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THE PLAY FOR CARBON PRICING: A group of House Democrats is making a push for the Biden administration to include a carbon price as part of its green infrastructure package, going against the grain of the party, which has largely moved on to favor other climate policies.
Rep. Ted Deutch of Florida told reporters today that he and 28 co-sponsors introduced a carbon tax and dividend bill last week, one that would return the revenue to households, in order to force the policy into negotiations between Congress and the administration.
“It’s premature to talk about where this is ultimately going to go,” Deutch said. “We believe strongly this needs to be part of the plan.”
Deutch’s comments come a few days after White House climate adviser Gina McCarthy all but closed the door on a carbon price, telling reporters that President Joe Biden‘s “choice” was to “look at” a clean electricity standard as part of the infrastructure bill as its main mechanism to eliminate carbon emissions from the power sector by 2035.
Given the small margin by which Democrats control the House, Deutch and co-sponsors have the power to stop Biden’s infrastructure package if it includes a clean electricity standard and not a carbon price, but he and his colleagues dodged a question by Josh on if they would oppose legislation on that premise.
But co-sponsor Rep. Scott Peters, Democrat of California, told Josh that he’s expressed “concern” to administration officials about the infrastructure plan not including a carbon price and he said it would be “irresponsible” to dismiss the policy because of “presumed political difficulties.”
Why they are holding out hope: Peters said a carbon price, which would address emissions across the economy, not just the power sector, is an “indispensable” component of any climate policy portfolio. He argued that the administration’s infrastructure plan is in its “early stages” and noted that Biden has said he’s open to other ideas than what he proposed.
The Democratic proponents referenced key Biden administration officials, including Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, who support carbon pricing. Yellen is a founding member of the Climate Leadership Council, which promotes a carbon tax and dividend approach. They also claimed a carbon price is more viable with Republicans because of the recent endorsement of the American Petroleum Institute.
Their bill has no Republican co-sponsors, but Deutch said the Democrats have been discussing the legislation with GOP colleagues.
“We couldn’t wait to introduce a bill,” he said, underscoring the urgency of it being a part of infrastructure negotiations.
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THE WAGE GAP BETWEEN GREEN AND FOSSIL FUEL JOBS: Workers in wind, solar, and other green industries earn significantly less than fossil fuel workers, challenging Biden’s effort to sell his infrastructure and climate plan as a creator of high-paying jobs of the future.
The medium hourly wage for solar industry workers is $24.48, and $25.95 for wind power employees, compared to $28.69 for the coal sector and $30.33 for natural gas, according to a report released this morning by the Energy Futures Initiative, run by former Obama administration Energy secretary Ernest Moniz.
Utility employees who run power plants receive a median hourly wage of $41.08, the highest in the energy sector, followed by workers in nuclear power, who require more training, at $39.19 per hour. But the nuclear industry accounts for less than 1% of total energy jobs.
Despite this disparity, wind and solar jobs are growing rapidly, increasing by 22% from 2015 to 2019. Petroleum and natural gas industry employment has grown by nearly 9% over that time, while coal sector jobs have fallen by 18%.
Energy industry jobs are quality ones: Energy workers as a whole earn more than the average American, with a median hourly wage of $25.60 compared to $19.14 nationally.
Energy industry employment was also more resilient during the pandemic compared to other industries. At the peak of job losses in April, the nation saw a roughly 20% decline in employment, while the energy industry lost 12% of its jobs. From June through December, the energy industry added back 324,000 jobs, though it remains 9% below peak employment at the end of 2019.
MEANWHILE, CHINA’S COAL BOOM UNDERCUTS CLOSURES ELSEWHERE: Record coal plant retirements in the U.S. and European Union last year were offset by a boom in China, according to a report this morning led by Global Energy Monitor.
A record-tying 37.8 gigawatts of coal plants were retired in 2020, led by the U.S. with 11.3 GW and the E.U. with 10.1 GW. (There were more coal plants closures in former President Donald Trump’s four years compared to the second Obama administration term).
But China commissioned 38.4 GW of new coal plants in 2020, comprising 76% of the global total (50.3 GW).
China really is a lone wolf: Interestingly, outside China, coal plant development is collapsing in Asia, as Bangladesh, the Philippines, Vietnam, and Indonesia have announced plans to cut up to 62 GW of planned coal power. In India, a top emitting country with a growing population, coal power capacity rose by just 0.7 GW in 2020.
Lauri Myllyvirta, lead analyst of the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air, which co-authored the report, challenged China to cancel the dozens of new coal power projects it announced last year in order to prove it’s serious about having emissions peak before 2030 and reaching carbon neutrality by 2060.
“Cancelling them would put the country on track to the low-carbon development the leadership says it wants to pursue,” Myllyvirta said.
STATE ATTORNEYS GENERAL ASK GARLAND TO SWITCH SIDES IN CLIMATE CASES: The attorneys general from five states and D.C. are calling on Attorney General Merrick Garland to reverse positions the Trump administration took supporting oil companies in lawsuits their offices have brought to hold the industry accountable for the costs of climate change damages.
The Trump administration’s positions “are not only misplaced—as almost all the courts to consider them have ruled to date— but also directly contravene President Biden’s 2020 pledge to ‘strategically support ongoing plaintiff-driven climate litigation against polluters,’” the attorneys general wrote in a letter yesterday. They referenced Biden’s pledge in his campaign climate plans suggesting he would back the states and cities suing oil companies for climate damages.
Oil companies now face two dozen lawsuits from cities and states seeking to force the industry to pay damages for the costs of adapting to climate change. The Trump administration had sided with oil industry attempts to hamstring the lawsuits, in part by moving them from state court to federal court, which the companies see as a more favorable venue.
The oil industry has lost several of those bids to move the cases to federal court. On its last full day in office, the Trump administration argued before the Supreme Court backing oil companies’ appeal on the issue in a climate case brought by Baltimore.
In their letter, the attorneys general call on Garland to urgently withdraw the Trump administration’s legal briefs supporting the oil companies where possible, or to tell the court its position has changed in instances where it can’t scrap the filings. The letter was signed by the attorneys general from Minnesota, Massachusetts, Delaware, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and D.C.
FINANCIAL STABILITY BOARD TO OFFER CLIMATE ‘ROADMAP’: The global Financial Stability Board will present a “coordinated, forward-looking roadmap” to the G20 governments outlining actions policymakers should take in the next few years to address climate-related risks to the financial system, wrote FSB Chair Randal Quarles, a member of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, in a letter this morning to G20 finance ministers.
“[I]t has never been more important to speak with one voice on a forward direction,” Quarles said. He added the FSB has invited the Network for Greening the Financial System, a group of global central banks working on climate change that the Federal Reserve officially joined late last year, to help with its climate work. The FSB will apply for observer status in the network, he said.
Quarles noted that the FSB is slated to present two reports to the G20 in July, focused on climate disclosure and on data gaps when assessing climate change risks to the financial system. The FSB also supports work by the International Financial Reporting Standards Foundation to speed up the development of consistent climate reporting standards for companies, Quarles said.
Yellen touts climate work: Yellen, in remarks to the Coalition of Finance Ministers for Climate Action this morning, said her agency is playing a critical role in implementing the Biden administration’s climate agenda.
For example, the Treasury Department is backing global efforts to identify “climate-aligned investments” and call on banks and other financial institutions to match their portfolios with the Paris climate agreement, Yellen said, according to prepared remarks. She also highlighted Treasury’s work co-chairing the G20’s sustainable finance group.
OXY ANNOUNCES NEW CO2 UTILIZATION PROJECT: Oxy Low Carbon Ventures, a subsidiary of oil company Occidental, announced this morning it is partnering with bioengineering startup Cemvita Factory on a pilot project that will use captured carbon dioxide to create ethylene, a compound widely used in the chemical industry.
The pilot plant, which is expected to begin operation in 2022, will start as a one metric ton per month project, the companies said.
“Our bio-synthetic process simply requires CO2, water and light to produce bio-ethylene, and that’s why it saves a lot of cost and carbon emissions,” said Moji Karimi, co-founder and CEO of Cemvita Factory. The project is the latest carbon capture, storage, and utilization investment from Oxy, which is also developing carbon capture projects attached to ethanol facilities and a direct air capture project in the Permian Basin.
BIDEN JOBS PLAN DOESN’T REPLACE EPA POLLUTION RULES, REGAN SAYS: Biden’s promised investments to replace every lead service line in the U.S. as part of his infrastructure package doesn’t take away the need for the EPA to issue strict pollution rules targeting lead in drinking water, EPA Administrator Michael Regan said yesterday.
“By no means does this investment replace our regulatory obligations, or the aggressiveness by which we will pursue remedies through proper science data and the statutory authority that has been bestowed upon this agency,” Regan said during a virtual roundtable with water utility officials and local policymakers.
The EPA said last month it would extend the effective date of Trump administration revisions to decades-old standards targeting lead in drinking water and seek further public input on the regulations. Environmentalists argued the Trump administration’s changes were far too weak and allowed water utilities more time to replace their lead pipes.
Last week, the EPA announced plans for a series of virtual listening sessions on the lead and copper rule over the next several months.
During the roundtable yesterday, Regan also touted the $111 billion investment included in Biden’s infrastructure plans to replace lead service lines, tackle other contaminants such as PFAS, and upgrade infrastructure for drinking water, wastewater, and stormwater. Those investments can create hundreds of thousands of jobs, he said.
COURT SCRAPS TRUMP RULE LIMITING CLIMATE MANDATES: A federal appeals court yesterday vacated an 11th-hour Trump EPA action that sought to rule out greenhouse gas emissions controls for all sectors but the utility industry.
The three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit scrapped the rule at the Biden administration’s request, sending it back to the EPA for reconsideration. It’s unlikely the Biden team will seek to reinstitute any form of the policy, which would have exempted sectors such as oil and gas and heavy industry from greenhouse gas emissions limits.
UAE’S NUCLEAR MILESTONE: The United Arab Emirates started operating its first nuclear power plant today, which promises to provide 25% of the country’s electricity.
The Barakah nuclear power plant is expected to play a major role in UAE’s efforts to diversify away from oil and gas to lower carbon sources.
UAE has pledged to generate half its power from renewable and other clean sources such as nuclear by 2050.
The Rundown
Bloomberg Aramco’s new disclosures still exclude vast majority of its emissions
Washington Post Carbon dioxide spikes to critical record, halfway to doubling preindustrial levels
Wall Street Journal BP signals recovery for oil industry in wake of pandemic
Calendar
TUESDAY | APRIL 6
1 p.m. The National Association of State Energy Officials, Energy Futures Initiative, and BW Research Partnership will hold a virtual event to present supplemental analysis to the 2020 U.S. Energy and Employment Report.
WEDNESDAY | APRIL 14
11 a.m. Green 2.0, US Climate Action Network, Climate Nexus, and the National Black Environmental Justice Network will hold an event called, “The First 100 Days: The People’s Town Hall for Justice.” Speakers include Rep. Donald McEachin, D-Va. and Shalanda Baker, deputy director for energy justice at the Department of Energy.
TUESDAY | APRIL 20
12:30 p.m. The National Capital Area Chapter of the United States Association for Energy Economics’ will hold its annual Energy Policy Conference. The virtual event runs over two days.
