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The Tyee has launched a new series exploring the efforts of Canadian tar sands interests to undermine low carbon fuel standard (LCFS) policies in the U.S. that could some day threaten to wipe out Alberta’s greenhouse gas-intensive oil sands industry. 

Climate change policies being implemented in California and currently under consideration in 23 other U.S. states seek to favor lower-carbon transportation fuels. Since Canada’s tar sands are widely known to be among the dirtiest and most carbon-intensive sources of oil on the planet, the tar sands would of course fall out of favor rapidly if enough U.S. states passed the low-carbon standards into law. And since laws passed by large states like California are often used to pressure Washington to set federal policies, tar sands interests have a lot at stake in battling early adopter states.

As a result, The Tyee reports:
“A sophisticated lobbying effort led by Canadian officials, fossil fuel lobby groups and several of the world’s largest oil companies is targeting policymakers and consumers across the United States.”

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Looks like being green is good for the economy after all.

Solveclimate.com reported on a non profit group called Next 10 and their 'Green Innovation Index' drawing the link between California's climate change action and that state's economic growth.

Surprise, surprise (not), looks like California has incurred some major economic benefits from going green, including the fact that Californians pay less on their utility bills and so far have saved $56 billion dollars through tough building and appliance standards.

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As the world prepares to meet in Bali next month at the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change to negotiate a successor to the Kyoto Protocol, U.S. governors have decided to take action at home. Weary of Congressional foot-dragging, the governors have made regional agreements on global warming and joined hands in a concerted bid to generate public and political support for legislation now before the Senate. But can anything meaningful take place while President Bush is still in office?

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The U.S. Supreme Court has recently endorsed California's strategy to regulate greenhouse gases from vehicles, validating the state's claim emissions should be classified as air pollutants over the objections of the Bush administration.

At least a dozen other states are expected to follow should the Environmental Protection Agency give California the right to limit auto emissions. A final decision is expected, coveniently, after Bush leaves the White House next year.

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The Republican and California governor accused the U.S. government in general and President Bush in particular of “inaction and denial” by blocking state efforts to take action on climate change.