Climate 411

Smithfield Foods, World’s Largest Pork Producer, Sets Goal to Reduce Its Carbon Footprint

By Joe Rudek / Published: December 16, 2016

A lot has changed since I first started working to reduce pollution from hog farms in North Carolina. That was back in the 1990s, during my early years at Environmental Defense Fund.

Back then, industry wasn’t exactly eager to sign on to new, environmentally-friendly technologies to manage hog waste. So it’s gratifying now to work with Smithfield Foods, the world’s largest pork producer, as it voluntarily commits to reduce its carbon footprint in a meaningful way.

Hog farms have long created both environmental and health problems for residents in the coastal plain of eastern North Carolina. Manure in the farms’ waste lagoons produces methane, ammonia, and other gases that contaminate both the air (causing respiratory problems as well as accelerating climate change) and the water (where nitrogen contributes to algae blooms, and at times, large-scale fish kills).

I collaborated with North Carolina State University for many years in evaluating possible technologies that can reduce pollution from pork production. This work led to 2007 legislation in North Carolina that banned new permits for lagoon and sprayfield hog manure treatment systems and established environmental performance standards for alternative treatment systems.

Now it’s 2016, and Smithfield has decided to take the lead in the animal protein industry by reducing its greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent by 2025. That’s more than 4 million metric tons, or the equivalent of removing 900,000 cars from the road. But in order to succeed, it first had to understand its baseline emissions footprint. That kind of assessment required a thorough lifecycle analysis — a careful look at emissions produced throughout the company’s supply chain, from raw materials to disposal to retail to in-home consumption.

Smithfield graphic

Smithfield graphic

Companies’ individual lifecycle assessments are critical to developing plans to reduce greenhouse gases. The quality of the data collected for the assessment determines how useful the results will be in planning the changes companies will undertake to meet their goals. Company-specific data illuminates individual emissions hotspots in supply chains — those critical points where companies can focus their energy and attention to reducing negative impacts most effectively.

Smithfield contracted with the University of Minnesota’s NorthStar Institute for Sustainable Enterprise to create a custom greenhouse emissions inventory for the company, and EDF agreed to review the analysis.

Let’s take a look at the two major greenhouse gas emissions hotspots the lifecycle analysis identified, and how Smithfield plans to reduce greenhouse gases:

  1. Pigs consume a great deal of corn (as well as soy) which requires a large amount of nitrogen and other nutrients often provided by industrially-produced fertilizer. When applied to the land, the nitrogen in the fertilizer results in the release of nitrous oxide from soils, which is a potent greenhouse gas. In fact, feed production accounts for about 20 percent of Smithfield’s greenhouse gas emissions. The solution? EDF is working with Smithfield to optimize its fertilizer use, so it can get the crop yield required to feed the pigs while minimizing the surplus nitrogen which fuels nitrous oxide emissions.
  2. The other dominant emission hotspot comes from manure management. In Smithfield’s case, this accounts for more than a third of its greenhouse emissions. Hog manure is typically flushed from the barn into an open earthen lagoon. Smithfield now plans to cover lagoons to reduce the methane that’s released into the air on 30 percent of its company-owned farms. Smithfield is also committing to help its contract growers do the same. Those lagoon covers will also prevent ammonia from being lost to the air — a huge benefit because atmospheric ammonia losses result in public health and environmental risks. By capturing ammonia under the lagoon covers, Smithfield can use it as fertilizer, offsetting some of the inorganic fertilizer the company otherwise would have to purchase.

While these commitments by Smithfield Foods will not solve all (or even a majority) of the public health and environmental impacts of hog farms, this is a meaningful step by the company. It is also promising that NorthStar’s work with Smithfield can be readily adapted to other companies to develop their own lifecycle analysis.

I’m encouraged that Smithfield is taking a leadership role in this endeavor, and proud of the roles that EDF has played. EDF will continue to work with Smithfield to make this commitment a reality, and to address the remaining issues associated with pork production.

It is my hope that the commitment by Smithfield Foods will encourage other livestock producers to step up and take the actions necessary to reduce the public health and environmental impacts of their operations.

Also posted in Partners for Change, Science / Comments are closed

Western Leaders, Attorneys General Support BLM’s Oil and Gas Waste Policies in Court

By EDF Blogs / Published: December 16, 2016

8362494597_b5e016f63f_z-300x169By Jon Goldstein and Peter Zalzal

(This post originally appeared on EDF Energy Exchange)

The legal fight to defend the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) recent efforts to prevent oil and gas companies from wasting methane on public and tribal owned land continued yesterday.

EDF and a coalition of local, regional, tribal and national allies filed a brief opposing efforts by industry organizations and a handful states to block BLM’s protections before they even come into effect. 

The states of New Mexico and California also sought to participate in the legal challenges, likewise stepping up to defend BLM’s common sense standards. Notably, New Mexico is the largest producer of oil from public lands in the U.S. and the second largest producer of natural gas.

In seeking to stay BLM’s protections, the industry associations have claimed the standards have no benefits – so blocking them won’t have any impacts on the communities they are designed to protect.

But BLM’s oil and gas waste standards are about ensuring that operators use common sense technologies to capture natural gas that would otherwise be wasted. That preserves a valuable natural resource and cleans up the air, all while putting additional royalty payments in the pockets of Western communities that can be used to fund schools, roads and important infrastructure.

For example, a recent analysis found that in 2013, oil and gas companies operating on public and tribal lands wasted more than $330 million worth of gas – more than $100 million of that from New Mexico alone. This translates to lost royalty revenues for local communities. One report estimates that without action to reduce this waste, taxpayers could lose out on more than $800 million in royalties over the next decade.

The challengers’ legal claims stand in stark contrast to the facts on the ground. Evidence of the broad-based benefits of BLM’s Waste Prevention Rule was readily apparent in yesterday’s court filings supporting the protections..  Current and former state and county officials and everyday Westerners alike let their voices be heard about the importance of common sense measures to preserve public resources and protect the environment.

For example, in their filing seeking to participate in the case, the states of New Mexico and California emphasized:

Implementation of the Rule will benefit the States of California and New Mexico by generating more annual royalty revenue . . . . In addition, the Rule will benefit the health of the states’ citizens who are exposed to harmful air contaminants leaked, vented and flared from federally-managed oil and gas operations . . . . The People of California and New Mexico have a strong interest in preventing the waste of public resources, as well as in reducing the emission of harmful air pollutants that threaten the health of the states’ citizens, the integrity of their infrastructure, protection of their unique environments and ecosystems, and the continued viability of their economies. ( Filing, pages 2 and 3)

And in their filing opposing the preliminary injunction, these states claimed:

Because the Rule is likely to result in the stronger protection of federal lands and greater prevention of the waste of natural resources, which belong to the People, the public interest weighs strongly in favor of denying the injunction. (Filing, page 16)

The benefits that New Mexico and California identified are broadly shared and were likewise reflected in declarations submitted by county officials and former state officials in support of the standards.

Current La Plata County Colorado Commissioner Gwen Lachelt identified both the problem of resource waste on public lands and the benefits for Western counties like hers in addressing it:

The San Juan Basin, in which La Plata County is situated, has one of the highest rates of wasted gas and methane loss in the country, accounting for nearly 17% of U.S. methane losses.

In addition to wasted methane, oil and gas sites in La Plata County and the San Juan Basin release dangerous pollutants such as benzene and ozone-forming pollutants that can lead to asthma attacks and worsen emphysema . . . . This air pollution continues to be a regional public health hazard, and has contributed to La Plata County receiving a low grade for poor ozone air quality from the American Lung Association…

The Rule will benefit La Plata County by providing additional royalties that we can use to fund key County priorities—including infrastructure, roads, and education—while also helping to clean up the air in the San Juan Basin, which will have health benefits for our citizens. (Filing, page 4 and 5)

Lachelt points out that unlike other leading oil and gas states like Colorado, New Mexico has no policies to reduce methane waste and other pollution from oil and gas wells, and that BLM’s efforts will help to provide uniformity across state lines.

Sandra Ely, a former Chief of the New Mexico Environment Department’s Air Quality Bureau likewise submitted a declaration describing the importance and benefits of the BLM standards. She particularly focused on the long-standing problem of resource loss in the San Juan Basin. The region made headlines in recent years when NASA scientists discovered a 200-square-mile methane cloud over the region – the largest methane cloud uncovered in the U.S. Subsequent studies determined that oil and gas emissions were the main contributor to the methane “hot spot.”

I am aware of a recent study, focused on the San Juan Basin, which suggested that BLM’s proposed leak detection and repair requirements alone would result in anywhere from $1–$6 million dollars of additional revenue for New Mexico… Absent the Waste Prevention Rule, I am concerned that resource loss and poor air quality associated with oil and gas development will continue unabated in New Mexico (Sandra Ely, Filing, page 7)

Western leaders have been vocal in their support for BLM’s sensible standards that take an important energy resource out of the air and deliver it responsibly to the American public. At public hearings that the BLM held across the west these rules were supported by more than 3 to 1 margins. More than 80 local officials across the West, including county commissions in La Plata, Park and San Miguel counties in Colorado and Bernalillo, Rio Arriba and San Miguel counties and the Santa Fe city council in New Mexico, all support the protections. And these rules enjoy broad bipartisan public support as well (more than 80 percent of Westerners in a recent poll).

Given this cross-cutting support and yesterday’s forceful legal filings, it’s no wonder that industry challengers in this case don’t even want the judge to hear the views of New Mexicans and Californians. Yesterday, they indicated that they would oppose these states’ efforts to protect the interests of their citizens by participating in the case. While this reflexive obstructionism isn’t surprising—industry petitioners filed their legal challenges within 40 minutes of the rule being finalized and tried to block the standards’ effectiveness shortly thereafter—it certainly reveals their very one-sided view of what is in the public’s interest.

The Wyoming Court is scheduled to hear oral argument in this case on January 6. We look forward to continuing to defend these standards that will clean the air and prevent waste.

Also posted in Economics, Energy, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Health, Partners for Change, Policy / Comments are closed

How Companies Set Internal Prices on Carbon

By EDF Blogs / Published: December 12, 2016
By Jonathan Camuzeaux and Elizabeth Medford

Despite the uncertainty created by the recent election, companies around the globe are demonstrating a commitment to keeping climate change in check. More than 300 American companies signed an open letter to President-elect Trump urging him not to abandon the Paris agreement. Others are acting on their own to reduce emissions in their daily operations, by setting an internal price on carbon.

The number of companies incorporating an internal carbon price into their business and investment decisions has reached new heights, a recent CDP report shows, with an increase of 23 percent over last year. The more than 1,200 companies that are currently using an internal carbon price (or are planning to within two years) are using them to determine which investments will be profitable and which will involve significant risk in the future, as carbon pricing programs are implemented around the world. Sometimes, they also use them to reach emissions reduction goals.

Not all carbon prices are created equal, and companies differ in how they set their specific price. Here’s a look at some of these methods:

Incorporating Carbon Prices from Existing Policies

 Some companies set their carbon price based on policies in the countries where they operate. For example, companies with operations in the European Union might decide to use a carbon price equal to that of the European Union Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) allowances, and those operating in the Northeastern United States might adopt the carbon price that results from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative market.

ConocoPhillips, for example, focuses its internal carbon pricing practices on operations in countries with existing or imminent greenhouse gas (GHG) regulation. As a result, its carbon price ranges from $6-38 per metric ton depending on the country. For operations in countries without existing or imminent GHG regulation, projects costing $150 million or greater, or that results in 25,000 or more metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent, must undergo a sensitivity analysis that includes carbon costs.

Using Self-Imposed Carbon Fees

Others take a more aggressive approach by setting a self-imposed carbon fee on energy use. This involves setting a fee on either units of carbon dioxide generated or a proxy measurement like energy use. These programs also often include a plan for using the fees such as investment in clean energy or energy efficiency measures. This can be an effective method for incentivizing more efficient operations.

Microsoft, for example, designed its own system to account for the price of its carbon emissions. The company pledged to make its operations carbon neutral in 2012 and does so through a “carbon fee,” which is calculated based on the costs of offsetting the company’s emissions through clean energy and efficiency initiatives. Each business group within Microsoft is responsible for paying the fee depending on how much energy it uses. Microsoft collects the fees in a “central carbon fee fund” used to subsidize investments in energy efficiency, green power, and carbon offsets projects. Still, by limiting carbon fees to operational activities, Microsoft has yet to address a large chunk of their emissions.

Setting Internal Carbon Prices to Reach Emissions Reduction Targets

 Other companies set an internal carbon price based on their self-adopted GHG emissions targets. This involves determining an emissions reduction goal and then back-calculating a carbon price that will ensure the company achieves its goal by the target date. This method is a broader approach focused more on significantly reducing emissions while also mitigating the potential future risk of carbon pricing policies.

Novartis, a Swiss-based global healthcare company, uses a carbon price of $100/tCO2 and cites potential climate change impacts as a motivator. The company has its own greenhouse gas emissions target, which it is using to cut emissions to half of its 2010 levels by 2030. These internal policies mean that Novartis, which is included in the European Union’s Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS), has been able to sell surplus allowances and thus far avoid an increase in operating costs.

Where we go from here

 While these internal carbon pricing activities are welcome – and we hope they continue – they are not sufficient to reduce greenhouse gases to the degree our nation or world requires. Like these forward thinking companies, nations around the world, including the United States, need to consider the costs of inaction, including the climate-related costs, to avoid short-sighted investments. Ultimately, we will need public policies that put a limit and a price on carbon throughout the economy.

The spread of internal carbon pricing could signal greater support for carbon pricing by governments. But companies can do more: the ultimate test of a company’s convictions and commitment to carbon pricing might be their willingness to advocate for well-designed, ambitious policies that achieve the reductions we need.

Posted in News / Comments are closed

Groundbreaking Study Shows New Coal Plants are Uneconomic in 97 Percent of US Counties

By EDF Blogs / Published: December 8, 2016

By: Ferit Ucar

At Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), we understand that market forces can drive either a healthy environment – or harmful pollution. I recently wrote about how generating electricity often creates pollution, which comes with environmental and health costs that are usually not paid for by the polluters. That’s why EDF works to identify and correct market failures, like the failure to understand – as well as account for – all of the costs pollution imposes on society.

The Energy Institute at the University of Texas at Austin (UT) just released a useful tool in that pursuit: a studythat aims to capture the full cost of new electric power generation – including environmental and public health costs – on a county-by-county basis in the United States. The study evolves traditional ways of estimating new generation costs by 1) incorporating pollution costs, and 2) breaking data down to the county level.

The results show economics are leading the U.S. to a cleaner energy economy, in which there is no role for new coal plants. Let’s break it down.

Enhancing the levelized cost method

The Levelized Cost Of Electricity (LCOE) method is commonly used to compute the costs of different power sources – including fossil fuels and renewables – on a comparable basis. The LCOE, expressed on a dollar per kilowatt-hour (kWh) basis, is the estimated amount of money it takes for a particular electricity generation technology to produce a kWh of electricity over its expected lifetime.

In its conventional form, the LCOE method does not take into account environmental and public health costs – costs external to electricity generation but caused by it. It also does not show the variation in costs of building and operating identical power plants across different geographies. The study provides an improved method that addresses these limitations. The study also factors in siting challenges – like water availability and access to fuel – that prevent certain plant types from being built in a given county.

The UT study presents results in a map format, which facilitates cost comparisons by fuel source, technology, and location. The study team released interactive maps that show the cheapest technology by county, as well as calculators that enable users to compare costs for different scenarios.

Key findings

The following U.S. map shows the least-cost technology when factoring in siting limitations, and environmental and public health costs. The key displays the number of counties in which each power technology is the least-cost option.

map-1

The analysis shows:

  • Wind is the least-cost option in the most number of counties.
  • Coal plants are never the least-cost option.
  • Natural gas combined cycle (NGCC) plants are the least-cost option in counties where the wind isn’t as strong.
  • Utility-scale solar photovoltaic (PV) plants are the least-cost option in counties where it’s particularly sunny and/or there is a lack of cooling water availability, which is needed for thermal generation like coal.
  • When a county faces siting challenges that prevent other technologies from being built, residential solar PV plants (like rooftop solar) are the least-cost option. Put another way, rooftop solar is a viable option in every county; other power sources are not.

If you remove the environmental and public health costs from the analysis, the map looks different:

map-2

Even without accounting for the environmental and public health costs, wind remains the least-cost option in over 1,000 counties – that’s about one third of U.S. counties. And solar appears on the map nearly five times as much as coal.

Caveats

Although the study presents an improved way to measure the costs of electricity generation, we should acknowledge its limitations. It does not:

  • Remove the subsidies received by coal and natural gas during the exploration and extraction process, which effectively make fossil-fuel plants appear less costly than they actually are.
  • Account for the uncertainty of future fuel prices and capacity factors for fossil fuel and nuclear plants.
  • Demonstrate the environmental and public health benefits of retiring an existing fossil-fuel plant. As the study states, if emission rates from existing (rather than new) power plants were used, the public health costs would, on average, be 10 times higher.
  • Factor in the costs associated with managing the variability in wind and solar’s generation output.
  • Model the implications of the federal Production Tax Credits and Investment Tax Credits for renewable generation technologies, as well as subsidies at the state or local level, which affect investment decisions. (The calculators do allow changes to capital cost assumptions; so therefore, these could be factored in).
  • Consider economic factors other than cost – like revenue – that also affect investment decisions.
  • Account for the high-level environmental damage risks associated with electricity generation from nuclear, natural gas, and coal as a result of incidents like Chernobyl and Fukushima, Aliso Canyon, and Dan River coal ash spill that cause massive, long-term, acute, and dispersed chronic harm.

    The Energy Institute study clearly shows the economic viability of wind and increasing prospects for solar.

The Energy Institute study clearly shows the economic viability of wind and increasing prospects for solar. Moreover, it provides policymakers and the public with important information on the full cost of electricity for new power sources – including the environmental and public health costs such as asthma attacks, premature death, and lung damage resulting from fossil-fuel pollution.

When pollution costs are accounted for, as the UT study shows, coal power plants are not the lowest-cost electricity generation technology anywhere. Even without including environmental and health costs and renewables subsidies, and despite the fact extraction of coal remains subsidized, new coal plants are still not economic in 97 percent of U.S. counties. As we work to fix outdated rules, we know that market forces are helping to clear the way for clean energy progress and cleaner air.

This post originally appeared on our Energy Exchange blog.

Posted in News / Comments are closed

What Do the 2016 Elections Mean for the Clean Power Plan?

By Tomas Carbonell / Published: November 21, 2016

President-Elect Trump has repeatedly claimed that climate change is a “hoax,” and has appointed notorious climate denier Myron Ebell to run the transition team for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). During the campaign, Trump advocated for “scrapping” the Clean Power Plan – the nation’s first limits on harmful climate pollution from existing power plants, which are among the United States’ very largest sources of these contaminants.

Lost in this campaign rhetoric was the reality that states and companies across the country are already making cost-effective investments in transformative clean energy technologies that are rapidly reducing emissions of climate pollution across the power sector. These investments are helping deliver a more reliable and affordable electricity grid, yielding tremendous public health benefits by reducing emissions of soot and smog-forming pollutants, and driving job growth in communities around the country.

The Clean Power Plan builds on all of these trends and helps ensure they will continue for years to come, but the Trump Administration will be hard pressed to stop the progress underway in its tracks.

If Trump does try to roll back the Clean Power Plan, he will find himself on the wrong side of history, the law, and public opinion. The Clean Power Plan is firmly rooted in our nation’s clean air laws, and there are millions of Americans across the country – along with a broad and diverse coalition of states, cities, businesses, faith organizations, consumer advocates, and other leaders – who support these protections and will fight to preserve them.

cpp_supportmap_600Large Majorities of Americans Support the Clean Power Plan.

Donald Trump did not get elected with a mandate to dismantle important climate protections supported by large majorities of Americans. Poll after poll shows that Americans all across this country — in red and blue states alike — broadly support clean air, clean energy, and climate progress. This includes strong, diverse support for the Clean Power Plan, even in states currently suing over the standards. More than two-thirds of voters favor federal action to reduce emissions of pollutants that cause climate change.

If the new administration tries to take steps to roll back these important measures, they will have to do so knowing that they are woefully out of touch with the majority of the American people.

Weakening or rescinding the Clean Power Plan, or other public health and environmental protections, also won’t do anything to address the economic concerns that did figure prominently in Trump’s campaign.

As recent analyses by respected energy experts have demonstrated, the coal industry has been experiencing declining production and employment due to factors that have nothing to do with the Clean Power Plan – including intense competition from natural gas, the falling cost of renewables, and a slew of bad investment decisions. Even Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell recently expressed doubt that attacking environmental regulations will cause a turnaround for the coal industry.

At the same time, undoing the Clean Power Plan could adversely and needlessly affect long-term growth in America’s vibrant clean energy industry –  which currently supports hundreds of thousands of manufacturing and construction jobs around the country, and employs far more people than the coal or oil and gas industries.

Leading Businesses, Cities of All Sizes and in All Regions Support the Clean Power Plan

In addition to enjoying the support of millions of Americans, limits on carbon pollution represent good business and good governance. Our cities, states, and companies support limits on climate pollution and investments in new, clean energy technologies that bring jobs and economic opportunity to our communities.

The week after the election, more than 360 of the nation’s leading businesses — including DuPont, General Mills, Levi Strauss, Nike, and Starbucks — signed a remarkable statement urging Trump to honor the United States’ commitments in the Paris Agreement to reduce dangerous climate pollution. These companies declared that “Failure to build a low-carbon economy puts American prosperity at risk,” and that the “right action now will create jobs and boost US competitiveness.”

Power companies that together own or operate one of every ten megawatts of the nation’s generating capacity – including some of the nation’s largest operators of fossil fuel powered plants – are supporting the Clean Power Plan in court.

So are many large energy users. Leading businesses that employ tens of thousands of people in all regions of the country — including Adobe, Apple, Amazon, Google, IKEA, Mars, and Microsoft — recognize the importance of the Clean Power Plan to their economic growth and are also supporting the rule. More than 100 of America’s top companies signed a public statement this spring calling for “swift implementation” of the Clean Power Plan.

Adding to this groundswell of support, 18 States, 60 cities, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, and the National League of Cities are supporting the these standards in court. These municipalities include major cities in states that are litigating against the Clean Power Plan, such as Houston, Grand Rapids, and Miami.  Many of these cities are on the front lines of climate change and they know their citizens don’t want leaders who put politics above their safety and well-being.

Our Nation’s Clean Air Laws Require EPA to Protect the Public from Harmful Pollutants that are Destabilizing Our Climate

EPA has a legal responsibility to protect the public from dangerous climate pollution that threatens our prosperity, security, and public health.

The Supreme Court has affirmed EPA’s authority to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act three times since 2007, including EPA’s authority to limit carbon pollution from power plants under the Clean Air Act provision that is the basis for the Clean Power Plan.

As so many Americans around the country recognize, the Clean Power Plan is a common-sense and cost-effective step towards fulfilling this bedrock legal obligation. Many companies and states also recognize that it provides unprecedented compliance flexibility that may not be replicated in another regulatory approach. Although Congress could attempt to modify or roll back the Clean Power Plan by amending the Clean Air Act, such action would be extremely controversial and encounter especially stiff opposition. Americans across the country — and the numerous states, municipalities, businesses, consumer advocates, faith organizations, and other leaders who support the Clean Power Plan — will vigorously oppose any attempt to weaken these vital, hard-fought protections for climate and public health.

The Incoming Administration Cannot Simply Dismantle the Clean Power Plan by Fiat

In addition to deep support, proponents of a safer climate have America’s bipartisan bedrock clean air laws on our side.

Any attempt to withdraw or modify the Clean Power Plan or other clean air protections would first have to go through the same rigorous, inclusive public notice and comment process that EPA carefully followed in adopting them. Such changes would also be subject to judicial review in the federal courts, and would be set aside if they are contrary to the Clean Air Act or do not rest on sound technical and policy foundations.

Previous Administrations that have attempted to make sweeping changes to Clean Air Act protections – including the George W. Bush Administration – abandoned these efforts in the face of strong public opposition and defeat in the federal courts.

The Clean Power Plan Builds on and Accelerates the Transition to a Clean Energy Future that is Already Under Way in the Power Sector

Perhaps the biggest reason opponents shouldn’t expect to overturn the Clean Power Plan overnight is that this important rule is only cementing the direction our energy system has been moving for years.

States and power companies across the country recognize this transition is the best way to provide ratepayers with affordable, reliable, and low carbon electricity – and they understand that the Clean Power Plan provides a common-sense, flexible, cost-effective framework for achieving those goals.

Even without the Clean Power Plan targets in effect, the Energy Information Administration has reported that power sector carbon emissions have fallen by 21 percent since 2005 –almost two-thirds of the way towards meeting the Clean Power Plan’s 2030 emission reduction targets.

Wind and solar are expected to account for almost two-thirds of the electric generating capacity added to the grid in 2016. Many states are on track to fully meet their Clean Power Plan reduction targets. Meanwhile, retail electricity prices actually fell in 2016 for the first time in many years.

That doesn’t mean the Trump Administration can’t attack the Clean Power Plan. We fully expect a fight, and we know it won’t be easy. But we are ready to fight – and we hope you’ll join us.

The transition to a clean energy future is already well underway, and it cannot and will not be stopped. The health and prosperity of America’s families and communities depend on it.

Also posted in Clean Air Act, Clean Power Plan, EPA litgation, Partners for Change, Policy / Read 1 Response

Open Road Ahead for Clean Trucks

By Jason Mathers / Published: October 25, 2016

rp_iStock_000002312011Medium2-1024x768.jpgOur nation is making great progress in reducing the environmental impact of trucking.

This is tremendous news, of course, as trucking – the main method of transporting the goods and services we desire – is critical to the fabric of our society.

Consider these facts:

We’re making major progress because of a team effort from truck and equipment manufacturers, fleets, policymakers, and clean air and human health advocates. With protective, long-term emission standards in place, manufacturers are investing in developing cleaner solutions and bringing them to market. Truck fleets are embracing new trucks because of lower operating costs and improved performance.

(For a more detailed picture of the widespread support for cleaner trucks, see EDF’s list of quotes supporting recent national Clean Truck standards.)

We must continue this team effort to make further necessary improvements in the years ahead.

Despite our recent progress, diesel trucks continue to be a leading source of NOx emissions, which is why a number of leading air quality agencies across the nation, health and medical organizations, and more than  30 members of Congress are calling for more protective NOx emission standards.

Trucks are also a large and growing source of greenhouse gas emissions. Thankfully, the new fuel efficiency and greenhouse gas standards mentioned above – which were released this past August and just published in the Federal Register today – will cut more than a billion tons of emissions.

Trucking fleets are embracing cleaner trucks. UPS, for example, is expanding its fleet of hybrid delivery trucks. PepsiCo, Walmart, Kane and others have applauded strong fuel standards for trucks.

Manufacturers are developing solutions to further improve the environmental footprint of trucking.

In the past few weeks alone:

  • Cummins unveiled a 2017 engine that cuts NOx emissions 90 percent  from the current emission standard.
  • Volvo Trucks North American showcased its entry to the DOE SuperTruck program, which is  a concept truck capable of surpassing 2010 efficiency levels by 70 percent and exceeding 12 miles per gallon.
  • Navistar also revealed its SuperTruck, the CatalIST, which hit a remarkable 13 mpg.

The progress we’ve made to date does more than just improve conditions within the U.S. Our strong standards push U.S. manufacturers to develop solutions that will resonate with international markets. For example, the European Union, Brazil, India, Mexico, and South Korea all are exploring new fuel efficiency and greenhouse standards for big trucks. U.S. manufacturers will be well positioned to compete in markets that put a premium on fuel efficiency.

In the coming years, we will need to continue to advance protective emission standards to protect the health of our communities and safeguard our climate. When the time comes, we will be building upon an impressive record of progress and cooperation.

Also posted in Cars and Pollution, Economics, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Policy / Comments are closed