carbon emissions

Wind Beats Out Natural Gas To Become Top Source Of New Electricity Capacity For 2012

Through June of 2012, renewable energy was right behind natural gas in terms of the most new energy generating capacity being installed in the United States, with wind making up most of the renewables push. And now Business Insider has flagged the numbers for the remainder of the year.

Last week, they reported that wind ultimately pulled ahead of natural gas to become the leading installer of new capacity in 2012, at 10,689 total megawatts.

Those numbers came from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s report on the trends and highlights in U.S. energy for the past year. According to FERC’s update, natural gas installed 8,746 megawatts of new capacity, coal installed 4,510 new megawatts, and solar came in fourth with 1,476 new megawatts. Here’s the relevant table from the report, conveniently highlighted by Business Insider:

One thing to note here is the issue of capacity factor: That’s how much power an installation actually produces as a percentage of its theoretical capacity. (Which is what’s listed in the table.) Natural gas plants do quite well in this regard: Their median performance tends to come out to at least 80 percent, and they max out at 93 percent, according to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory’s cost database.

Unfortunately, wind power doesn’t perform as well, due to the intermittency of, well, wind. Its median tends to be around 40 percent offshore. Onshore it’s been at 30 percent, though arguably onshore performance is pulling alongside offshore. And both max out at 50 to 54 percent. So even though wind beat out natural gas for new capacity in 2012, the new natural gas installation will almost certainly wind up generating more total electricity.

The good news for wind is that it’s still a relatively young technology, with lots of room to improve. The energy it does deliver is produced much more efficiently in comparison to natural gas — the former loses less than one percent of its energy as waste heat, while the latter can lose as much as 54 percent. Natural gas production in the U.S. may be on track to plateau, leading to predictions of rising prices, which will give wind power a further economic opening.

And, of course, there’s the fact that, while cleaner than coal, natural gas remains a contributor to greenhouse gas emissions both through leaks and combustion.

White House: ‘We Are Going To Achieve The President’s Goal Of Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions By 17 Percent By 2020′

Obama Knows It is ‘Global Climate Disruption’ And Without Mitigation And Adaptation, All You Get Is ‘Misery’

I attended the Environmental and Clean Energy Inaugural Ball in DC Monday night. That is the smaller, wonkier ball, the one without Will.i.am.

A number of White House and Cabinet officials made clear that Obama meant it when he emphasized action on climate and clean energy in his second inaugural. For instance, Heather Zichal, Deputy Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change, told the crowd, “Energy and climate policy are going to be a top priority” in Obama’s second term.

Zichal asserted “We are going to achieve the President’s goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 17 percent by 2020.” There are really only two plausible ways that can be done with certainty — a carbon tax or aggressive use of EPA authority to control emissions from existing power plants and industrial facilities. And the carbon tax  (presumably as part of some overall deficit or tax reform deal) would need Congressional approval, which makes it far harder.

Zichal did not spell out the details. She told The Hill:

I am not going to get in front of my boss on this one. I think you will, in due time, see a really aggressive agenda on the energy and climate initiative in line with what the president talked about today.

Interestingly, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar promised “more detail about what [Obama] wants to do in the State of the Union” address.

Obama science adviser John Holdren said that “President Obama knows that global warming is a misnomer. It is global climate disruption,” a term he and other scientists have been using for over 15 years.

Holdren repeated his statement that humanity has three choices in the face of global climate disruption — “mitigation, adaptation and suffering” — noting “the more mitigation and adaptation, the less suffering there will be.”

If we keep listening to the disinformers and delayers, we will keep doing little mitigation and adaptation, leaving us with maximum misery. This is just another way of saying what his boss said Monday, “We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations.

Beltway Heat: Sweltering Summers To Become The Norm For Nation’s Capital, According To New Climate Report

Projected average increases in the number of days with a maximum temperature greater than 95°F between 2041-2070, compared to 1971-2000 assuming continued increases in global emissions.

The draft of the Federal Advisory Committee’s National Climate Assessment was released several days ago, with dire warnings of significantly hire temperatures across the nation bringing more heat waves, deluges, droughts, and other forms of extreme weather. It also concluded that much of the climate change seen over the last 50 years was primarily driven by human activity.

But the report also had more locally relevant news for residents of Washington, D.C., which just experienced a record-breaking 11 straight days of temperatures of 95 degrees Fahrenheit this past summer. If humans continue driving up the amount of carbon in the atmosphere at their current pace, the number of days D.C. sees over that temperature threshold could increase by more than 15 days per year by mid-century:

If emissions continue to increase… warming of 4.5ºF to 10ºF is projected by the 2080s; if global emissions were reduced substantially… projected warming ranges from about 3ºF to 6ºF by the 2080s.

Under both emissions scenarios, the frequency, intensity, and duration of heat waves is expected to increase, with larger increases under higher emissions. Regional climate model simulations suggest that the southern part of the region, including large parts of West Virginia, Maryland, and Delaware could experience more than a doubling of days per year over 95ºF by the 2050s.

Much of the southern portion of the region, including the majority of Maryland, and Delaware, and southwest West Virginia and New Jersey, are projected to experience more than 15 additional days per year above 95°F, which will impact the regions vulnerable populations, infrastructure, and agriculture and ecosystems.

2012 was Washington, D.C.’s hottest year, with records going back all the way to 1871. And this past summer was the third hottest the city has seen in that time — and the two summers that beat it out were 2010 and 2011.

According to the climate assessment, the snowless winters the nation’s capital has recently experienced could become the norm as well. If greenhouse gases continue their current rapid increase, the number of days when temperatures dip below 32 degrees Farehnheit would decrease by 25 percent between now and 2050 — a total drop of 20 days.

Along with the heat, D.C. also dealt with persistent drought in 2012, leading to rainfall about 8 inches below normal. Conversely, and consistent with global warming’s tendency to drive more erratic weather, the District has also been hit with more severe flooding as recently as 2006. And the city is already adapting: Thanks to its efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Washington, D.C. was recognized in 2011 and 2012 as the number one U.S. EPA Green Power Community. The city is constructing a floodgate on the National Mall to protect its core from flooding, it surpassed 1.5 million square feet of green roofs in 2012, and it grew its tree canopy by 818 acres between 2006 and 2011 — bringing added shade, cooler temperatures, and reduced energy use.

A Sweltering Planet’s Agenda: Washington Post Editorial Board Calls For Carbon Tax

Okay, a carbon tax is a pretty obvious choice if one cares at all about science, humanity, and the national debt. Still, it’s nice to see even a centrist group like the Washington Post editorial board endorse it.

In a piece headlined, “A sweltering planet’s agenda,” they explain that 2012 “offers a vision of what will happen more often on a planet that is heating — slowly and fitfully, not every year warmer than the last, but inexorably.” They note that lack of absolute certainty as to just how bad global warming will be is no excuse for inaction. Quite the reverse:

That’s an argument not for doing nothing but for managing the risks, spending now to avoid the likelihood of much greater costs later, as any good business would do in the face of certain threats of uncertain magnitude.

The smartest hedge would be a national carbon tax. It would marshal the market’s power to wring carbon out of the economy, putting decisions about the direction of energy and manufacturing in the hands of consumers and businesses that meet their demands, not Congress and interest groups that lobby lawmakers. When people must pay something for their pollution, they pollute less and invest in cleaner alternatives. A carbon tax would provide more certainty to industry and investors who currently can only guess at what climate policy will look like year to year.

But, given the dim debate on global warming in Congress, another consequence of a carbon tax might be more appealing to policymakers: revenue. Resources for the Future estimates that a tax set at $25 per ton of carbon dioxide would raise $125 billion annually — more than would be saved by eliminating the mortgage interest tax deduction. Even if much of that were rebated to ensure that low-income households weren’t unduly hurt — the right policy — a sizable chunk would be left to shrink the deficit or ease the major tax reform that Washington’s leaders have been promising.

Implementing a national carbon tax would be only one step toward addressing climate change, a problem that must ultimately be dealt with globally. But it would be a big one.

Perhaps the Post should have pointed out just why there is a “dim debate” on global warming in Congress, as they have in the past — see WashPost stunner [4/18/11]: “The GOPs climate-change denial may be its most harmful delusion.” Still, it’s worth remembering that this is a paper that has worked hard to appeal to conservatives by publishing the nonsense of deniers and confusionists:

• WashPost [4/12/11] back to running climate and energy disinformation from the likes of Bjorn Lomborg
• WashPost [12/8/09] goes tabloid, publishes second falsehood-filled op-ed by Sarah Palin in five months — on climate science and the hacked emails!
• WashPost [4/2/09] lets George Will publish a third time global warming lies debunked on its own pages!

In case you were wondering just who is the Washington Post‘s editorial board and how do they decide to write editorials, they provide the answer here:

Editorials represent the views of The Washington Post as an institution, as determined through debate among members of the editorial board. The board includes: Editorial Page Editor Fred Hiatt; Deputy Editorial Page Editor Jackson Diehl; Jo-Ann Armao , who specializes in education and District affairs; Jonathan Capehart, who focuses on national politics; Lee Hockstader, who writes about political and other issues affecting Virginia and Maryland; Charles Lane, who concentrates on economic policy, trade and globalization; Stephen Stromberg, who specializes in energy, the environment, public health and other federal policy; and editorial cartoonist Tom Toles. Op-ed editor Autumn Brewington, opinions editor for digital Marisa Bellack and letters editor Michael Larabee also take part in board discussions. The board highlights issues it thinks are important and responds to news events, mindful of stands it has taken in previous editorials and principles that have animated Post editorial boards over time. Articles in the news pages sometimes prompt ideas for editorials, but every editorial is based on original reporting. News reporters and editors never contribute to editorial board discussions, and editorial board members don’t have any role in news coverage.

I’m guessing the main voice of climate sanity on the Board is the brilliant Tom Toles — see Toles’ “last rant about the climate.”

Obama’s First Term: Assessing Progress On Top Energy And Climate Priorities

by Daniel J. Weiss

Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign was built on “hope and change.” Millions of Americans went to the polls hoping that the federal government would change its approach to many of the nation’s challenges after eight years of retreat, neglect, and inertia under President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney. This was particularly true for concerns about providing greater public health protection from climate change and air pollution, while also increasing security of our energy supplies. The Bush administration gave scant attention to these challenges, and instead pursued policies designed by Big Oil and coal companies for their economic benefit—policies that ignored growing threats from climate change.

In December 2008, during President-elect Obama’s transition, the Center for American Progress proposed the “Top 10 Energy and Environment Priorities for the Obama Administration and 111th Congress.” This progressive agenda was designed to protect public health from carbon and mercury air pollution, reduce oil consumption, and simultaneously boost the economic recovery. Four years later the administration accomplished nearly all of these goals despite the worst economy in nearly 80 years and strong opposition from Big Oil, coal, and other energy interests. Unfortunately, the priorities that required congressional action did not occur, though some progress was still made in each of these areas.

Here are brief descriptions of these top 10 energy and environment priorities outlined by CAP in 2008, and their status at the end of President Obama’s first term. Shortly, we will propose the top 10 energy and environment priorities for President Obama’s second term and the 113th Congress.

Let’s look at each of the above priorities in greater detail.

Cleaner cars

Wish they all could be California cars

On his seventh day in office, President Obama launched the development of the first improved fuel economy standards in 20 years. His administration, supported by 13 major auto companies, the United Auto Workers, the state of California, and environmentalists, promulgated rules to double automobile fuel economy by 2025 while slashing carbon pollution by 6 billion tons. The modern standards will save drivers $8,200 in lower gasoline purchases over the life of their 2025 vehicle, and will reduce oil consumption by 2.2 million barrels per day.

The White House also adopted the first ever efficiency and carbon pollution standards for commercial trucks, vans, and other heavy vehicles. According to the White House, the new standards will “save over 500 million barrels of oil and save vehicle owners and operators an estimated $50 billion in fuel costs.”

Thanks to these standards, the average fuel economy of cars and light duty trucks (SUVs, minivans) was 23.9 miles per gallon in 2012, the highest ever, according to a University of Michigan analysis.

Take first step to limit carbon pollution under the Clean Air Act

Global warming is a real and present danger

In addition to setting the first limits on carbon pollution from motor vehicles, the Obama administration also made the “endangerment finding” for greenhouse gas pollutants under the Clean Air Act, as recommended by Environmental Protection Agency scientists. President Bush refused to make this finding during his administration despite the strong recommendation by then-EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson. The endangerment finding is a critical step in the process of establishing limits on carbon pollution from power plants and other large sources.

Invest in clean energy as part of economic recovery plan

Green stimulus and recovery

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, passed in February 2009, included $90 billion in grants, tax incentives, and loan guarantees to increase investments in clean energy. This was the largest clean-energy program in history. It included assistance for wind and solar electricity generation, advanced batteries, public transportation, advanced energy research, and many other clean energy projects.

Case in point: The Recovery Act, which financed weatherization to make nearly 900,000 homes of low-income families more energy efficient, saving an annual average of $400 per household in lower energy costs. The act also “supported 30 new advanced battery and electric vehicle component plants opening across the country so that, by 2015, the U.S. will be able to produce enough batteries and components to support one million hybrid and electric vehicles.”

Slash mercury pollution from power plants

Mercury falling

The Clean Air Act of 1990 required major industrial polluters to severely limit their emission of toxic and hazardous air pollutants. The George W. Bush administration’s mercury reduction standard for power plants—the largest domestic emitter— was struck down by the federal courts because it was too weak. In December 2011 the Obama administration finalized a mercury and toxic pollution standard for power plants that will slash this neurotoxin by 90 percent. Additionally, the standard will save at least an estimated 11,000 lives and prevent 130,000 asthma attacks annually. The mercury standard for power plants will also generate up to $90 billion in net economic benefits from saved lives, reduced health care costs, and fewer missed work days.

In addition, on December 20, 2012, the EPA finalized mercury and toxic pollution-reduction standards for industrial boilers, incinerators, and cement kilns. The new standards for the first two sources will:

• “Avoid up to 8,100 premature deaths, 5,100 heart attacks, and 52,000 asthma attacks [annually]”
• Enable Americans to “receive between $13 and $29 in health benefits for every dollar spent to meet the final standards”

The new pollution-reduction standard for cement kilns will cut mercury pollution by 93 percent and other toxic pollutants by more than 80 percent. Although the cement kiln safeguards provide new public protections, the American Lung Association determined that “industry pressure resulted in weaker standards and delayed implementation.”

Reduce carbon pollution with cap and trade program

Curb the enthusiasm for greenhouse gases

There was great optimism at the start of the Obama administration that the 111th Congress would finally pass comprehensive climate change and clean-energy legislation. In June 2009 the House fulfilled its responsibility by passing Reps. Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Ed Markey’s (D-MA) American Clean Energy and Security Act with bipartisan support. It would have cut carbon pollution by at least 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020, while reducing oil use and creating hundreds of thousands of clean energy jobs. Unfortunately, the Senate was unable to pass the similar American Power Act, drafted by Sens. John Kerry (D-MA) and Joe Lieberman (I-CT). This failure occurred because the worst unemployment in 30 years inhibited enough senators that it was impossible to muster a super-majority of 60 votes needed to pass the bill. The jobless rate in 2009 and 2010 was 50 percent higher compared to the time periods when most major environmental laws passed between 1970 and 2009. In addition, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) insisted that his caucus oppose all legislation supported by Democrats. Finally, Big Oil and coal companies, along with other special interests, spent more than $500 million in lobbying and advertising to ensure enough opposition to defeat the bill.

Despite this disappointment, the Energy Information Administration recently concluded that the United States has reduced its carbon pollution by 9 percent below 2005 levels— halfway to the 2020 goal of the 17 percent reduction below 2005 levels set in these bills. The reduction in carbon pollution is due to emission reductions from motor vehicles (see “Cleaner cars” section) and lower electricity demand. The Energy Information Administration projects, however, that carbon pollution from the energy sector will begin to rise in 2017 without additional action.

In 2012 the Obama administration proposed a carbon pollution standard for new power plants that would allow only half the emissions compared to an uncontrolled plant. That standard must be finalized to slow the growth of emissions. The administration must also adopt pollution limits on existing power plants, which emit one-third of all climate pollution in the United States.

Establish national renewable electricity program

The answer is blowing in the wind (and shining in the sun)

Thirty states and the District of Columbia have renewable (or alternative) electricity (or portfolio) standards that require utilities to generate a certain portion of their electricity from wind, solar, or other renewable energy sources. A renewable electricity standard was included in both the American Clean Energy and Security Act and the American Power Act in the 111th Congress.

Since neither bill became law, in 2011 President Obama proposed a clean-energy standard that would require utilities to generate 80 percent of their electricity from no- or low-carbon pollution sources by 2035. In 2012 Senate Energy Committee Chair Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) introduced such a bill, but it was never voted on.

Despite these setbacks, however, the combination of renewable energy investments in the Recovery Act, concerted administration efforts to site solar projects on appropriate public lands, existing tax incentives, and state standards led to the doubling of renewable electricity generation under President Obama. Nationwide wind electricity doubled to 50 gigawatts, enough to power every home in Alabama, Colorado, Connecticut, Nevada, Virginia, and Wisconsin.

Bridge loans to auto companies to prevent bankruptcy and produce more fuel-efficient cars

Bridge loans to the 21st century

When President Obama took office both General Motors and Chrysler teetered on the brink of bankruptcy. Despite some public and congressional opposition, the president provided loans to the automakers to prevent their collapse and provide them with time to restructure.

One of the stipulations of the auto bailout was that the companies had to develop aggressive plans to return to viability by investing in energy-efficient cars. Both companies agreed to move toward a more fuel-efficient fleet. In a March 2009 press statement President Barack Obama said the landmark agreement would create “a 21st century auto industry that is creating new jobs, unleashing new prosperity, and manufacturing the fuel-efficient cars and trucks that will carry us towards an energy-independent future.”

In addition to the successful bridge loans, other major Obama administration policies helped the auto industry and the nation by creating jobs, reducing oil use, saving families money, and cutting pollution. These policies included modern fuel economy standards, investments in research of alternatively fueled vehicles, retooling facilities to manufacture cleaner cars, and incentives for consumers to buy more fuel-efficient vehicles.

In addition to returning General Motors and Chrysler to profitability, GM announced on January 4, 2013, that it is the first automaker to sell 1 million cars in one year that get 30 miles per gallon.

Establish federal energy-efficiency resources standard

Pick the low-hanging energy fruit

Policies encouraging energy efficiency enjoyed bipartisan support over the past four years, and a number of landmark pieces of efficiency legislation were advanced in both houses of Congress only to languish along with the stalled climate legislation. An Energy Efficiency Resource Standard, which requires utilities to reduce energy use, was included in the American Clean Energy and Security Act. The Senate’s American Clean Energy Leadership Act had standards for energy efficiency, including strong new building codes and significant investments in industry, utilities, homes, and offices. Likewise the bipartisan Home Star, Rural Star, and Building Star bills created incentives for efficiency upgrades. The first two bills (Home Star and Rural Star) passed the House in the 111th Congress but were not voted on in the Senate. At the conclusion of the just completed 112th Congress, a modest energy-efficiency bill became law. That bill, the American Energy Manufacturing Technical Corrections Act, will modernize some efficiency standards for appliances, and study efficiency strategies employed by businesses and the federal government.

Despite congressional inaction on nearly all energy-efficiency legislation, the Obama administration provided leadership through other avenues. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, for example, included a historic investment of $14.5 billion in energy efficiency measures alone. President Obama repeatedly used his executive authority to promote energy efficiency. The Better Buildings Initiative made a combined federal-private commitment of $4 billion for efficiency upgrades on federal buildings. Executive Order 13514 complemented these efforts, requiring that all new federal buildings achieve “net zero” energy usage by 2030. And new federal building construction must meet guiding principles for sustainability. In the near term, 15 percent of the existing federal building stock must meet these principles by 2015.

Adopt reforms to ease rehabilitation and siting of transmission lines

Green the wires

The comprehensive House and Senate bills that failed to pass in the 111th Congress included provisions to ease the siting and construction of electricity transmission lines. Such reforms are essential to ease the transmission of wind or solar generated electricity from rural areas where it’s generated to urban areas where it is consumed.

Despite this failure, administration policies in the first term helped modernize the power grid and made electricity transmission more efficient. The Recovery Act, passed in February 2009, has invested $4 billion in efforts to modernize the electricity grid. The Department of Energy reports that customers are “experiencing fewer outages, faster power restoration when outages do occur, more efficient operations, and cost savings” due to these investments.

The Energy Information Administration reports that 36 million electricity customers had “smart meters” by August 2012. The agency says that these meters “support demand response and distributed generation, can improve reliability, and also provide information that consumers can use to save money by managing their use of electricity.”

The president also created an Interagency Rapid Response Team for Transmission, which “aims to improve the overall quality and timeliness of electric transmission infrastructure permitting, review, and consultation by the Federal government on both Federal and non‐Federal lands.”

In 2011 the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission used its existing authority to encourage the use of power lines that will carry renewable energy. Richard Caperton, Director of Clean Energy Investment at CAP, concluded:

[The] FERC’s new rule does two big things that will lead to new transmission lines: It strengthens regional planning processes and clarifies rules on who will pay for new lines… Broad cost allocation can make it easier to build important new lines… FERC’s rule instructs planners to consider certain goals, which will change which lines are prioritized. Ultimately, Order 1000 will give more priority to lines that serve renewable energy and will make those lines more affordable.

Invest in clean energy research, development, and deployment

Rise of the new machines

The first Obama administration invested $90 billion in clean-energy projects—far more than any previous administration. This investment included support for research, development, and deployment for new and emerging technologies.

In addition to previously noted programs, the investment in clean-energy projects included $400 million for the Advanced Research Project Agency-Energy, or ARPA-E, for “high-risk, high-reward efforts to develop transformational energy technologies…[including] 60 cutting-edge research projects in 25 states.” Nearly $17 billion was spent on projects under the Department of Energy’s Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy office. A special program (Section 1603) was created to assist companies with solar projects even if the companies could not use existing tax credits. The Advanced Energy Project Credit program (48c) helped industrial facilities become more energy efficient or employ renewable energy.

Conclusion

This tally of the Obama administration’s first-term accomplishments is quite impressive despite congressional failure to pass essential legislation to reduce carbon pollution and establish a renewable electricity standard. Nonetheless, the administration successfully adopted policies to protect public health from air pollution, lower oil consumption, and create jobs. The administration must continue this progress in its second term by building on these successes.

Daniel J. Weiss is a Senior Fellow and Director of Climate Strategy at the Center for American Progress.

Thanks to Richard Caperton, Director of Clean Energy Finance; Bracken Hendricks, Senior Fellow; and Jackie Weidman, Special Assistant for the Energy Team at the Center for American Progress

New York Times Pushes Obama On Climate: ‘He Needs To Do A Great Deal More Than…Foster A Conversation’

Many were disappointed after President Obama’s first post-election press conference when he talked about the urgency of climate change — and then immediately swept aside specifics for action in his second term.

Days after, White House press secretary Jay Carney shot down the prospects for a carbon tax by saying the Administration would “never propose” such a policy.

There doesn’t seem to be much urgency coming out of the White House.

In response, The New York Times is calling out the President for his plan to address climate change with a “conversation”:

Since his re-election, Mr. Obama has agreed to foster a “conversation” on climate change and an “education process” about long-term steps to address it. He needs to do a good deal more than that. Intellectually, Mr. Obama grasps the problem as well as anyone. The question is whether he will bring the powers of the presidency to bear on the problem.

Enlisting market forces in the fight against global warming by putting a price on carbon — through cap-and-trade or a direct tax — seems out of the question for this Congress. But there are weapons at Mr. Obama’s disposal that do not require Congressional approval and could go a long way to reducing emissions and reasserting America’s global leadership.

One imperative is to make sure that natural gas — which this nation has in abundance and which emits only half the carbon as coal — can be extracted without risk to drinking water or the atmosphere. This may require national legislation to replace the often porous state regulations. Another imperative is to invest not only in familiar alternative energy sources like wind and solar power, but also in basic research, next-generation nuclear plants and experimental technologies that could smooth the path to a low-carbon economy.

Mr. Obama’s most promising near-term strategy may be to invoke the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority under the Clean Air Act to limit emissions from stationary sources, chiefly power plants.

Indeed, the Administration deserves credit for passing numerous critical executive policies promoting vehicle efficiency, mercury standards, building efficiency standards, and renewable energy. And with Congress unable to act on climate policy, the importance of EPA regulations for global warming pollution is even greater in Obama’s second term. However, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson in on her way out, opening up some uncertainty about leadership at the agency: The New York Times explains:

Any such regulations are likely to be strongly opposed by industry and will require real persistence on the administration’s part. If Mr. Obama takes this approach, he will certainly need a determined leader at E.P.A. to devise and carry out the rules. Lisa Jackson, the E.P.A. administrator who on Thursday announced her resignation after four productive years in one of the federal government’s most thankless jobs, was just such a leader.

She suffered setbacks — most notably the White House’s regrettable decision to overrule her science-based proposal to update national health standards for ozone, or smog. But she accomplished much, including tougher standards for power plant emissions of mercury and other air toxics, new health standards for soot, and, most important, her agency’s finding that carbon dioxide and five other gases that contribute to global warming constituted a danger to public health and could thus be regulated under the Clean Air Act.

The New York Times piece fails to point out one of the most critical — and often ignored — pieces of climate policy. Creating new standards for power plants and building renewable energy is only one piece of the equation. In order to truly address carbon pollution, we must keep large amounts of coal, oil, and gas in the ground. According to the International Energy Agency, nearly two-thirds of known fossil fuel reserves must stay underground in order to avoid catastrophic climate change. While the Obama Administration has done more than any other administration in history to promote alternative forms of energy, it has also shown a willingness to aggressively promote unchecked fossil fuel extraction.

In a recent Time Magazine interview, President Obama said that climate would be one of his top three priorities in his second term. So far, there aren’t many strong signals that the Administration has a coherent plan to actually back up those claims.

Coal Could Surpass Oil As World’s Top Energy Source By 2017

By 2017, the world will increase its coal consumption by more than 1.2 billion tons per year — equivalent to the current coal use of the U.S. and Russia combined. That’s according to a new report on the booming coal sector from the International Energy Agency.

Many have hailed the drop in U.S. coal consumption over the last year as a modestly positive trend for climate; however, that decrease is being overshadowed by a boom in developing countries, particularly China. The IEA projects that China will account for 70 percent of coal consumption by 2017:

Coal accounted for 45 percent of global CO2 emissions in 2011. Without a slowdown in coal consumption, China’s carbon emissions hockey stick is about to get a lot sharper. Here’s what it looks like already:

The same could be true in India as well, a country that will account for 22 percent of growth in coal consumption. According to a recent report from the World Resources Institute, there are more than 1,200 coal plants planned around the world, most of which will be built in China and India. If all the plants in the pipeline are built, they would amount to a generation capacity four times greater than the current American coal fleet.

Here are some key stats reported by the IEA in its latest assessment:

• Coal demand is growing everywhere but the United States. The trend of the last decade continued in 2011, with coal supplying near half of the incremental primary energy supply globally. Coal demand grew 4.3% in 2011, or 304 million tonnes (mt). Chinese demand grew by 233 mt. The only region where coal demand declined was the United States. That drop is neither policy-driven nor a consequence of recession but rather the result of the availability of cheap gas.
• Even though coal demand growth is slowing, coal’s share of the global energy mix is still rising, and by 2017 coal will come close to surpassing oil as the world’s top energy source. The world will burn around 1.2 billion more tonnes of coal per year by 2017 compared with today. That’s more than the current annual coal consumption of the United States and Russia combined.
• China has become the largest coal importer in the world. In 2009, China became a net coal importer for the first time. In 2011, it became the largest coal importer, surpassing Japan, which had held the position for decades. Chinese imports (including Hong Kong) reached 204 mt in 2011 and they continued to grow in 2012.
• Indonesia has become the largest coal exporter in the world. As another example of the increasing weight of non-OECD countries, Indonesia surpassed long-standing leader Australia as the largest exporter on a tonnage basis. Floods in Queensland in 2010-2011 constrained Australian exports, while Indonesia growth did not stop, surpassing the 300 mt line.

As both the World Bank and the International Energy Agency have pointed out in recent scientific summaries, we are on a path toward disastrous climate change — and only a dramatic re-thinking of policies can set us on a path toward manageable warming.

Cleaning Up Carbon Pollution 101

by Danielle Baussan and Daniel J. Weiss

Largely due to destruction caused by recent climate-related extreme weather events in the United States, there is a new urgency in our nation to adopt additional carbon pollution reduction measures. In 2011 and 2012, 21 such events each caused $1 billion or more in damages. This new evidence demonstrates that our climate change problem is much more imminent and severe than previously thought. Instead of idly waiting for the next devastating storm, flood, drought, or heat wave to hit, we should tackle climate change head on by further reducing our carbon pollution.

The World Bank, International Energy Agency, and the U.N. Environment Programme have all issued reports since the presidential election last month predicting a steep escalation in carbon pollution in the atmosphere over the coming decades. These warnings heighten the necessity of reducing carbon and the other pollutants responsible for climate change. If we don’t take action now, we will inevitably face more devastating changes to our weather, water, land, air, and food supply. We must reduce carbon pollution from power plants to help fight climate change and its associated destructive extreme weather, as well as other serious public health impacts such as respiratory deaths and illnesses caused by more smog and the onset of tropical diseases.

The Obama administration has proposed—and should promptly finalize—a carbon pollution standard for new power plants. Additionally, it should develop, propose, and promulgate a standard for existing power plants, as they are the single largest unregulated carbon pollution source, comprising 40 percent of total U.S. emissions. The Clean Air Act provides the executive authority to require such emission reductions without congressional action, which would likely be delayed or blocked considering that many congressional Republican leaders adamantly deny the existence of human-induced climate change.

What follows is an introduction to cleaning up carbon pollution using existing executive authority.

U.S. carbon pollution projected to rise over next 30 years

Carbon pollution is the primary greenhouse gas that traps heat in the atmosphere, which contributes to climate change. According to the latest projections by the Energy Information Administration, the United States is about halfway toward its goal of reducing its carbon pollution by 17 percent of 2005 levels by 2020. The implementation of the Obama administration’s new limits on carbon pollution from automobiles will achieve greater pollution reductions every year. Even with this progress, however, the Energy Information Administration recently projected that carbon pollution from the energy-generating sector—the source of most U.S. pollution—will only be 5 percent lower in 2040 than it was in 2005 if we stick to current policies.

Legal authority to cut carbon pollution

In 1970 Congress passed and President Richard Nixon signed the Clean Air Act, a pollution-control regime that still exists today. The act developed a flexible regulatory system to limit pollutants from stationary and mobile sources. Twenty years later Congress passed the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990, which increased the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority to reduce the pollution responsible for acid rain, airborne toxics, hazardous pollutants, ozone-depleting chemicals, and more smog-forming pollutants. Though it has been a long time—22 years—since the Clean Air Act was updated, it is still an effective and flexible tool for responding to new and ongoing scientific and public health challenges. It also produces a huge net economic benefit by reducing health care costs related to air pollution. In fact, the Environmental Protection Agency estimates that “direct benefits from the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments are estimated to reach almost $2 trillion for the year 2020, a figure that dwarfs the direct costs of implementation ($65 billion).”

The Environmental Protection Agency can develop safeguards for unregulated pollutants

The Clean Air Act allows the Environmental Protection Agency to limit air pollutants from stationary sources such as chemical plants, utilities, and industrial plants, as well as automobiles and other mobile sources. The act grants the Environmental Protection Agency the authority to let states develop individual plans to meet national health standards. It also allows the agency’s administrator to prescribe standards for any individual pollutants if he or she determines that such a pollutant “may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health or welfare.” This is known as an “endangerment finding.”

At the turn of the 21st century, the evidence of the public health and economic threats posed by climate change grew. During the 2000 presidential campaign, Republican nominee George W. Bush promised to reduce carbon pollution from coal-fired power plants. Six weeks after taking office, however, he broke that promise. His administration essentially ignored any concrete steps to reduce the carbon pollution responsible for climate change in its May 2001 National Energy Plan devised by Vice President Dick Cheney—who largely consulted with Big Oil, coal, and utility companies.

The Supreme Court decides that carbon can be a pollutant

In the wake of Bush administration inertia, states that were concerned about their growing vulnerability to damages from climate change sued the Environmental Protection Agency under the Clean Air Act to force the government to take action. In 2007 the Supreme Court ruled in Massachusetts v. EPA that greenhouse gases are pollutants under the Clean Air Act, and as such, the agency’s administrator must consider whether these pollutants “may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health or welfare.” If the administrator finds that this is the case, he or she has the authority to limit pollutant emissions.

President Bush ignores scientific endangerment finding

After the Supreme Court decision, Environmental Protection Agency scientists conducted an assessment of the public health and welfare impacts of carbon and other climate change pollutants, and concluded that these emissions endangered the public. Agency Administrator Stephen Johnson wrote a January 2008 memo to President Bush stating, “Your Administration is compelled to act on this issue under existing law.” In other words, the Clean Air Act required the administration to make an endangerment finding—to explicitly state that greenhouse gas pollutants threaten human health and welfare. The president ignored this recommendation. No action was taken until the Obama administration took office.

The Obama administration makes a carbon pollution endangerment finding

In December 2009 the Obama administration’s head of the Environmental Protection Agency, Lisa Jackson, adhered to the recommendation of agency scientists and finally made the endangerment finding for six major greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide. Jackson noted that the “impact on morbidity and mortality associated with higher temperatures” provided support for “a public health endangerment finding.”

Carbon pollution limits will apply only to the largest emitters

The Supreme Court decision and subsequent endangerment finding paved the way for the Environmental Protection Agency to develop the first limits on carbon pollution from stationary sources, such as power plants and oil refineries, under the Clean Air Act.

This work began with the so-called “tailoring rule,” which limits carbon pollution reduction permits to only the largest industrial sources. Without the tailoring rule, the Clean Air Act would have required permits for sources emitting as little as 100 to 250 tons of a pollutant per year, depending on which pollutant. The Environmental Protection Agency, however, found that this would “overwhelm the capabilities of state and local … permitting authorities to issue permits.”

The first phase of the tailoring rule, announced in September 2009, instituted operation permits for “anyway sources”—those sources that would have to get a pollution permit for other reasons besides greenhouse gas emissions—if they increased those other emissions by 75,000 or more tons per year of a carbon dioxide equivalent. The second phase of the tailoring rule required permits for newly constructed greenhouse gas emitters if they spewed at least 100,000 tons per year of carbon dioxide equivalent. It also required permits for existing modified structures if their net greenhouse gas emissions increased by 75,000 tons per year of carbon dioxide equivalent. The third phase of the tailoring rule considered—but ultimately rejected—the idea of lowering the carbon dioxide equivalent thresholds; it did, however, establish plant-wide applicability limitations to streamline the permit process.

The Environmental Protection Agency determined that under this tailoring rule, “only 15,550 sources will need operating permits” and that nearly all of these facilities already had them. The agency noted that, “Without the Tailoring Rule 6 million sources would have needed operating permits” because the regulation would have covered millions of small emitters, as well. This would have overwhelmed states’ efforts to issue permits and could have effectively halted pollution control permits and systems.

The agency adopted the tailoring rule to ensure that “emissions from small farms, restaurants, and all but the very largest commercial facilities will not be covered by these programs at this time.” This means that only the biggest and baddest polluters would have to limit their emissions. Even with the tailoring rule, 67 percent of all stationary-source greenhouse gas emitters are covered by limits developed by the Environmental Protection Agency. Big coal, utility, and oil companies, along with other interests opposed to climate protection, have attempted to overturn this sensible rule, but the courts have so far denied these efforts.

The Environmental Protection Agency proposes first-ever carbon pollution reductions for new power plants

After lengthy consultation with large numbers of stakeholders, the Environmental Protection Agency proposed a carbon pollution standard for new power plants in March 2012. Since power plants are designed to last for at least 50 years, this rule would effectively prevent the construction and operation of new coal-fired plants that don’t incorporate carbon pollution capture and storage, therefore ensuring that we will not build the next generation of uncontrolled coal-fired power plants that would further exacerbate climate change.

There was overwhelming public support for the new power plant rule. Three million comments were submitted in favor of limiting carbon pollution for both new and existing power plants—a record number for the agency. The pending carbon pollution standard for new plants has been relatively uncontroversial because it overwhelmingly applies to future coal-fired power plants. According to the Sierra Club “Coal Rush” database of proposed coal plants, a maximum of 17 proposed power plants would be subject to this rule. Many observers believe that investors are uninterested in new coal-fired power plants because of the allure of cheaper, more efficient natural gas plants powered by shale gas.

The primary opposition to the proposed rule has come from the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, a coal and dirty-utility front group. Ideological opponents funded by fossil fuel interests—such as Americans for Prosperity, which is funded by the Koch Brothers—also oppose the rule. But the largest, most influential power companies, as well as the Edison Electric Institute, have not unleashed a full-throated attack on the proposal. The Environmental Protection Agency has given no signal since the election as to when it intends to finalize the proposed carbon pollution standard for new power plants or whether the final rule will be at all different from the proposed rule.

We must reduce carbon pollution from existing power plants

After the agency finalizes the carbon pollution standard for new power plants, it must begin to focus on carbon pollution limits for existing power plants. They are the greatest stationary source of carbon pollution in the United States, representing 40 percent of total U.S. carbon pollution and 33 percent of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2009. Cutting carbon pollution from existing power plants will help reduce global warming and help the United States achieve its carbon goals.

A carbon pollution standard for existing power plants would have significant impact on the roughly 600 existing coal-fired power plants by requiring them to reduce their emissions to the level determined in the rulemaking process. To reduce their pollution, these plants would probably employ some combination of fuel-switching to natural gas or co-firing with biomass; demand reduction via energy efficiency measures; and development of clean, renewable electricity generation.

Study finds carbon pollution cuts from existing sources have economic benefit

The Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental advocacy organization, recently released a plan to unlock the Clean Air Act’s potential to curb carbon pollution from existing power plants. The plan would cut emissions from existing power plants by 26 percent by 2020. It would operate by:

• Considering individual state baseline pollution levels
• Establishing separate targets for oil/gas and coal-based power plants, crediting plants for energy efficiency and renewable energy modifications
• Generally creating a flexible approach for states and power plants to meet carbon pollution limits

The plan achieves climate protection and public health benefits, grossing between $26 billion and $60 billion in 2020 for a net benefit between 6 times and 15 times more than the cost of the plan. There would also be no disruption in power supply even as emissions decline.

This plan has wide bipartisan support. William Reilly, Environmental Protection Agency administrator under President George H.W. Bush, noted that the plan “deserves to be carefully analyzed and to be taken seriously.” Carol Browner, Senior Distinguished Fellow at the Center for American Progress and Environmental Protection Agency administrator under President Bill Clinton, said that this plan is “very thoughtful and should be part of any debate” on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. John Podesta, Chair of the Center for American Progress and former White House chief of staff under President Clinton, noted, “Investments to achieve these reductions would create manufacturing, construction, and other well-paying jobs.”

The Natural Resources Defense Council has helped moved the discussion about power plant carbon pollution to its next step: explaining how to cut power plant carbon pollution in a way that moves us toward clean, renewable, and cost-effective energy.

Dirty coal industry resistant to pollution reductions

As the Environmental Protection Agency begins its efforts to protect the public from carbon pollution, coal companies, utilities, and other big-emitting industries will be much more vocal in their opposition to a carbon pollution standard for existing power plants. As the damages from extreme weather and other climate change impacts grow, it’s more important than ever to use this law for its intended purpose: reducing pollution and protecting public health and welfare, rather than protecting the moneyed interests behind coal-fired power plants.

Danielle Baussan is the Associate Director of Government Affairs at the Center for American Progress. Daniel J. Weiss is a Senior Fellow and the Director of Climate Strategy at the Center.

Exxon’s Dangerous Energy Outlook

by Lorne Stockman, via Oil Change International

ExxonMobil recently issued its latest global energy projections in a report called the “2013 Outlook for Energy: a view to 2040.”

The report (pdf) is chock full of figures and graphs showing an inexorable rise in global energy demand and supply, as well as the growing market for Exxon’s products.

As can be expected, the report shows that despite some recent efficiency gains, the world is on course to consume ever growing amounts of energy, a large proportion of which will likely be derived from fossil fuels. Exxon places global growth in energy demand at 35% between 2010 and 2040.

In this regard, the report is in line with recent business-as-usual forecasts from the International Energy Agency (IEA) and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration (EIA).

But the report differs greatly from the IEA’s report in some vital areas. The IEA is a public agency, funded by the tax dollars of developed countries including the United States, while Exxon is the world’s largest private oil and gas company, with a self-interested agenda behind every public communication it makes.

It’s perhaps no surprise that the Exxon Outlook fails to mention that if energy demand were to rise 35% to 2040, and if 60% of energy demand in 2040 were to be met by oil and gas as Exxon predicts (the IEA has it at 50%), then the planet would be on an unstoppable collision course with a 4 degree Celsius warmer world. While the IEA’s report was very clear about where current energy demand trends will lead it was also clear that this could be avoided if serious action is taken soon.

Our collision course with a 4 degree world was recently highlighted by the World Bank, a relatively recent convert to the urgency of climate change action that still needs to match its actions with its words. On the release of a recent report called Turn Down the Heat, the Bank’s President Jim Yong Kim said:

“A 4 degree warmer world can, and must be, avoided – we need to hold warming below 2 degrees, (…) lack of action on climate change threatens to make the world our children inherit a completely different world than we are living in today. Climate change is one of the single biggest challenges facing development, and we need to assume the moral responsibility to take action on behalf of future generations, especially the poorest.”

But while Exxon produced some figures for greenhouse gas emissions and reported that they may peak in the 2030s (which would be catastrophic, as emissions need to peak before 2020) it offered no indication of whether it was concerned or indifferent to the consequences of these emissions. Of course, the purpose of the Exxon Outlook is not to advocate for change that would benefit society but to bolster support for Exxon’s business plan.

The history of the public version of Exxon’s Energy Outlook, documented in Steve Coll’s excellent recent book on the company, Private Empire, shows how the public presentation of the Outlook has always served the company’s public relations and lobbying agenda.

The Outlook was an internal-only document for many years. But according to Coll, in 2004 Exxon’s then CEO Lee Raymond, together with his (still in place) vice president of public and government affairs Ken Cohen, envisaged a greater role for the “tsunami of color-coded pie charts, bar graphs and global maps, read out unemotionally by executives wearing dark suits.”

With global oil prices rising, George W. Bush’s White House was awash in anxiety over dependence on Middle East oil and Bush himself was curious about Exxon’s interest in alternatives like hydrogen fuel cells.  In April 2005, Raymond and his team presented the Outlook to a top Bush adviser at the White House and convinced him to set up a series of briefings with White House staff.

The aim of the Outlook, as it was presented then and is still presented now, is to dispel any notion that there might be a clean energy future lying ahead. As the global population rises — increasing wealth in emerging economies — the energy these would require can only be met by increasing supply of fossil fuels, according to the figures. Exxon does not dismiss renewable energy and efficiency completely, but maintains that they will not challenge the continued dominance of fossil fuels, particularly oil and gas, in the time frame.

Back in 2005, the timeframe stretched to 2030. Today the timeframe stretches to 2040. But the overall conclusions remain the same.

Following the success of the 2005 White House staff briefings, Exxon began to present the Outlook regularly to governments, NGOs, and the media. Slides from the Outlook began to appear in presentations to investors.

One British NGO director, quoted in Coll’s book, noted the change in Lee Raymond’s presentation, but not the substance in what he was saying:

“I note that Raymond is no longer seeking to gainsay the science behind climate change. (…) Instead he simply predicts an endless rise in the demand for the fossil fuels his company sells, and maintains that there is nothing that can be done to alter that.”

Over the next few days you may frequently see the media, particularly the business media, repeat the findings of the Exxon Energy Outlook and discuss it as a forecast for the need to surge oil and gas investments.

You’re probably less likely to see coverage of another report published this week that documents the growing investments by Fortune 100 companies (Exxon aside), in renewable energy and efficiency technologies that are helping to reduce emissions and fossil energy price volatility.

The Exxon Energy Outlook is no forecast. It is an outlook, Exxon’s outlook, and what it envisages is an energy future we cannot afford.

Lorne Stockman is a Research Director at Oil Change International. This piece was originally published at Oil Change International and was reprinted with permission.

U.S. Natural Gas Capacity Must Peak Soon To Achieve Sustainable Pathway

by Adam James

As you may have noticed, the natural gas industry has undergone a bit of a boom in the last few years.

In April, generation from natural gas tied that from coal for the first time ever. The boom has some energy analysts hailing a natural gas “miracle.” But others are very concerned, largely because of the local environmental impacts and the long-term climate impacts. Letting natural gas displace coal is a net-benefit on carbon emissions, but there are still unanswered questions about methane release and the impact on renewables.

What we know for sure is that the climate threat is real and must be taken seriously in charting a path forward for energy policy. The amount of natural gas we burn for electricity is critical in determining whether or not we’re on the right path.  This post compares a few climate pathways related to natural gas, and then presents a recommendation for developing natural gas capacity — including balancing additions and retirements.

The bottom line is this: in order to meet climate targets, the United States needs to build only planned additions and, starting in 2023, retire all natural gas plants over 45 years old. This will allow the United States to develop renewable alternatives and not waste excess natural gas capacity through uneconomic retirements later in an effort to meet climate goals. Of course, there are little adjustments around the margins, but this approach represents the most likely solution given the data available.

Before diving into an explanation of this point, I’ll summarize some of the more interesting conclusions from the different projections of natural gas capacity from Energy Information Administration (EIA), EPA, and National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL):

• There is a gap between the business-as-usual (BAU) pathway for natural gas capacity and where we need to be to hit climate targets, and that gap widens significantly over time. In 2025, capacity of natural gas exceeds the recommended climate target by 13.9 GW. In 2030, natural gas capacity exceeds the climate target by 83.6 GW. In 2035, it exceeds the climate target by 143.8 GW. Assuming no further retirements, by 2050, natural gas capacity exceeds climate targets by 218.8 GW.

• Coal retirements won’t make up the difference in this increased natural gas capacity. The coal retirements needed to continue business-as-usual natural gas development and meet the NREL scenario’s 80 percent CO2 reduction would be unlikely. Specifically, it would require taking 240 GW of coal out of the system before 2035, a feat that the NREL scenario does over 40 years to ensure reliability.

• Aggressive retirements of natural gas capacity later on to meet the climate target are pretty unlikely. Over half our current natural gas capacity is under 12 years old. 38 percent of our current natural gas capacity was built between 2000 and 2004. An additional 15 percent was built between 2005 and 2011. That means 53 percent of capacity is basically brand new. These plants aren’t going anywhere anytime soon — retirements would be incredibly uneconomical.

This post will walk through where we need to be to address climate change, where we are headed, and quantify the gap between the two. Next, it will dismiss a few of the common excuses for our business-as-usual path of natural gas development, including that coal retirements will make up the difference and that we can retire old natural gas later on. Finally, it will present a reasonable approach to natural gas development that will ensure we can meet a climate target of 80 percent emissions reductions by 2050.

Assessing the Status Quo: Where do We Need to be and Where Are We Headed?

What are the implications of the increased utility investment in natural gas for the fight against climate change? To answer this question, we must compare current trends of natural gas capacity investment to projections for the levels of natural gas capacity needed to meet climate targets.

The “climate target” here is an 80 percent emissions reduction below 2005 levels in the power sector by 2050 (or reducing power sector emissions by about 2000 MMTCO2e a year). The three data points used to model how to reasonably get to 80 percent emissions reductions are the EIA and EPA projections, respectively, of implementing the Waxman-Markey bill (which projected an 83 percent GHG reduction below 2005 levels by 2050) and the excellent “Renewable Electricity Futures” study from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (the core scenario would achieve 80 percent emissions reductions from the power sector).

In these studies, analysts from NREL, EIA, and EPA charted a course from our present day generation mix to a low-carbon fuel mix that ensures climate safety. In each case, the analysts show the year-by-year capacity additions and retirements for each fuel sources that would be necessary to ensure reliable electricity delivery during the transition. Because these pathways each look a little different, I have also shown an average of their recommendations.

For business-as-usual projections of natural gas capacity, this post uses the EIA Energy Outlook. Using these projections, we can ascertain what the planned capacity additions are for natural gas out to 2035.

As you can see in Figure 1, the U.S. is actually projected to be close to being on track to meet the climate scenario up until 2020, when new additions of installed natural gas capacity kick in, and natural gas capacity takes a dramatic uptick right when it ought to be declining.

Well, we can always retire more coal or more natural gas later on, right? Right?

Wrong.

Let’s look at coal first. While some could argue that this additional natural gas capacity is okay for climate because it will eat up some of the carbon allowance these projections provided for coal, our analysis shows that the retirements of coal needed to make that true would be incredibly dramatic and steep; retiring about 240 GW of coal before 2035. To put that in context, the NREL pathway phases out that same amount of coal capacity, but does so between now and 2050 to ensure reliability. The point is that we cannot stick to the climate target and justify our business-as-usual natural gas installations on the basis very aggressive — and unlikely — coal retirements.

So what is the main conclusion of this data? We are projected to blow past our ability to hit a climate target starting in 2017 unless we are prepared to later sacrifice reliability or retire plants uneconomically. The gap between the BAU pathway for natural gas capacity and where we need to be to the hit climate target is real, and widens exponentially over time. In 2025, capacity of natural gas exceeds the recommended climate target by 13.9 GW. In 2030, natural gas capacity exceeds the climate target by 83.6 GW. In 2035, it exceeds the climate target by 143.8 GW. Assuming no further retirements, by 2050, natural gas capacity exceeds climate targets by 218.8 GW.

That ever widening gap can only be bridged by natural gas capacity retirements. But where are those going to come from? The next section takes a quick inventory of the natural gas capacity stock to gauge the likelihood of retirements.

The simple fact is, most of our natural gas fleet is very, very new — and it isn’t going anywhere.

Since retiring plants early is uneconomical (utilities want to get the most out of their existing investments), it is important to assess our existing natural gas stock. As Figure 2 below shows, over half of the existing natural gas capacity was built between 2000 and 2004 (green). An additional 19 percent was built after 2005 to the present date (red), making 70 percent of our natural gas fleet under 12 years old.

Further, as Figure 3 shows, the construction of this installed natural gas capacity was an outlier compared to other construction trends. Solar, for instance, hardly registers. Even coal, with its spike in the 1960’s and 1970’s, pales in comparison. What does this mean? Well, these plants are highly unlikely to go anywhere anytime soon — so when we are thinking about building additional natural gas capacity, we should remember that the vast majority of our existing capacity is very, very new.

Of course, building excess natural gas capacity doesn’t necessarily exclude retiring old natural gas. But it would make it uneconomical, as utilities would be left with stranded costs. Similarly, you can shut down certain fuel sources in a manner not recommended by these analysts, but there is no guarantee that electricity will be delivered reliably.

Looking Ahead: Charting a Reasonable Course for Natural Gas

There is a way forward on natural gas that would enable us to stay on the NREL pathway to 80 percent renewables, and thus, 80 percent carbon dioxide emission reductions. Building only planned additions and, starting in 2023, retiring plants over 45 years old would keep us on well track, as Figure 4 shows below.

The key years to look at here are 2020 and 2025.

In 2020, we will either build out the EIA projected capacity for natural gas, and give up on meeting the climate target, or we will build only planned additions. That will mean natural gas capacity remains stable out to 2025, at which point retirements of plants built over 45 years old will need to start taking place.

This may not be a popular view, but for those of us who want to address the climate challenge, it is important to recognize that the investments we make today will have a serious impact on the decisions we will be able to make in 10, 20, and 30 years. By working backwards from where we know we need to be, and considering real constraints like reliability and utility return on investment from generation, we can get an idea of our year-by-year goals for natural gas and how that fits into the climate picture.

Adam James is a Special Assistant for Energy Policy at the Center for American Progress.

Vote For A Carbon Tax!

Vote at the online U.S. News poll, “Is a Carbon Tax a Good Idea?”

My colleague, Richard Caperton, Director of Clean Energy Investment at the Center for American Progress, is part of a U.S. News debate. Readers know my basic feeling about online polls (see “Memo to media, science museums, homo ‘sapiens’: Enough with the online polls!“)

But as long as they exist, they aren’t entirely a waste of your time. Anyway, here’s is Caperton’s position:

Superstorm Sandy. Massive droughts. Devastating tornadoes. Horrific wildfires. The United States has certainly seen the dramatic weather-related effects of climate change in 2012, and every American has in some way been negatively impacted. Unfortunately, unless we start taking action now to curb the greenhouse gas pollution that’s causing this extreme weather, things are only going to get worse.

Congress passing a progressive carbon tax is one way for the United States could make a significant contribution to the fight against climate change.

To be effective, a carbon tax should do a few things. First, it must be robust enough to lead to meaningful greenhouse gas pollution reductions; increasing over time and applying to non-carbon-dioxide greenhouse gases such as methane. This ensures continuing reductions and encourages companies to move toward cleaner energies instead of different dirty ones. Second, it should encourage businesses to invest in energy efficiency and renewable energy to reduce emissions. This will stimulate the economy and put people back to work in the burgeoning green-jobs sector. Third, it must reduce the economic vulnerability of low-income households by ensuring that they are compensated for increases in energy prices. Fourth, it should have appropriate mechanisms to protect existing American businesses and prevent “pollution leakage,” which occurs if highly polluting industries simply move to other countries that don’t have a comparable limit on pollution. Leakage can also happen if domestic industries shut down, causing us to import goods from other countries. Finally, it should reduce the budget deficit to prevent draconian cuts in vital domestic programs by raising revenue from the tax.

America is currently on the right path. Our greenhouse gas pollution is lower than it’s been in recent history, and our economy is starting to see more signs of life. Neither of these positive trends, however, is anywhere close to where we need them to be to fully address the challenges of climate change and economic growth. Even worse, our country must make additional significant changes to reduce our substantial budget deficit so future generations aren’t stuck with the bill for our expenses.

These issues—climate change, economic growth, and fiscal responsibility—may not appear to be intimately linked. They all have different causes, and they impact our country in different ways. They are, however, inextricably tied together by their solution: A price on carbon can make a significant contribution to solving each of these challenges.

Click here to vote.

For more, see “In-Depth Analysis: How A Progressive Carbon Tax Will Fight Climate Change And Stimulate The Economy.”

Two Thirds Of The World’s Top Corporations Have Set Emissions Reduction Targets Or Renewable Energy Goals

Walmart is a leading corporate investor in solar.

Last year, $260 billion was invested in clean energy globally, marking the one trillionth dollar put into the sector since 2004 and the first time that clean energy saw more investment than fossil fuels.

As a new report shows, much of that activity is being driven by large corporations that are setting internal sustainability goals that include targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions or targets to procure renewable energy and energy efficiency.

According to a new analysis from Ceres, WWF, and Calvert Investments, 68 percent of companies in the Global 100 list have set targets to lower global warming pollution or purchase clean energy. In addition, 58 percent of companies in the Fortune 100 list have set similar targets.

In the past, when corporations announced renewable energy goals, they were mostly a public relations opportunity. Instead of investing in projects themselves, companies would buy tradeable renewable energy credits — an offsetting mechanism that many criticize for doing little to bring new renewables online. But that dynamic is changing. As this report points out, large corporations are now choosing to directly purchase renewable electricity from project developers, or are even building on-site projects themselves. As the report points out, this is an important and positive shift in corporate culture:

Many companies with a history of predominantly purchasing RECs have transitioned instead to favoring PPAs and on-site direct investment, driven  by longer-term commitments to emissions reductions and renewable energy. These companies are looking to capture the long-term value of renewable energy, like electricity price certainty, instead of year-on-year purchases of RECs. In some cases companies are able to get closer to cost parity (the price at which renewable energy is cost competitive with fossil fuel) with long-term PPAs or  on-site direct investment. Companies also increasingly recognize that RECs do little to incentivize new investments in renewable energy. By investing directly or signing PPAs, companies are directly adding renewable capacity to the grid.

Most of the corporate targets are set for 2015 to 2020. With very little certainty on a global deal to reduce greenhouse gases and with numerous countries shifting their support for renewable energy, there are many uncertainties beyond that time frame. But one thing is certain: the planet is warming at an accelerated pace and many of the world’s leading companies understand that they need both adapt to and mitigate the problem. According to a survey of 400 of the biggest global companies released by the Carbon Disclosure Project in September, 37 percent of corporations say they are already seeing the impact of climate change on their business — up from 10 percent in 2010.

Reactions to corporate sustainability goals are understandably mixed. Advocates working closely with companies hail these corporate targets as a big step forward; others concerned more broadly about rampant consumer culture worry that they are simply cosmetic changes that avoid the need for structural reforms.

For example, when Walmart announced its suite of targets designed to cut packaging, make operations more efficient, and procure more renewables, many advocates saw it as a major shift in corporate culture. Ultimately, however, Walmart’s business model is still built around fueling consumerism by selling massive amounts of cheap products in sprawled-out stores. That’s not sustainable.

Both of these views have merit. Ultimately, true corporate sustainability — a target that is still very hard to define — is a very complex, long-term process. The road to getting there is evolutionary. So if a corporation like Walmart doesn’t completely reinvent its business model overnight, that shouldn’t prevent us from building off the short-term successes.

This latest report reminds us many of the world’s largest companies and investors actually recognize we have a problem and are trying to do something about it. That’s more than we can say for our policymakers here in the U.S.

Two Thirds Of The World’s Top Corporations Have Set Emissions Reduction Targets Or Renewable Energy Goals

Walmart is a leading corporate investor in solar.

Last year, $260 billion was invested in clean energy globally, marking the one trillionth dollar put into the sector since 2004 and the first time that clean energy saw more investment than fossil fuels.

As a new report shows, much of that activity is being driven by large corporations that are setting internal sustainability goals that include targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions or targets to procure renewable energy and energy efficiency.

According to a new analysis from Ceres, WWF, and Calvert Investments, 68 percent of companies in the Global 100 list have set targets to lower global warming pollution or purchase clean energy. In addition, 58 percent of companies in the Fortune 100 list have set similar targets.

In the past, when corporations announced renewable energy goals, they were mostly a public relations opportunity. Instead of investing in projects themselves, companies would buy tradeable renewable energy credits — an offsetting mechanism that many criticize for doing little to bring new renewables online. But that dynamic is changing. As this report points out, large corporations are now choosing to directly purchase renewable electricity from project developers, or are even building on-site projects themselves. As the report points out, this is an important and positive shift in corporate culture:

Many companies with a history of predominantly purchasing RECs have transitioned instead to favoring PPAs and on-site direct investment, driven  by longer-term commitments to emissions reductions and renewable energy. These companies are looking to capture the long-term value of renewable energy, like electricity price certainty, instead of year-on-year purchases of RECs. In some cases companies are able to get closer to cost parity (the price at which renewable energy is cost competitive with fossil fuel) with long-term PPAs or  on-site direct investment. Companies also increasingly recognize that RECs do little to incentivize new investments in renewable energy. By investing directly or signing PPAs, companies are directly adding renewable capacity to the grid.

Most of the corporate targets are set for 2015 to 2020. With very little certainty on a global deal to reduce greenhouse gases and with numerous countries shifting their support for renewable energy, there are many uncertainties beyond that time frame. But one thing is certain: the planet is warming at an accelerated pace and many of the world’s leading companies understand that they need both adapt to and mitigate the problem. According to a survey of 400 of the biggest global companies released by the Carbon Disclosure Project in September, 37 percent of corporations say they are already seeing the impact of climate change on their business — up from 10 percent in 2010.

Reactions to corporate sustainability goals are understandably mixed. Advocates working closely with companies hail these corporate targets as a big step forward; others concerned more broadly about rampant consumer culture worry that they are simply cosmetic changes that avoid the need for structural reforms.

For example, when Walmart announced its suite of targets designed to cut packaging, make operations more efficient, and procure more renewables, many advocates saw it as a major shift in corporate culture. Ultimately, however, Walmarts business model is still built around fueling consumerism by selling massive amounts of cheap products in sprawled-out stores. That’s not sustainable.

Both of these views have merit. Ultimately, true corporate sustainability — a target that is still very hard to define — is a very complex, long-term process. The road to getting there is evolutionary. So if a corporation like Walmart doesn’t completely reinvent its business model overnight, that shouldn’t prevent us from building off the short-term successes.

This latest report reminds us many of the world’s largest companies and investors actually recognize we have a problem and are trying to do something about it. That’s more than we can say for our policymakers here in the U.S.

In-Depth Analysis: How A Progressive Carbon Tax Will Fight Climate Change And Stimulate The Economy

by Richard W. Caperton

Superstorm Sandy. Massive droughts. Devastating tornadoes. Horrific wildfires. The United States has certainly seen the dramatic weather-related effects of climate change in 2012, and every American has in some way been negatively impacted. Unfortunately, unless we start taking action now to curb the greenhouse gas pollution that’s causing this extreme weather, things are only going to get worse. Depending on which actions we choose to take, this year will either be the new normal or it will be a glimpse into a future where conditions are much, much worse.

Progressive leaders across the country are beginning to take action and look for ways to fight climate change. President Barack Obama is using provisions of the Clean Air Act to reduce pollution from new power plants. California and some Northeastern states—Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island, and Vermont—have regional programs that put a price on carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas pollutants in the hope of reducing their usage. These are powerful steps in the right direction, but they alone cannot solve the challenge of climate change. Avoiding the most catastrophic consequences of global warming will require much broader action.

There are several ways that the United States could make a significant contribution to the global fight against climate change. We could take President Obama’s action on new power plants to the next level and use the Clean Air Act to reduce pollution from existing power plants and other major sources of emissions. The existing regional programs that charge a fee for pollution could be strengthened and broadened to cover more of the country, or Congress could get involved and put a nationwide price on carbon by creating a carbon tax.

Before diving into specifics on a national carbon tax, it’s important to recognize that there are countless ways to put a price on carbon. A cap-and-trade system is one such method, and it’s certainly possible to design a progressive cap-and-trade system. In such a system, a strict cap is set on national pollution, and polluters must have permits for all of their pollution. These permits are freely traded so that companies can reduce their pollution profit by selling permits to other companies that may need more pollution allowances. Analysis showed that the cap-and-trade bill passed in the U.S. House of Representatives in 2009 would have benefited low-income people, reduced the deficit, protected vulnerable industries, reduced pollution, and stimulated investment. That’s why CAP, along with private businesses and a bipartisan majority of the House of Representatives, supported the bill. Unfortunately, it failed to muster the necessary support in the Senate and was never enacted.

Three years later cap and trade is off the table largely because of a polluter-funded effort to deny climate science and delay action on pollution reductions. But Hurricane Sandy, the fiscal cliff, and the debate over clean energy incentives have together made it clear that we must put a price on carbon—and we must do it soon.

Given the track record of climate legislation in Congress—including the failed effort to pass the cap-and-trade bill in 2009—enacting a carbon tax poses more of a challenge than either expanding the regional carbon-pricing actions or using the Clean Air Act to regulate all power plants. While both of these alternatives are steps in the right direction, a national carbon tax would be able to address more than just our environmental concerns. In addition to mitigating the effects of climate change, a carbon tax could help solve our country’s budget crisis and provide revenue for new job-creating investments in clean energy infrastructure. By raising new funds, driving new investments, and reducing the likelihood of the most catastrophic consequences of climate change, a carbon tax is a tool that can take on our country’s three most pressing challenges: the deficit, joblessness, and the climate crisis.

In this issue brief we describe some of the key questions Congress needs to answer in designing a carbon tax. We lay out the principles for making sure that a carbon price puts our country on a progressive path to future prosperity and describe why a carbon tax is a desirable way to price carbon. We then turn to the issues in collecting the necessary revenue. Finally, we discuss how to use the revenue to most effectively solve the challenges facing our country.

Key principles for a progressive carbon tax

As with most energy policies, the details of a carbon tax are critical to accomplishing its goals. A well-designed pricing system can create jobs, reduce greenhouse gas pollution, and have fair impacts across all regions and income groups. To ensure this positive outcome, the United States should adopt a carbon pricing system that embodies progressive principles of fairness, environmental safety, and economic growth. The pricing system should:

• Be sufficiently robust that it leads to meaningful reductions in greenhouse gas pollution, getting us on a path that helps us avoid the most catastrophic effects of climate change. In addition to being high enough to affect pollution rates, the tax should also increase over time and be applicable to non-carbon-dioxide greenhouse gases such as methane. This would both ensure a continuing reduction in the release of carbon dioxide and also encourage companies to move toward cleaner energies instead of different dirty ones.
• Encourage businesses to make new investments in energy efficiency and renewable energy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This will stimulate the economy and put people back to work in the burgeoning clean-tech and green-jobs sectors.
• Reduce—not increase—economic vulnerability of low-income households by ensuring that they are fairly compensated for any increase in energy prices.
• Have appropriate mechanisms to protect existing American businesses and prevent so-called pollution leakage to countries without similar systems in place. Leakage occurs if highly polluting industries simply move to other countries that don’t have a comparable limit on pollution; in this way, they can continue business as usual without stricter environmental regulations. Leakage can also happen if domestic industries shut down, causing us to import goods from other countries.
• Reduce the budget deficit to prevent draconian cuts in vital domestic programs by raising revenue from the tax.

The remainder of this issue brief explains how to design a carbon tax that meets these criteria.

Why a carbon tax is the best solution

Although it is unlikely that Congress will attempt to pass federal cap-and-trade legislation again in the near future, there are alternatives to putting a price on carbon—including the carbon tax, which is getting significant attention today from lawmakers and thought leaders across the political spectrum. The basic mechanics of a carbon tax are very simple: A tax is assessed on each ton of greenhouse gas pollution, the tax is paid to the government, and the government uses the money for either targeted spending or general usage. The tax will discourage pollution, therefore discouraging the use of fossil fuels while promoting cleaner energies. It can be increased over time to continue incentivizing polluters to lower their emission rates.

A carbon tax does have a critical distinction from cap-and-trade. With the carbon tax, the price is fixed, and the market responds by reducing carbon pollution to a point where it is cheaper to pay the tax than reduce the pollution. With cap-and-trade, though, the amount of pollution reduction is set by law, while the market responds by setting a price for pollution at the point that reflects the amount of pollution that must be reduced. The difference is cost certainty versus emissions-reduction certainty. For some pollutants such as sulfur dioxide or nitrogen oxides, the emissions certainty is very important. With greenhouse gas pollutants such as carbon dioxide, on the other hand, atmospheric concentration will determine the impacts of climate change. This means that the reductions in greenhouse gas pollution need not be as precise as those for conventional pollutants, as long as we meet longer-term goals such as reducing pollution 17 percent from 2005 levels by 2020 and 80 percent by 2050. A carbon tax of $15 to $25 will achieve these levels of reductions by incentivizing companies to lower their pollution rates to the desired levels, making it an effective solution to curbing greenhouse gas pollution.

The cost certainty implicit in a carbon tax could also be very useful in driving investments in efficiency and new clean technologies. For long-lived assets such as power plants and factories, knowing what the cost of carbon will be in the future makes planning those investments much easier. A carbon tax will also incentivize the use of non-fossil-fuel-based energy, causing an economic boost in the green-jobs and clean-tech markets.

There are two important sides to a carbon tax: how the revenue is collected and where the revenue goes. Getting the right mix of policies on both sides of the equation will ultimately determine whether or not a carbon tax achieves the aforementioned goals.

How to collect the revenue

At the most basic level, a carbon tax is simply a fixed fee per ton of carbon dioxide pollution, as well as a comparable fee for other greenhouse gas pollutants such as methane, that a company must pay when it emits these pollutants. Beyond that, the details get somewhat more complicated. How much should the tax be? What sectors of the economy should have to pay? How should the tax be collected? The answer to each of these questions involves tradeoffs, but recent research can point us in the right direction.

How much should the tax be?

The tax should be set as close as possible to a level that will achieve growing pollution reductions over time—reductions that will be significant enough to avoid the most catastrophic consequences of climate change. Setting the tax lower than this will simply create a revenue-generating tool that doesn’t solve the underlying problem.

While getting the price right to the penny is virtually impossible, getting in the ballpark should be relatively easy. Modeling of cap-and-trade proposals from 2009 and extensive modeling of energy systems since then indicates that a price anywhere from $15 to $25 per ton is about what is needed to reduce pollution by appropriate amounts.Recent experience from California’s cap-and-trade system indicates that significant emissions can be achieved with a price of just around $10 per ton. To avoid shocks to the economy that may arise from introducing a new tax on pollution, it makes sense for the price to be very low—perhaps lower than ultimately necessary to achieve significant pollution reductions—for the first year or two years of the program, with a gradual ramp up to the target price. The price should then increase at a steady rate each year to ensure further reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

Congress likely does not have the internal expertise to set the tax at exactly the right level. To set the price, Congress should direct the Department of Energy to determine the necessary carbon price that will put us on a path toward necessary greenhouse gas pollution reductions. Congress should recommend that the Energy Department use $25 per ton as a starting point for their analysis. Finally, the tax should be phased in on a predetermined schedule along the lines of 25 percent of the target price in year one, 50 percent in year two, and 100 percent in year three. (For a target tax rate of $25 per ton, that would mean a price of $6.25 per ton in the first year, $12.50 in the second year, and the full $25 in the third year.) Because there is a risk that the price may not be sufficient to fully address climate change, however, Congress should not interfere with the Environmental Protection Agency’s existing authority to regulate greenhouse gas pollution.

Who should have to pay?

The tax should ultimately cover the entire economy. Addressing the climate crisis will require reducing emissions from every source—including electricity, transportation, industry, households, agriculture, and forestry—and the best way to do so is through a price on carbon. Given the differences in terms of how easy it is for each of those sectors to reduce pollution, however—as well as the political challenges that will arise from attempting to tax some of them for carbon use—it may make sense to start with only a portion of the economy and phase in the rest over time.

The two largest sources of U.S. carbon pollution are electricity plants and motor vehicles. The Obama administration already adopted the first limit on carbon pollution from motor vehicles, which is projected to reduce carbon pollution by 6 billion tons over the lifetime of the cars built between 2017 and 2025. A carbon tax should therefore focus first on the electric power industry. One advantage in doing so is that there are a relatively small number of sources—just 5,800 power plants in America—and existing technologies can help them reduce their pollution.

The electric power industry is also where most cost-effective reductions are found. Research from Roberton Williams and others at the environmental think tank Resources for the Future shows that a tax on carbon pollution just from the electricity industry gets 90 percent of the reductions of an economy-wide tax in 2020. This is because a relatively low tax will lead to much more fuel switching and changed behavior in the electricity industry than in other parts of the economy. Put another way, sectors such as transportation and industry will not respond as much to a moderate tax as the electricity industry will because the electricity industry has less expensive ways to reduce pollution than other sectors of the economy. As the tax increases, though, emissions reductions in other sectors will become a bigger part of the solution.

To be clear, reducing emissions from the electricity sector alone is not sufficient to avoid the most catastrophic impacts of climate change. A sector-specific approach only works in the very early years of a carbon tax. Eventually, the tax must cover all major emitters.

How should the tax be collected?

If the carbon tax is initially only placed on power plant emissions, the tax should be assessed at the power plant. This is better than assessing the tax either farther upstream or downstream from the plant for several reasons. Assessing it downstream—that is, on people’s power bills—is extremely complicated and unnecessarily bureaucratic. It would send a price signal in favor of energy efficiency to families and businesses, but the downsides—complicated and expensive bureaucracy—almost certainly outweigh the benefits. Assessing the tax upstream—that is, at the mouth of the coal mine or at the natural gas well—is relatively straightforward, but it impacts other industries that use coal and natural gas and doesn’t capture imported fossil fuels. If the carbon tax were only applied to certain sectors of the economy—at least in the beginning— assessing the tax at this point would not be appropriate.

Power plants collect and report other environmental data, so adding greenhouse gas pollution is a relatively low administrative burden. Assessing the tax at the power plant also sends a price signal for energy efficiency at the power plant, which should encourage investments in more efficient combustion of fossil fuels—or even investments in renewable energy technology.

Where the revenue goes

While much of the focus on a carbon tax has historically been based around how a carbon price will reduce pollution, it’s important not to discount the other side of the equation. Spending the revenue earned from a carbon tax is critical for fighting climate change and driving economic growth. The revenue needs to be directed to three uses: minimizing harm to vulnerable consumers and businesses, growing the economy with investments in clean energy infrastructure and other infrastructure that makes communities more resilient in the face of climate change, and reducing the deficit burden on future generations.

Minimizing harm

A simple carbon tax will likely be regressive instead of progressive, and a carbon tax on just the power sector will potentially be more regressive than an economy-wide program. That’s because low-income consumers spend a higher portion of their income on electricity than high-income consumers, even though wealthy households tend to use more electricity because they live in bigger houses, own more appliances, and generally have more demand for energy.

Research from the Congressional Budget Office explored seven different options for reducing the regressivity of a carbon tax via the tax code or targeted-spending programs. While none of its solutions are perfect, it does find that an income-tax rebate or payroll-tax rebate can be very effective in addressing the challenge. This is because these rebates reach a very broad number of people and can be targeted to specific income levels. Congress could also create a carbon tax in the context of broader tax reform. If this is the case, the carbon tax need not be explicitly linked to a progressive fix, as long as the overall reform package is progressive.

Closely related to reducing harm to low-income consumers is reducing potential harm to energy-intensive, trade-exposed industries. A relatively small number of industries such as cement and glass manufacturing could be harmed by competing imports from countries that do not have their own price on carbon—and therefore can offer their goods at a lower price. Efforts to reduce harm can come from the revenue collection side; that is, there could be some sort of “border tax” on imports from nations without programs to limit carbon pollution in order to level the playing field.

Another option would be to spend federal revenue to compensate domestic industries and reduce the competitive advantage of imports from nations without carbon pollution reductions. Because there are questions about the legality and complexity of a border tax on imports, it may make more sense to address this challenge on the revenue-spending side instead of by using border adjustments. In other words, the government can make domestic products less—not more—expensive through some type of rebate or government spending. This spending is also vital in fighting climate change since it prevents emissions leakage to countries without a price on carbon.

Investments in clean energy

A carbon tax is not the only thing that’s needed to win the fight against climate change. The tax will be much more effective if paired with additional investments in clean energy infrastructure both domestically and abroad. Using the revenues accrued from the carbon tax could allow us to make those additional investments. The Center for American Progress has previously estimated that in order to address the climate crisis, we need to spend about $20 billion annually on researching, developing, and deploying clean energy technologies, reducing emissions in challenging sectors such as forestry, and meeting our international climate commitments to assist developing nations with their pollution reductions.

The exact mix of investments should evolve over time to reflect the impacts of the carbon tax and ongoing developments in clean energy technologies. Generally, though, the spending should be a mix of direct grants, tax incentives, and credit support for deployment of renewable energy technologies, all of which can be cost-effectively targeted to meet specific needs. This spending should be adjusted annually to recognize the impact of an increasing carbon tax on the competitiveness of clean alternatives and the interactions with other policies, such as state renewable portfolio standards or a federal clean energy standard.

There is also a great need to repair and replace critical transportation and water infrastructure that helps communities deal with the impacts of climate change. Some portion of the revenues from the carbon tax could be directed toward these sectors. These investments have the benefit of being good for the economy. Research shows that infrastructure investments are one of the most effective ways to spend public money to drive growth. In this case, the infrastructure investments would put people to work in labor-intensive sectors such as renewable energy and energy efficiency.

Reducing the deficit

The money remaining after funding these measures should be used for deficit reduction. The total amount of money available for deficit reduction depends on how much of the economy is covered by the tax, but it will likely be substantial. For instance, a $25-per-ton tax on power plants, which were responsible for about 2.2 billion tons of carbon dioxide in 2010, would generate $55 billion per year. Even after protecting low-income consumers and investing in infrastructure, billions of dollars could be left over to help address our nation’s debt. Cutting the deficit reduces the amount of interest future generations will have to pay on our national debt, which frees up resources for more valuable uses.

A carbon tax is a popular bipartisan tool for reducing the deficit. Think tanks across the political spectrum, including CAP and the American Enterprise Institute, among others, endorsed a carbon tax in 2011 as part of their proposals to balance the budget. Just like with progressive tax reform, Congress could include a carbon tax to raise revenue as part of an agreement on deficit reduction. In this case, the tax may not need to be explicitly linked to deficit reduction as long as the comprehensive budget package deals with this problem.

Conclusion

America is currently on the right path. Our greenhouse gas pollution is lower than it’s been in recent history, and our economy is starting to see more signs of life. Neither of these positive trends, however, is anywhere close to where we need them to be to fully address the challenges of climate change and economic growth. Even worse, our country must make additional significant changes to reduce our substantial budget deficit so future generations aren’t stuck with the bill for our expenses.

These issues—climate change, economic growth, and fiscal responsibility—may not appear to be intimately linked. They all have different causes, and they impact our country in different ways. They are, however, inextricably tied together by their solution: A price on carbon can make a significant contribution to solving each of these challenges.

This issue brief has explored some of the critical questions in designing a carbon tax, which is the most likely way that carbon will be priced in the near future. There are certain ingredients that a carbon tax must include to be part of a progressive vision for the United States: It must reduce greenhouse gas pollution, drive new investments in infrastructure, minimize harm to vulnerable consumers and businesses, and reduce the deficit.

The good news is that there is no doubt that such a tax can be created. The question is whether Congress will do the right thing and design a tax that meets these standards. For the benefit of current and future Americans and global citizens, Congress should act now and create a progressive carbon tax.

Richard Caperton is the Director of the Clean Energy Investment program at the Center for American Progress.

Study: We Can Cut Carbon Pollution One Third By Closing ‘Carbon Loophole’ Through The Clean Air Act

by Whitney Allen

After four years of congressional stalemate on efforts to slash carbon pollution responsible for climate change, the Natural Resources Defense Council released a road map to cleaner electricity this week that relies on existing executive authority rather than Congress.

NRDC’s new report describes how  the Obama Administration can make substantial cuts in carbon pollution from existing power plants, which are the single largest source of carbon pollution in the U.S.  Its strategy would employ Section 111(d) of the Clean Air Act, which gives the Environmental Protection Agency the authority to “set state specific carbon emission rates that reflect the diversity of the nation’s electricity sector and fuel mix.”

This approach differs in a few important ways from earlier pieces of legislation like the 2009 climate bill sponsored by Representatives Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Ed Markey (D-MA) during the 111^th Congress. The proposal would set the initial pollution reduction standard for power plants by taking their state’s current energy mix taken into account. That is, a state with relatively low pollution would have a different target compared to a state with high emissions.

In addition, states would be allowed to create regional alliances, such as the ten-state Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), to work together to meet pollution reduction goals. This is crucial because the electricity supply from power plants frequently crosses state boundaries.

Under the NRDC proposal, states would develop a compliance strategy most appropriate for their mix of electricity generation, as long it achieves pollution reductions. They can develop state policy options that improve the efficiency of current plants, incentivize energy efficiency, shift production to lower-pollution natural gas plants and/or zero-emitting wind or solar generation.

NRDC estimates that its plan would cut carbon emissions by 26 percent below 2005 levels by 2020, and 34 percent by 2025. The accompanying reduction of other power plant pollutants would also save 3,600 lives and prevent nearly 1.2 million asthma attacks in 2020 alone.

These benefits create a significant return on investment. NRDC predicts that successful implementation of the plan could cost around $4 billion dollars in 2020, and lead to a return of anywhere from $25 – 60 billion due to reduced illnesses and other harms from climate change.

The NRDC proposal is already garnering interest. William Reilly, EPA Administrator under President George H. W. Bush, called it “an imaginative proposal that addresses some real needs. It deserves to be carefully analyzed and taken seriously by all the affected interests.”

Carol Browner, former EPA administrator and current distinguished senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, added “NRDC’s proposal is very thoughtful and should be part of any debate on how we build on the work already begun by the administration to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”

CAP Chair and Former White House Chief of Staff John Podesta put the proposal in context:

“The recent plague of climate related extreme weather events particularly harms middle- and lower-income households. We can reduce the climate change threat to the middle class by limiting carbon emissions from their largest source – power plants.

“The Natural Resources Defense Council’s plan would allow states to design their own cost-effective programs to limit pollution. Investments to achieve these reductions would create manufacturing, construction, and other well-paying jobs. President Obama can build on his carbon pollution reductions from motor vehicles by establishing a standard for existing power plants.”

The urgency to reduce the carbon pollution responsible for climate change grows every day. On December 4, 2011, the New York Times reported that global greenhouse gas pollution hit a record of 9.5 billion tons in 2011.

The United States is beginning to experience the wrath of climate change.  In the past two years it suffered 21 climate-related extreme weather events that each caused at least $1 billion in damages.  These floods, droughts, heat waves and storms caused over 1,000 fatalities, and caused combined damages of $174 billion. “Heavy Weather,” a recent CAP report, determined that these severe extreme weather events disproportionately affected areas where the average household had lower income than the national median household income. The weather has also caused over a thousand deaths between 2011 and 2012.

The NRDC proposal could go a long way in the fight against climate change by reducing carbon pollution from power plants, which are responsible for 40 percent of the nation’s total climate pollution.

Dan Lashof, Director of the Climate and Clean Air Program at NRDC, put it best: “We know where the pollution is. Now we have to go after it.”

Whitney Allen is an intern at the Center for American Progress, coming from the University of Texas at Arlington. She is fall 2012 Bill Archer Fellow.

U.S. Energy Outlook: The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly

by Daniel J. Weiss

New projections released by the Department of Energy show a mixed — but mostly scary — picture for America’s energy and environmental future.

This week, the Energy Information Administration released its “AEO 2013 Early Release Overview.” It is the preview version of its complete Annual Energy Outlook 2013 due next spring.  This updates AEO 2012 by factoring in newly adopted policies – such as the 2017-2025 fuel economy standards for light duty vehicles – for EIA’s projections of energy production, consumption, and carbon pollution between now and 2040.

AEO 2013’s “reference case,” which assumes no future policy changes, includes good, bad, and ugly predictions for our energy system. Efforts to limit carbon pollution responsible for climate change fall into the ugly category. EIA’s estimates make it shockingly clear that under existing energy policies there will only be a small decrease in carbon pollution from the energy sector between now and 2040, condemning us to increasingly deadly climate change.

Here are some of the highs – and lows – of the AEO 2013 Early Release.

First, the good news. EIA predicts a sizable drop in gasoline consumption due to more stringent corporate average fuel economy standards. The agency estimates that liquid fuel consumption (mostly gasoline) will be 7 percent lower in 2020 compared to 2011, or about 600,000 barrels per day less.  As you can see in the graph below, these reductions continue until the early 2030’s when nearly all of the cars on the road are built with an average fuel economy standard of 54.5 miles per gallon.

Along with a decrease in liquid fuel consumption, EIA also projects that “crude oil production, particularly from tight oil plays, rises sharply over the next decade.”  Growing development of shale oil fields in North Dakota and Texas will help increase domestic oil production under current energy policies by 2 million barrels per day between 2010 and 2020 – a 36 percent increase.

The improved fuel efficiency, combined with this growing domestic oil consumption, means that foreign oil imports will fall by one quarter between 2010 and 2020. From a narrow energy security perspective, this means less money sent overseas to buy foreign oil. However, from a climate perspective, this keeps us on a path toward disaster: according to the International Energy Agency, we need to keep 2/3rds of proven carbon reserves in the ground through 2050 in order to avoid catastrophic climate change.

While there are clear economic benefits to using less foreign oil, it is critical that the U.S. reduce overall petroleum through conservation and efficiency in order to address climate.

Interestingly, the combination of lower oil consumption along with higher domestic production suggests that the proposed Keystone XL pipeline – projected to move 800,000 barrels per day of Canadian tar sands oil from Alberta to the Gulf Coast – will do little to add to our national energy security.  Building the pipeline would facilitate a significant increase in the energy-intensive production of this oil, which yields at least 17 percent more carbon pollution compared to the production of conventional domestic oil.

Some good news on the renewables front: Solar power will grow as a source of clean electricity.  EIA projects that electricity generation from solar photovoltaic systems hooked up to the grid will more than double between 2012 and 2020, and increase by another third by 2030.

But there is also a sobering solar prediction.  Electricity from solar thermal plants will double between now and 2014, but remain static after that all the way through 2040. EIA predicts that under current energy policies there won’t be many other solar thermal plants like the Ivanpah project in California, which will use the sun to provide power to 140,000 homes. Hopefully, this reference case understates the growth in solar thermal plants due to outdated information or overly cautious estimates.

AEO 2013 also forecasts only a slight increase in wind electricity generation between now and 2020, with only a total 6 percent increase between 2012 and 2030.  This low estimate is based on the assumption that the Production Tax Credit for wind electricity expires at the end of 2012, and is not renewed, even though there is a bipartisan Congressional effort to extend it through 2013.

The laissez faire, business-as-usual approach to wind that is reflected in the EIA projections ignores that more wind electricity generation would help lower carbon pollution. In addition, an analysis by CAP’s Richard Caperton determined that “wind power helps to lower electricity prices.” It is imperative that Congress extend the PTC for multiple years to fight climate change, while also helping the middle class with electricity costs. This essential measure, along with enhanced wind access to transmission, would expand our wind generation capacity substantially.

The ugly news begins with coal-fired electricity, which is the single largest source of climate change pollution in the United States.  Coal combustion also annually emits millions of tons of other pollutants, including mercury, carcinogens, soot, and smog ingredients.

In the last several years the low price of natural gas has led many utilities to substitute it for coal. Consequently, EIA projects that utilities will retire many aging coal plants between now and 2020 – enough to remove 49 gigawatts of electricity (or nearly 100 average sized coal plants).  However, EIA forecasts zero additional coal plant retirements between 2022 and 2040.

The news gets uglier. EIA estimates that carbon pollution from electricity generation will grow at an average rate of 0.2 percent annually between 2011 and 2040, with a total increase of 7 percent under status quo energy policies.

The ugliest, most hideous news of all is that EIA predicts 2040 emissions will only be 5 percent below the 2005 baseline under current energy policies.  This is critical because the energy sector is the dominant contributor to climate change pollution in the United States.  EIA determined that:

“Of the total amount of U.S. greenhouse gases emitted in 2010, about 87% were energy-related and 91% of those energy-related gases were carbon dioxide from the combustion of fossil fuels.”

EIA’s latest projection that there will be only a minor decrease in carbon pollution from the energy sector over the next 30 years would be an epic disaster for the United States and the rest of the planet.

Such an outcome would certainly condemn the United States and the world to the most devastating impacts from climate change, including more fatalities and damages from increasingly ferocious and frequent extreme weather, more deaths and illness from smog, tropical diseases infecting people in northern latitudes, and the disruption of the world’s food production system.

The most effective way to thwart the worst impacts from climate changes is to dramatically reduce the carbon pollution from existing power plants by using the executive authority under the Clean Air Act — a plan laid out in great detail by the Natural Resources Defense Council this week.

There is some hopeful news in all of this: these dire projections are based on no policy changes at all. Lawmakers and regulators still have an opportunity to put in place the signals that will put us on a lower-carbon path. We do have a choice.

Daniel J. Weiss is a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress.

Carol Browner: ‘Stunning’ Climate Denial In The House Prevents Any Action On Climate In Washington

by Luke Morgan

Former EPA Chief and White House Climate Czar Carol Browner says that climate deniers in the House of Representatives are the biggest impediment to getting a price on carbon.

When asked what the most significant obstacle in passing climate change legislation is during an event in Washington on the Clean Air Act yesterday, former EPA Chief Carol Browner pointed to Republicans in the House and their “stunning” denial of the reality of earth’s changing climate.

“I think unfortunately, right now a majority in our House of Representatives appears to not even think the problem is real,” Browner said. “It’s sort of stunning to me because I’ve never seen the breadth of scientific consensus on an environmental issue like there is on this.”

Speaking directly after Browner was Texas GOP Representative Joe Barton. Barton is the chairman emeritus of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and sits on the Environment and the Economy subcommittee.  However, while collecting $1.7 million from Big Oil over the years, he has displayed alarming ignorance on climate reality.

Barton claimed that carbon dioxide is not only irrelevant to the Clean Air Act, but that it’s not dangerous at all because it’s “a necessity for life.” To illustrate his example, he noted that he was exhaling carbon dioxide as he spoke, and actually argued that people should build greenhouses because they create life, so greenhouse gases are good.

“There’s a reason that you build things called greenhouses, and that’s to help things grow,” he said.

Barton also claimed that the atmosphere had, in the past, contained carbon dioxide levels greater than 5,000 parts per million (ppm), implying that we could do so again today.  The current scientific consensus, however, is that 350 ppm is the safe upper limit.

Barton said that he accepted the climate is changing, but he discounted human influence and the rise in extreme weather as “opinions.” Both the anthropogenic causes of climate change and its effects on extreme weather events are extremely well-documented in the scientific community.

Barton’s remarks came during a panel convened by National Journal and the American Lung Association on the legacy and future of the Clean Air Act.  Although he spoke alone, many of the other speakers either pre-empted or responded to his off-base remarks.

Dr. Jerome Paulson of the Children’s National Medical Center pointed out the silliness of Barton’s argument that CO2 is a necessity for life.  Paulson noted, “If we had no sodium, we wouldn’t be alive.  But there does come a point where if people consume too much sodium or if there’s too much sodium in their bodies, then it becomes toxic and people can die.”

The same is true, Paulson said, of CO2 in the atmosphere: it’s necessary, but too much of it is clearly a bad thing.

The event, which can be viewed online, focused mainly on the Clean Air Act and whether it had been successful, and how successful it could be moving forward.  While Barton incorrectly argued that CO2 is not a dangerous pollutant and therefore not subject to the jurisdiction of the Clean Air Act, Browner – who was also the longest-serving EPA Administrator – pointed out that the agency is required by law to regulate anything it considers to be detrimental to environmental health.

Barton also repeated the Republican talking point that the EPA places an undue burden on businesses.  However, Browner pointed to the EPA’s review of the Clean Air Act, which detailed $2 trillion dollars in economic savings through 2022.  Browner has made similar arguments before to Stephen Colbert.

Barton expressed doubt that Congress would be legislating on the Clean Air Act at all in the current Congress.  Browner, however, noted that current law allows the EPA and the executive branch to make significant progress in combatting CO2 without needing Congress’s stamp of approval, and that the Supreme Court has upheld that right.

Luke Morgan is the executive Intern at the Center for American Progress.

Why Claims About Reductions Of U.S. Carbon Dioxide Emissions Are Misleading

by Kevin Matthews

A person — a public figure, member of the media, maybe even an international climate negotiator — could be confused about U.S. carbon dioxide emissions.

In August, 2012, the Associated Press reported this:

In a surprising turnaround, the amount of carbon dioxide being released into the atmosphere in the U.S. has fallen dramatically to its lowest level in 20 years, and government officials say the biggest reason is that cheap and plentiful natural gas has led many power plant operators to switch from dirtier-burning coal.”

Since August, the misleading meme of shrinking U.S. greenhouse gas emissions has been picked up and carried forward by a variety of respected sources. As recently as November 26, for instance, the Guardian reported on how the findings were influencing climate negotiations:

Greenhouse gas emissions from the US have fallen sharply in recent years, owing to the replacement of coal-fired power generation by gas in the US, following its widespread adoption of shale gas.

Jonathan Pershing, a senior negotiator for the US, said: “Those who don’t know what the US is doing may not be informed of the scale and extent of the effort, but it’s enormous.”

Given these claims, you’d think that there was solid information that U.S. greenhouse gas emissions have dropped. But the real story is somewhat different.

Back in August, the U.S. Energy Information Agency (EIA), part of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) that collects and reports certain energy-related data, posted an article centered on this graph:

That graph is labeled obscurely, but with partial accuracy, as showing U.S. “carbon dioxide emissions from energy demand.”

That’s the same as “carbon dioxide emissions from energy use” or “carbon dioxide emissions from energy consumption,” which is primary data collected by the EIA. It’s relatively easy to track in real time, since it’s essentially based on adding up the sales figures for coal, oil, and natural gas.

Therein lies the first layer of confusion. The EIA does not include biomass combustion energy, hydroelectric power, or true renewables like wind and solar in its main energy consumption figures. Except for biomass, there is little CO2 associated with the use of these clean energy sources.

So the EIA graph in the article should be labeled as U.S. “carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel consumption.” In fact, that’s exactly how the graph is labeled in EIA’s deeper technical reports. According to the most recent official EPA figures, carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel consumption represented about 79% of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2010.

Starting a tally of this U.S. fossil fuel use “grade inflation,” we can use these terms:

(CO2 emissions from fossil fuel use) + (CO2 emissions from all other energy use) = (total CO2 emissions from energy use).

The big headline on the EIA article adds another level of exaggeration. It says “U.S. energy-related CO2 emissions in early 2012 lowest since 1992.” Note the shift from “energy-use” CO2 emissions to “energy-related” CO2 emissions.

The headline is directly wrong because the underlying data does not include CO2 emissions from energy production and distribution such as flaring of natural gas, an increasing element in the U.S. EIA seems to use the this sloppy label regularly.

(CO2 emissions from energy use) + (CO2 emissions from energy production & distribution) = (energy-related CO2 emissions)

The headline also sets people up for another natural error. While CO2 is the biggest greenhouse gas, it’s not the only one. It’s common practice in adding up climate numbers to convert all the differing units of other greenhouse gases into CO2-equivalent values.

It’s tedious to always say “CO2-equivalent greenhouse gas emissions.” And pretty often, people just say “CO2 emissions” when “CO2-equivalent emissions” is what they really mean.

That’s just a little slippage in our language, but it has big implications for the numbers.

(energy-related CO2 emissions) + (non-CO2 energy-related emissions) = (energy-related greenhouse gas emissions)

Missing Methane

The biggest energy-related non-CO2 emissions are methane — and that’s huge.

Estimates of energy-related methane emissions are in flux, as traditional industry numbers are being looked at more closely. Current research, in line with a recent NOAA report, suggests under-reporting by the fossil fuel industry may be on the order of 2 percent of natural gas used, suggesting total methane losses on the order of 4%. Since methane is about 21 times more potent as a greenhouse gas than CO2 (in the time frame of a generation), we can multiply (4% methane leakage) x (21 times GHG impact compared to CO2) = 84%. That shows that methane emissions from the natural gas system may have a CO2-equivalent greenhouse gas impact roughly comparable to the GHG impact in CO2 from burning the gas. While the methane emissions may prove to be somewhat smaller, there’s little doubt they are significant.

This is part of the picture described by guest bloggers Shakeb Afsah and Kendyl Salcito in the Climate Progress article “Shale Gas And The Overhyping Of Its CO2 Reductions.”

By leaving out methane, and other things, the EIA data really only describes one specialized slice of emissions. It’s a big slice, but not one to freely generalize from.

Because renewables are missing from the EIA data, which has been widely and inappropriately generalized, it’s all too easy for pundits and reporters to simply compare the coal curve and the natural gas curve against the (baseless) overall conclusion of dropping emissions, and then call out lower natural gas prices as the cause of U.S. progress — thus leaving out the significant growth of renewables. But that’s another story.

Ultimate Confusion

As noted above, it’s apparently been easy for analysts and media alike to take the EIA information to the final level of misinformation, trumpeting that CO2 levels have fallen to their lowest levels in 20 years or that greenhouse gas emissions have fallen sharply.

The claim is wrong, because to get to greenhouse gas emissions overall, all the non-energy-related emissions sources also need to also be included. To summarize and complete the equation:

EIA data: (CO2 emissions from fossil fuel use)
+ (CO2 emissions from all other energy use)
+ (CO2 emissions from energy production & distribution)
+ (non-CO2 energy-related emissions)
+ (all non-energy-related greenhouse gas emissions)
= total greenhouse gas emissions

Methane, flaring, and biomass emissions not included in the primary EIA numbers mean those numbers don’t fully reflect energy-related GHG emissions.

According to the official U.S. GHG emissions inventory, the non-energy-related emissions (from agriculture, logging, other land use changes, etc.) represent another ~20 percent of the total, on top of the ~80 percent of GHG emissions that are directly energy-related.

EPA to the Rescue

The EIA used to actually calculate and report its own U.S. total greenhouse gas emissions numbers. That EIA overall GHG inventory was discontinued in 2011, due to mid-year budget cuts, according to an EIA source. However, the agency has never been the source of the official U.S. inventory.

The official U.S. greenhouse gas emissions inventory has been produced for many years by the EPA, following detailed international reporting protocols. It’s presented to the United Nations every April, in a careful and fairly hard-to-read formal report.

The most recent official EPA inventory, reported in April 2012 and showing total U.S. emissions for 2010, shows our emissions going up that year:

The current EPA inventory report shows total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions for 2010 up 3.2% over 2009 emissions, with an average annual growth rate from 1990 through 2010 of 0.5%. It’s hard to say what increase or decrease the U.S. inventory for 2011 will show, when the EPA releases it in April 2013, or what the inventory for 2012 will show when it comes out in April 2014. Unless someone is prepared to duplicate the EPA’s work, and do it faster, we can expect to wait for those numbers.

Bottom Line

U.S. major media and others have been trumpeting a false meme of declining U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, spinning off from EIA data that actually shows a much narrower trend.

While the primary EIA data represents a large, very specific piece of the overall U.S. emission inventory, it’s fundamentally misleading to inflate its importance. Nonetheless, this seems to have been done regularly by the EIA itself, and to an even greater degree by downstream users of EIA information.

In the past, EIA produced an overall emissions inventory. Because energy consumption is easier to collect and report on quickly than other types of emissions, they continue to produce reports including U.S. CO2 emissions from energy use, which the EIA releases at a pace tantalizingly close to real time.

No doubt it’s frustrating to media and officials who love to report on realtime score cards, but the only official U.S. greenhouse gas emission inventory comes from the EPA. It takes a while for all the data to be collected and complied — and impatience is no reason to misrepresent the data available.

In any case, year-to-year ups and downs in U.S. emissions are not very meaningful relative to the scale of the climate mitigation challenge we face together. In the U.S., we need to be planning and faithfully implementing, in every sector of our economy, in every government, agency, and large organization, roughly 5% reductions in total greenhouse gas emissions, every year, year-on-year, for the rest of our lives.

And no blip in annual emissions, whether actual or invented, is going to rescue business-as-usual from this fundamental need for real climate action.

Kevin Matthews is Editor-in-Chief of Architecture Week.

World’s Largest Mining Firm: ‘In A Carbon Constrained World, Coal Is Going To Decline. And Frankly It Should.’

One of the world’s biggest mining firms says that extreme weather caused by climate change is already impacting some of its assets, thus forcing the company to re-evaluate its investments in the coal sector.

Speaking to investors and analysts on Monday, the Chief Executive of BHP Billiton’s coal division explained how the company is reinforcing infrastructure around its coal export terminal in Queensland, Australia because of increases in extreme weather that threaten the facility.

BHP Billiton is one of the largest producers of aluminum, copper, thermal coal, metallurgical coal, nickel, silver and uranium. The Australian company also owns and operates the Hay Point Services Coal Terminal, a coal facility that makes up a large portion of the biggest coal port in the world.

And now that facility is under threat from intensifying extreme weather, says BHP executive Marcus Randolph. His comments were reported in the Australian Financial Review after the company’s presentation on its sustainability strategy:

“As we see more cyclone-related events . . . the vulnerability of one of these facilities to a cyclone is quite high,” he said. “So we built a model saying this is how we see this impacting what the economics would be and used that with our board of directors to rebuild the facility to be more durable to climate change.”

Mr Randolph said the decision was taken after cyclone Yasi hit further north in Queensland in February 2011. “If cyclone Yasi had hit Hay Point, we would have lost that facility,” he said. “So it is a recognition that as these cyclones become more severe, we need to have facilities that are more able to withstand them.”

Simply reinforcing a coal export facility with extra jetties to withstand an increase in extreme weather caused by carbon pollution from the coal that the company wants to continue exporting isn’t exactly a ringing endorsement for sustainability. But this plain-spoken admission that climate change is having a measurable impact now — without trying muddle the science — is very unique for a coal company.

“You couldn’t ask for a more surprising source for our basic message: coal causes climate change, climate changes creates more extreme weather, more extreme weather will force us to make huge new investments in trying to protect ourselves,” said Carl Pope, former executive director of the Sierra Club, in an email.

In his presentation, Randolph made another stunning comment about the need to address carbon pollution by clearly stating that there is an “absolute ceiling” on emissions that can be pumped into the atmosphere:

BHP’s internal target over the next four years is to maintain its greenhouse gas emissions below 2006 levels, adjusted for material acquisitions and divestments. Mr Randolph said the target would stay even if a future government repealed the carbon tax.

“If you look at the targets . . . there is not a qualifier saying it is okay to emit more greenhouse gases if the carbon tax is eliminated,” he said. “An absolute ceiling is an absolute ceiling. Even if there isn’t a carbon tax, it still needs to be an issue we devote a lot of attention to.”

Just one month before, Randolph — the chief executive of the company’s coal division — told the Australian Financial Review that he believes the market for coal is going to decline because of environmental constraints, and that “frankly it should”:

“In a carbon constrained world where energy coal is the biggest contributor to a carbon problem, how do you think this is going to evolve over a 30- to 40-year time horizon? You’d have to look at that and say on balance, I suspect, the usage of thermal coal is going to decline. And frankly it should.”

Mr Randolph said it was positive that investment was being made in examining clean coal technology but he had his doubts that would be enough to make coal a good choice for power generation in the longer term. He said the rapid rise in shale gas production in the United States, which this year lowered demand for thermal coal in that country, had caught the world by surprise.

“We’ve been cautious in our energy coal investments,” Mr Randolph said. “There are a couple of reasons for that: the cloudy future, the general return on investment that is available in the industry and there are some structural reasons why it is the way it is. And it is also the availability of better returns on other projects that exist in the broader [BHP] portfolio.”

In 2009, as a member of the American Council on Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE), BHP was swept up in a scandal around the U.S. climate bill then being considering in Congress. A lobbying firm that worked for ACCCE was caught sending fake letters to members of Congress asking them to vote against the bill. At that time, BHP was a prominent member of the coal lobby; however the company is no longer listed as a member on the coalition’s website.

So while one of the world’s largest mining companies makes these stunning admissions about the reality of coal’s contribution climate change, the U.S. coal lobby continues to smear the climate science, target state renewable energy targets, and organize fake campaigns to make it look like the industry has wide public support.

As Global CO2 Emissions Rise, Scientists Warn 2-Degree Target Is Nearly Out Of Reach: ‘We Need A Radical Plan’

Global carbon dioxide emissions are set to rise again this year, putting the world on a path toward dangerous climate change and making the internationally-accepted warming target of 2 degrees Celsius nearly “unachievable,” say researchers.

According to a new paper published yesterday in the journal Nature Climate Change, carbon dioxide emissions will rise by 2.6 percent this year, fueled by major increases in China and India. This follows a record year in 2011, when countries pumped 3.1 percent more global warming pollution into the atmosphere — making it very likely that the world will blow past the 2 degree C warming threshold that scientists and international negotiators agree is needed to avoid catastrophic consequences.

Some even call global warming of 2 degrees C, which is on the lowest end of projections, a “prescription for disaster.”

Here’s how one of the report’s authors characterized the problem when talking to The Guardian:

“I am worried that the risks of dangerous climate change are too high on our current emissions trajectory. We need a radical plan,” said co-author Corinne Le Quéré, director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research in Britain and professor at the University of East Anglia.

Current emissions growth is placing the world on a path to warm between 4C and 6C, says the study, with global emissions jumping 58% between 1990 and this year. The study focuses on emissions from burning fossil fuels and cement production.

“Unless large and concerted global mitigation efforts are initiated soon, the goal of remaining below 2C will soon become unachievable,” say the authors.

The findings come during the COP18 international climate talks in Doha, Qatar, where observers have low expectations for any agreements to reduce carbon emissions. The world’s two biggest emitters — China and the U.S. — are quietly setting up a framework for a possible international climate treaty after 2015. In the meantime, global warming pollution continues unabated and scientists warn that the window for action is closing fast.

“We are losing control of our ability to get a handle on the global warming problem,” said Canadian Climate Scientist Andrew Weaver, responding to the latest data on carbon emissions.

Last week, the World Bank issued a report sumarizing the latest climate science. It concluded that the world is on track for 4 degrees Celsius warming by the end of the century — an extremely dangerous rise in temperature that ensure “extreme heat-waves, declining global food stocks, loss of ecosystems and biodiversity, and life-threatening sea level rise.”