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Dan Lashof, Program Director, Climate & Clean Air, Washington, D.C.

Dan Lashof
I am the director of NRDC's climate and clean air program. My main focus is solutions to global warming, in particular developing federal regulations and legislation to place enforceable limits on carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping pollutants. I also do a lot of work on the related areas of national energy policy and efforts to reduce America's dangerous dependence on oil. I have participated in scientific assessments of global warming through the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and have monitored international climate negotiations since their inception. I earned my bachelor's degree in physics and mathematics at Harvard and have a doctorate from the Energy and Resources Group at the University of California, Berkeley. I became an environmentalist the first time I went backpacking on the continental divide above Boulder, Colorado. I live with my wife Diane and our dog Diva. We have two sons in college and one who has graduated. I enjoy bicycling, hiking, and skiing when there is enough snow.

Recent Posts

Mission Impossible?

Posted May 19, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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On Friday I had the honor of being the commencement speaker for Berkeley’s Energy and Resources Group, where I obtained my Ph.D. 26 years ago. Here is a lightly edited version of my speech (some inside jokes removed). Thank you...continued

Taxpayers Get Nearly $100 Billion Bill for 2012 Extreme Weather, Equivalent to One-Sixth of Non-Defense Discretionary Spending

Posted May 14, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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With all the debate on the federal budget in Congress, climate change rarely gets mentioned as a deficit driver. Yet dealing with climate disruption was one of the largest non-defense discretionary budget items in 2012. Indeed, as NRDC shows in...continued

Extreme Drought is Extremely Expensive for U.S. Taxpayers

Posted April 25, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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This blog was written by Andy Stevenson, NRDC Finance Advisor and Dan Lashof. It first appeared in LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. Texas’ reputation as a small government, big steaks, business friendly state is beginning to wither as it continues...continued

The Economist's Climate Deep Dive off the Shallow End

Posted April 12, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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The Economist is a well-regarded magazine. Its writers aren’t loony science deniers, like those on the Wall Street Journal’s editorial page, or the broadcasters on Fox News. Generally speaking, their climate coverage wins high marks. But an article the magazine...continued

U.S. CO2 Emissions Have Been Falling--Will That Continue?

Posted April 9, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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A version of this blog first appeared in Live Science's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. The Energy Information Administration (EIA), the official U.S. energy data keeper, recently released full-year 2012 data. They show a 3.7 percent reduction in carbon dioxide...continued

US Taxpayers Under Water

Posted March 28, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Curbing Pollution, Health and the Environment, Living Sustainably, Moving Beyond Oil, Solving Global Warming, U.S. Law and Policy

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This blog was written by Dan Lashof and Andy Stevenson, finance advisor for NRDC, and first appeared in Live Science's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.   There are many, many compelling and urgent reasons to take decisive action to combat climate change....continued

Smart Advice: President's Science Advisors Detail Climate Action Plan

Posted March 27, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) has released a six-point plan in a letter to President Obama responding to his request for input on his second term climate strategy. PCAST laid out a clear-eyed vision of...continued

Exxon's Startling Outlook for Our Future

Posted March 21, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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There’s something startling about ExxonMobil’s 2013 Outlook for Energy: A View to 2040 report. Could it be that the company that’s spent many millions of dollars and important years promoting denial of global warming now issues a report for investors...continued

The Bottom Line on Climate Is in the Air

Posted March 7, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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If you want to know the bottom line on how the effort to curtail dangerous climate change is going, check what’s happening to the atmosphere’s concentration of heat-trapping carbon dioxide (CO2). That’s just what the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration...continued

Sequester This: U.S. Consumers Paid a 2.7% Climate Disruption Tax in 2012

Posted March 1, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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This post has been revised (March 4th) to reflect comments by Charlie Komanoff from carbontax.org regarding the use of state sales tax rates as opposed to state and local tax rates. The post was co-written with NRDC Finance Advisor Andy...continued

To Start Making Things Better, You Have to Stop Making them Worse

Posted February 22, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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To start making things better, you have to stop making them worse. That’s the principle we demonstrators articulated at Sunday’s Forward on Climate rally in Washington DC, as our feet stomped against the cold. I was there wearing two hats....continued

The State of the Union's Carbon Pollution

Posted February 13, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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“Tonight, there is much progress to report,” the President said last night at the beginning of his State of the Union address. When it comes to combating climate change, there was indeed.  To begin with, President Obama noted that …over...continued

Yes We Can Get There From Here

Posted February 8, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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Last July I published an issue brief called Closer than You Think, pointing out that U.S. carbon dioxide emissions in 2011 were lower than many people realized—about 9 percent below their 2005/2007 peak—putting President Obama’s 17-percent-below -2005-levels reduction target within...continued

The World Bank Is NOT Coming After Our Ice Cream Cones

Posted February 2, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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Last week, World Bank President Dr. Jim Yong Kim came out with a powerful, laudable statement supporting urgent action on climate change. “If there is no action soon,” he wrote in the Washington Post, in a January 24th op-ed, “the...continued

A BFD for Our Climate

Posted January 22, 2013 by Dan Lashof in Solving Global Warming

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President Obama promised that “[w]e will respond to the threat of climate change,” in what the New York Times called the most prominent policy vow of his second inaugural address. If he delivers on that promise—and he has the authority...continued

About

Switchboard is the staff blog of the Natural Resources Defense Council, the nation’s most effective environmental group. For more about our work, including in-depth policy documents, action alerts and ways you can contribute, visit NRDC.org.

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