inherently regressive and can be designed to be progressive.
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Document type: Briefing
Fiscal Instruments in INDCs: How countries are looking to fiscal policies to support INDC implementation
The research paper reviews INDCs submitted to the UNFCCC as of November 20, 2015, to identify the prevalence of fiscal policies such as fossil fuel subsidy reform, clean energy subsidies, and carbon pricing. It finds that 39 INDCs reference these instruments, with a strong trend toward unconditional commitments. The paper highlights the significant potential for greenhouse gas reductions through fossil fuel subsidy reform (FFSR), supported by the GSI-IF model, and recommends that more countries integrate these tools to help meet the two-degree climate threshold.
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Document type: Research paper
TomorrowNow – Manitoba’s Green Plan: Stakeholder consultations on climate change
The report details a bottom-up consultation process in Manitoba involving nine group sessions and 67 bilateral meetings between October 2013 and January 2015. It identifies the province's unique emissions profile, dominated by transportation (38.4%) and agriculture (31.3%), and provides a suite of consensus recommendations across governance, regulatory streamlining, and energy efficiency. A significant portion of the document explores carbon pricing options, including a proposed Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) model and Environmental Fiscal Reform (EFR) such as vehicle registration fee adjustments, to support the transition to a low-carbon economy.
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Document type: Executive summary
THE CLEAN POWER PLAN IS WITHIN REACH
Energy Innovation used the Energy Policy Simulator to determine that a specific combination of six policies could meet the Clean Power Plan's goal of reducing power sector CO2 emissions by 32 percent by 2030 while saving the U.S. economy nearly 40 billion dollars between 2016 and 2030. The recommended package focuses on improving coal plant efficiency, accelerating coal retirements, enhancing building and industrial energy efficiency, implementing a 25 percent national average renewable portfolio standard, and increasing transmission capacity. The report contrasts this approach with more expensive alternatives, such as those relying heavily on nuclear power or carbon capture and storage.
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Document type: Report
THE COSTS OF DELAY
The fact sheet compares two scenarios for meeting U.S. 2025 decarbonization targets: a 'Policy Solutions' package starting in 2016 and a 'Delayed' scenario starting in 2020. It finds that delaying action by four years would cost nearly $400 billion in lost cumulative savings by 2030 and result in less than three-quarters of the total greenhouse gas abatement over the 15-year period. The document emphasizes that early adoption leverages natural capital stock turnover in vehicles and buildings, whereas delayed action requires more aggressive and costly measures, such as higher carbon taxes and accelerated coal plant retirements, to reach the same 2030 emissions levels.
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Document type: Fact sheet
ENERGY POLICY SOLUTIONS
Energy Innovation presents a set of 15 targeted policies across economy-wide, industrial, transportation, power, building, and land-use sectors. These policies, modeled via the Energy Policy Simulator, aim to reduce emissions and save the U.S. approximately $840 billion between 2016 and 2030 while positioning the country as a leader in clean energy technology.
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Document type: Report
Can we prosper without growth? 10 policy proposals
The document outlines ten policy proposals from Research & Degrowth in Barcelona aimed at breaking the 'spell of growth' and providing a cooperative economic model for radical Left and Green parties. These proposals include a citizen debt audit, work-sharing with a 32-hour week, a basic income of 400-600 Euros, and a green tax reform shifting taxation from work to energy and resource use. It advocates for ending subsidies for polluting activities, supporting the non-profit cooperative sector, optimizing existing building use, restricting advertising, establishing absolute caps on CO2 and material resources, and replacing GDP with prosperity indicators. The authors argue these complementary measures decouple social security from economic growth and shift the focus toward the commons and shared infrastructure.
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Document type: Statement
10 pomysłów na życie bez wzrostu
The text outlines a degrowth-based policy framework consisting of ten proposals to decouple social well-being from economic growth. These include debt audits, work-sharing, a guaranteed basic income with a maximum income cap, green tax reforms, and the replacement of GDP with quality-of-life metrics. The authors argue that these measures, implemented as a package, can create a green economy and maintain social security even in a scenario where the economy ceases to grow.
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Document type: Statement
Bridging Costa Rica’s green growth gap
The report analyzes Costa Rica's transition from an agricultural to an export-led economy, highlighting successes in biodiversity and renewable energy alongside critical failures in wastewater management and public transport. It argues that a lack of sustainable public infrastructure and a mismatch in workforce skills hinder the country's goal of carbon neutrality by 2021. The authors recommend streamlining public procurement, diversifying the energy mix beyond hydropower, and implementing a green industrial policy to reduce economic vulnerability to external shocks.
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Document type: Report
SOUTH AFRICA’S INTENDED NATIONALLY DETERMINED CONTRIBUTION (INDC)
South Africa's INDC proposes a 'peak, plateau and decline' emissions trajectory, with GHG emissions expected to peak between 2020 and 2025 and decline in absolute terms after 2036. The plan integrates climate action with the National Development Plan's goal to eliminate poverty by 2030. Adaptation efforts focus on six goals, including the development of a National Adaptation Plan by 2020, while mitigation emphasizes a transition to a low-carbon economy through renewable energy and efficiency. The document emphasizes that these commitments are premised on a fair multilateral agreement and the provision of international finance, technology, and capacity-building support.
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Document type: Report
Fossil Fuels are Dead, Long Live Fossil Fuels
Botswana faces a critical need to diversify its economy due to expected declines in diamond revenues. The report evaluates the viability of exporting coal via the proposed Trans-Kalahari Railway (TKR) and extracting iron ore near the Okavango Delta. It concludes that raw coal exports are risky due to high infrastructure costs and a narrowing global demand window. Instead, it recommends using coal and iron ore for domestic beneficiation to create a regional steel industry in Selebi-Phikwe and prioritising eco-tourism as a sustainable primary revenue generator.
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Document type: Research paper
US Climate Policy: A critical assessment of intensity standards
The paper evaluates whether intensity standards for energy-intensive and trade-exposed (EITE) industries are an efficient alternative to uniform carbon taxes in the US. Using a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model, the authors find that while lax standards may slightly reduce leakage, stringent standards can actually increase carbon leakage and lead to substantial welfare losses compared to economy-wide emission pricing. The study concludes that intensity standards are primarily driven by political economy considerations rather than economic efficiency.
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Document type: Research paper
HIGHLIGHTS FROM Planetary Economics: Energy, Climate Change and the Three Domains of Sustainable Development
The document outlines a framework called 'Planetary Economics' to address the inadequacy of traditional neoclassical economics in solving climate change. It proposes three domains of socio-economic processes: the First Domain (Satisficing), focusing on human behaviour and efficiency gaps; the Second Domain (Optimising), focusing on market trade-offs and pricing; and the Third Domain (Transforming), focusing on innovation and systemic change. These domains map to three policy pillars: standards and engagement for efficiency, markets and prices for carbon reduction, and strategic investment for infrastructure and innovation. The author concludes that only an integrated strategy combining all three pillars can effectively decarbonise energy systems and overcome systemic 'lock-in' and behavioural inertia.
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Document type: Executive summary