The New York Legislature Takes Action on a Number of Pieces of Legislation Related to Climate Change
The 2008 New York legislative session came to a close on June 27th. With so much attention on climate change and rising energy prices, its not surprising that several pieces of legislation relating to the environment and energy were passed by both the State Senate and the State Assembly and are currently awaiting action by the Governor.
One significant legislative initiative driven by Governor David Paterson was the adoption by the Senate and Assembly of an expanded net metering law to allow businesses, municipalities and non-profit utility customers to receive credit on their utility bill for excess energy produced through solar or wind technologies. Under current law only residential customers are allowed to sell power back to the utilities. While non-residential customers will be capped at the lesser of 2 mega watts or their peak load, the expansion of net-metering is expected to further spur the development of solar and wind projects in New York.
The Senate and Assembly also came together to pass legislation that provides a 4 year real property tax abatement for solar electric generating systems placed in service in New York City. The abatement ranges from 5 percent - 8 ¾ percent of the cost of the solar equipment depending on whether the equipment is placed in service. Again, this legislation (coupled with the net-metering expansion mentioned above) is expected to spur development of solar projects in New York City.
Continue Reading...Climate Change and Aviation Fuel: A Tough Problem to Solve
Large aircraft require high energy fuel, and lots of it. But jet fuel is very difficult to clean up to satisfy climate protection imperatives, which has led to a major dispute in the US over the role coal-to-liquids and other alternative aviation fuels may play. Congress, the US Air Force, the major airlines, the US Environmental Protection Agency, its Federal Aviation Administration, a special Defense Department task force, coal-state senators, and many, many others are getting into the dogfight, which may go on for a long time.
Continue Reading...NGO Campaign Addresses NEPA and Climate
A recent spate of activities by environmental organizations shows the expanded scope and sophistication of the campaign by non-governmental environmental organizations (NGOs) to convince, or force, federal agencies to analyze potential climate impacts in environmental impact statements mandated by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). A recent blog addressed efforts to get federal NEPA guidelines amended to require this, but this is just one small step in a wider effort.
Continue Reading...Who's in the Driver's Seat? Washington vs the States, Agency vs Agency
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) recently dealt a blow to both EPA and the states by proposing preemptive federal fuel economy standards (corporate average fuel economy or CAFE standards) that not only negate the states’ efforts to regulate fuel economy and vehicle greenhouse emissions but also directly challenge EPA’s leading role in regulating vehicle emissions. Will the courts, Congress, or a presidential administration sort out the traffic jam over authority to reduce vehicle greenhouse emissions? At this writing, the governors of twelve states are weighing in against what they view as a “cynical” power grab by the NHTSA, but resolution is nowhere in sight. [summary]
Continue Reading...The US's Existing Climate Protection Laws: Will They Work?
Congress in 2008
Federal climate change legislation may be on the way. The Senate has targeted a vote in June, and the House by the end of the year, although a bill both chambers can agree upon is unlikely until 2009, if then. It would be a great mistake, however, to view 2008 as a lost year on the climate front. The fundamental elements of Senate and House bills will be debated and accessible to all who probe beneath the surface. The fundamental regulatory structure and economic impact of climate legislation will have been thrashed over thoroughly by the end of the year. To interested stakeholders, the time to weigh in is now. [summary]
Obtaining GHG Credits Through Managing Water Supply Systems
Most recent climate-oriented discussions of water supply and quality have focused on the potential for altered precipitation, stream flows, groundwater recharge, and other impacts of regional climate change. These impacts are more likely than not to be severe in some locales, and thought is being given to the development of new infrastructure to address these changes (see related item on climate adaptation). But in addition to these obvious impacts on water supply and quality, it is now apparent that "non-trivial" greenhouse gas emissions are associated with the treatment of drinking water and sewage. [summary]
Continue Reading...Global Climate Change Under NEPA
Increasingly, the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) is being seen as a vehicle for ensuring that the federal government considers the impact of its actions on global climate change. Relying on a string of judicial decisions that require agency NEPA impact statements specifically to address the climate consequences of agency actions, environmental organizations have petitioned the President’s Council on Environmental Quality to conform its NEPA guidelines to the requirements of these cases. Climate will clearly figure prominently in future federal impact statements, and non-federal stakeholders, who often are the real parties in interest in NEPA compliance, would be wise to address climate early and often when developing their NEPA compliance strategies. [summary]
Continue Reading...Food vs. Fuel and Impacts on Climate Change: Biofuels Under Siege
Concern about world food prices and shortages is causing law makers in both the EU and the US to consider either a moratorium or a cutback in biofuels production. In particular, ethanol produced from corn is being blamed as a significant contributor to the world food crisis. [summary]
Continue Reading...The SEC is Getting Hot and Bothered over Climate Change
Publicly-traded companies should evaluate whether global warming (or, if you prefer, climate change) is reasonably likely to have a material impact on the company's future financial performance. If the company concludes that there is a material impact, it must disclose that conclusion to the US Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) in various periodic reports.
As the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) stated in its 2007 report, evidence of climate change "is unequivocal, as it is now evident from observations of increases in global average air and ocean temperatures, widespread melting of snow and ice, and rising global average sea level" (see IPCC Report, Summary for Policymakers, in Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis at 5). Thus, the only question is whether the potential consequences of these physical effects of global warming on the company - such as damage to company property, interruption of revenue streams that such property generate, increased costs to comply with regulations attempting to minimize global warming, and potential liability in lawsuits seeking damages from parties perceived as causing global warming - are "reasonably likely" to have a "material" impact on a company's financial performance.
How to interpret and apply these two expansive and as-yet poorly defined terms in the context of climate change, given the unknown time horizons during which the financial impacts may arise, is the $64 or $640 million question publicly traded companies must now answer. [summary]
