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The report analyzes the vulnerability of the Gulf Coast's diverse ecosystems—from upland forests to coral reefs—to rising temperatures and sea levels. It highlights that while climate change poses significant threats to water resources, biodiversity, and public health, current human activities like shoreline development and water engineering remain the primary drivers of ecological change. The authors advocate for a three-pronged strategy of mitigation, minimization of human impacts, and adaptive management to safeguard the region's economic and natural heritage.

The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) monitored 10 US nuclear power plants and found a "serious breakdown in quality assurance," noting that internal auditors failed to identify any of the 200+ reported incidents. The study found that 44 percent of problems were caused by poor procedures and 35 percent by worker mistakes. While some plants like Surry and Oyster Creek demonstrated proactive safety cultures, others like LaSalle and Sequoyah showed systemic failures, including ignored warnings and repetitive errors. UCS recommends better training for auditors and workers, revised procedures, and stronger NRC enforcement.

The document evaluates the WRAP program at Dow Chemical, which uses a contest format to encourage small-scale capital investments in energy savings, yield improvement, and waste reduction. It highlights the program's strengths, such as top management support and the lack of bureaucracy, while identifying weaknesses including a lack of strategic alignment and limited employee participation. The note also contrasts the Louisiana Division's WRAP approach with the Bayside Division's continuous improvement model.

The WRAP (Waste Reduction Always Pays) program was implemented by Dow Chemical Company's Louisiana Division starting in 1987. Evolving from an energy-saving contest initiated in 1981 to address oil price shocks and capital scarcity, the program expanded to include yield improvement and waste reduction. The program's creation was influenced by a 1985 congressional survey on emissions, pressure from environmental groups, and the upcoming SARA Title III reporting requirements. Over time, the program's financial criteria shifted from requiring a 100% return on investment (ROI) to a 30% ROI, with a minimum savings threshold of $10,000 per project.

The WRAP program at Dow Chemical's Louisiana Division incentivized employees to propose waste reduction projects by linking environmental goals with financial returns. Starting as an energy contest in 1981, it evolved into a comprehensive waste reduction initiative by 1986, utilizing a competitive submission process and ROI-based justification. By 1992, the program achieved significant waste reductions and cost savings, fostering a corporate culture of pollution prevention through recognition and knowledge sharing.

The Clean Air Task Force (CATF) has launched the Climate Equity and the Clean Energy Transition Project to address the historical trend of placing clean energy infrastructure in low-income neighborhoods and communities of color, which often exacerbates existing injustices. The project aims to move from adversarial relationships to cooperative engagement between environmental justice communities, the energy sector, and climate advocates. Key activities include on-site community research, analyzing best practices for clean energy siting to protect public health, and developing a roadmap to modernize federal government programs and budgets to make them more accessible to underserved populations. Additionally, CATF is piloting an online capacity-building tool for community engagement and hosting workshops with environmental justice organizations to redefine decision-making processes and address air quality health impacts. The project focuses on various U.S. rural, tribal, and urban locations, including the Navajo Nation and the Ironbound Community, to produce recommendations for equitable project development and federal program implementation.

The document outlines the three-stage process of carbon capture and storage (CCS)—capture, transport, and storage—and explains why Louisiana is well-suited for this technology due to its industrial base and subsurface geology. It highlights that CCS could create 17,000 new jobs and attract $76 billion in investment, while also reducing air pollutants like particulate matter and sulfur oxides. The text details the geologic mechanisms that ensure permanent CO2 storage and describes the EPA's Class VI regulatory program, which governs well construction, monitoring, and financial responsibility to protect groundwater and the public.

The document details the regulatory framework of the EPA's Underground Injection Control (UIC) program, specifically Class VI wells used for carbon capture and storage (CCS). It outlines stringent requirements for site characterization, construction, monitoring, and financial responsibility to protect underground sources of drinking water. As of December 2023, 12 Class VI wells have been permitted in the U.S., with 178 additional applications submitted. The text emphasizes the need for increased funding and state primacy to alleviate permitting bottlenecks and support the rapid expansion of the CCS market driven by the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

The HyVelocity Hydrogen Hub is projected to create 45,000 direct jobs, including 35,000 in construction and 10,000 permanent positions. The initiative involves seven major projects located in areas such as the Golden Triangle, Corpus Christi, and Louisiana. The hub is supported by a wide consortium of industry sponsors, including AES Corporation, Air Liquide, Chevron New Energies, ExxonMobil Low Carbon Solutions, MHI Hydrogen Infrastructure (MHI H2I), and Orsted, with GTI Energy serving as the prime consortium representative and administrator.

The Clean Air Task Force (CATF) used US EPA COBRA modeling to estimate that retiring four Illinois nuclear plants (Byron, Dresden, Braidwood, and LaSalle) would lead to significant increases in PM2.5 pollution. Over a ten-year period, this shift is projected to cause between 1,200 and 2,700 premature deaths and $10 to $24 billion in monetized damages. While the pollution sources are spread across ten states, the most severe health impacts are concentrated in the Midwest.

Louisiana is the leading U.S. state in both dedicated hydrogen production and consumption, producing nearly 2.5 million metric tons annually. The state leverages its industrial clusters and infrastructure to attract over $20 billion in private investment for clean hydrogen, which is primarily intended to replace conventional hydrogen in petroleum refining, ammonia, and methanol production.

Louisiana is the largest U.S. ecosystem for hydrogen, ranking first nationally in dedicated hydrogen production and serving as a major hub for petroleum refining, ammonia, and methanol production.

Since the 2018 45Q reform, 84 carbon management projects have been announced in the U.S., with a significant surge in 2021. The majority of these projects are industrial-sector initiatives utilizing saline storage, though regional infrastructure in the Midwest is enabling ethanol projects. The power sector accounts for 23% of projects, primarily natural gas and coal plants, while only one large-scale Direct Air Capture plant is planned.

The document examines the application of environmental taxes, fees, and charges across different sectors in the U.S., including water, air, solid waste, and hazardous waste management. It distinguishes between revenue-raising taxes and cost-offsetting fees, noting that while many instruments are designed to recover administrative costs, some—such as the federal tax on ozone-depleting chemicals and certain state-level hazardous waste taxes—have demonstrated significant incentive effects in reducing pollution. The report also details specific state-level experiments with variable-rate waste collection and wetland compensation fees.

The report analyzes 118 planned petrochemical projects in the US, finding that they could add 153.8 MMT of annual CO2e emissions, equivalent to nearly 40 coal plants. It highlights that a small number of megaprojects drive the majority of these emissions, with ammonia production being a primary contributor. The document argues that carbon capture and storage (CCS) is an ineffective solution used to justify fossil-fuel-based expansion, often supported by federal subsidies. It also notes that the buildout is concentrated in disadvantaged communities in the Gulf Coast and Appalachia, worsening environmental racism.

The document argues that the petrochemical industry's expansion is unsustainable and harmful, urging financial institutions to stop financing petrochemical expansion, require client transition plans, and adopt environmental justice policies. It highlights the severe health and environmental impacts in US 'sacrifice zones' and the financial risks of stranded assets.

The report details a global surge in plastics production capacity driven by cheap fossil fuel feedstocks. In the US, shale gas has led to planned investments of $164 billion for 264 new or expanded facilities. China is heavily investing in carbon-intensive coal-to-olefins technology to overcome a lack of natural gas. Meanwhile, the Middle East continues to leverage oil and gas, and Europe is seeing new investments enabled by US liquefied natural gas shipments. The report warns that this capacity expansion could lock in high plastic production for decades, exacerbating environmental pollution and the climate crisis.

The report details the financial mechanisms supporting over 100 planned petrochemical projects in the US, primarily in the Gulf South. It finds that a small number of global banks and asset managers provide the majority of this capital, despite mounting market overcapacity, litigation risks, and environmental harms. The document calls for immediate divestment and the adoption of strict climate-aligned policies by financial institutions.

The document analyzes how climate change and the transition to net zero impact the reliability and resilience of Canada's electricity grid. It identifies risks across generation, transmission, and distribution, and proposes solutions such as infrastructure hardening, increasing system flexibility, and updating regulatory frameworks and building codes.

The document analyzes how climate change and the transition to a carbon-neutral economy threaten the resilience of Canada's electrical grids. It details risks to power generation, transmission, and distribution, while highlighting the danger of 'cascading effects' where power failures disrupt other essential services. The paper proposes mitigation strategies including infrastructure hardening, increasing grid flexibility through energy storage and decentralized resources, and improving energy efficiency. It also identifies systemic obstacles, such as regulatory frameworks that prioritize short-term reliability over long-term resilience and outdated building codes based on historical rather than future climate data.