Climate Change

Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) announced this afternoon that he would stay on at the helm of the Banking Committee, which also has jurisdiction over federal transit issues, rather than move over to lead the health panel previously led by his friend, the late Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA).

With Congress returning to work next week after a month away from Washington, a national dialogue long dominated by health care is about to open to the long-awaited Senate debate on climate change.

As Senator Barbara Boxer works on her upcoming climate change bill, the Senate environment committee chairman is "definitely looking at" a plan to give green transport 10 percent of the revenue generated from carbon emissions caps, according to a new report from BNA's Transportation Watch.

The story so far: Ed Glaeser recently began an effort to assess the costs and benefits of constructing high-speed rail lines at the New York Times' Economix blog. Last week, he posted his first substantive take on the issue, an attempt to estimate direct costs and benefits from a hypothetical line between Houston and Dallas.

America's oil addiction is readily acknowledged, even by its biggest enablers. But what is the nation actually doing to kick the habit and embrace a safer, healthier, more realistic energy future? 

Making good on a vow first reported in Streetsblog Capitol Hill, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd (D-CT) and three colleagues today offered a bill authorizing $4 billion in grants to help states and cities pursue transit-oriented development, bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure, and other green transport projects.

The Washington lobbying firm of Bonner & Associates is facing protests and a possible wire fraud probe after it was revealed to have forged at least a dozen letters to Congress this summer that claimed to represent local grassroots groups opposed to fighting climate change.

According to a new survey, the economic benefits of walking, biking and taking transit may ultimately be their strongest selling point for Californians - at least during a recession.

The Washington Post's Ezra Klein, whose blog is a must-read look at the political dynamics of congressional policy-making, makes an eyebrow-raising assertion in his food column today: