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With health care legislation finally wrapped up, there should be more attention from Congress on climate and energy legislation. This article from the Economist gives a good summary of which policy tools are likely to be promoted in new legislation emerging from the Senate, and cap-and-trade doesn’t seem to be a favorite. This New York Times article asks “Why did cap and trade die?” while mentioning other emerging proposals, like cap-and-dividend.
The City of Los Angeles is planning a 5% utility rate increase to create incentives for the adoption of solar photovoltaic energy.
Wal-Mart is moving forward with plans to green its supply chain by working with suppliers to reduce greenhouse gas emissions associated with products sold at Wal-Mart. This will put additional pressure on other retailers to take similar actions.
On California’s coast in Davenport, an idea being discussed is to revive the cement plant and use carbon dioxide exhaust to make a new variety of greener cement in an adjacent process. Cement products, because of carbon dioxide emissions associated with production, are an important source of CO2 reductions, but knowing just how much CO2 is sequestered in the process requires detailed life cycle analysis. A life cycle analysis of this project would be valuable information.
Money from the recovery and reinvestment act will go toward a solar financing program CaliforniaFIRST. Like many of the local programs have been pursued, the financing program will leverage future property tax revenues. The program will lend out $200 million, which could be up to 100 MW of of renewble energy. Though an interest rate around 7 or 8% may still too high to be effective.
In a move that sets up a clash with California’s low carbon fuel standard, the EPA yesterday finalized rules for the renewable fuel standard. While both programs incorporate land use change in their life cycle analyses, the controversy stems from different carbon intensity values for particular biofuels in the LCFS and RFS.
A new life cycle analysis published in the Journal of Environmental Science and Technology suggests that even substituting part of the coal at coal fired power plants with biomass could have significant low-cost emissions reductions.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission determined today that companies “must consider the effects of global warming and efforts to curb climate change when disclosing business risks to investors.” Companies must also disclose risks posed by climate change to the investors.
New CEQA (California Environmental Quality Act) guidelines, adopted at the end of 2009, require that Environmental Impact Statements now include information on climate change impacts, which involves calculating and reporting greenhouse gas emissions. A brief summary of the changes notes that Federal regulations will soon follow suit.
Solargen is building the world’s largest solar array in the rural Panoche Valley south of Hollister. The 420 MW project does not come without controversy as many local residents of the area oppose the project, with concerns including impacts to several rare and endangered species. A review of Solargen’s website found no information about any life cycle analysis for the project, so its unclear what the greenhouse gas reduction potential for the project is.
