Peter Glaser

Kerry-Boxer’s not-so-hidden fangs

by Marlo Lewis on October 23, 2009 · 1 comment

in Global Warming, Legal

Next week, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee will hold three hearings on S. 1733, the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act,” also known as Kerry-Boxer after its co-sponsors Senators John Kerry (D-MA) and Barbara Boxer (D-CA). Kerry-Boxer is the Senate companion bill to H.R. 2454, the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACESA), also known as Waxman-Markey after its co-sponsors Reps. Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Ed Markey (D-MA).

Part A of Title VII of Kerry-Boxer sets forth the emission reduction targets and timetables of the bill’s proposed greenhouse gas emissions cap-and-trade program. It is nearly identical to the corresponding section of the Waxman-Markey bill, the main substantive difference being a tougher emissions reduction target for the year 2020. Waxman-Markey requires a 17% reduction below 2005 levels by 2020; Kerry-Boxer, a 20% reduction. 

It would be a mistake, though, to suppose that those numbers reflect the full extent of the regulatory burdens Title VII Part A could impose on the U.S. economy. Identical language in both bills could (1) unleash a torrent of lawsuits against tens of thousands of relatively small emitters of carbon dioxide (CO2), and (2) put pressure on future presidents and congresses to adopt substantially tougher emission reduction targets. 

Section 701 Findings: Setup for CO2 Tort Litigation

Under the Kerry-Boxer and Waxman-Markey bill, business entities would be subject to the cap-and-trade program only if they emit at least 25,000 metric tons per year of carbon dioxide-equivalent (CO2-e) greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. So on superficial inspection, if you are small manufacturer or just about any type of non-industrial facility, you will have no emission reduction obligations. That perception helps the bills’ proponents divide-and-conquer the business community.

In reality, the Findings in Kerry-Boxer and Waxman-Markey are the setup for litigation demanding additional emission reductions beyond those specified in the bills’ cap-and-trade programs. This is particularly worrisome because state attorneys general and environmental groups are already suing energy companies under tort law for emitting CO2.

The Findings say that “each increment of emission … causes or contributes … to the acceleration and extent of global warming and its adverse effects,” and “accordingly, controlling emissions in small as well as large quantities is essential” to reduce “threats” and “injuries,” including disease, death, property damage, bad weather, business losses; harm to forest, plants, wildlife, water resources, and air quality; and – as if that list weren’t inclusive enough — “other harm.”
 
Worse, the Findings go on to equate risk of harm with actual harm: “the fact that some of the adverse and potentially catastrophic effects of global warming are at risk of occurring and not a certainty does not negate the harm persons suffer from actions that increase the likelihood, extent, and severity of future impacts.” Get that? All plaintiffs will need is some remote, speculative possibility of catastrophic impacts — and of course that’s what the global warming scare is all about — and voila, harm has been done, injuries cry out for redress.
 
If the language in the Findings becomes the law of the land, there will be no stopping the flood of common law nuisance suits. Any increment of emissions, no matter how small, will be deemed to cause or contribute to global warming and its harmful effects. And even if no harm can be proved, the risk of harm will count as actual injury.

Bottom line: Although EPA, initially, may only regulate entities emitting at least 25,000 tons of CO2-e per year, the Findings implicitly authorize litigation targeting vast numbers of small entities.

Section 705 Review and Program Recommendations: Setup for Moving Goal Posts
 
There’s a lot of mischief in this section, too. To begin with, Sec. 705 requires the EPA Administrator, every four years, to address “existing scientific information and reports, considering, to the greatest extent possible, the most recent assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, reports by the United States Global Change Research Program … ” This provision will turn EPA into an even more uncritical rubber stamp for the IPCC and USGCRP than it already is. More than ever, IPCC and USGCRP will write their reports to influence U.S. policy (i.e. they will be even more politicized) and their influence will increase. Cheer if you like agenda-driven science!
 
Sec. 705 also requires EPA to report on annual emissions and annual per-capita emissions by country. Not a word, though, about tracking emission intensity (greenhouse gas emissions per dollar of output) by country. In other words, the metrics have been selected to paint the United States in the worst possible light.
 
Also, as you’d expect, the Administrator is required to assess the impacts of climate change on everything under the Sun — populations, health, livelihoods, tribal culture, weather, fresh water, ecosystems, agriculture, etc. — but there is no requirement to assess the impacts of climate policy on anything. This despite a requirement that the Administrator use a “risk management framework.”
 
Similarly, the Administrator is supposed to assess the potential non-linear, abrupt, or essentially irreversible changes in the climate system but he is under no corresponding obligation to assess factors that might stabilize the climate and counteract the forcing effects of greenhouse gases.
 
Now here’s where it gets serious. The Administrator is also required to assess what terrible things won’t be prevented by limiting CO2 equivalent emissions to 450 ppm or global warming to 2°C (3.6°F) beyond pre-industrial temperatures. This sets up the Administrator to advocate 350 as the new 450. It specifically requires the Administrator to identify “alternative thresholds or targets that may more effectively limit the risks” of climate change.
 
Similarly, the Administrator must assess whether the Kerry-Boxer bill, taking into account international actions and commitments, is sufficient to limit GHG concentrations to 450 ppm and global warming to 2°C above pre-industrial temperatures, or whether ”other temperature or greenhouse gas thresholds identified” by the Administrator would be more protective.
 
So the U.S. Climate Action Partnership gang are naive if they think the Kerry-Boxer and Waxman-Markey emission reduction targets, once enacted, will be set in stone. These bills are just the framework for more aggressive emission reduction requirements to come. Regulatory certainty is an illusion.
 
Perhaps because some people just don’t trust EPA — imagine that! — Kerry-Boxer requires the National Academy of Science (NAS) to undertake a similar four-year review of climate science and policy. If the NAS concludes that the United States will not meet the Kerry-Boxer targets, or that 450 ppm and 2°C are not sufficiently protective, the President “shall” submit a plan to Congress identifying the domestic and international actions that will achieve the additional reductions. This language implicitly makes the president a handmaid of the National Academy. Once Jim Hansen and his NAS buddies decide that 350 is the new 450, the president “shall” submit a plan explaining how we get there.

Much of the debate on Kerry-Boxer and Waxman-Markey has centered on the bills’ emission reduction targets. Meeting those targets could destroy millions of jobs. The not-so-hidden fangs lurking in Sections 701 and 705 pose additional significant threats to the economy — and provide additional reasons to oppose such legislation.

California federal court dismisses global warming common law nuisance lawsuit

by Marlo Lewis on October 16, 2009 · 3 comments

in Global Warming, Legal

My weekend is starting out fine, thanks to this happy news.

Peter Glaser, an environmental attorney with Troutman Sanders, just sent around his analysis. Here it is:

California Federal Court Dismisses Global Warming Common Law Nuisance Lawsuit

In another chapter in the continuing saga of whether energy companies can be sued under tort law for emitting greenhouse gases (GHGs), a federal district court in California yesterday dismissed a lawsuit brought by the Kivalina Alaska Native Village and others against a large number of energy companies.  The Court became the fourth federal district court to find, in essence, that there is no common law nuisance tort of global warming.  One of those district court decisions, however, was recently reversed by the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in the Connecticut v. AEP case, which we reported on extensively in a previous client alert available at the link provided below. 

The lawsuit dismissed yesterday alleged that the defendants’ GHG emissions contribute to global warming that has diminished the Artic sea ice that protects the Kivalina coastline.  As a result, the plaintiffs argued that their protection from winter storms has diminished, resulting in erosion and destruction of the land which will require that Kivalina’s residents be relocated.  Plaintiffs sought monetary damages for these impacts, which they estimated in a range of $95-400 million.

The United States District Court for the Northern District of California dismissed the lawsuit on the ground that the case involved a political question more properly decided by the legislative and executive branches.  The court also concluded that the plaintiffs lacked standing.  On the political question issue, the Court ruled that:

Regardless of the relief sought, the resolution of Plaintiff’s nuisance claim requires balancing the social utility of Defendants’ conduct with the harm it inflicts.  That process, by definition, entails a determination of what would have been an acceptable limit on the level of greenhouse gases emitted by Defendants….the allocation of fault – and cost of global warming is a matter appropriately left for determination by the executive and legislative branch in the first instance.

On standing, the court ruled that “[i]n view of the undifferentiated nature of greenhouse gas emissions from all global sources and their worldwide accumulation over long periods of time, the pleadings make clear that there is no realistic possibility of tracing any particular alleged effect of global warming to any particular emissions by any specific person, entity, group at any particular point in time.”

The decision will undoubtedly be appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, a court known for its liberal outlook.  At the same time, one of the other lawsuits, involving allegations that energy companies’ emissions contributed to Hurricane Katrina, is now pending and awaiting decision in the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.  Defendants in the Second Circuit Connecticut v. AEP case are currently considering whether to seek rehearing.  Ultimately, this issue may end up in the Supreme Court.

See our discussion of the Second Circuit Connecticut v. AEP case and the issues these global warming tort lawsuits raise.

* * *

P.S., I also blogged on the Second Circuit case here.

EPA “Tailoring Rule” confirms Mass v. EPA set the stage for administrative quagmire and economic disaster

by Marlo Lewis on October 1, 2009 · 1 comment

in Features, Global Warming, Legal, Zeitgeist

Updated at 10/1/09 4:47 PM

I’ve just begun reading EPA’s proposed Tailoring Rule to establish a new 25,000 tons per year (TPY) ”major stationary source” applicability threshold for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions under the Clean Air Act’s Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) pre-construction permitting program and Title V operating permits program. I’ll blog about this again later on, but for now I just want to say, “We told ya so!”

Attorney Peter Glaser, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, CEI and a host of other free market groups warned repeatedly that regulating GHG emissions from new motor vehicles — the immediate policy objective of plaintiffs in the Supreme Court global warming case, Massachusetts v. EPA – would have the following consequences:

  1. CO2 would automatically become an air pollutant “subject to regulation” under the PSD and Title V programs.
  2. Millions of previously unregulated entities — big box stores, enclosed malls, hotels, apartment complexes, mid-sized office buildings, even commercial kitchens — would be vulnerable to new controls, paperwork, penalties, and litigation.
  3. The volume of permit applications would create an administrative quagmire for EPA and state environmental permitting agencies.
  4. The new costs, uncertainties, and delays would create an unprecedented roadblock to new construction and economic development, turning the Clean Air Act into a gigantic Anti-Stimulus program.

Predictably, global warming activists, such as Sierra Club climate council David Bookbinder, a plaintiff in Massachusetts v. EPA, derided these concerns as a “bugaboo,” a “red herring,” and a “pure scare tactic” by industry foes of regulatory climate policy. (See segments 1:47 – 1:48 and 2:03 – 2:05 of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee’s Archived Webcast).

EPA’s July 30, 2008 Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking: Regulating Greenhouse Gas Emissions under the Clean Air Act (ANPR) acknowledged that applying PSD to CO2 might increase the volume of permit applications by an “order of magnitude” (p. 44499), might “overwhelm” the administrative resources of permitting authorities (p. 44507), and might subject sources to new costs, uncertainties, and delays (p. 44502). However, the ANPR considerably understated the risks, Glaser, the Chamber, and CEI argued.

Well, you can now get the lowdown straight from the horse’s mouth.  Here’s what EPA’s Tailoring Rule says:

If PSD and Title V requirements apply at the applicability levels provided under the CAA, state permitting authorities would be paralyzed by permit applications in numbers that are orders of magnitude [not a mere "order of magnitude," as in the ANPR] greater than their current administrative resources could accomodate [p. 1].

* * *

If PSD and Title V requirements apply at the applicability levels provided under the CAA, many small sources would be burdened by the costs of individualized PSD control technology requirements and permit applications. In addition, state permitting authorities would be paralyzed by enormous numbers of these permit applications; the numbers are orders of magnitude greater than the current inventory of permits and would vastly exceed the current administrative resources of the permitting authorities [pp. 15-16]

* * *

In short, without this tailoring rule, the administrative burdens would be immense, and they would immediately and completely overwhelm the permitting authorities. Without this tailoring rule, permitting authorities would receive approximately 40,000 PSD permit applications each year — currently, they receive approximately 300 — and they would be required to issue Title V permits for approximately some six million sources — currently, their Title V inventory is some 15,000 sources [p. 19].

* * *

Based on our GHG threshold data analyis, we estimate that almost 41,000 new and modified facilities per year would be subject to PSD review, based on the current rate of modifications at major sources, if a GHG major sourcee threshold of 250 TPY CO2e [carbon dioxide equivalent] were applied. Compared to the 280 PSD permits currently issued last year, this would be an increase in permits of more than 140-fold [p. 50].

* * *

Based on these assumptions [permitting agency costs in time and money to process a PSD permit for a commercial or residential GHG source would be only 20% of the time and money required to process a permit for an industrial GHG source], the additional annual permitting burden for permitting authorities, on a national basis, is estimated to be 3.3 million hours at a cost of $257 million to include all GHG emitters above the 250-TPY threshold [pp. 51-52].

* * *

Most significant [of new Title V obligations triggered by GHG regulation of new motor vehicles] are the more than six million sources of GHGs that would become newly subject to Title V requirements because they exceed the 100-TPY threshold for GHG but did not for previously regulated pollutants. Although there are generally not applicable requirements for GHGs that apply to such sources [a gross understatement -- although there are generally no Clean Air Act requirements, period, that apply to such sources], these six million sources would be required to submit a Title V permit application within 1 year [pp. 56-57].

* * *

Obviously, this massive influx of permit applications would overwhelm permitting authorities’ administrative resources. Indeed, permitting authorities report that they currently are having difficulty keeping up with their existing permit workloads. The Tite V Operating Permits System database, which tracks permit issuance, confirms that issuance of many permits is already delayed. By increasing the volume of permits by over 400 times, the administrative burden would be unmanageable [p. 58].

* * *

We estimate that for permitting authorities, the average new commercial or residential [Title V] permit would require 43 hours to process, which is 10 percent of the time needed for the average industrial permit . . . We estimate that the total nationwide additional burden for permitting authorities for Title V permits from adding GHG emissions at the 100-TPY threshold would be 340 imllion hours, which would cost over $15 billion [p. 59].

These burdens are “absurd,” EPA argues, because they are “inconsistent” with “congressional intent,” indeed would “undermine congressional purposes” (p. 19). Hence, EPA concludes, it is justified in effectively amending the statute, upping the PSD and Title V applicability thresholds for major sources from 100/250 TPY to 25,000 TPY.

Well, somebody needs to point out the obvious. The looming threat of an economy-chilling administrative quagmire didn’t just happen. The absurdity of agencies spending 340 million hours and $15 billion to process hollow operating permits didn’t suddenly spring forth from the text of Title V. Nothing in the Clean Air Act has changed since it was amended in 1977 and 1990 to turn it into an economic wrecking ball. Congress is still debating cap-and-trade, and never signed off on EPA using the Clean Air Act to control CO2 emissions from stationary sources. No, the absurd results are entirely a product of Mass. v. EPA. So is the necessity for EPA now to amend clear and unambiguous statutory language, violating the separation of powers.

When a court decision leads to absurd results, there are only two possibilities. (1) The absurdity was lurking in the statute all along and the court simply brought it to light; or (2) the court messed up, manufacturing absurdity in an otherwise sane and reasonably coherent law. My comment on EPA’s proposed endangerment finding (especially pp. 28-33) argues the blame lies with the Court, not those who drafted and enacted the Clean Air Act.

Policy Peril Segment 8: Coal (updated 08/26/2009)

by Marlo Lewis on August 18, 2009 · 1 comment

in Global Warming, Odds & Ends

Today’s excerpt from CEI’s film, Policy Peril: Why Global Warming Policies Are More Dangerous Than Global Warming Itself, is on the global warming movement’s anti-coal campaign and the dangers it poses to U.S. consumers and the economy. To watch today’s clip, click here. To watch the entire film, click here.

The text of today’s excerpt follows. I provide additional commentary and links to supporting information in the footnotes.

Narrator: First and foremost, they want to ban construction of new coal-fired power plants. [1] Why? Coal is the most carbon-intensive fuel. It releases the most carbon dioxide per unit of energy produced. [2]

More importantly, emissions from new coal plants are expected to swamp, by as much as five to one, all the emission reductions that Europe, Canada, and Japan might achieve under the U.N. global warming treaty, the Kyoto Protocol. Either global warming activists kill coal, or coal will bury Kyoto. [3]

coal-v-kyoto

Figure Source: Myron Clayton, New coal plants bury ‘Kyoto,’ Christian Science Monitor, 23 December 2004.

Narrator: To be fair, the activists say they’ll allow new coal generation, if the power plants deploy something called CCS, carbon capture and storage technology. [5] The idea is that instead of releasing CO2 into the air, the power stations would capture it, liquefy it, and then transport it to underground storage sites. [6] There’s just one problem. No commercial coal plants today have CCS technology. [7]

I asked Mary Hutzler, formerly head of analysis at the Energy Information Administration, how long it would take just to determine whether a CCS system would be economical for utilities to build.

Mary Hutzler, former Acting Acting Administrator, Energy Information Administration: It probably requires an immense amount of research and development. People have told me 1o to 15 years alone. [8]

Narrator: Mary also told me that building a national CCS pipeline network could take another decade. Developing the regulations would also take years. [9] So the proposed moratorium is really a ban on new coal plants for 20 years or more.

What’s the risk here? New coal generation is forecast to supply two-thirds of all new electric power over the next two decades. By 2030, new coal generation is expected to provide 15% of all our electricity. [10] So banning it, could create one heck of a power deficit. Frequent blackouts and power failures–an energy crisis would not be an unlikely consequence. At a minimum, our electric bills would go way up.

Narrator: But Al Gore is not content to ban new coal plants. He now proposes to scrap all existing coal plants and natural gas power plants too. He says we must replace all carbon-based electricity with carbon-free electricity in just 10 years–by 2018. [11]

Ben Lieberman (Heritage Foundation): The idea is absolutely off the charts, unrealistic. [12]

Dr. Patrick Michaels (Cato Institute): Al Gore is proposing the literally, physically impossible. [12]

 Commentary

[1] James Hansen, the NASA scientist whose congressional testimony during the hot summer of 1988 launched the global warming movement, calls coal power plants ”factories of death“ and “the single greatest threat to civilization and all life on our planet.” The “top priority of any climate policy must be to stop the building of traditional coal plants,” writes climate crusader Joe Romm. He continues: “A climate policy that does not start by achieving at least the first goal, a moratorium on coal without CCS, must be labeled a failure.” “The silver bullet [for global warming] is no more coal,” says Architecture 2030. “Kill Coal. Coal is the enemy of the human race,” declares the Sustainable Development Issues Network. My Google search shows that global warming and coal are discussed on some 4,470,000 Web sites. It’s a safe bet most of those sites share the Gorethodox sentiments quoted above. 

[2] Different fossil (carbon-based) fuels emit different amounts of CO2 in relation to the energy they produce. For a variety of fuels, the U.S. Energy Information Administration compares pounds of CO2 emitted per energy output measured in British thermal units (Btu).

Fuel                                                        Pounds/Btu

Natural Gas                                          117

Liquefied petroleum gas                 139

Gasoline                                                156

Coal (bituminous)                             205

Coal (subituminous)                        213

Coal (lignite)                                       215

Petroleum coke                                 225

Coal (anthrocite)                              227

From these numbers, we can calculate the emission ratios (or relative CO2 intensity) of the fuels. For example, bituminous coal is 1.37 times more CO2-intensive than gasoline, and 1.75 more CO2-intensive than natural gas.

[3] The Christian Science Monitor chart shown above and in the film clip is based on late 2004 estimates by UDI-Platts, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), and unspecified industry sources. David Hawkins of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), in a February 2005 speech, presented a similar bottom line, based on International Energy Agency (IEA) data. He said:

 The International Energy Agency (IEA) forecasts that 1400 GW of new coal plants will be built worldwide in the next 25 years alone. To put that in context, current U.S. coal capacity is about 330 GW and global capacity is 1000 GW. This enormous increase in coal capacity will lock us into a huge additional commitment to global warming unless we use technologies that reduce CO2 emissions to minimal levels; marginal efficiency improvements will not prevent this lock-in.

The lifetime emissions from just this next wave of coal investment will be about 580 billion tons of CO2. That amount is more than half the total loading of the atmosphere with CO2 from all forms of fossil fuel combustion in the past 250 years!

Build scores or hundreds of new coal plants, and the Kyoto CO2 reductions barely amount to a drop in the bucket. As has been widely reported, China is building coal power plants at the rate of one a week.

[5] A wide-ranging coalition of environmental groups called “Coal Moratorium Now“ demands that no new coal-fired power station be built unless it is equipped with carbon capture and storage. In 2008, Reps. Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Ed Markey (D-MA)–the authors of the 2009 Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill (H.R. 2454, the American Clean Energy and Security Act)–introduced legislation (H.R. 5575) to impose a moratorium on new coal plants lacking CCS. In March 2009, state legislators introduced a similar bill in Texas. In April 2009, the UK Government proposed regulations requiring new coal plants to install CCS on at least 400 MW of output–about 25% of the output of an average power station. In addition, the power stations would have to capture 100% of their emissions by 2025–if the applicable technology exists by then. That’s a big “if.”

[6] A wealth of both basic and technical information on CCS is available in studies by MIT, the U.S. Government Accounting Office, the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), the Congressional Research Service, the Department of Energy (DOE), and Glaser et al. (2008).

[7] Oil companies sometimes inject CO2 into wells to squeeze more petroleum out of them–a technique called enhanced oil recovery (OER). Sometimes people talk as if a CCS system could piggy-back on EOR projects. But, as MIT’s Future of Coal report points out, CO2 injection for EOR has “limited significance for long-term, large-scale CO2 sequestration–regulations differ, the capacity of EOR projects is inadequate for large-scale deployment, the geologic formation has been disrupted by production, and EOR projects are usually not well instrumented [monitored for CO2 leakage; p. xiii].”

The Department of Energy (DOE), citing rising costs, pulled the plug on FutureGen, a $1.5 billion government-industry partnership to build the world’s first commercial scale CCS power plant. In July 2009, however, FutureGen Alliance, Inc. announced it had reached an agreement with DOE to begin “construction of the first commercial-scale, fully integrated carbon capture and sequestration project in the country in Matton, Ill.” So there is still not even a commercial-scale demonstration project, though there may be in the next few years.

[8] MIT’s March 2007 Future of Coal report calls for large demonstration projects in 3-4 sites in different regions of the country costing “$500 million over eight years.” Better still, MIT argues, “Five large tests could be planned an executed for under $1 billion, and address the chief concerns for roughly 70% of U.S. [coal generation] capacity. Information from these projects would validate the commercial scalability of  geologic carbon storage and provide a basis for regulatory, legal, and financial decisions needed to ensure safe, reliable, economic sequestration” (p. 54).

EPRI’s Bryan Hannegan estimated in March 2007 that CO2 capture (including compression, transportation, and storage) would increase the levelized cost of an Integrated Gassification Combined Cycle (IGCC) coal power plant by ”about 40-50%” (p. 5). IGCC is already more costly than the more common pulverized coal (PC) power plants. EPRI is confident that additional RD&D will lower carbon capture costs. But by how much and how soon is uncertain.

A February 2009 Stanford University study, citing a September 2008 McKinsey & Co. study and other sources, says that CCS is projected to increase the capital costs of new coal power plants by almost 50%. “On the basis of avoided emissions, the cost of CCS ranges from $30-$90/ tonne CO2, which translates into a 60-80% increase in the levelized cost of electricity ($/MWh).” 

A July 2009 Harvard University study estimates that early adopters of carbon capture technology will incur a cost of $100-$150/ton of CO2 avoided (equivalent to 8-12 cents/kWh). Once the technology matures, the additional cost will fall to $35-$50/ton of CO2 avoided (equivalent to 2-5 cents/kWh), the researchers estimate. For comparison, in 2009, residential electric rates were 20.9 cents/kWh in Connecticut, 9.2 cents/kWh in Kansas, and 14.6 cents/kWh in California.

How long between early adoption and technological maturity? According to the researchers, increasing scale, learning by doing, and technological innovation “are expected to reduce abatement [CO2 capture] costs by approximately 65% by 2030, although such estimates are inevitably uncertain” (emphasis added). 

In plain speak, it may take many years to sort out the economics of CCS.

[9] The scale of the network of pipelines and storage sites required to transport and bury CO2 from U.S. coal power plants is staggering. According to MIT’s Future of Coal report (p. ix):

  • The United States produces about 1.5 billion tons per year of CO2 from coal-burning power plants.
  • If all of this is CO2 is transported for sequestration, the quantity is equivalent to three times the weight and, under typical operating conditions, one-third the annual volume of natural gas transported by the U.S. gas pipeline system.
  • If 60% of the CO2 produced from U.S. coal-based power generation were to be captured and compressed into a liquid for geologic sequestration, its volume would about equal the total U.S. oil consumption of 20 million barrels per day.
  • At present the largest sequestration project is injecting one millions tons/year of carbon dioxide (CO2) from the Sleipner gas field into a saline aquifer under the North Sea.

Even if Congress approves such a system, and major environmental groups support it, NIMBY (“not in my backyard”) protests and litigation could block or delay implementation for many years. Some people just don’t like energy projects, regardless of how “green” the projects purport to be. For the gory details, check out the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s ”Project No Project“ Web site. 

[10] Two-thirds of all new generation and 15% of total U.S. electric supply–these estimates came from the Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) 2008 Annual Energy Outlook. See the figure below.

eia-2008-coal-electric-generation

Coal’s estimated share of new generation and total generation are lower in EIA’s Annual Energy Outlook 2009. EIA forecasts that from 2007 to 2030, new coal generation will provide 64% of all new generation and 9% of total U.S. electric supply. See the figure below.

eia-2009-coal-electric-generation1

Actually, it’s remarkable that EIA still forecasts a robust increase in electric generation from coal. Coal increasingly operates in a politically hostile, litigious environment. The Sierra Club, for example, claims that its activists, lawyers, and allies, working with state and local leaders, have prevented 100 planned coal power plants from being built over the past eight years. Click here for a partial list.

For example, even in Texas, an energy-producing state, environmental activists stopped TXU Corp. from building eight of 11 planned new coal power plants, despite estimates by the Perryman Group that investment in the new plants, over five years, would add $25.8 billion to state GDP, $17.3 billion to in-state personal income, and 389,000-plus person-years of employment.

[11] I’m not making this up. The text and video of Gore’s speech calling for carbon-free electricity by 2018 are available here.

[12] According to the EIA, in 2008, renewable sources generated 356 billion kWh, of which 259.7 billion kWh, or 73%, came from conventional hydro-electric dams. Total net generation by the electric power sector was 3852 billion kWh. So renewables provided only 9% of total generation, which means that only about 2.4% came from the politically-correct renewables–wind, biomass, solar, and geothermal.

Note that non-hydro renewable sources would provide even less electricity but for a plethora of market-rigging federal and state tax breaks and subsidies and Soviet-style production quotas known as renewable portfolio standards.

Coal and natural gas provided 2654 billion kWh, or about 69% of total U.S. electric generation in 2008. Gore and his allies would undoubtedly oppose the construction of new large hydroelectric dams even if suitable sites were available. So what Gore and “We Can Solve It” are proposing to do, is replace the 69% of our electricity that comes from coal and natural gas with the non-hydro renewables that currently supply only 2.4%–all in 10 years. 

This plan would fail–dismally. Our electricity rates would skyrocket, because the demand for renewable electricity, ramped up by mandates, would vastly exceed supply. No transition that big and that fast would be smooth. Service disruptions and blackouts would likely be frequent and perversive–a chronic energy crisis.

Gore’s plan would also set a world record for government waste, since hundreds of profitable coal and natural gas power plants would have to be decommissioned long before the end of their useful lives.   

 To read previous posts in this series, click on the links below:

Will Lisa Jackson turn the Clean Air Act into a gigantic de-stimulus package?

by Marlo Lewis on February 19, 2009

in Deregulate to Stimulate, Energy, Global Warming, Legal

Earlier this week, in a letter to Sierra Club climate council David Bookbinder, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said the Agency would reconsider, via a notice-and-comment rulemaking, a Bush-EPA memorandum interpreting regulations that determine whether carbon dioxide (CO2) is currently subject to emission controls under the Clean Air Act’s Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) pre-construction permitting program. [click to continue…]