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WSJ: Emission Caps Hit Snags
by duane330＠aol.com 04 Dec '07

04 Dec '07

Kyoto's Caps on Emissions Hit Snag in Marketplace U.N. Mulls How to Fix Pollution-Credit System; 'Expecting Too Much' By JEFFREY BALL. Wall Street Journal, December 3, 2007; Page A1 The Kyoto Protocol was supposed to harness market forces to solve global warming. It slapped caps on greenhouse-gas emissions and set up a complex market for companies to trade permits to pollute. But it hasn't yet ignited the green-energy revolution its architects were expecting. The cap-and-trade system has brought about useful projects targeting a few especially potent greenhouse gases. It hasn't, however, forced the industrialized world to meaningfully curb what scientists say is the biggest problem of all -- the growing consumption of fossil fuels. Today, diplomats at a big United Nations global-warming conference in Bali, Indonesia, will begin looking for a fix as they open debate on a new global-warming agreement. Also this week, a Senate committee in Washington is scheduled to debate a proposed cap-and-trade system for greenhouse gases in the U.S., which opted not to ratify the Kyoto treaty. The Kyoto treaty requires the industrialized countries that ratified it to reduce their overall emissions by 5% from 1990 levels. The caps, which expire in 2012, will not go into effect until next year. But participating nations have spent several years scrambling to get ready. The European Union has already instituted caps on its member nations. This has fueled a nascent carbon-permit trading system: Countries and companies that can't meet the new requirements can buy emissions permits from others that can. Trading in permits hit $30 billion last year, according to the World Bank. Yet problems with the system loom large. The world's two biggest energy users, the U.S. and China, aren't subject to emissions caps. Countries that face the caps have been reluctant to push their industries too hard. And industry itself has proved adept at fulfilling its obligations without cutting down much on fossil fuels such as oil, coal and natural gas. It is doing this largely by funding projects in the developing world that destroy potent but uncommon greenhouse gases. "What has happened is, markets work as markets will do, to find the lowest-cost alternative," says Michael Zammit Cutajar, a Maltese diplomat who during the Kyoto talks was head of the U.N. body that gave birth to the carbon market. The cap-and-trade system was "a brilliant idea," he says, but implementing it has exposed the "tension between the market approach and the sustainable approach." The big question now is how to structure a carbon-trading system that's palatable to the U.S. and to developing countries such as China. The U.S. and China together account for about 40% of emissions of carbon dioxide from fossil-fuel combustion, which scientists say is the most common source of man-made greenhouse-gas emissions. That alone dwarfs the 28% share from the countries that did sign up for Kyoto caps, among them Canada, Japan and the nations of the EU, according to the Paris-based International Energy Agency. The politicians face a dilemma: They want emissions constraints to be tough enough to matter, but loose enough to persuade the U.S. and China to play greater roles. European nations have expressed a willingness to cut emissions deeply, but only if the U.S. does too. The U.S. and China are calling on one another to play ball. The broader question is whether a cap-and-trade system targeting industry is enough to meaningfully curb greenhouse gases. Some favor the introduction of carbon-emission taxes, such as an added tax on gasoline, saying that would push consumers to trim their energy use. Others say even blunter tools are needed, such as tougher government rules on the energy-efficiency of cars and buildings. Industry long has resisted such steps. The current carbon-trading system is producing modest environmental benefits. In Europe and Japan, where the Kyoto emissions caps are set to kick in next year, some companies have begun changing their operations as the effective cost of burning fossil fuel rises. If governments toughen emission caps in coming years, as is expected, the cost will rise further. But progress has been much slower than Kyoto's architects hoped for. Japan's emissions are rising, Canada has backed away from its target, and the EU says it will meet its goal only if member nations get tougher. Scientists say far bigger cuts than those called for in the treaty are needed. But global energy use is expected to rise by 50% by 2030. The U.S. pioneered the concept of harnessing markets to solve environmental problems. In 1995, it imposed a cap-and-trade program to curb power-plant emissions of sulfur dioxide, a pollutant that causes acid rain. Under that program, the federal government gives power plants yearly allocations of permits to emit sulfur dioxide. Power plants that are over the limit have a choice: cut their emissions or buy pollution permits from plants that don't need their entire allocations. The system has reduced U.S. sulfur-dioxide emissions from power plants by about 40% from 1990 levels. It's widely viewed as an environmental and economic success. In the talks leading to the Kyoto treaty, the U.S. argued successfully for using the cap-and-trade model to fight greenhouse gases. But because global warming involves many countries and many gases, solving the problem is far more complicated than addressing acid rain. The Kyoto treaty sets emissions limits for industrialized countries and for the EU, which decided itself how to divide the burden among member countries. Developing nations face no caps. Diplomats decided that it wasn't fair to burden their economies right away with pollution controls, given that the industrialized world had faced no restrictions during decades of growth. It's up to each participating nation to determine which companies to slap restrictions on. After a government sets an emissions limit for a company, it gives that company just enough permits to cover it. Companies that reduce emissions below their caps can sell excess credits to companies that don't have enough. Each company must decide how much to cut emissions and how many permits to buy from others. The EU's cap-and-trade system has been in effect since 2005. It's a dry run for the Kyoto treaty's emissions caps, which go into effect next year and run through 2012. Holcim Ltd., a Swiss cement maker, faces caps. In 2005 and 2006, it didn't need all its permits, so it sold a total of about one million of them for an average of about €11, or about $16, apiece, says Bruno Vanderborght, Holcim's vice president for environmental strategy. This year, Holcim increased cement production and needed to buy about 100,000 permits. Mr. Vanderborght says the company has improved its energy efficiency "slightly" and is looking to improve further. It has also been buying permits from another source: developing nations. The treaty includes a unique mechanism for involving the developing world in the process. Carbon-reduction projects in developing nations generate emissions permits, or credits, which can be sold to companies in industrialized nations facing emissions caps. In effect, these companies can fulfill some of their emission-reduction obligations by financing pollution-control projects in the developing world. The troubles with the system began even before it went into effect. In 1997, the U.S. Senate passed a resolution urging President Clinton not to embrace the Kyoto treaty, and soon after President Bush took office in 2001, he announced he wouldn't support emissions caps because they would be too costly for the economy. That made it tougher for the EU to force stringent emissions caps on its industry. Tough caps would make it harder for European companies to compete against American ones. In 2005, when Europe introduced its first round of caps, it kept them soft. As an added shock absorber, governments and companies began looking hard in the developing world for cheap emissions credits. Kyoto's architects now say they didn't anticipate how the projects in the developing world would suppress efforts to cut back on fossil-fuel use. Under the treaty, projects targeting more potent gases generate more credits than projects targeting carbon dioxide. The treaty covers six kinds of greenhouse gases. At one end of the spectrum is carbon dioxide. It accounts for 77% of all man-made greenhouse-gas emissions, the U.N. says, but it's also the weakest. At the other end is HFC-23, a byproduct of the manufacture of a common refrigerant. Every ton of it is 11,700 times as damaging to the atmosphere as a ton of carbon dioxide, according to the U.N. But despite its high potency, the gas accounts for less than 1% of the effect of man-made greenhouse-gas emissions, the U.N. says. Under the Kyoto trading system, each credit represents one "carbon-dioxide-equivalent" ton of avoided emissions. So a project that eliminates one ton of carbon-dioxide emissions generates one sellable credit. A project that gets rid of one ton of HFC-23 emissions generates 11,700. Installing machinery on a refrigerant plant to incinerate HFC-23 is cheap. According to the World Bank, generating one carbon credit through an HFC-23 project typically costs less than $1. Generating a credit from a renewable-energy project -- erecting a wind turbine or a solar panel -- can cost $5 to $10, the World Bank says. Such credits currently sell for as much as €17, or about $25. So the economic incentives to undertake HFC-23 projects have far exceeded those for fossil-fuel reduction projects. During the Kyoto talks, there wasn't much discussion about whether such disparities might focus too much activity on eliminating gases that aren't a big part of the overall problem, according to Mr. Cutajar, the Maltese diplomat who headed the U.N. body. The provision that allows industrialized countries to obtain credits in the developing world was "an add-on" late in the talks, he notes. "The general impression was that low-carbon development was about clean energy," Mr. Cutajar says. "It sounded good. It smelled good. It was only later that the details got worked out." Between 2002, when credits generated in developing countries began trading, and the end of last year, HFC-23 projects accounted for 46% of all developing-world credits traded -- by far the biggest chunk of that market, according to the World Bank. All told, at least 70% of developing-world credits traded during that market's first five years came from projects targeting gases other than carbon dioxide, the World Bank says. At present, most eligible plants that emit HFC-23 have been signed up for carbon-credit projects. As a result, projects targeting less-potent gases are getting more funding. One such gas is methane. It's emitted when animal dung decomposes on farms and when trash rots at landfills. Ton for ton, it's 21 times more damaging to the atmosphere than carbon dioxide, the U.N. says. That's provided an incentive for two types of popular carbon-credit projects: putting tarps over animal-waste lagoons, and putting pipes in landfills to tap and burn off the methane. Burning methane produces less-potent carbon dioxide. Programs to reduce the burning of fossil fuels -- a far bigger environmental problem -- accounted for less than one-third of the developing-world credits traded between 2002 and last year, the World Bank says. But they have begun getting more attention. The trading system has given birth to an industry of middlemen who arrange projects in developing countries to produce credits. Natsource LLC, a New York-based asset-management firm, manages a roughly $700 million investment fund through which companies, including many Japanese and European utilities, buy carbon credits. Most come from projects targeting the potent but ancillary gases such as HFC-23 and nitrous oxide, a byproduct of nylon production. "Of course the market is going to do the cheaper thing first," says Jack Cogen, Natsource's chief executive officer. "That's what markets do." The World Bank has put together some of the biggest emissions-reduction projects. Karan Capoor, a senior financial specialist at the World Bank, says "it's expecting too much" to think the Kyoto treaty could significantly curb fossil-fuel consumption without long-term caps and the participation of big countries such as the U.S. Some investors in the carbon market cite another reason for the scarcity of clean-energy projects: a panel of U.N.-sanctioned officials who meet periodically in Bonn, Germany, and decide which proposed carbon-reduction projects will get to sell credits. The panel approves only environmental projects it determines wouldn't happen without the sale of the credits. Clearing that bar can be difficult for clean-energy projects. Those related to potent gases such as HFC-23 and methane have an easier time, because they rarely make economic sense without the carbon-credit revenue. U.N. officials say that to keep the system honest, it's important not to subsidize projects that would happen anyway. In 2006, the European Commission, the EU's governing body, reported that the European industry ended 2005 with more permits than it needed to meet caps under the EU's system. That caused the price of European credits to plummet. The commission now is pressuring member governments to tighten their emissions caps, which has pushed prices back up. Eight countries have sued or threatened to sue, arguing the commission is being too stringent. At the U.N. conference in Bali, the price issue is likely to color debate over whether to award carbon credits to projects that preserve forests, which consume carbon dioxide. Kyoto's architects authorized credits for planting new trees. But they declined to allow credits for preserving existing trees. They worried, among other things, that nations might seek credits to preserve trees they have no intention of destroying. Heavily forested nations such as Indonesia and Brazil want to reverse that decision. On Capitol Hill, companies anticipating a U.S. carbon cap are gunning to make it as loose as possible. Duke Energy Corp., the nation's third-biggest coal burner, is one. In October, Duke joined the heads of other big emitters in writing to the head of a Senate committee on the environment. Their letter declared it "critically important" for any cap-and-trade system to set an upper limit on the market price of a carbon permit. That ceiling would rise over time. A system without price controls might force utilities to switch to fuels that are cleaner but costlier than coal. "While a lot of people started down the road romanticizing" the use of emissions caps to fight global warming, says Duke's chief executive, James Rogers, in an interview, they're "now coming to grips with the cold reality of the economics." ________________________________________________________________________ More new features than ever. Check out the new AOL Mail ! - http://o.aolcdn.com/cdn.webmail.aol.com/mailtour/aol/en-us/text.htm?ncid=ao…

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FW: DOE Issues Orders Granting Requests for Rehearing for Report and Orders Designating NIETCs
by Grubb, Karen 04 Dec '07

04 Dec '07

-----Original Message----- From: nietcwebmaster(a)anl.gov [mailto:nietcwebmaster@anl.gov] Sent: Tuesday, December 04, 2007 11:08 AM To: Grubb, Karen Subject: DOE Issues Orders Granting Requests for Rehearing for Report and Orders Designating NIETCs ************************************************************ National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors ************************************************************ DOE Issues Orders Granting Requests for Rehearing The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has issued orders granting rehearings for the Report and Orders designating the Mid-Atlantic Area National Transmission Corridor (Docket No. 2007-OE-01) and the Southwest Area National Transmission Corridor (Docket No. 2007-OE-02). The orders are available on the "Applications for Rehearing" page on the National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors and Congestion Study Web site at http://nietc.anl.gov/index.cfm For More Information ******************** For more information about the National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors and Congestion Study, visit the National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors and Congestion Study Web site at (http://nietc.anl.gov/index.cfm), or contact us at: nietcwebmaster(a)anl.gov Forward This Message ******************** Please forward this message to any party you feel may be interested in the National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors and Congestion Study. _________________CONTACTS/SUBSCRIPTIONS_____________________ FEEDBACK -------- To submit feedback, contact the webmaster at nietcwebmaster(a)anl.gov PRIVACY POLICY -------------- Our online privacy policy is at: http://www.energy.gov/privacy.htm SUBSCRIBE/UNSUBSCRIBE --------------------- To subscribe or unsubscribe to the National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors and Congestion Study e-mail service, visit: http://nietc.anl.gov/email/index.cfm If the above URL is not enabled as a link, please copy it into your browser window to access our E-Mail Services Page. ************************************************************ You are currently subscribed as: kgrubb(a)fairmontstate.edu ************************************************************

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Conference call today
by Barbara Fallon 30 Nov '07

30 Nov '07

The Energy committee needs to have a conference call regarding the TrAIL project and in particular we need to make some decisions about payment to expert witnesses. Here is the information about the conference call number and code. Please call in at 4:30 today. Number 866.501.6174 Conference Code: 1005700 Thank you... Barbara ____________________________________________________________________________________ Be a better pen pal. Text or chat with friends inside Yahoo! Mail. See how. http://overview.mail.yahoo.com/

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Fwd: Dynegy plant article from Georgia
by Paul Wilson 30 Nov '07

30 Nov '07

fyi, paul ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: <Baumling(a)aol.com> Date: Nov 29, 2007 9:18 PM Subject: Dynegy plant article To: Pat.Gallagher(a)sierraclub.org, bruce.nilles(a)sierraclub.org, Jesse.Simons(a)sierraclub.org, sarah.hodgdon(a)earthlink.net, Virginia.Cramer(a)sierraclub.org, Alice.McKeown(a)sierraclub.org, pjgrunt(a)gmail.com *"They said the Sierra Club fights coal plants around the country, and uses permit issues to do so."* ** This article is about the Early County, GA LSPower/Dynegy coal burner: http://www.ajc.com/business/content/business/stories/2007/11/29/coal_1130.h… Coal power plant's permit in the crosshairs Environmental groups say planned facility will be too polluting By MARGARET NEWKIRK <mnewkirk(a)ajc.com> The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Published on: 11/29/07 Did the state drop the ball when it gave a permit to Georgia's first planned new coal power plant in years? An administrative law judge will answer that question in the next few weeks, after nearly a month of arguments that ended Thursday. If allowed to go forward, the 1,200-megawatt plant would sit on the Chattahoochee River in Early County, near the Florida border. Owned by Houston-based Dynegy<http://www.ajc.com/business/content/business/stories/2007/11/29/coal_1130.h…>Inc., the plant would be a merchant, meaning it will have to find utilities or other large power users to buy its power. Its capacity is roughly the same as one of the two new nuclear units Georgia Power wants to add to its Vogtle nuclear plant near Augusta. A group of Early County residents, as well as most of the state's environmental community, has been fighting the plant for more than two years, on a number of fronts. What brought them to Atlanta in recent weeks was the plant's environmental permit. They want the plant's permit from the state Environmental Protection Division tossed out. The Early County plant will be built with more air pollution controls than any new coal plant in the state. But it won't be as clean burning as it could and should be, according to the Sierra Club, Friends of the Chattahoochee and Greenlaw, the environmental law firm representing them. Federal law requires new plants to have controls that achieve the "maximum degree of reduction" in pollution, attorney George Hays told Administrative Law Judge Stephanie Howells. "This is not the maximum degree of reduction." Hays said the state Environmental Protection Division relied too heavily on the company's claims and data in drafting the permit. And he said that permit is not as strict as those at other coal plants in development around the country. He noted that the scrubbers planned for the new plant are less effective than those Georgia Power is now installing on its old ones. Scrubbers remove acid rain-causing sulfur dioxide and mercury from coal smoke. The EPD is allowing Dynegy to use so-called dry scrubbers at the plant, instead of the more expensive wet scrubbers. Wet scrubbers remove more sulfur dioxide. Lawyers for the state said they opted against wet scrubbers because of water supply issues. Wet scrubbers use more water. They also attacked the credibility of the Sierra Club's expert witness, saying the witness was a Sierra Club member and donor and that her science was biased. They said the EPD permits were reasonable — and that opponents would have attacked it in any case. They said the Sierra Club fights coal plants around the country, and uses permit issues to do so. They said Friends of the Chattahoochee didn't want a coal plant in the neighborhood, period. Bobby McLendon, chairman of the river protection group, agreed with that, at least in part. He said during a court break that he had a number of issues with the plant in addition to the permit, including the fact that it will have a 20-year exemption from local taxes. His wife, Jane, said local doctors were opposed to the plant, and that she didn't buy claims that the plant would help economic development. "We need something," she said. "It's a poverty situation." But she said a coal plant is not the answer. "We don't need this." ------------------------------ Check out AOL Money & Finance's list of the hottest products<http://money.aol.com/special/hot-products-2007?NCID=aoltop00030000000001>and top money wasters<http://money.aol.com/top5/general/ways-you-are-wasting-money?NCID=aoltop000…>of 2007. -- Paul Wilson Sierra Club 504 Jefferson Ave Charles Town, WV 25414-1130 Phone: 304-725-4360 Cell: 304-279-6975

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Fwd: in the news: NRDC got nearly $500K to promote CCS on behalf of industry
by Paul Wilson 29 Nov '07

29 Nov '07

fyi, paul ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: <Virginia.Cramer(a)sierraclub.org> Date: Nov 29, 2007 5:28 PM Not sure if this so damning or not. BUT the bloggers are eating up and they aren't pleased and have been grilling the NRDC comms director. Also involved: Izaak Walton League, CATF. http://energysmart.wordpress.com/2007/11/28/dirty-hands-and-clean-coal/ The Natural Resources Defense Council, NRDC, which earned its reputation as a shadow government by watchdogging EPA, now shares EPA's giddy optimism toward carbon sequestration. In a *letter*<http://www.precaution.org/lib/nrdc_defends_carbon_sequestration.070501.pdf>to a California legislator, NRDC's George Peridas asserts that carbon sequestration can be "perfectly safe." And NRDC lawyer David Hawkins was *quoted*<http://www.precaution.org/lib/prn_epa_to_regulate_carbon_sequestration.0710…>recently saying carbon sequestration can be carried out with "very very small risks." NRDC has a $437,500 *grant*<http://www.joycefdn.org/GrantList/GrantDetails.aspx?grantId=29414>from the Joyce Foundation to promote carbon sequestration on industry's behalf. *INSIGHTS: Carbon Sequestration* *By Peter Montague* *NEW BRUNSWICK, New Jersey*, November 19, 2007 (ENS) - In response to a relentless stream of bad news about global warming, a cluster of major industries has formed a loose partnership with big environmental groups, prestigious universities, philanthropic foundations, and the U.S. federal government - all promoting a technical quick-fix for global warming called carbon sequestration. Carbon sequestration is a plan to capture and bury as much as 10 trillion metric tonnes of carbon dioxide deep in the ground, hoping it will stay there forever. Though the plan has not yet received any substantial publicity, it is very far along. The purpose of the plan is to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide entering the atmosphere from the burning of fossil fuels - coal, oil and natural gas. Carbon dioxide is the most important greenhouse gas, which is thought to be contributing to global warming. *Nevada Power's Reid Gardner coal-fired power plant has a higher emission rate of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide than any other power plant in the United States. **(Photo courtesy **DCNR* <http://dcnr.nv.gov/>*) * A carbon sequestration program would capture the gas, turn it into a liquid, transport it through a network of pipelines, and pump it into the ground, intending for it to stay buried forever. >From an industrial perspective, carbon sequestration seems like a winning strategy. If it succeeded in reducing carbon dioxide emissions to the atmosphere, it would allow coal and oil firms to retain and even expand their market share in the energy business throughout the 21st century, eliminating the need for substantial innovation. Carbon sequestration would also greatly reduce the incentive for Congress to invest in renewable energy, which competes with coal and oil. Furthermore, carbon sequestration might deflect the accusation that the coal and oil corporations bear responsibility, and perhaps even legal liability, for the major consequences of global warming - more and bigger hurricanes, droughts, floods, and fires, for example. Finally, if the carbon sequestration plan were to fail, with grievous consequences for human civilization, failure would occur decades or centuries into the future when the current generation of decisionmakers, researchers, philanthropists, and environmental advocates could no longer be held accountable. For all these reasons, coal, oil, mining, and automobile corporations, plus electric utilities, are eager to get carbon sequestration going. To accomplish their goal, the coal and oil firms are being helped by researchers at *Princeton*<http://www.precaution.org/lib/princeton_cmi_6th_annual_report.070201.pdf>and *Stanford* <http://gcep.stanford.edu/research/geoengineering.html>universities, and by the *Joyce Foundation* <http://www.joycefdn.org/News/NewsDetails.aspx?newsid=55>in Chicago, which is underwriting a campaign by environmental advocates on behalf of industry's plan. Natural Resources Defense Council, NRDC, the Izaak Walton League, the Clean Air Task Force, the Michigan Environmental Council, and others have received substantial grants to advocate for carbon sequestration. Finally, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency administrator Stephen Johnson recently endorsed industry's plan. All the pieces are now in place and an aggressive campaign is under way to persuade state and federal legislators to endorse large-scale carbon sequestration. *What's at stake?* After trillions of tons of carbon dioxide have been buried in the deep earth, if even a tiny proportion of it leaks back out into the atmosphere, the planet could heat rapidly and civilization as we know it could be disrupted. Quite plausibly the surface of the Earth could become uninhabitable for humans. Thus, one way or another, the future of humanity is at stake in the decision whether to endorse carbon sequestration or to develop the many renewable energy technologies that are available to *eliminate our dependence* <http://www.precaution.org/lib/07/prn_ieer_roadmap.070822.htm>on carbon-based fuels. *Major benefits for the coal industry* To one degree or another, carbon sequestration will benefit all of the industries involved, allowing them to continue business as usual, removing the need for substantial innovation, and reducing competition from renewable fuels. However, it is the coal industry that will benefit the most. One could argue that, without carbon sequestration, the *coal industry*<http://www.precaution.org/lib/07/prn_coal_news.070920.htm>itself cannot survive. Once large-scale carbon sequestration has begun, the coal industry will be free to unleash an enormous new enterprise turning coal into liquid fuels. The technology for coal-to-liquids, or CTL, was fully developed decades ago. CTL was devised by German chemists in the 1920s, and the Nazis could not have pursued World War II without it. *A front loader piles coal at Niagara Mohawk's Dunkirk steam station in New York. **(Photo by David Parsons courtesy **NREL* <http://www.nrel.gov/>*) * Unfortunately, coal-to-liquids is an exceptionally dirty technology that produces twice as much carbon dioxide per gallon of fuel, compared to petroleum. Carbon sequestration would bury that extra carbon dioxide in the ground, thus solving the coal industry's biggest problem, making coal-to-liquids feasible, and assuring a future for the coal industry itself. You have, perhaps, heard the phrase clean coal. This contradictory term was coined by carbon sequestration advocates as a public relations ploy. In clean coal, the word clean is narrowly defined to mean coal that contributes less carbon to the atmosphere in the short term, compared to typical coal combustion. In actual fact there is nothing clean about clean coal. Even if large-scale carbon sequestration begins, the mining and burning of clean coal will continue to *destroy* <http://www.mountainjusticesummer.org/facts/steps.php>hundreds of mountains in Appalachia, and will continue to pollute the Midwestern and Eastern states with millions of tons of deadly fine and ultrafine particles of soot, plus nitrogen oxides, sulfur oxides, mercury, dioxins, radioactive particles, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and so on. Large tonnages of coal bottom ash will still be buried each year in shallow pits overlying aquifers, creating a perpetual and growing threat to drinking water supplies. In the Midwest and West, large tracts of land, and large amounts of scarce water, would still be contaminated or otherwise made unavailable for alternative uses. In sum, clean coal is an advertising slogan without substance. Furthermore, if even a small proportion of the sequestered carbon from clean coal ever leaks out of the ground, the planet could experience runaway global warming. *The danger of tiny leaks* It is important to distinguish between carbon dioxide and carbon itself. Carbon is an element, one of the 92 naturally-occurring building blocks of the universe. Carbon dioxide is a chemical compound made up of one carbon atom attached to two oxygen atoms - CO2. By weight, carbon dioxide is 27 percent carbon; in other words, one ton of elemental carbon will create 3.7 tons of carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide is the main greenhouse gas thought to be contributing to global warming. As humans burn fuels containing carbon such as coal, oil and natural gas - carbon in the fuel combines with oxygen in the air to create CO2. In the air, CO2 acts like the glass roof on a greenhouse - it lets in sunlight, which is converted into heat energy as it strikes the Earth. When the heat energy radiates back into the sky, CO2 in the atmosphere acts like a mirror, reflecting heat back down to earth, warming the planet just as a glass roof warms a greenhouse. Global warming from this greenhouse effect was first described by Swedish chemist Svante Arrhenius in 1896. Before the industrial revolution, there were 580 billion tonnes of carbon in Earth's atmosphere. Today there are 750 billion tonnes - an increase of 170 billion tonnes, or 29 percent, since about 1750. Because humans burn roughly two percent more coal, oil and natural gas each year - thus doubling total use every 35 years - the carbon buildup in the atmosphere is accelerating. Presently humans are emitting about eight billion tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere each year, not all of which is retained there. Unfortunately, emissions of eight billion tonnes per year are sufficient to worsen a global warming problem. The amount of carbon held in underground supplies of coal, oil and natural gas is very large. By a conservative *estimate*<http://www.precaution.org/lib/carbon_cycle.000601.pdf>, worldwide there are 3,510 billion tonnes of carbon remaining underground in coal; 230 billion tonnes of carbon in oil; and another 140 billion tonnes of carbon in natural gas plus 250 billion tonnes in peat, for a total of 4,130 billion tonnes of carbon held in fossil fuels globally. If 25 percent of this were burned and the carbon sequestered, leakage of only 0.8 percentof the total per year would exceed the current annual human contribution to atmospheric carbon (eight billion tonnes). And of course the oil and coal companies plan to burn far more than 25 percent of what remains in the ground. Their goal is to burn 100 percent of it. If they managed to burn 75 percent of remaining fuels, then annual leakage of 0.26 percent of the total would exceed the current eight billion tonne annual human contribution to atmospheric carbon. This could eventually lead to runaway global warming, plausibly rendering the Earth uninhabitable for humans. It is now widely believed that humans must cut their carbon emissions 80 percent by the year 2050 to avert runaway global warming. Actually, some now calculate that more than an 80 percentcut is needed - but for the sake of argument, let's accept the lower 80 percent estimate at face value. An 80 percent reduction from eight billion tonnes would allow humans to emit only 1.6 billion tonnes of carbon annually to avert runaway global warming. If we accept this estimate of the carbon reduction needed - cutting 80 percentfrom current levels - then the allowable leakage must be reduced accordingly: - if 25 percentof remaining fossil carbon is sequestered, any leakage above 0.16 percent (about one-sixth of one percent) of the total per year could eventually result in runaway global warming; - if 75 percent of remaining fossil carbon is sequestered, then leakage greater than 0.05 percent (one-twentieth of one percent) of the total per year could eventually produce runaway global warming. Can humans bury several trillion tons of carbon dioxide in the ground with complete confidence that 0.05 percentof it will not leak out each year? Never leak out? The leakage could begin at any time in the far distant future because the danger would lie buried forever, waiting to escape, a perpetual threat. The short-term secondary effects of a carbon sequestration program are also worth considering. Once large-scale carbon sequestration begins, it will be exceedingly difficult to stop. As soon as sequestration begins, the coal and oil corporations, and the environmental groups and universities advocating on their behalf, will assert that "carbon sequestration has been successfully demonstrated." Indeed, the environmental advocates are making such *claims*<http://www.precaution.org/lib/nrdc_defends_carbon_sequestration.070501.pdf>already, based on a very short history of pumping small amounts of carbon dioxide into oil wells to force more oil to the surface. *University of Texas geologists had workers drill a well more than 5,700 feet underground in which to inject carbon dioxide. **(Photo courtesy **U. Texas* <http://www.utexas.edu/research/projects/frio.html>*) * Thirty-five million tons of CO2 are being pumped into depleted oil wells in Texas each year, to force oil to the surface. Thirty-five million is 0.00035percent of ten trillion. Scaling up a 35 megaton operation by a factor of 285,000 is not a trivial problem but this is not mentioned by industry's advocates who are trying to persuade legislators to endorse large-scale carbon sequestration. How can anyone "demonstrate" that leakage will never occur in the future? Such a demonstration cannot be made. Furthermore, once the U.S. government begins to repeat the environmentalists' false claim that carbon sequestration has been "successfully demonstrated," why would China not adopt it? And India, countries in Africa, the Middle East and the former Soviet Union - why wouldn't they adopt it? If we claim a right to threaten the future of humanity, don't others have an equal right to assert such a claim? But can other countries devote the same resources we can devote to siting, engineering and geologic studies? Will they all be able to monitor for leaks far into the future, essentially forever? For that matter, will the U.S. have that capability? Humans have no experience creating institutions with a duty of perpetual vigilance. If the carbon sequestration advocates can get their program started, it seems likely that Congress will declare the global warming problem solved and carbon sequestration will be employed until all the recoverable fossil fuels in the ground have been used up. If carbon sequestration advocates can get their program going, the U.S. will have little further incentive to invest in renewable sources of energy - and so we stand to lose a unique opportunity to rebuild the U.S. economy on a sustainable basis and revive America's standing as an industrial leader in the world. Carbon sequestration, once it gets started, will allow 19th century energy technologies to dominate the U.S. throughout most of the 21st century. In sum, to evade liability, to relieve pressure for innovation, to stifle competition, and to make a great deal of money, the proponents of carbon sequestration are betting the future of humans on an untestable technology - permanent underground storage - an act of hubris unparalleled in the annals of our species. *Minds already made up* But, you may ask, "Doesn't the U.S. have the strongest environmental protection laws in the world? Surely a vigilant Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, will ask hard questions, and protect us from the bias of industry's hired experts?" Last month EPA chief Stephen Johnson announced that EPA "will" issue regulations covering carbon sequestration. However, as he was announcing EPA's intention, Mr. Johnson issued a ringing endorsement of carbon sequestration as the silver bullet to fix the nation's environmental and economic problems. "By harnessing the power of geological sequestration technology, we are entering a new age of clean energy where we can be both good stewards of the Earth, and good stewards of the American economy," Mr. Johnson said Clearly, Mr. Johnson's mind is already made up. The Natural Resources Defense Council, NRDC, which earned its reputation as a shadow government by watchdogging EPA, now shares EPA's giddy optimism toward carbon sequestration. In a *letter*<http://www.precaution.org/lib/nrdc_defends_carbon_sequestration.070501.pdf>to a California legislator, NRDC's George Peridas asserts that carbon sequestration can be "perfectly safe." And NRDC lawyer David Hawkins was *quoted*<http://www.precaution.org/lib/prn_epa_to_regulate_carbon_sequestration.0710…>recently saying carbon sequestration can be carried out with "very very small risks." NRDC has a $437,500 *grant*<http://www.joycefdn.org/GrantList/GrantDetails.aspx?grantId=29414>from the Joyce Foundation to promote carbon sequestration on industry's behalf. Clearly, these "experts" have their minds made up. But many common sense questions remain: - Given that there are many good *alternatives*<http://www.precaution.org/lib/07/prn_ieer_roadmap.070822.htm>, why would humans accept even a "very very small" risk of making their only home uninhabitable? - And, given that the stakes are exceptionally high, shouldn't we approach this with a little humility and ask, "What if the experts are wrong? What if they are fallible and haven't thought of everything? - What if their understanding is imperfect?" After all, geology has never been a predictive science, and humans have no experience burying lethal hazards in the ground expecting them to remain there in perpetuity. - Since everyone alive today - and all their children and their children's children far into the future - could be affected, shouldn't we have a vigorous international debate on the wisdom of carbon sequestration versus alternative ways of powering human economies? Don't we have an obligation to develop a very broad international consensus before proceeding - especially among the nations most likely to be harmed if carbon sequestration fails? - And finally, given the exceedingly high stakes, the irreversible nature of carbon sequestration, and the substantial and irreducible uncertainties involved, isn't this a decision that cries out for application of the precautionary principle? * {Peter Montague is director of Environmental Research Foundation in New Brunswick, N.J., and editor of two ERF newsletters, **Rachel's Environment & Health News* <http://www.rachel.org/>*, which is available free in English and Spanish, and **Rachel's Precaution Reporter* <http://www.precaution.org/>* which is available free in English. This article of opinion was originally published in Rachel's Environment & Health News.} * Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2007. All rights reserved. ----------------- Josh Dorner Associate Press Secretary Sierra Club tel 202.675.2384 cel 202.679.7570 -- Paul Wilson Sierra Club 504 Jefferson Ave Charles Town, WV 25414-1130 Phone: 304-725-4360 Cell: 304-279-6975

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Fwd: Coal updates email for Club Coal/Energy volunteers
by Paul Wilson 29 Nov '07

29 Nov '07

I would appreciate if any of you could forward to your coal/energy activists. thanks, paul w. (WV & National Coal Campaign) ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: <Alice.McKeown(a)sierraclub.org> Date: Nov 29, 2007 12:19 PM Subject: Coal updates email to be forwarded to the volunteer listservs Dear Coal Activists, Below please find a copy of our new National Coal Report, which the national coal team is going to create and update every other week. The report is meant to help volunteers, organizers, donors, staff, and other stakeholders stay in tune with the entire campaign throughout the country. Ben Avery, one of our staff members in San Francisco, will be putting together the report every other week and would welcome any updates you write about your local issues. Please take a look at the "Campaign Trail" section to see what these updates should look like. We do not want a year in review, or a series of articles. We do want brief but technical updates on the most recent events and major developments. Ben Avery will be looking for a good range of issues and localities to report on. Direct any questions you have on reporting directly to Ben at ben.avery(a)sierraclub.org. The latest report will be coming out this Friday, and you can start sending in updates to Ben for the next report immediately. We will be sending reminders about submitting stories as well as the final copies of these reports to the new coal alerts listserv. If you received a copy of this email directly from me, then you do not need to take any action to continue receiving these as your email will be migrated to the listserv when it is fully functioning. However, if you received this email through a forward or other list, or if you know of anyone else who would like to receive these emails directly, please have them email me at alice.mckeown(a)sierraclub.org to sign up for the listserv. Many thanks for all of the amazing work you are doing on the ground. Best wishes, Alice ________________________________ Alice McKeown Sierra Club National Coal Campaign tel: 202.675.6271 fax: 202.547.6009 (See attached file: Nov 15 Report.PDF) -- Paul Wilson Sierra Club 504 Jefferson Ave Charles Town, WV 25414-1130 Phone: 304-725-4360 Cell: 304-279-6975

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Conference call
by Barbara Fallon 29 Nov '07

29 Nov '07

Karen and I would like to have a conference call in order to get an update on TrAIL and to make some decisions about payment to expert witnesses. I suggest Friday (tomorrow 11/30) at 4:30. Who can join me? ____________________________________________________________________________________ Be a better pen pal. Text or chat with friends inside Yahoo! Mail. See how. http://overview.mail.yahoo.com/

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Fwd: Fw: WA: Power-plant plan rejected; fails to meet emissions law
by Paul Wilson 29 Nov '07

29 Nov '07

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: <Pat.Gallagher(a)sierraclub.org> Date: Nov 29, 2007 11:36 AM Subject: Fw: WA: Power-plant plan rejected; fails to meet emissions law To: Jesse.Simons(a)sierraclub.org, sarah.hodgdon(a)earthlink.net, pjgrunt(a)gmail.com, Baumling(a)aol.com, Alice.McKeown(a)sierraclub.org, Virginia.Cramer(a)sierraclub.org fyi, paul http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2004039453_powerplant28m.ht… Power-plant plan rejected; fails to meet emissions law By Warren Cornwall Seattle Times environment reporter New power plants built to light Washington must limit their greenhouse-gas pollution, according to a ruling Tuesday that affirms a new direction for the state's pursuit of electricity. In a critical first test of a new state law meant to block construction of power plants that spew climate-changing gases, a state panel soundly rejected plans for a 793-megawatt plant in Kalama, Cowlitz County, that would be fueled by coal or oil-refinery waste. The decision by the Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council, which oversees power-plant permits, is a blow for Energy Northwest, the coalition of 20 Washington public utilities that wants to build the plant. It's also among a string of recent setbacks for new polluting power plants nationwide — including ones in Florida, Kansas and Texas — as concerns rise about climate change. "Burning coal for energy is a 19th-century answer to the problems that we have in front of us," said attorney Jan Hasselman, of Earthjustice, which represented environmental groups in challenging the Energy Northwest plan for Kalama. "We think that it is time to move on." The state energy-facility council's strongly worded and unanimous ruling sided with the environmental groups and several state agencies. They all had argued that Energy Northwest essentially was trying to skirt a new state law. That law, passed in the spring, requires new power plants to limit emissions of greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide, to the same levels of a high-efficiency, natural-gas power plant. Any plant puffing out more than that — such as a coal-fired plant — must capture the extra and find a way to store it permanently. Energy Northwest claimed that the current state of technology limits its ability to store the greenhouse gases, so it promised that if it could build the plant, it would come up with a more detailed plan in the future. But the energy council said sharply that Energy Northwest's approach "misses the mark by a wide margin." It said Energy Northwest was basically asking the council to overturn the new state law, which it can't do. Simply having "a plan to make a plan" wasn't adequate, the council said. The council halted any further consideration of the application to build the plant. Energy Northwest spokesman Gary Miller on Tuesday said the group needs time to review the decision before deciding on its next step. The group's leaders have previously said a requirement to capture the gases, called sequestration, could thwart the project. Kim Schmanke, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Ecology, said the agency would work with Energy Northwest to find a solution. Ecology was among the opponents to the Energy Northwest plan for the project, as was the state Department of Community, Trade and Economic Development. Meanwhile, the ruling could give a boost to a separate effort to build a coal-fueled power plant along the Columbia River near Wallula, Walla Walla County, in Eastern Washington. Promoters of that project, led by United Power of Gig Harbor, say it would be able to store much of its greenhouse gases in basalt rocks beneath the site. Tests are planned to determine whether that's really so. The state energy council hasn't yet considered whether that plant would meet the new state law. Warren Cornwall: 206-464-2311 or wcornwall(a)seattletimes.com ___________________________ Lauren Trevisan Program Assistant Sierra Club Environmental Law and Environmental Justice Programs 408 C Street, NE Washington, DC 20002 tel: 202.675.6278 fax: 202.547.6009 lauren.trevisan(a)sierraclub.org -- Paul Wilson Sierra Club 504 Jefferson Ave Charles Town, WV 25414-1130 Phone: 304-725-4360 Cell: 304-279-6975

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Who are TrAILCo's Investors?
by James Kotcon 27 Nov '07

27 Nov '07

One of the questions that came out of last night's conference call is "Who are the investors" in these transmission line projects. Apparently the investors in the New York line include 20+ "secret" investors, and the utility will not release their names. In our case, TrAILCo is wholly-owned subsidiary of Allegheny Energy, but Allegheny formed TrAILCo is an effort to encourage investors at a more favorable interest rate than Allegheny could get on their own. So who are the investors? As Deep Throat said during Watergate, "Follow the money!" Do these investors have an agenda independent of Allegheny? (Of course they do.) Do they have any assurances if the line does not get built, or if it is underutilized, or if Allegheny goes bankrupt, that protects their investment and will ratepayers have to cough up more money? Allegheny will likely argue that this is confidential business information, but I think we need to see where TrAILCo is getting their money. JBK

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FW: [CH] Reminder: Energy Corridors Call Tomorrow (Monday, Nov 26)
by Grubb, Karen 25 Nov '07

25 Nov '07

________________________________ From: Sierra Club Chapter and RCC Conservation Chairs [mailto:CONS-CHAPTER-CONS-CHAIRS@LISTS.SIERRACLUB.ORG] On Behalf Of Jill Workman Sent: Sunday, November 25, 2007 5:37 PM To: CONS-CHAPTER-CONS-CHAIRS(a)LISTS.SIERRACLUB.ORG Subject: [CH] Reminder: Energy Corridors Call Tomorrow (Monday, Nov 26) Please remember tomorrow's call on energy transmission/corridors. The original email posting is below. Please forward this message as appropriate. Jill ________________ America's Wild Legacy Conservation Initiative Committee (AWL) has been tasked with implementation of the Stop Destructive Energy Development on Public Lands issue of national concern. Energy transmission/corridors posses a huge threat to public lands and their proliferation has helped feed our national hunger for increasing amounts of energy regardless of its origin or ecological or human ramifications. As a solutions driven organization, Sierra Club has the duty to proactively step forward with answers to siting, corridor and energy development questions. Please join us for a conference call to help frame Sierra Club's work on this important issue and to create a project team of leaders to oversee the implementation of our goals. Participation in the call commits you to nothing other than sharing your ideas and expertise as we jointly seek to define the problems we face and possible solutions. Call information: Monday, November 26, 2007 5 PM Pacific/8 PM Eastern 866-501-6174 8960000# Please feel free to share this invitation with other public lands and/or energy activists in the Sierra Club who are interested in energy transmission issues. My apologies for cross postings. Best ~ Jill Jill M. Workman Chair, America's Wild Legacy CIC Home: 503/654-8670 Cell: 503/421-3635 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - To unsubsribe from the CONS-CHAPTER-CONS-CHAIRS list, send any message to: CONS-CHAPTER-CONS-CHAIRS-signoff-request(a)LISTS.SIERRACLUB.ORG Check out our Listserv Lists support site for more information: http://www.sierraclub.org/lists/faq.asp Sign up to receive Sierra Club Insider, the flagship e-newsletter. Sent out twice a month, it features the Club's latest news and activities. Subscribe and view recent editions at http://www.sierraclub.org/insider/

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