The AP is reporting that Sarah Palin will resign as governor of Alaska effective July 26.

Update:  More from Reuters, suggesting that she is resigning to pursue the GOP nomination in 2012.

According to a recent report, venture investment in cleantech amounted to $1.2 billion in the second quarter of 2009, up from roughly $800 million in the first quarter.

Bradford Plumer, writing in TNR, claims that although Europe had some early "miscues" in its carbon trading program, that it is actually working now to reduce carbon emissions and encourage energy efficiency.  He concludes:

"Bottom line: The EU cap-and-trade system suffered a slew of early mishaps, but the United States has been watching and learning, and we should be able to avoid most of those fumbles. What's more, now that the problems have been ironed out, Europe's cap genuinely appears to be working, spurring companies to become more energy-efficient and making meaningful cuts in emissions. That said, the China factor is still huge: Europe obviously can't stop global warming all by itself, and there's no substitute for an international treaty."

President Obama says that Waxma Markey would spark a "green energy transformation" but the Environmental Protection Agency disagrees.  The EPA recently released a report saying that Waxman Markey would actually slow the growth of renewable energy. 

The WSJ has a story on the administration's dueling viewpoints. 

You might think that the administration would get its story straight before embarking on a legislative odyssey that will result in wealth transfers in the billions of dollars.  But in these days of bailouts and bankruptcies, who'll quibble over details.

The EPA's view is that cap and trade legislation will not increase the price of fossil fuels "enough" to spur additional growth in renewables in the face of the decline in energy use that will come from energy conservation. 

That circular logic, sadly, will only inject more confusion into the debate.

The bottom line is that the energy conservation provisions of Waxman Markey, while significant, will take decades to have an impact.  Tax incentives for retrofitting energy-inefficient buildings will do little to induce change and America's usage of energy has increased unabated for more than one hundred years.  In all likelihood it will continue to increase (ignoring of course the growth of energy consumption from the rapidly developing economies of China, India and Brazil). 

Waxman Markey will, without a doubt, increase energy prices to consumers and will induce a land rush into renewable energy.  Whether this is wise public policy is open to debate but the practical effect of capping CO2 emissions will create a new market that will dramatically change the way the industry and consumers think about energy. 

The EPA analysis also ignores the extent to which some renewable energy providers willl become CO2 sinks, creating emission credits that they will be able to trade.  Those values will offset at least part of the higher cost of renewable energy and further promote renewable energy development.

After seeming to fall apart over Democrats' inability to resolve differences involving impacts on farming, the environmental cap and trade legislation known as Waxman Markey is now back to life.

Reports indicate that the bill will be brought to the floor of the House for a vote on Friday. 

If enacted, the bill would cap industries' emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases and create a national trading market for carbon credits.  Entities that reduced carbon dioxide gases (or that produced less than their mandatory maximum) would be able to sell their credits to emitters who could not reduce below their maximums.

The bill would also implement a national renewable energy standard and impose a national building code to reduce energy consumption.