legislation

Notable quotable

“So when it came time to vote on Dick Cheney’s energy bill, I voted no, and Senator Obama voted yes.” — Hillary Clinton, Ohio Democratic presidential primary debate

A safety valve in Lieberman-Warner is senseless

I see no point whatsoever in passing a climate bill this year that includes a safety valve. I have blogged on this before, but it bears repeating as we appear to be getting to the endgame negotiations in the Senate on the Lieberman-Warner bill. Bottom line:

If you want to get a 60% to 80% greenhouse gas cut in four decades, you just can't waste time with safety valves. We need to get to a price of $30 to $40 a ton for carbon dioxide as soon as possible -- and if it needs to go higher than that because conservatives block the progressives and moderates from legislating aggressive technology deployment strategies that would keep costs low, well, as the saying goes, "We'll burn that bridge when we come to it."

If you just want to pass a bill that makes it seem like you're doing something while in fact doing little, then go for it! But surely a year's delay (waiting for a somewhat wiser Congress and an infinitely wiser president) is better than a pointless bill.

In an article titled "Sponsors of Senate emissions bill seek compromise on cost provisions," Greenwire (subs. req'd) reports:

Tasty hatin’

All you Lieberman-Warner haters will not want to miss David Sassoon’s "The 10 Dominoes Toppling Lieberman-Warner."

John McCain scores a big ol’ goose egg on this year’s environmental report card

Today, the League of Conservation Voters released its annual scorecard, which rates legislators based on their votes on issues of environmental significance. The LCV scorecard has its critics, but it’s nonetheless become something of a gold standard when measuring how "green" a lawmaker is. A couple of big stories emerge from this year’s scorecard. The […]

Delay makes environmental catastrophe more likely

This is the second in a series; the first is here.

We've covered two reasons Environmental Defense is pushing for passage of climate legislation in 2008 -- the politics will be very much the same in 2009, and we don't want to gamble away a good bill on the chance of a perfect one someday.

Today I'll look at a third reason: The price of waiting, even a year or two, is simply too high. Carbon dioxide concentrations are higher today than they've been in 650,000 years, and our emissions rate is increasing. It's crucial that we start aggressively cutting emissions as soon as possible.

Here's the math.

Source: the national allowance account for the years 2012-2020 from the S.2191 as reported out of the EPW Committee. The emissions growth from 2005 to 2013 is assumed to be 1.1 percent (an average of the 2004 and 2005 rate reported by the EPA [PDF]).

Scenario one: The Climate Security Act is passed into law this year, and takes effect in 2012. To comply with the emissions cap, covered sources would have to cut annual emissions by roughly 2 percent per year. By 2020, they would be emitting at 15 percent below the starting point in 2012.

Scenario two: We delay enacting legislation by two years, holding everything else constant. We pass a cap-and-trade bill in 2010, and it takes effect in 2014. To meet the same cumulative emissions cuts, emissions would have to fall by 4.3 percent per year -- over twice as quickly -- and we'd have to do it year after year until 2020, just to get to the same place. By 2020, emissions from covered sources would have to be cut 23 percent below the starting point in 2014.

Congress needs to stop flirting with the renewable energy industry

This post is by ClimateProgress guest blogger Bill Becker, executive director of the Presidential Climate Action Project.

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When it comes to relationships, Congress is a big tease. Or so it must seem to the energy efficiency and renewable energy industries. Just when they think they're about to go to the altar with the federal government, Congress becomes the runaway bride.

Everyone who's anyone acknowledges that energy efficiency and renewable energy are indispensable to America's future. They promise greater energy independence, clean air, steady prices, infinite supplies, a lower trade deficit, and a way to begin minimizing the suffering that will result from global climate change.

Due to the urgency of global warming, the future must start now with rapid diffusion of the clean energy technologies that are ready for market. We must also expedite the development of new efficient and renewable energy technologies and the industries that make, sell, and service them.

To compete on the same playing field as oil, gas and coal -- our entrenched and heavily subsidized carbon fuels -- the clean energy technologies need federal help, including subsidies. For example, to help embryonic renewable energy industries reach viability, Congress implemented a Production Tax Credit (PTC) as part of the Energy Policy Act of 1992 and scheduled it to expire in 1999, seven years later. Since 1999, Congress has extended the credit for one to two years at a time and has allowed it to expire three times. It currently is scheduled to expire at the end of this year, along with a bundle of other tax benefits to encourage the use of more efficient windows, furnaces, and building insulation.

The result of this on-again, off-again subsidy has been boom-bust cycles for wind energy and the other technologies covered by the credit. Each time the PTC is renewed, renewable energy projects begin to blossom. Then, months before the next expiration date, investment stops because of uncertainty. In an analysis of the PTC's impact on the wind industry, researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory concluded:

Opinion writer suggests efficiency stimulus would be more effective

An opinion writer at the Houston Chronicle says: Congress missed a major opportunity with the stimulus package. They could have invested in something that would have been good for the consumer (encouraging energy savings), the environment (reducing emissions) and the economy (stimulating development of products that represent our future). The magic elixir? Energy efficiency is […]

Have you been naughty with your light bulbs? You need some good old command and control.

The so-called incandescent light bulb ban (not actually a ban) included as part of the recent energy bill has prompted a low-level but consistent set of complaints that deserve further consideration, because they betray a fair amount of confusion about which policy tools to break out for which issues.

On the right, the reaction to the new lighting efficiency standard has ranged from hysterical whining to hysterical snark. But even on the left, it's fairly common to run across the high-minded opinion that finicky legislation like the lighting efficiency standard only wastes time and stirs up needless recrimination. Instead we should set a price on carbon, and let the market sort out the rest.

It's an excellent theory, one that I subscribe to under most circumstances, but sometimes command and control really is just the thing. The math on light bulbs is pretty easy to run. Follow along if you're interested, or just skip the next two paragraphs.

‘Fix it or ditch it’

Here’s the new TV ad from Friends of the Earth, telling Senate Democrats to “fix or ditch” the Lieberman-Warner climate bill: