Duke vs. Newt: frantic lobbying as House climate bill vote draws near

Duke Energy wants it, Newt Gingrich doesn't. With the House climate bill heading to the floor for debate Friday, lobbying is fast and furious.
In the past two days:
• A group of 22 environmental groups sent a letter to all House members urging them to vote for the bill – the American Energy and Climate Security Act (H.R.2454). Groups included the Natural Resources Defense Council, Sierra Club and League of Conservation Voters. LCV said it would not endorse anyone who votes against it.
• 20 companies and electric utilities took out full-page ads in Washington papers calling for passage because they want the clarity of rules it would bring (and likely because most allowances for cap-and-trade will be given -- not sold -- to polluters at the start). Those signing on included Duke, NRG Energy and PSEG Inc.
• 20 climate scientists sent a letter to Congress saying that to avert a "rapidly developing global climate crisis” they should pass a strengthened version of the bill as a basis for stronger federal policies. Well-known NASA scientist James Hansen, who is convinced CO2 emissions must be cut back to 350 parts per million (from the current 385) rather than the early target of 450 ppm, did not sign.
• President Obama urged passage during his news conference Tuesday, saying it would spark a clean-energy transformation.
• The Cooler Heads Coalition, a new group of science skeptics and other legislative opponents began lobbying Congressmen.
• Newt Gingrich’s American Solutions for a Winning Future planned to run a TV ad, starting Wednesday, opposing the bill and saying it would hurt the economy.

Are the votes there to pass it?
On Tuesday there were 170 reliable votes and 108 on the fence, according to an analysis by E&E Daily. 218 votes are need to pass the bill. If the votes aren’t there, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said he may push it back until after the Fourth of July.

In years past the Senate took the lead on climate legislation, and the House has never passed a cap-and-trade bill. But this year the Senate is lagging behind, with a weak energy bill out of the Energy Committee and Barbara Boxer still crafting a cap-and-trade bill in her Environment Committee. So even if the House manages to pass this bill, Senate agreement is not by any means secure.

A few other points
* The EPA said Tuesday the bill would cost the average household between $80 and $111 a year. Congressional Budget Office figures released Friday said an average of $175 a year, with a range of $40 to $245 depending on income level.

* The bill has been changed somewhat in recent days to accommodate the eight committees with some jurisdiction. A concern of Agriculture Chair Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) has apparently been met by giving rural electric cooperatives one-half a percent of the free allowances. But agriculture is still concerned about who will oversee farm offsets, the Agriculture Department or the EPA. And moderate Democratic representatives from farm states are needed on this vote.

* States would now be permitted to spend 10% of their allotment (which in turn is 10% of free allowances) on public transportation.

* Because of the powerful farm interests, methane emissions from cows have been exempted from the bill. They called it a “cow tax.” Methane is a much more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, and cows produce about 25% of the emissions so that’s a significant exemption.
(Sources: E&E Daily, E&E News PM)

Trash talk: Zero waste would end landfills, incinerators and help curb GHG emissions

(Photo of trash in landfill from Flickr and photographer Zen/Zen Sutherland)

Weekly Angst: When you first started recycling, maybe 2 decades ago, little did you know one of the benefits would be to cut the greenhouse gas emissions that threaten catastrophic climate change. Now you have an additional reason to reduce, reuse, recycle -- and compost.

We are drowning in trash and, despite recycling, it’s adding at least 7% to emissions that cause global warming. Incinerators and landfills both emit GHG. And worse than that, every item that is destroyed needs to be replaced – which means more emissions from extraction, processing, manufacturing and transportation.

The Sierra Club’s new report Stop Trashing the Climate recommends phasing out all municipal waste incinerators and building no new incinerators or landfills.

The report sets a goal of zero waste by 2040, which could be accomplished by reducing consumption, recycling most products, re-using paper, plastic, glass and many other materials, and composting food and lawn scraps. Zero waste would reduce greenhouse gas emissions the same as if 20% of our coal-fired power plants were closed down. Under the Urban Environmental Accords, 103 mayors worldwide have agreed to send no waste to incinerators or landfills by 2040. More than 2 dozen American cities or states have a zero waste goal.

Too much consumption
The term “consumer” – if you’ve thought about it – is related to “consume” which means “use up.” And that’s exactly what we consumers are doing. Using up the world’s natural resources at a record pace.

The United States, with just 5% of the world’s population, is using up 30% of the world’s resources, producing 30% of the waste and emitting 22% of the planet’s greenhouse gases.

Think about what would happen if the rest of the world caught up with us on consumption. We’d need several planets to supply everyone. What we’re going to have to do is scale back so our consumption isn’t so far out of line with everyone else’s.

Manufacturers will have to take responsibility for producing less waste, especially the products and packaging that make up more than 72% of our trash.

Reuse, recycle and compost
Americans destroy nearly 170 million tons of paper, metals, plastics food scraps, etc., a years, and we have the ability to reuse, recycle or compost 90% of what we waste. Composting avoids significant methane emissions and increases carbon storage in soil to improve plant growth.

The damage landfills do
In addition to destruction of goods and using up of natural resources, landfills are the largest anthropogenic (human-caused) source of methane, which is 75% more potent a heat-trapping gas than carbon dioxide over a 20-year period. Although some landfills capture methane to use for power, only 20% is captured, and non-recycled organic materials should instead be composted or anaerobically digested, the report said.

The damage incinerators do
Incinerators emit more carbon dioxide per megawatt hour than coal, gas or oil power plants. They produce CO2 and nitrous oxide, which is 300 times more potent than CO2. Many require fossil fuels to operate.

Other recommendations
• Implement federal, state and municipal zero waste targets.
• Levy a per-ton surcharge for taking waste to incinerators or landfills, as many European countries do.
• End “renewable energy” subsidies for landfills and incinerators.
• Charge by volume and weight for trash collection.
• Regulate paper packaging and junk mail and significantly increase paper recycling.

Toronto’s solution
The city of Toronto removes about 1/3 of its garbage before it can get to a landfill. It goes to a plant where microscopic bugs digest garbage and turn it into compost. The Toronto plant has a system that can separate out plastic bags, batteries, bones and other non-biodegradable objects in a huge tank that spins to break the bags and let them float to the top, then separates out hard and heavy objects, which do go to a landfill.

What remains is methane and compost. The latter is given free to residents to enrich soil or taken to city parks and gardens.

The plant, which processes 50,000 tons of organic waste (double what was originally expected) handles trash from a half-million single-family homes, with another half-million apartments expected online soon. There are plans to build another composting plant by 2010, which will capture and use the methane for power, and then to expand and retrofit the current plant by 2012.

Toronto’s goal is to divert 75% of its waste from landfills by 2010. The city also has a significant recycling program.

One of the features that helps its popularity is the ability of the bugs to gobble up the odors usually emitted by such a program.

Many European cities have organic composting plants, but in North America Toronto is the only one doing it on this scale. Other cities starting more slowly are San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, Oakland and Alameda County, Calif.

These cities have shown what can be done. Now we just need the will to do it.

(Sources: Sierra Club’s “Stop Trashing The Planet,” Greenwire.)