2002

“Clean Power Act” Up for Senate Committee Vote

by William Yeatman on June 25, 2002

in Politics

The U.S. Senates Environment and Public Works Committee is scheduled to mark up and vote June 27 on the Clean Power Act (S. 556) proposed by its chairman, Senator James Jeffords (I-Vt.). If enacted, the Kyoto-style policies in the most recent version of the bill would have serious adverse impacts on the reliability and affordability of the nations electricity supply.

The bill would be very costly according to estimates by the U.S. Energy Information Administration. The caps on emissions of sulfur dioxide, nitrous oxides, mercury and carbon dioxide would increase residential energy costs by 17 percent and household energy costs by 25 percent by 2010. By 2020, the cumulative cost of S. 556 to energy producers would rise to $177 billion, and eliminate 48 percent of coal-fired electricity production. It would also reduce real GDP by $100 billion the year the caps go into effect.

The full economic impacts are actually much worse, because EIA did not analyze all of the bill’s onerous restrictions, including some Chairman Jeffords added in recent weeks. For example, a provision in the most recent version lowers the specified emission caps by the number of tons collectively emitted by small producers (less than 15 megawatts capacity).

The bill requires coal-fired power plants 40 years and older to install the latest pollution control technology to reduce sulfur dioxide and nitrous oxide emissions. Edison Electric Institute argues that this requirement would affect 74 percent of coal-fired capacity by 2013 and 83 percent by 2018. This could be virtual death sentence for large portions of U.S. generating capacity. Indeed, a similar rule in California is forcing the retirement of 1,400 megawatts of generating capacity, a loss the state can ill-afford.

The higher electricity prices resulting from S. 556 would fall most heavily on poor people and retirees on fixed incomes. At a hearing on the bill earlier this month, J. Thomas Mullen, president of Catholic Charities Health and Human Services in Cleveland, testified that the bill would literally force retirees or working mothers to have to decide between eating and heating. “These are not choices any senior citizen, child, or for that matter, person in America should make,” said Mullen.

In the latest re-write, Jeffords attempts to deflect that argument by awarding 64 percent of the tradable emission allowances to “trustees” who will provide assistance to the affected households. The idea is that utilities would have to buy the allowances from residential electricity consumers, thereby offsetting the adverse affects on consumers.

But this is just smoke and mirrors according to Marlo Lewis, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. “Where, after all, does Senator Jeffords think utilities are going to get the money to buy emission credits from consumers after spending billions on technology controls and conversions from coal to natural gas?” he asks. “From their consumers, of course.”

What Constitutes “Dangerous Anthropogenic Interference?”; ENSO Not Linked to Global Warming

by William Yeatman on June 25, 2002

in Science

What Constitutes “Dangerous Anthropogenic Interference?”

The stated goal of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change it to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations at levels that avoid dangerous anthropogenic interference with the atmosphere. As President George W. Bush has rightly pointed out, the Kyoto targets “were arbitrary and not based upon science” and “no one can say with any certainty what constitutes a dangerous level of warming, and therefore what level must be avoided.”

Brian C. ONeill at the Watson Institute for International Studies and the Center for Environmental Studies at Brown University and Michael Oppenheimer at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs and the Department of Geosciences, Princeton University, attempt to answer that question in a Policy Forum paper in the June 14 issue of Science.

The authors admit that this is a difficult task that must “ultimately involve a mixture of scientific, economic, political, ethical, and cultural considerations, among others. In addition, the links among emissions, greenhouse gas concentrations, climate change, and impacts are uncertain. Furthermore, what might be considered dangerous could change over time.”

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has identified two criteria for defining “dangerous” interference: “warming involving risk to unique and threatened systems and warming engendering a risk of large-scale discontinuities in the climate system.”

The authors offer three risks which would fall under these criteria, (1) “Large-scale eradication of coral reef systems,” (2) the “disintegration of the Western Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS),” and (3) “the weakening or shutdown of the density-driven, large scale circulation of the oceans (thermohaline circulation or THC).”

To prevent severe damage to reef systems, the authors recommend a long-term target of one degree C above 1990 global temperatures. To protect the WAIS would require a limit of two degrees C above 1990 temperatures. And to stop the shutdown of the THC would require a limit of three degrees C warming over the next 100 years.

None of these cases is particularly convincing, however. As noted in a critique of this study by The Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change (www.co2science.org), the evidence shows that coral reefs have been shown to be very resilient in the face of temperature change. Coral reefs have survived several past interglacial periods that experienced warmer temperatures than now. For example, the most recent interglacial was a full three degrees C warmer than the current interglacial, yet coral reefs survived.

Recent studies have cast serious doubt on the likelihood of a collapse of the WAIS or the shutdown of the THC. A June 19 study in Science found that the WAIS is actually thickening. A January 31 study in Nature found that the Antarctic has been cooling since 1966. And another study in the February 21 issue of Nature found that the palaeoclimate data show that abrupt changes to the THC are not characteristic of the current interglacial, but are characteristic of the latest glaciation. In other words, it is unlikely that global warming will cause the THC to shut down.

ENSO Not Linked to Global Warming

With El Nio returning to the southern Pacific, it wont be long before we begin hearing about the ill effects of global warming and its possible link to this large-scale natural weather phenomenon. A study in the February 2002 issue of Paleoceanography shows that there is no connection between global warming and the frequency or strength of El Nio.

Using palaeoclimate data, the researchers reconstructed a record of El Nio activity, the latter 400 years of the record being the most reliable. The data show that El Nio activity “was more frequent after 1980, lower in the 1940-1975 epoch, and again more frequent around the beginning of the 1900s.”  It also showed that “the 1860-1880 period was relatively quiescent,” while “the 1820-1860 period was also a period of relatively vigorous ENSO [El Nio Southern Oscillation] activity.”  Indeed, the 1820-1860 period was “similar to [that] observed in the past two decades.”

The study concludes, “As these observations extend at least into the preindustrial period, attribution of the unusually ENSO-rich past few decades may lie in part with natural variability.” This is a bit of an understatement given the evidence. It looks like El Nio activity is likely due entirely to natural variability.

Lomborg Speaks About Global Warming

by William Yeatman on June 22, 2002

in Kyoto Negotiations, Politics, Science

At a briefing in Capital Hill on October 5 Danish statistician Bjorn Lomborg, once a member of Greenpeace, argued that predictions of the world heading for ruin are wrong. In 1997 he set out to challenge acclaimed economist Julian Simon who refuted environmentalist claims that the world was running out of resources. Lomborg discovered that the data on a whole supported Simon. “The Skeptical Environmentalist,” Lomborg’s new book is a composite of graphs, charts and statistics that factually show the earth’s environment is steadily improving.

His book asserts among other things that the global warming issue is overblown. In short he attests, “Things are getting better.” In his presentation, Lomborg said that global warming is a real issue, but suggested that the prime danger is the Kyoto Treaty, which he cites as a grand waste of money. He said, “Essentially Kyoto will do very little to change global warming. On the other hand Kyoto will be very expensive. It will cost anywhere from $150-350 billion a year, and that’s a lot of money when compared to the total global aid of $50 billion a year. Basically, just for one year of Kyoto, we could give clean drinking water and sanitation to every person on earth. This would avoid 2 million deaths a year, and assist half a billion people from not getting seriously ill each year.”

Environmentalists tend to be ecologically pessimistic about the future. Veterans of the environmental movement such as Paul Ehrlich of Stanford University and Lester Brown of the Worldwatch Institute have formed a litany of fears. These fears include depletion of natural resources, ever-growing population, extinction of species and pollution of the planet’s air and water. However, Lomborg’s approach is decidedly different. He says, “We must remove our myths about an imminent doomsday and remember we do not have to act in total desperation. Essential information is necessary to making the best possible decisions. Statistics tell you how the world is. Resources have become even more abundant and things are likely to progress in the future.”

The briefing was sponsored by the Cooler Heads Coalition, made up of 23 non-profit organizations that work on global warming issues.

U. S. Out of Kyoto For a Decade At Least; California Assembly Delays CO2 Vote; Canada Finding Reasons Not to Ratify; Campaign E

by William Yeatman on May 17, 2002

in Politics

U. S. Out of Kyoto For a Decade At Least

There is no chance that the United States will get back into the Kyoto Protocol before 2012, according to Dr. Harlan Watson, the U. S. State Departments senior climate negotiator. The Times of London (May 14, 2002) reported comments made by Watson while in London for talks with British officials.

“We have set 2012 as the date to take stock and if theres going to be a review of policy that is the time to do it,” he said. “We are not going to be part of the Kyoto Protocol for the foreseeable future and the 2005 review is not something we intend on being actively engaged in.”

When asked if that means that U.S. ratification of the Kyoto Protocol has been ruled out for the next decade, Watson responded, “That is correct that there is no chance before 2012. In order for any treaty to be ratified, it needs 67 votes in the Senate, and Kyoto is thus an unratifiable treaty. Theres no way that the U.S. could participate, even if the President sent it up again.” This remains true in Watsons judgment even if a Democrat were elected president in 2004 or 2008.

On a related note, Undersecretary of State Paula Dobriansky responded on May 15 to an April 8 letter from Christopher Horner, the Cooler Heads Coalitions counsel. Horners letter laid out the case for the U. S. government to remove its signature from the Kyoto Protocol. Dobriansky responded that, “President Bush and this administration have made clear on numerous occasions that the Kyoto Protocol is fatally flawed and that the United States will not participate in it.” She did not address the inconsistency between un-signing the Rome treaty creating the International Criminal Court and keeping the U. S. signature on Kyoto.

California Assembly Delays CO2 Vote

The California Assembly has postponed a vote on a bill that would regulate greenhouse gas emissions from automobiles. The bill, AB 1058, would require the California Air Resources Board (CARB) to formulate rules to achieve the “maximum feasible and cost-effective” emissions reductions. If passed into law, the bill would go into effect in 2006 and apply to the 2009 model year.

The Assembly originally passed AB 1058 earlier this year, but must now approve minor Senate changes before it can be sent to Governor Davis. The reported reason the vote has been postponed is that bill supporters arent certain that they have the votes (Greenwire, May 15, 2002). In the last few weeks, the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers has mounted a large-scale campaign against the measure, including radio and newspaper advertising. The United Auto Workers union has now also come out strongly against it.

According to the San Jose Mercury News (May 14, 2002), Assemblyman Joe Canciamilla (D) originally voted for the bill out of courtesy to its sponsor, Assemblywoman Fran Pavley (D), but is now having second thoughts. He fears that the bill would give CARB too much power. “There is a certain amount of disagreement as to the science and what we can do,” Canciamilla said. “I am wondering now if [the bill] is something that makes sense.”

Canada Finding Reasons Not to Ratify

The Canadian government has just released “A Discussion Paper on Canadas Contribution to Addressing Climate Change.” The paper first sets out the problem: “Business-as-usual projections would see Canadas GHG emissions rise to approximately 809 MT [megatons] by 2010. Canadas Kyoto target is 571 MT by 2010, creating a “gap” of about 240 MT that must be addressed.”

The cost of meeting that target, according to the discussion paper, would be between zero and two percent of GDP by 2010. Instead of growing 31 percent by 2010, GDP would only grow by 29 percent at worst. “The AMG [Analysis and Modelling Group] estimates indicate that, unless policies are well designed, the impact could be uneven across provinces and territories. This is particularly true for the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Newfoundland.”

The paper offers several options for meeting Canadas Kyoto target, such as a domestic emissions trading program, more specific measures targeted at consumers or particular sectors of the economy, or government purchases of international permits.

Campaign ExxonMobil Warns of “Tobacco Suits”

A new report released by Campaign ExxonMobil, the group responsible for bringing shareholder resolutions to harass the company for its position on global warming, says that the company is risking shareholder value by opposing global warming regulation. ExxonMobil called the analysis “ridiculous.”

The most interesting part of the report is a side bar which threatens that ExxonMobil and other corporations that do not get behind efforts to ration energy will find themselves being hauled into court. “It is highly likely that serious damage will occur as a result of climate change,” says the report. “The aggrieved parties are likely to seek compensation from those who (sic) they regard as responsible.”

The report continues, “While ExxonMobil is no stranger to billion dollar lawsuits, climate change actions could swamp even those seen in the tobacco industry. The potential value at risk here could easily exceed $100 billion, especially as annual losses from climate change could significantly exceed that figure.

“Even if ExxonMobil escapes liability, it could be dragged into interminable lawsuits, at considerable expense and loss of management time. One estimate is that Philip Morris spent as much as $700 million on lawyers in the 1990s.” The report, by Mark Mansley, head of Claros Consulting, can be downloaded at www.campaignexxonmobil.org.

Greenpeace released another attack on ExxonMobil just in time for the international week of protest against the oil giant, which culminates on May 18 with boycotts and demonstrations at Esso stations throughout Britain. Denial and Deception: A Chronicle of ExxonMobils Efforts to Corrupt the Debate on Global Warming may be downloaded at http://www.greenpeaceusa.org/climate/pdfs/exxon_denial.pdf.

The Greenpeace “report” contains some astonishing claims, of which we quote only one: “It was recently reported that Exxon and Mobil spent approximately $1 billion financing the GCC [Global Climate Coalition], though accurate figures may never be known.” A footnote cites an article in the April 5 Guardian newspaper by environment correspondent Paul Brown. Browns article offers no source or evidence for the figure and refers to the GCC as the Climate Change Convention.

IPCC to Study Regional Impacts; Urban Heat Island Effects in Australia

by William Yeatman on May 17, 2002

in Science

IPCC to Study Regional Impacts

The new Chairman of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Rajendra Pachauri, who is currently working to set the agenda for the panels fourth assessment report (FAR), said that the IPCC will “place more emphasis on regional assessments of climate change, and on its socio-economic impact,” according to the May 9 issue of Nature.

As an example of the kind of work the IPCC needs to do, Pachauri pointed out the melting ice on the Himalayas. “Five hundred million people depend on these glaciers for their water supply,” he said. “What kind of response do we have? To take an extreme example, we could move highly water-intensive industry out of that region. If you have 20 or 30 years to do that you are not going to cause major disruption.”

Pachauri is aiming at having the FAR finished in time to influence negotiations scheduled to begin in 2005 to set new greenhouse gas emission targets for 2013 and beyond. The report may have an assessment of the state of greenhouse reduction technology and carbon sequestration.

According to Nature, Pachauri is also “launching a $500,000 feasibility study on an advisory mechanism to inform governments and international bodies on the scientific issues facing global agriculture, including the implications of genetically modified crops.”

The focus on regional impacts is likely to be highly controversial. Due to lack of computing power, computer models have difficulty dealing with regional scale climate variables. The IPCCs own Third Assessment Report included an entire chapter in its science report assessing the regional climate information from climate models. It concludes that a “coherent picture of regional climate change via available regionalization techniques cannot yet be drawn (Climate Change 2001: The Scientific Basis pg. 623).”

Urban Heat Island Effects in Australia

A study appearing in the Australian Meteorological Magazine (50: 2001) found that even very small towns can exhibit detectable urban heat islands. The studys authors studied the urban heat island effects of several Australian cities with populations from 1,000 to 3,000,000 people.

The authors noted that the heat islands of Australian cities tended to be smaller and to increase at a slower rate with population than similarly sized cities in Europe and North America. As noted by CO2 Science Magazine (www.co2science.com), “The regression lines of all three continents essentially converged in the vicinity of a population of 1,000 people, however, where the mean urban-rural temperature difference was approximately 2.2 0.2 degrees C.”

In other words small towns are likely to have urban heat islands that raise temperature about the same amount as the amount of global warming since the Little Ice Age. According to CO2 Science, “With such small aggregations of people having such a dramatic impact on air temperature, it is ludicrous to believe that on top of the natural warming experienced by the earth in recovering from the Little Ice Age we can confidently discern an even more subtle increase in background temperature caused by concomitant increases in greenhouse gas concentrations.”

Rethinking Kyoto

by William Yeatman on May 14, 2002

in Blog

Rethinking Kyoto

An article in Foreign Affairs (May/June 2002) by Thomas C. Schelling, Distinguished Professor of Economics and Public Affairs at the University of Maryland, argues that it is time to rethink the Kyoto Protocol.

When President Bush rejected Kyoto, he did so for three reasons, according to Schelling. First, the developing countries have made it clear that they have no intention of participating in Kyoto. Second, there are still large uncertainties in the science and extent of the impacts. Third, he has expressed a preference for voluntary measures over mandatory regulation.

Schelling argues that the developing countries have the most to lose from global warming due to their higher dependence on agriculture. “Constrained by poverty and technological backwardness, their ability to adapt to climate change is limited,” writes Schelling. “The best way for developing countries to mitigate global warming, therefore, is through economic growth.” Calling on developing countries to participate is a waste of time.

Regarding the scientific uncertainties, Schelling writes that “what is least uncertain is that climate change is real and likely to be serious.” Here, Schelling merely takes the IPCCs Summary for Policymakers at face value. More importantly, “A huge uncertainty that will make any lasting regime impossible for many decades to come, however, is how much carbon dioxide can safely be emitted over the coming century.”

Schelling concludes that the weakness of Kyoto is its focus on the short term. “But any reasonable trajectory of emissions in the future ought to show a rise for some decades and a rapid decline later in the century.” There are several reasons for this according to Schelling. For one, the technology needed to reduce fossil-fuel consumption significantly is not yet developed. And prematurely scrapping equipment already in use is expensive and wasteful.

Emissions trading is unworkable in practice, according to Schelling. “The problem with the trading regimes is that initial quotas are negotiated to reflect what each nation can reasonably be expected to reduce. Any country that is tempted to sell part of an emissions quota will realize that the regime is continually subject to renegotiation, so selling any excess is tantamount to admitting it got a generous allotment the last time around. It then sets itself up for stiffer negotiation next time.”

Schelling further ridicules the Kyoto plan to let Russia sell its hot air as nothing more than a bribe masquerading as an emissions-trading scheme. “The purpose is to bribe the recipient into ratifying a treaty and providing governments a cheap way to buy out of emissions commitments, with the pretense that it serves to reduce emissions in accordance with the principle of competitive advantage.”

Instead of Kyoto, Schelling recommends a system similar to NATO where countries share burdens and contribute resources voluntarily. He also recommends that the way to deal with developing countries is through financial contributions to help them reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Taxes, Taxes Everywhere; Cap-and-Trade Follies; Aussie Power Bills to Include Individual Emissions

by William Yeatman on April 30, 2002

in Blog

Taxes, Taxes Everywhere

The New Zealand government has approved a new energy tax to help control greenhouse gas emissions. The tax on vehicle fuel, electricity and natural gas will cost households an average $2.25 per week starting in 2007. The tax will also raise business energy costs by nine percent. New Zealand is expected to ratify the Kyoto Protocol in August.

Several sectors of the economy have been made exempt from the tax, however. High-energy-using export industries will be exempt, but in return for the exemption they will have to take measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The farm sector is also exempt from paying taxes on all agriculture-related emissions, but will be required to invest $6.7 million per year to research methods for reducing agricultural greenhouse gas emissions.

New Zealand business groups have argued that the governments plan would hurt the economy. “The risk for New Zealand is that we will achieve neither the intended climate change outcomes nor encourage others. Its more likely that our economic, trading and export competitiveness will be damaged,” said Simon Carlaw, Business New Zealand Inc.s chief executive (Reuters, April 30, 2002).

Canada is also considering a gasoline tax. It was reported in the National Post on April 19 that the federal government was considering a tax of 10 Canadian cents per liter, but the rate was denied by Canadas Environment Minister David Anderson. He did say, however, that a gas tax is an option (Reuters, April 26, 2002).

Energy taxes in Germany have raised household energy bills by seven percent over the last year. However, energy bills are still lower than they were before Germany liberalized its energy markets (Reuters, April 30, 2002).

In London, the Royal Society has announced that it will look into what further measures are necessary in order for Britain to meet its Kyoto Protocol commitments. A new carbon tax on top of the Climate Change Levy appears to be at the top of the list of likely recommendations (Reuters, April 29, 2002).

Domingo Jimenez-Beltran, the head of the European Environment Agency, told Reuters in an interview published on April 18 that the world needs a global tax on fossil fuels. “Unless you get some global taxation, it will be impossible to tackle the effects of globalization,” Jimenez-Beltran said.

Earlier, Cooler Heads (April 17, 2002) reported that the European Union is planning an EU-wide tax on aviation fuel.

Cap-and-Trade Follies

In a guest commentary for Electricity Daily (April 29, 2002), David Wojick points out some of the serious flaws behind the assumptions underlying cap-and-trade schemes to reduce emissions.

Wojick points out that “emissions allowances” are nothing more than ration coupons that can be bought and sold. The idea of cap-and-trade systems is that all else being equal, “firms with high compliance costs can buy allowances from those with lower costs. If the price is set by the cost of compliance, another big if, the total compliance cost for all firms will be lower than if every firm has to go it alone.”

The assumptions underlying this claim, however, “ignore the complexities of market dynamics in general, and the structure of technology in particular,” said Wojick. The simple equilibrium models used to simulate how a cap-and-trade system might work assume a marginal cost of compliance curve for each facility and add an allowance allocation mechanism. The market clearing price is then calculated and voila, everybody is in compliance at a lower cost.

“But at the facility level,” says Wojick, “the system is hugely lumpy. Existing power plants, plus any new ones, are very large, so emission control systems are also very large, both in cost and in the time it takes to build them. In extreme cases, an emission control system may cost a third as much as the plant itself, and take five years to design, buy, and build. In many cases, there is only one technology option, as far as cost and time are concerned. One either builds or does not.” There is no marginal cost curve for a given facility.

Such a system cannot be optimized even with perfect information, an assumption that makes the models workable, but does not apply in the real world. Limited information about others intentions and future changes in power demand make it impossible for firms to make rational business decisions. “The economic system described above,” says Wojick, “is likely to resemble a commodity system, because both are driven by lumpiness, lack of information, and unpredictability. The dynamics of such systems are shortage glut shortage glut, or glut first, not equilibrium.”

Aussie Power Bills to Include Individual Emissions

In hopes of convincing the households and businesses of Victoria, Australia to change their energy consumption habits, the state government has announced that it will now list individual greenhouse gas emissions on consumers electricity bills. By linking global warming to electricity use, the state believes that it can convince consumers to reduce energy use and switch to renewable energy sources.

According to Victorias Energy and Resources Minister Candy Broad, “Victoria has a large generation from brown coal which makes our electricity very greenhouse-intensive, and thats a very good reason to include this information on the bill to remind people of how they contribute to the states emissions.”

Senate Passes “Energy” Bill Loaded with Global Warming Policies; Vehicle Emissions Bill Passes California Senate Committee; EU H

by William Yeatman on April 30, 2002

in Politics

Senate Passes “Energy” Bill Loaded with Global Warming Policies

On April 25, the Senate overwhelmingly passed comprehensive energy legislation by a vote of 88-11. Ironically, neither Senate Republicans nor Democrats seemed pleased by the end product.

The Senate bill (formerly S. 1766, then S. 517, and finally passed as H. R. 4) has little in common with either the energy bill the House passed last August or the Bush administrations energy plan released in May 2001. Instead of provisions designed to rebuild Americas energy infrastructure and provide more secure and abundant supplies of energy, the key parts of the Senate bill would raise energy prices for consumers and create countless new government programs, offices, agencies, and reports.

Many key parts of global warming bills introduced in the Senate during this Congress are included. Title XI, which in Majority Leader Tom Daschles (D-S.D.) original version provided for a mandatory registry of greenhouse gas emissions, was replaced with a complex amendment offered by Senators Jon Corzine (D-N.J.) and Sam Brownback (R-Ks.). Their amendment was accepted after an attempt led by Senators Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) and George Voinovich (R-Ohio) to replace the mandatory registry with a voluntary one was withdrawn because it lacked majority support.

The Brownback-Corzine amendment creates a registry of emissions that would be voluntary in name only. Unless 60% of total U.S. GHG emissions are reported within five years, the registry would automatically become mandatory, although farms and feedlots would be exempt. The amendment would require the reporting of indirect as well as direct emissions, which means that automakers, soda bottlers, and brewers are likely to be forced to report emissions from their products.

Among numerous other global warming provisions, the bill re-directs the efforts of the U.S. Global Change Research Program and makes it a part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and includes “sense of the Senate” language that supersedes the Senates 1997 Byrd-Hagel resolution.

The Senate-passed version also includes a renewable portfolio standard that requires that ten percent of electricity produced by utilities be generated from non-hydro renewable sources by 2019. Another provision designed to raise energy prices an expanded ethanol mandate that will triple the amount of ethanol required in gasoline by 2012 survived repeated attempts by Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), and Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) to remove or weaken it.

The Senate and House versions of H.R. 4 now go to a conference committee, which will try to produce a compromise bill acceptable to both chambers.

Eileen Claussen, executive director of the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, a front group for corporations that hope to profit from energy rationing, was elated over the climate provisions in the bill. “This is more activity than we’ve seen on climate change in the Congress, I think, ever, which is a very positive sign,” she said (Los Angeles Times, April 26, 2002).

Vehicle Emissions Bill Passes California Senate Committee

A California Senate Committee has approved, by a vote of 8-3, AB1058, a bill to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from California automobiles. The measure has already passed the California Assembly, and will be voted on by the full Senate as early as next week.

“The bill,” according to Reuters (May 1, 2002), “would require the states Air Resources Board to adopt regulations that would achieve the maximum feasible reduction in emissions of greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, emitted by cars and light-duty trucks, the category that includes sport utility vehicles.” The bill originally would have required the regulations to be completed by 2005 and would take effect on January 1, 2006, but an amendment to the bill would give automakers until 2009 to comply with the new standards.

Automakers are attacking the bill, arguing that it is a “driving tax” that would severely impact sales of SUVs, which account for 47 percent of the vehicles sold in California. The bills author, Assemblywoman Fran Pavley of Woodland Hills, dismisses the auto industrys complaints. She claims that automakers will have no problem meeting the new standards, noting that Ford will be coming out with a new gas/electric hybrid SUV in the near future. “A lot of automakers have cars in the works that will offset CO2 emissions,” Pavley said.

EU Hits Rio Target, But Likely to Miss Kyoto Target

The European Union has announced that it has reached the greenhouse gas reduction target that it agreed to under the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The voluntary target was to stabilize greenhouse gas emissions at 1990 levels by 2000. The EU claims that it reduced its emissions to 3.5 percent below 1990 levels in 2000.

Although the European Commission congratulated itself for the success, it also expressed concern over increases in greenhouse gas emissions between 1999 and 2000. Emissions of carbon dioxide rose by 0.5 percent while emissions of five other greenhouse gases rose by 0.3 percent.

The commission warned that under existing policies the EU would not meet the target it agreed to under the Kyoto Protocol, which is to reduce emissions to eight percent below 1990 levels by the 2008-2012 compliance period.

“All member states except for the United Kingdom project their emissions by 2010 will be above their burden-sharing target under the Kyoto Protocol,” said Commission spokeswoman Pia Ahrenkilde. “The new EEA [European Environment Agency] data confirm that in the year 2000 most member states were well above their target path to Kyoto.”

The EU has been trying to implement a Europe-wide tax on greenhouse gas emissions for ten years, the latest being a “harmonization” tax that has been under negotiation for three years. A recent agreement between the member states may clear the way for it to be in place by the end of 2002. Other measures awaiting approval by member states are an emission trading scheme, and renewable energy and energy efficiency requirements (BNA Daily Environment Report, April 30, 2002).

Wind Power Meets Air Power

Five planned offshore wind power projects in the United Kingdom have run into a difficult snag. The Ministry of Defense has decided that the projects would interfere with military flights and radar. According to the British Wind Energy Association, if the Ministry of Defense successfully blocks the wind projects, then it would have a serious impact on the countrys ability to meet its renewable energy goals.

“If they are built, the 18 sites would provide more than one percent of the U.K. electricity supply,” said BWEA communications chief Alison Hill. “The governments own legal requirement is that 10 percent of its electricity is from renewable energy by 2010. It is widely expected that wind power and offshore will provide half of that.”

BWEA claims that by applying radar-reflective paint the projects will pose no problem for the military (Reuters, April 24, 2002).

Bad Data Hurts Model Performance

by William Yeatman on April 30, 2002

in Science

An article appearing in the April 19 issue of Science looks at how accurately climate models are able to reproduce current and past climate. What the authors conclude is that the models do a decent job of simulating the observed data, but that the data itself may not be that good.

“We can now test how well climate models simulate century-scale variations in the observed climate record,” say the authors, Thomas Smith, Thomas Karl and Richard Reynolds, at the National Climatic Data Center. “There have been numerous intercomparisons of various climate model simulations of 20th-century climate, based on the best available estimates of the climate forcing.”

It is assumed that these simulations closely reproduce observed climate variability, but, “This assumption mustbe viewed with caution,” say the authors. “Observational errors, sampling errors, and time-dependent biases degrade the climate record.” Although researchers have attempted to remove these errors, there are still problems.

The authors compare the errors in the computer models with the errors in the observed temperature record of worldwide sea surface temperatures (SSTs) which stretch back to the 19th century. To illustrate model errors the authors run three separate computer simulations with identical forcings, but starting at different initial conditions. By doing this they were able to “estimate the magnitude of the uncertainty introduced by a chaotic climate system.”

For the observed temperature record the authors calculated the uncertainty by comparing the range of SSTs derived from different observational errors, sampling errors and time-dependent bias adjustments. “The errors in analyzed SSTs,” say the authors, “are comparable to the uncertainty estimate associated with climate chaos over much of the 20th century.”

They conclude, “Todays models are thus within the observed uncertainty of the observations, at least with respect to the global SST record. This does not imply that the model simulations are perfect; rather, it indicates that more attention must be given to improving the records of past climate and ensuring that future climate records have little or no time-dependent biases.

“It is unsettling that the uncertainty related to treatment of the data is increasing in recent decades in the most-sampled oceans. This points to the importance of developing a global observing system that not only has good spatial coverage, but more importantly, strictly adheres to guidelines and principles articulated by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences.”

Etc.

  • In an April 21 editorial in the New York Times, former Vice President Al Gore called Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, the new chairman of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a “lets drag our feet candidate who is known for his virulent anti-American statements.”

Dr. Pachauri responded in a letter to the editor in the May 1 New York Times, stating, “Mr. Gores derogatory statements about me reflect a deep disappointment at my election as chairman of the [IPCC], with 76 votes for me against 49 for his protg, Dr. Robert T. Watson.

“In a 1999 speech, Mr. Gore, referring to my commitment, vision and dedication, said; Pachy is the one person in the world who could bring us all here. He is known all over the community of concerned men and women as someone with the intellect and the heart.

“In Earth in the Balance, Mr. Gore acknowledged me among the other scientists who have been helpful in giving me advice during the writing of this book.

“Would the real Al Gore stand up? Does what he says today hold no value tomorrow?”

Announcements

  • The Cooler Heads Coalition together with the Science and Environmental Policy Project and Frontiers of Freedom will hold a briefing on “Whatever Happened to Global Warming?” on Monday, May 13, from Noon to 2 PM in Room B-339 of the Rayburn House Office Building. Speakers will include John Daly, who runs the highly regarded Still Waiting for Greenhouse web site in Australia, and climate scientists from Europe and North America. Lunch will be served. Attendance is free of charge, but reservations are required. Please contact Ericka Joyner of CEI at (202) 331-1010, ext. 267, or e-mail her at ejoyner@cei.org. Include your name, affiliation, and phone number.

EU Wants an Air Tax; British Emissions Scheme Flawed; Multi-pollutant Bills are “Cutting Edge” of Kyoto Agenda

by William Yeatman on April 16, 2002

in Blog

EU Wants an Air Tax

A European Union plan to reduce the amount of greenhouse gas emissions from commercial flights would force air passengers to pay up to $72 per ticket. As noted by Londons Times (April 4, 2002), “The charge could be imposed on all airlines within two years, adding 50 [$72] to the cost of flying from London to California, 35 [$50] to flights to New York and between 5 and 10 [$7 and $14] to flights within Europe.”

Previous attempts to tax airlines were frustrated because airlines simply threatened to change their routes to “fill up” in countries where there is no tax. But the new plan would be implemented throughout the EU to encourage airlines to purchase more fuel efficient airplanes and to discourage people from flying.

Tim Johnson, of the Aviation Environment Federation coalition of environmental groups, said the levy would simply discourage nonessential flights. “Offering flights to Dublin for 8 [$11.50] return is creating demand that wouldnt be there if the price was more realistic.”

But Greener by Design, a lobby group that opposes the tax, said, “This is nothing other than a holiday tax on poor people and those who pay fares out of pocket would suffer the most.”

British Emissions Scheme Flawed

Serious questions are being raised about the validity of greenhouse gas reductions under Great Britains new emissions trading scheme. The program got underway with an auction in which the government offered a price for each ton of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) reduced. Participating companies then bid by offering greenhouse gas reductions at the offered price.

According to a report by UK-based Environmental Data Services, however, “There are strong grounds for suspecting that at least half and possibly much more of the claimed emission reductions are either not real, or would have been delivered anyway.” What this means is that some of the companies involved in the program may be the beneficiaries of huge financial windfalls without doing a thing.

Under the program, a companys baseline from which it must reduce emissions to get credits is calculated from its average yearly emissions from 1998, 1999, and 2000. The program also attempts to eliminate credit for “hot air” reductions by only taking into account actual emissions that exceeded existing regulatory caps. But according to the report, “DEFRAs [Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs] rules are poorly thought through and, when combined with the shortcomings in the Environment Agencys regulatory controls, have failed to prevent a huge injection of hot air into the scheme.”

An egregious reported example is that of Ineos Fluor, a company that makes refrigerants that are also greenhouse gases. The global warming potential of HFC-23, for instance, is 11,700 times that of CO2. In 1999, Ineos installed a 6 million incinerator to reduce its HFC-23 emissions, which fell from 864 tons in 1998 to 304 tons in 1999 and 45 tons in 2000.

HFC-23 emissions were already regulated, but only as part of an overall rule that limited the collective release of all volatile organic compounds. This was the figure applied by DEFRA when it calculated Ineoss baseline.

According to the report, “The baseline would be 148 tons of HFC-23. But if emissions continue at the 2000 level of 45 tons, Ineos is already more than 100 tons or 1.2mtCO2e [metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent] below its baseline.

On this basis, the company could easily meet its final emission reduction target of 0.8mtCO2e and have a massive surplus of credits to sell in the schemes early years when its targets are less tight.” Ineoss incentive payment was worth 43 million, a pretty good return on its 6 million investment.

Other participants that appear also to be in line for such windfalls under differing circumstances are the chemical companies Dupont and Rhodia, oil companies Shell and BP (Beyond Petroleum), and British Airways.

Multi-pollutant Bills are “Cutting Edge” of Kyoto Agenda

A new study published by the American Legislative Exchange Council takes a look at the various multi-pollutant bills being considered by the U.S. Congress and finds that they are wasteful and largely devoid of benefits.

The study notes that, “Senator James Jeffordss (I-VT) “Clean Power Act” (S. 556) and Representative Henry Waxmans (D-CA) “Clean Smokestack Act” (H.R. 1256) are the Kyoto agendas cutting edge in the 107th Congress. These bills would require substantial reductions in power plant emissions of nitrogen oxides (NOX), sulfur dioxide (SO2), mercury, and carbon dioxide (CO2), the principle greenhouse gas targeted by the Kyoto Protocol.

The author, Dr. Marlo Lewis, Jr., a former staff director for Representative David McIntoshs House Government Reform Subcommittee on Regulatory Affairs and currently a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, presents several reasons why pursuit of these policies would be folly:

  • The Jeffords-Waxman bills are based on the false premise that reducing fossil fuel use is a prerequisite to reducing air pollution. History shows dramatic air quality improvements paralleling large increases in energy consumption, population and GDP.

  • The bills include CO2 reductions as a component of air quality management even though the presence of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has no effect on air quality.

  • Including CO2 in an air quality management bill is “horrendously wasteful.” As noted by the Energy Information Administration, “Reducing NOX and SO2 emissions 75 percent below 1997 levels by 2005 would cost $6 billion. Reducing CO2 emissions 7 percent below 1990 levels by 2005 would cost $77 billion.” Integrating the two reduction strategies would also cost $77 billion, which would get the same “air quality” results that could be obtained for $6 billion.

  • These bills would be completely useless in averting global warming. If fully implemented, the Kyoto Protocol would prevent a mere 0.07 degrees Celsius of global warming by 2050 too little to detect. A domestic program would do even less. To obtain a copy of the study, contact Bob Adams at (202) 466-3800.

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