New Analyses on Clean Power Plan Examine State Compliance Options

The Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University
The Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University

Additional tools have been added to the resources intended to help states and regulators navigate compliance with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) proposed Clean Power Plan, for which the rule is projected to be finalized in August. As proposed last summer, the plan regulates carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants under the Clean Air Act, and gives states flexibility in how they can meet interim state-level emissions rate goals (2020–2030) and a final 2030 emissions rate limit. The American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, this week, released a plan detailing how energy efficiency financing can help states meet Clean Power Plan goals. And the National Association of Clean Air Agencies (NACAA) released a “menu of options” for states to weigh emissions reductions strategies.

Developed by former air and energy regulators at the Regulatory Assistance Project (RAP), the NACAA report considers the pros and cons of the 26 options it examines—including cap-and-trade systems, carbon dioxide taxes, electricity storage, smart grid applications and device-to-device communications—but does not rank them (subscription).

“We understand that each state has different needs and different interest and different politics and different experiences,” said Ken Colburn, a senior associate with RAP.

Another analysis by Duke University’s Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions finds that with the right policy choices, compliance with the Clean Power Plan can be cost-effective for states. It outlines tradeoffs of three policy options: using state-specific, rate-based emissions goals, as laid out in the proposed plan versus converting that rate into a mass-based standard; identifying how trading emissions credits within state borders or with other states affect the cost of compliance with the rule; and determining whether to include under the rule new natural gas combined cycle units that produce electricity and capture their waste heat to increase efficiency (subscription).

“Our analysis shows how important it can be for states to exercise the flexibility afforded to them under the proposed rule,” said Brian Murray, director of the Environmental Economics Program at the Nicholas Institute. “None of the compliance options analyzed raise power sector costs more than a few percent nationally, but these costs could be cut in half or more with a mass-based system and interstate trading of credits like we’ve already seen in some regions of the U.S.”

Meanwhile, a U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) analysis suggests that the proposed Clean Power Plan could put carbon dioxide emissions at about 1,500 million metric tons per year by 2025—roughly what they were in 1980. The EIA analysis points to a reduction in coal-fired generation and increase in natural gas-fired generation as the predominant compliance strategy as implementation begins; renewables play a bigger role starting in the mid-2020s, and demand-side energy efficiency plays a “moderate” role in compliance. The federal government’s energy statisticians find that the plan would raise electricity prices 4.9 percent above their current trajectory by 2020 (subscription).

Study: Roughly 5,500 Glaciers Could Disappear

Over the course of this century, Mount Everest could see major losses as the result of climate change, according to a new study in the journal The Cryosphere.

“The worst-case scenario shows 99 percent loss in glacial mass … but even if we start to slow down emissions somewhat, we may still see a 70 percent reduction,” said Joseph Shea, lead author with the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development in Nepal.

Researchers used previous measurements of glaciers in a region of the Himalayan mountain range that is home to Mount Everest as well as climate change scenarios based on emissions pathways used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change to analyze how glaciers have changed and may continue to change as future global temperatures rise. The authors notethat melt isn’t just the result of rising temperatures—there’s a trend of overall warming “raising the elevation of the freezing level, which has two secondary effects: the area exposed to melt will increase, and the amount of snow accumulation will decrease.”

EPA Issues New Air Pollution Rule

The EPA has issued a new regulation to reduce air pollution emissions during power plant startup, shutdown and malfunction (SSM)—emissions that may adversely affect the health of people in neighboring and downwind communities. The agency clarifies the SSM policy is consistent with the Clean Air Act and recent court decisions.

“The called-for changes to state plans will provide necessary environmental protection and will give industry and the public more certainty about requirements that apply during these periods,” the EPA said in a statement. The rule also directs 36 states to submit state implementation plans by November 2016.

The Climate Post offers a rundown of the week in climate and energy news. It is produced each Thursday by Duke University’s Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions.

States, Nations Announce Commitments Ahead of U.N. Climate Conference

The Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University
The Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University

Roughly six months before international leaders meet in Paris for a United Nations climate change conference, U.S. states and foreign nations are stepping forward with climate commitments. Canada, on Friday, pledged to cut its greenhouse gas emissions 30 percent below 2005 levels by 2030.

California is joining a climate agreement with eight foreign nations and four states that aims to keep the world’s average temperature from rising another 2 degrees Celsius. All signatories of the Under 2 MOU commit to either reduce greenhouse gas emissions 80 to 95 percent below 1990 levels by 2050 or achieve a per capita annual emissions target of less than 2 metric tons by 2050.

“This global challenge requires bold action on the part of governments everywhere,” said California Gov. Jerry Brown, who urged Under 2 MOU to serve as a template for Paris. “It’s time to be decisive. It’s time to act.”

The signatories of the non-binding agreement include: California; Vermont; Oregon; Washington; Wales, United Kingdom; Acre, Brazil; Baden-Württemberg, Germany; Baja California, Mexico; Catalonia, Spain; Jalisco, Mexico; British Columbia, Canada; and Ontario, Canada.

India and China—among the world’s largest emitters of greenhouse gases—also committed to working together in advance of Paris negotiations. Neither made formal commitments, indicating they would submit their official plans “as early as possible” and “well before” the December conference. In a statement, both urged “developed countries to raise their pre-2020 emission reduction targets and honor their commitment to provide $100 billion per year by 2020 to developing countries.”

Studies Examine Cause of Warming

A study published in Environmental Research Letters presents a 1958–2012 temperature and wind dataset of the upper troposphere (Earth’s atmosphere) as clear evidence of emissions-induced climate change.

“Using more recent data and better analysis methods we have been able to re-examine the global weather balloon network, known as radiosondes, and have found clear indications of warming in the upper troposphere,” said lead author and Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science Chief Investigator Steve Sherwood.

The study helps to answer questions about temperature variations throughout different parts of the atmosphere by developing a new method to account for natural variability, long-term trends, and instruments in the temperature measurement—revealing real temperature changes as opposed to artificial changes generated by alterations in data collection methods. It finds that tropospheric warming has continued as predicted and it confirms the expectation that as global warming progresses, the troposphere will warm faster than the Earth surface. In fact, tropospheric temperature is rising roughly 80 percent faster than Earth’s surface temperature (within the tropics region).

“Our data do not show any slowdown of tropical atmospheric warming since 1998/99, an interesting finding that deserves further scrutiny using other datasets,” said the study authors.

Another study, published Monday in Nature Geoscience, sheds yet more light on “missing” heat—or the failure of global surface temperatures to rise as quickly as expected since 1999. Scientists have accounted for the so-called global warming pause by suggesting that there’s been a transfer of heat from the tropical Pacific into the Indian Ocean. It turns out that heat in the Pacific moved with an ocean current strengthened by unusually high trade winds into the Indian Ocean, which is now home to 70 percent of all heat taken up by global oceans during the past decade.

“This is a really important study as it resolves how Pacific Ocean variability has led to the warming slowdown without storing excess ocean heat locally,” said Matthew England, a professor at the University of New South Wales. “This resolves a long-standing debate about how the Pacific has led to a warming slowdown when total heat content in that basin has not changed significantly.”

Others suggest the story is more complex (subscription). Real-world measurements of ocean heat content obtained through the Argo program—which measures temperature and salinity through free-drifting floats—suggest that some of the missing ocean heat might be present at depths between 700 and 1,400 meters, in a region of the ocean south of the 30th parallel; the study authors focused on the Indian Ocean north of the 34th parallel and used climate models to validate observations.

Obama: Climate Change Endangers National Security

The warming planet poses an immediate risk to the United States and urgent action is needed to combat climate change as a national security imperative, President Obama told the U.S. Coast Guard Academy during a commencement address.

“Here at the academy, climate change—understanding the science and the consequences—is part of the curriculum, and rightly so, because it will affect everything you do in your careers,” said Obama. “As America’s maritime guardian, you’ve pledged to remain always … ready for all threats, and climate change is one of those most severe threats. And so we need to act, and we must act now … anything less is negligence. It is a dereliction of duty.”

He noted that droughts and other conditions will pose new challenges for military bases and training areas, that rising oceans will threaten the U.S. economy, and that an increase in natural disasters will result in humanitarian crises.

The U.S. committed to reducing carbon emissions 28 percent by 2025—and Obama is expected to travel to Paris in December to explore whether a global climate treaty to reduce greenhouse gases can be reached.

The Climate Post offers a rundown of the week in climate and energy news. It is produced each Thursday by Duke University’s Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions.

Organizations Develop Tools to Help States Comply with EPA’s Clean Power Plan

The Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University
The Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University

The same week Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W. Va.) introduced a new bill pushing back on implementation of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) proposed Clean Power Plan, organizations released tools to help states and regulators navigate compliance with the resulting rule, set to be finalized this summer.

The rule uses an infrequently exercised provision of the Clean Air Act to set state-specific reduction targets for carbon dioxide and to allow states to devise individual or joint plans to meet those targets. One tool—the Multistate Coordination Resources for Clean Power Plan Compliance—developed by the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners and the Eastern Interconnection States Planning Council looks to build on the flexibility the proposed rule gives states to meet their interim and final emissions reduction goals. The document is aimed at helping states overcome institutional barriers to coordination of rule compliance efforts (subscription). The guide includes a multistate planning checklist, a legislative language examples checklist and a sample memorandum of understanding for multistate coordination.

“A range of interactions is possible, from simple awareness of each others’ plans to the transfer of emissions reductions between states that have individual-state plans and targets (not a multi-state plan to meet a joint target) when states have ‘common elements’ in their compliance plan,” the guide notes.

The common elements concept was developed at Duke University’s Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions and is an idea I spoke about last month at the Navigating American Carbon World conference in California. In a nutshell, power plant owners can transfer low-cost emissions reductions between states whose compliance plans share common elements—credits defined in the same way and mechanisms to protect against double counting. This approach builds on existing state and federal trading programs while maintaining the traditional roles of state energy and environmental regulators.

Still another tool—a calculator—arms state air quality agencies with the data to estimate carbon emissions savings from state adoption and enforcement of stringent building energy codes in state compliance plans under the proposed EPA rule.

“Because energy savings from stronger building energy codes put thousands in the wallets of home and commercial building owners, and improve building quality, comfort, and resale value, state officials should be adopting them simply to benefit their residents,” said William Fay, executive director of the Energy Efficient Codes Coalition. “But because buildings use 71 percent of America’s electricity, 54 percent of our natural gas, and 42 percent of all energy, improving their efficiency has profound potential benefits to national energy policy as well.”

Oil Drilling Conditionally Approved in Artic Waters

Shell is once again set to take up oil drilling in American Arctic waters after winning approval from the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), which said it had accepted the company’s plan to drill up to six wells in the Chukchi Sea after concluding that the operations “would not cause any significant impacts” to the environment, residents, or animals. As part of the conditional approval, Shell must first obtain permits from the federal government and the state of Alaska.

Seasonal conditions in the Arctic mean that drilling can typically occur only over a four-month period, but a reduction of the ice due to climate change could ignite Arctic drilling aspirations. For many in industry, the news was welcome.

“The Chukchi Sea is widely seen as one of the last great unexplored conventional oil basins,” said Alison Wolters, an analyst with Wood MacKenzie’s Alaska and Gulf of Mexico programs. “A positive discovery this season would encourage the other operators to reconsider the region.”

Announcement of the news spurred environmental groups to express concern about Shell’s mishap-filled 2012 Arctic drilling season and about new operations in the harsh region, which has little capacity for emergency response but in which federal scientists believe some 15 million barrels of oil may be held.

On the heels of the BOEM’s greenlighting of renewed oil drilling in the Arctic, Christiana Figueres, who leads the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, noted that achieving net-zero emissions by 2100 means that many oil and gas reserves must remain untapped (subscription).

“We have absolutely no opinion about what governments do with companies that operate within their geographic boundaries,” she said. “But there is an increasing amount of analysis that points to the fact that we will have to keep the great majority of fossil fuels underground.”

Report: Oil Price Drop Could Hurt Global Economy

A new report from the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate finds that the recent drop in oil and natural gas prices—although providing temporary relief for consumers—may compel governments to authorize projects that use expensive carbon-intensive fuels. In fact, the Oil Prices and the New Climate Economy report suggests that governments should take advantage of low prices to reduce dependency and reform fossil fuel subsidies (subscription).

“For years, we’ve had a market failure by not taxing carbon and air pollution nearly enough,” said Lord Stern, co-author and a prominent climate economist. “That is subsidizing hydrocarbons in my book. When oil prices fall, it is a wise time to change it and that will also help protect us against energy price volatility in the future.”

The report notes that renewable energy sources—including solar and wind—have little to no operating cost after installation and suggests their use can lock in the cost of energy for two or more decades.

The Climate Post offers a rundown of the week in climate and energy news. It is produced each Thursday by Duke University’s Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions.

States Challenge Clean Power Plan, Report Finds Health Benefits

The Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University
The Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University

Attorneys for two-energy producing states spoke on the legal implications of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Power Plan—which aims to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from existing fossil fuel–fired power plants 30 percent below 2005 levels by 2030—at a Senate Environment and Public Works Subcommittee this week. West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, whose state is involved in lawsuits filed against the proposed rule, argued that it is illegal and would cause a loss in jobs and raise electricity rates.

“The proposed rule is actually causing real, tangible harm in the states, and also it’s affecting power plant operations currently,” said Morrisey. “If you go and look at our litigation, we have at least eight declarations from very experienced environmental regulators who talk about the cost of trying to comply with this rule. The other point that I would raise is that the time frames associated with this proposal are hyper-aggressive.”

The rule—set to be finalized this summer—uses an infrequently exercised provision of the Clean Air Act to set state-specific reduction targets for carbon dioxide and to allow states to devise individual or joint plans to meet those targets. It gives states flexibility to decide how to meet their interim and final emissions reduction goals. The goals were set by assessing the ability of states to use four “building blocks”—such as expanding renewable energy generation and creating energy efficiency programs—to meet their emissions reduction goals.

At the same time, a new study in the journal Nature Climate Change finds that the Clean Power Plan would reduce the number of premature deaths in the United States by roughly 3,500 per year. The study modeled three scenarios for reducing carbon emissions. The one that most closely resembled the proposed rule delivered the largest health benefits.

“The general narrative is addressing climate change will be costly, and the benefits will now accrue for generations,” said Dallas Burtraw, study co-author and senior fellow at Resources for the Future. “We take a look at this and see there are important benefits and changes in air quality that accrue in the present and close to home.” He notes that shifts from coal-fired power toward sources such as natural gas, wind and solar would produce health benefits in a “matter of days to weeks.”

Carbon Plans: Are they Enough?

With half a year before countries meet in Paris to work toward a binding global climate agreement, new analysis from the Economic & Social Research Council’s Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment and the Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy finds that pledges to date are insufficient to keep the planet from warming no more than two degrees Celsius (C) over pre-industrial levels. Current commitments would bring the current trajectory of 70 gigatons of annual carbon dioxide emissions to 55–57 gigatons. That’s still higher than the annual 40–42 gigatons by 2030 goal to hit the 2 degree C target.

“We think that it is important to offer preliminary analysis of how the pledges and announcements by some of the biggest emitters, together with assumptions about current and planned policies by other countries, compare against pathways for staying within the global warming limit of 2C,” the paper notes. “This allows us to confirm that there is a gap between the emissions pathway that would result from current ambitions and plans, and a pathway consistent with the global warming limit 2C. Consequently, countries should be considering opportunities to narrow the gap before and after the Paris summit.”

The paper makes several suggestions to alter this path, including finding credible ways of achieving bigger emissions reductions, creating a mechanism that can be included in any agreement that emerges from Paris for countries to review and ramp up reductions by 2030 and beyond and intensifying efforts to increase investment and innovation.

It comes on the heels of news that March broke a new carbon dioxide record—concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere reached 400 parts per million (ppm) for an entire month at 39 sites around the world. The measure is an indicator of the amount of planet-warming gases man is putting into the atmosphere, and comes nearly three decades after what is considered the “safe” level of 350ppm was passed.

“We first reported 400 ppm when all of our Arctic sites reached that value in the spring of 2012,” said Pieter Tans, lead scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Global Greenhouse Gas Reference Network. “In 2013, the record at NOAA’s Mauna Loa Observatory first crossed the 400 ppm threshold. Reaching 400 parts per million as a global average is a significant milestone.”

Study Comes to “Sobering” Conclusion on Biodiversity Loss

If world carbon emissions continue to rise on their current trajectory, one in six species will be gone or on the road to extinction by century’s end, according to a study published in Science magazine.

“It’s a sobering result,” said University of Connecticut ecologist Mark Urban of his examination of 131 peer-reviewed studies to identify the level of risk that climate change poses to species and the specific traits and characteristics that contribute to risk. The most comprehensive look yet at the effect of climate change on biodiversity, the study finds that the rate of biodiversity loss will accelerate with each degree Celsius (1.8 degrees Fahrenheit) the planet warms.

Previous studies had provided widely ranging region- or taxon-specific estimates of biodiversity loss with climate change, making the seriousness of the problem hard to assess. According to Urban’s meta-analysis of these studies, global extinction risks increase from 2.8 percent at present to 5.2 percent at the international policy target of a 2 degree Celsius (C) post-industrial temperature rise; if Earth warms 3 degrees C, the extinction risk increases to 8.5 percent—and to 16 percent at the 4.3 degrees C rise projected for the current emissions trajectory.

With that in mind, he said that his findings should inform the Paris climate summit and that they showed the importance of cutting greenhouse gas emissions now rather than waiting for evidence of warming-related species loss “to become identifiable beyond the background noise of ‘natural’ extinctions,” reported the Guardian.

Commenting on the study, Stuart Pimm, a conservation ecologist at Duke University, said, “We’re not going to go extinct” in the face of climate change and its impact on biodiversity, but he noted that major changes in biodiversity can alter the quality of life. “The question is: What kind of life will we have?”

The Climate Post offers a rundown of the week in climate and energy news. It is produced each Thursday by Duke University’s Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions.