Climate Wise Women Tour: Georgetown
In April 2010, Climate Wise Women from the South Pacific Islands, Uganda and Biloxi, Mississippi will begin a 30-city, 18-country speaking tour in the Americas. These community activists can’t wait for politicians and governmental negotiators to get it right on climate change. They want straight talk on what climate change is doing to women, children, families and communities around the world. The tour continues to Asia / the Pacific in Fall 2010 and to Europe in Spring 2011.
Panelists- Keya Chatterjee, World Wildlife Foundation
- Kate Sheppard, Mother Jones
- Kari Manlove, Center for American Progress
- Tonya Rawe, CARE
- Gina Wimp, Georgetown University
Georgetown
Reiss Science Bldg Rm 112 6-8:00pm
Climate Wise Women Tour: Johns Hopkins
In April 2010, Climate Wise Women from the South Pacific Islands, Uganda and Biloxi, Mississippi will begin a 30-city, 18-country speaking tour in the Americas. These community activists can’t wait for politicians and governmental negotiators to get it right on climate change. They want straight talk on what climate change is doing to women, children, families and communities around the world. The tour continues to Asia / the Pacific in Fall 2010 and to Europe in Spring 2011.
Panelists- Majora Carter, Majora Carter Group
- Elizabeth Becker, Author/Journalist
- Kathleen Rogers, Earth Day Network
Johns Hopkins
1717 Mass. Ave NW Rm LL7
How to Use Social Media to Drive Growth for Sustainable Products
A lively discussion moderated by Kate Sheppard of Mother Jones will take place from 5:30-6:30 followed by a cocktail reception at Helix Lounge featuring drink and food specials.
Panelists:- Sacha Cohen is President of grassfed media, an integrated communications firm that helps green companies create compelling content, marketing materials, and social media campaigns. She is also the founder of GoingGreenDC.net.
- Jennifer Kaplan is adjunct faculty in Marketing at Marymount University, blogger for Ecopreneurist.com, and author of the new book,Greening Your Small Business.
- Diane MacEachern is a communications professional, speaker and accomplished writer. Diane is passionate about empowering consumers — especially women — to use their marketplace clout to protect the environment. Diane is the author of Big Green Purse: Use Your Spending Power to Create a Cleaner, Greener World.
- Lynn Miller is a green marketing consultant and founder of Organicmania.com, a blog “devoted to cutting through the hype andfiguring out when it makes sense to lay out the big bucks for organic and green purchases. Lynn also tweets with a business focus at @4GreenPs.
- Adam Shake is Editor-in-Chief of Simple Earth Media and founder of Twilight Earth and EcoTech Daily. He is an environmental writer, advocate, entrepreneur, speaker and Washington DC-based activist. Adam is a member of the Society of Environmental Journalists, and an active participant in a number of environmental and social media clubs and organizations.
Moderator:
Kate Sheppard is an environmental reporter and blogger at Mother Jones. Kate’s inside the beltway muckraking on the energy industry and the Chamber of Commerce make her a must follow for anyone interested in the business and politics of green and greenwashing.
Helix Lounge
Hotel Helix
1430 Rhode Island Ave NW
2010 Energy Conference: Short-Term Stresses, Long-Term Change
For the first time, the U.S. Energy Information Administration is hosting a major energy conference in partnership with the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) at Johns Hopkins University. The conference attracts U.S. and international attendees from government, industry, non-profit organizations, the media, and academia.
2010 Energy Conference with Keynotes- Dr. Steven Chu, Secretary of Energy
- Dr. Lawrence H. Summers, Director of the National Economic Council
| Session | Moderator |
| U.S. Climate Change Policy: What’s Next After Copenhagen | Richard Newell (EIA Administrator) |
| Short-Term Energy Prices — What Drivers Matter Most? | Howard Gruenspecht (EIA Deputy Administrator) |
| The Energy-Water Nexus: Availability and Impacts | Howard Gruenspecht |
| EIA’s 2010 Annual Energy Outlook Highlights | John Conti (EIA) |
| Regulating Energy Commodities | Steve Harvey (EIA) |
| Biofuels: Continuing Shifts in the Industry and Long-Term Outlook | Michael Schaal (EIA) |
| Natural Gas: U.S. Markets in a Global Context | Glen Sweetnam (EIA) |
| Smart Grid: Impacts on Electric Power Supply and Demand | Joseph Paladino (DOE, Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability) |
| Energy and the Economy | Adam Sieminski (Deutsche Bank) |
| Energy Efficiency: Measuring Gains and Quantifying Opportunities | Deborah Bleviss (School of Advanced International Studies) |
- Paul N. Argyropoulos (Environmental Protection Agency)
- David M. Arseneau (Federal Reserve Board)
- Thomas Beauduy (Susquehanna River Basin Commission)
- Guy Caruso (Center for Strategic and International Studies)
- Brooke Coleman (New Fuels Alliance)
- John Conti (EIA)
- Sean Cota (Cota & Cota)
- Tom R. Eizember (Exxon Mobil Corporation)
- Michelle Foss (University of Texas)
- Peter Gross (EIA)
- Jason Grumet (Bipartisan Policy Center)
- Karen Harbert (U.S. Chamber of Commerce)
- M. Michael Hightower (Sandia National Laboratories)
- Skip Horvath (Natural Gas Supply Association)
- Gina McCarthy (Environmental Protection Agency)
- Edward L. Morse (Credit Suisse Securities)
- Deanna L. Newcomb (McDermott Will & Emery LLP)
- Mary Novak (IHS Global Insight)
- Matthew C. Rogers (DOE)
- Timothy D. Searchinger (Princeton University)
- Benjamin Schlesinger (Benjamin Schlesinger and Associates/Galway Group)
- Andrew Slaughter (Shell)
- Glen Sweetnam (EIA)
- Jeff Wright (Federal Energy Regulatory Commission)
International Trade Center
1300 Pennsylvania Avenue N.W.
Washington, DC 20004
Putting a Predictable Price on Carbon: Opportunities for Bipartisan Agreement
- Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA)
- Senator Susan Collins (R-ME)
- Steve Kline, Vice President, Corporate Environmental and Federal Affairs, PG&E
- Mike Parr, Senior Manager, Federal Affairs, Dupont
- Michael Schnitzer, Economic Policy Advisor, Entergy (Northbridge Group)
- Amit Ronen, Deputy Chief of Staff, Senator Cantwell
- Jason Grumet, President, The Bipartisan Policy Center
Opportunities to Improve Energy Security and the Environment through Transportation Policy
Wednesday’s hearing is one in a series as the committee develops the next surface transportation authorization bill.
Witnesses
Panel 1- John D. Porcari, Deputy Secretary of Transportation, United States Department of Transportation
- Regina McCarthy, Assistant Administrator, Office of Air and Radiation, United States Environmental Protection Agency
- Larry Greene, Executive Director/Air Pollution Control Officer, Sacramento Metropolitan Air Quality Management District
- Deron Lovaas, Federal Transportation Policy Director, Natural Resources Defense Council
- Doug Siglin, Federal Affairs Director, Chesapeake Bay Foundation
- Richard (Rich) R. Kolodziej, President, NGVAmerica
Markup of Home Star, Smart Grid, and Renewable Energy Legislation
The Subcommittee on Energy and Environment will consider H.R. _, Committee Print on the Home Star Energy Retrofit Act of 2010, H.R. _, Committee Print on the Grid Reliability and Infrastructure Defense (GRID) Act, and H.R. 4451, the Collinsville Renewable Energy Promotion Act.
Nominations of Department of Defense energy and environment positions, and others 1
- Elizabeth A. McGrath to be Deputy Chief Management Officer of the Department of Defense;
- Michael J. McCord to be Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller);
- Sharon E. Burke to be Director of Operations Energy Plans and Programs;
- Solomon B. Watson IV to be General Counsel of the Department of the Army; and
- Katherine G. Hammack to be Assistant Secretary of the Army for Installations and Environment.
The nominees will be present.
E&E NewsThe Senate Armed Services Committee tomorrow will consider President Obama’s nominee to be the first person to fill a position created to rein in the Defense Department’s energy use in combat situations.As the director of operational energy plans and programs, Sharon Burke would be responsible for working toward better fuel demand management for the services’ ships, tanks, aircraft and vehicles as well as the generators that provide heating, air conditioning and power to bases in Afghanistan and Iraq. If confirmed, Burke will be the top adviser to the secretary of Defense and the deputy secretary of Defense regarding the services’ operational energy plans and programs.
Burke will likely have a smooth confirmation hearing. Ranking member John McCain (R-Ariz.) does not have any concerns with her confirmation, according to a committee aide. And, Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) is planning to meet with Burke today to “get a sense of who she is and what she’s about,” according to Inhofe spokesman Jared Young. However, Inhofe does not plan on opposing her confirmation at the hearing tomorrow, Young said.
Burke currently serves as a vice president at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS) in Washington, D.C., focusing on ways international demand for natural resources affects climate change, biodiversity and security.
Last summer, while working at CNAS, she testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on how U.S. national security and climate change are linked. Her comments provide insight into what type of actions she would advocate if confirmed to the position and indicate that she would likely take swift and definitive action to reduce the Defense Department’s carbon footprint and incorporate climate change concerns into defense strategies.
“National security capabilities can take decades to build: We need to design the ideas and equipment and recruit and train the personnel to protect and defend the nation 10 to 40 years in the future, and it is clear that climate change will shape our future,” Burke said in her testimony.
Burke stressed that since DOD is the single largest energy consumer in the United States, it could create a “significant demand pull” that could drive the research and response regarding climate change. She also pressed for better education efforts to help the defense community reach consensus on the science of climate change and how it would affect defense operations.
“There is an urgent need to communicate the science [of climate change] in terms of risk management and plausible scenarios; the defense community, after all, has spent billions of dollars building weapons and training personnel to deal with risks and plausible threats in the future,” she said.
The position Burke was nominated for was created in the fiscal 2009 Defense Authorization Act following sharp criticism from the Defense Science Task Board on DOD’s energy management by operational forces. The task board said in 2008 that the lack of sustained senior leadership on this issue is “one of the most significant barriers to changing wasteful practices.” Other nominees
The committee tomorrow also will consider Katherine Hammack to be assistant secretary of the Army for installations and environment.
Hammack currently works for Ernst & Young’s Climate Change and Sustainability Services, where she has helped clients obtain Energy Star or LEED certification for their new construction or existing buildings. Hammack was also a consultant to the White House on the “greening” of the White House and Executive Office Building, leading the group focused on indoor environmental quality issues.
If confirmed, she will supervise the design, construction, operations, maintenance and management of Army installations. She would also be responsible for the Army’s environmental compliance and cleanup progress.
Climate Policy: Public Perception, Science, and the Political Landscape
This briefing will explore public perceptions of climate change, scientific understanding, and the current political landscape. Our goal is to identify areas where these three perspectives reinforce each other and where they diverge in order to: 1) better understand the challenges and opportunities policy-makers face, 2) identify remaining needs that, if met, could help society most effectively manage risks, and 3) explore opportunities to improve communication among policy-makers, scientists, and the public.
Speakers:- Norman J. Ornstein, Ph.D. Resident Scholar, American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research
- Michael Oppenheimer, Ph.D. Albert G. Milbank Professor of Geosciences and International Affairs, Department of Geosciences and Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University
- Jon A. Krosnick, Ph.D. Frederic O. Glover Professor in Humanities and Social Sciences, Department of Communication, Stanford University
- Paul Higgins, Ph.D. Senior Policy Fellow, American Meteorological Society
SPEAKER BIOGRAPHIES
Norman Ornstein is a long-time observer of Congress and politics. He writes a weekly column for Roll Call and is an election analyst for CBS News. He serves as codirector of the AEI-Brookings Election Reform Project and participates in AEI’s Election Watch series. He also serves as a senior counselor to the Continuity of Government Commission. Mr. Ornstein led a working group of scholars and practitioners that helped shape the law, known as McCain-Feingold, that reformed the campaign financing system. He was elected as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2004. His many books include The Permanent Campaign and Its Future (AEI Press, 2000); the coauthored The Broken Branch: How Congress is Failing America and How to Get It Back on Track (Oxford University Press, 2006); and, most recently, Vital Statistics on Congress 2008 (Brookings Institution Press, 2008), also coauthored.
Michael Oppenheimer is the Albert G. Milbank Professor of Geosciences and International Affairs at Princeton University. He is also the Director of the Program in Science, Technology and Environmental Policy (STEP) at the Woodrow Wilson School. He joined the Princeton faculty in 2002 after more than two decades with the Environmental Defense Fund, a non-governmental environmental organization, where he served as chief scientist and manager of the Climate and Air Program. Oppenheimer is a long-time participant in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) which won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007, serving most recently as a lead author of the IPCC’s Fourth Assessment Report and is now a coordinating lead author of an upcoming IPCC Special Report covering climate extremes and disasters. He serves on the US National Academies Board on Energy and Environmental Systems. He is also a science advisor to the Environmental Defense Fund. His interests include science and policy of the atmosphere, particularly climate change and its impacts. Much of his research aims to understand the potential for “dangerous” outcomes of increasing levels of greenhouse gases by exploring the effects of global warming on ecosystems such as coral reefs, on the ice sheets and sea level, and on patterns of human migration. Oppenheimer is the author of more than 100 articles published in professional journals and is co-author (with Robert H. Boyle) of a 1990 book, Dead Heat: The Race Against The Greenhouse Effect. He received his Ph.D. in chemical physics from the University of Chicago.
Jon A. Krosnick is Frederic O. Glover Professor in Humanities and Social Sciences and professor of communication, political science, and psychology at Stanford University.
A leading international authority on questionnaire design and survey research methods, Professor Krosnick has taught courses for professionals on survey methods for 25 years around the world and has served as a methodology consultant to government agencies, commercial firms, and academic scholars. His books include “Introduction to Survey Research, Polling, and Data Analysis” and “The Handbook of Questionnaire Design” (forthcoming, Oxford University Press), which reviews 100 years of research on how different ways of asking questions can yield different answers from survey respondents and on how to design questions to measure most accurately. His recent research has focused on how other aspects of survey methodology (e.g., collecting data by interviewing face-to-face vs. by telephone or on paper questionnaires) can be optimized to maximize accuracy.
Dr. Krosnick is also a world-recognized expert on the psychology of attitudes, especially in the area of politics. He is co-principal investigator of the American National Election Study, the nation’s preeminent academic research project exploring voter decision-making and political campaign effects. For 30 years, Dr. Krosnick has studied how the American public’s political attitudes are formed, change, and shape thinking and action. His publication explore the causes of people decisions about whether to vote, for whom to vote, whether to approve of the President’s performance, whether to take action to influence government policy-making on a specific issue, and much more.
Dr. Krosnick’s scholarship has been recognized with the Phillip Brickman Memorial Prize, the Pi Sigma Alpha Award, the Erik Erikson Early Career Award for Excellence and Creativity, a fellowship at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, and membership as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
As an expert witness in court, he has testified evaluating the quality of surveys presented as evidence by opposing counsel and has conducted original survey research to inform courts in cases involving unreimbursed expenses, uncompensated overtime work, exempt/non-exempt misclassification, patent/trademark violation, health effects of accidents, consequences of being misinformed about the results of standardized academic tests, economic valuation of environmental damage, change of venue motions, and other topics.
At Stanford, Dr. Krosnick directs the Political Psychology Research Group (PPRG). PPRG is a cross-disciplinary team of scholars who conduct empirical studies of the psychology of political behavior and studies seeking to optimize research methodology for studying political psychology. The group’s studies employ a wide range of research methods, including surveys, experiments, and content analysis, and the group often conducts collaborative research studies with leading news media organizations, including ABC News, The Associated Press, the Washington Post, and Time Magazine. Support for the group’s work has come from U.S. Government agencies (e.g., the National Science Foundation, the Bureau of Labor Statistics), private foundations (e.g., the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation), and Institutes at Stanford (e.g., the Woods Institute for the Environment). Dr. Krosnick also directs the Summer Institute in Political Psychology, an annual event that brings 60 students and professions from around the world to Stanford for intensive training in political psychology theory and methods.
In his spare time, Dr. Krosnick plays drums with a contemporary jazz group called Charged Particles that has released two CD’s internationally and tours across the U.S. and abroad (www.chargedparticles.com).
Nobel Prize-Winning Economists and Scientists Call on Congress to Address Climate Change
Nobel prize-winning economists and scientists will talk about a letter that they, other economists and scientists, and clean energy business representatives will deliver to the Senate Thursday, urging lawmakers to require immediate cuts in global warming emissions. The letter was signed by more than 2,000 economists and climate scientists, including eight Nobel laureates, 32 National Academy of Science members, 11 MacArthur “genius award” winners, and three National Medal of Science recipients. The signers point out that the evidence of climate change is incontrovertible and the longer we wait to address it, the more costly the consequences will be. Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) will kick off the call with a statement of support and express the need for Senate action on clean energy and climate legislation.
Speakers- Kevin Knobloch, Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) president
- Tom Udall, U.S. senator from New Mexico
- Jim McCarthy, biological oceanography professor at Harvard University, former American Association for the Advancement of Science president, UCS board member, Nobel prize winner for his work with the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
- Eric Maskin, economics professor at the Institute for Advanced Study; winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics for his work on mechanism design, the theory of how to design institutions for achieving particular social or economic goals
- Alan Robock, meteorology professor at Rutgers, Nobel prize winner for his work with the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
Call-in number: (866) 871-4318