At the crossroads: The United States and Global Climate Change Presidential Climate Action Project W

1
At the crossroadsThe United States and Global
Climate ChangePresidential Climate Action
Project William Becker, Executive Director
2
What science is telling us

• Global warming is real.
• It is underway now.
• It is caused mostly by human activities.
• If allowed to go much farther, it will have
  disastrous consequences for our economy, health,
  security ecosystems.
• We have the tools to prevent this.
• We dont have much time.

3
How Far?

• By 2015
• Stabilize global
• emissions (IPCC)
• By 2020
• Cut industrial nations
• emissions 25-40 (Bali)
• Cut 20-30 (EU)
• Cut 30 (PCAP)
• Cut to 1990 level (Obama/McCain)

4
How fast?

• "If there's no action before 2012,
• that's too late. What we do in
• the next 2 to 3 years will
• determine our future. This is the defining
• moment. Rajendra Pachauri, IPCC
• The next president and congress must define a
  course next year in which the United States
  exerts leadership commensurate with our
  responsibility for the present dangerous
  situation Dr. Jim Hansen, NASA

5
U.S. Moving in Wrong DirectionMcKinsey Company
2030 Reference Case

• CO2e emissions increase 35
• Carbon absorption declines 7
• Carbon intensity
• per capita emissions
• improve
• Growth factors
• Population
• Buildings appliances
• More carbon-based power

6
World Moving in Wrong DirectionEnergy
Information Administration - 2007
7
Missed Opportunities

• Presidents Science Advisory Panel
• November 1965
• By the year 2000 there will be about 25 more
  CO2 in the atmosphere than
• at present. This will modify the
• heat balance of the atmosphere
• to such an extent that marked
• changes in climate, not controllable
• through local or even national
• efforts, could occur.

8
Missed Opportunities

The earth's well-being is an issue important to
America...We recognize our responsibility and
will meet it -- at home, in our hemisphere, and
in the world - 2001

9
National Energy Policy
10
National Energy Policy

• If were addicted to oil, why are we
• subsidizing the drug?

11
Drill here, drill now?

• We wont end our addiction by switching
  suppliers.

12
National Climate Policy
13
PCAP Poll

• 66 want presidential climate action
• 44 very important
• 14 not at all important
• 63 believe action is urgent
• 41 want action immediately
• 16 dont care
• Strongest climate position?
• 22 Obama
• 21 Clinton
• 8 McCain
• 49 dont know

Online Poll Harris Interactive 2,092 likely
voters April 9-11, 2008
14
PCAP Mission

• Provide the 44th President of the United States
  with a comprehensive plan to take bold action on
  climate change within 100 days.

15
Project Background

• Location Wirth Chair, School of Public Affairs,
  University of Colorado Denver
• Staff 3.5 FTE
• Budget 2 million
• Project period
• Jan.1 07-Jan.31 09

16
Objectives

• Set stage for federal action that is
• Science-based
• Transformative
• Timely
• Courageous
• Build public mandate for boldness
• Redefine whats politically possible
• Chart reinvention of Federal Government
• Do homework in advance of Inauguration
• Help President create effective domestic program
  that allows U.S. to engage other nations with
  credibility

17
PCAP Advisory Committee

• John Petersen, Arlington Institute
• Hunter Lovins, Natural Capitalism Solutions
• Michael Northrop, Rockefeller Bros. Fund
• Dr. David Orr, Oberlin College
• Theodore Roosevelt IV, Pew Center
• Larry Schweiger, President, National Wildlife
  Federation
• Jeremy Symons, National Wildlife Federation
• Dr. Gus Speth, Dean, School of Forestry
  Environmental Studies, Yale University
• Adm. Richard Truly (USN ret), former NASA
  Administrator NREL Director
• Heidi VanGenderen, Chief Climate Advisor,
  Colorado Governors Office

• Ray Anderson, Founder CEO, Interface Inc.
• Dr. D. James Baker, former NOAA Administrator
• Scott Bernstein, Center for Neighborhood
  Technologies
• April Bucksbaum, Baum Foundation
• Dianne Dillon-Ridgley, Chair, Plains Justice
• Brian Castelli, VP, Alliance to Save Energy
• Boyd Gibbons, past president, Johnson Foundation
• Gary Hart, U.S. Sen. (ret)
• Sheila Slocum Hollis, PartnerDuane Morris LLP
• Van Jones, President Founder, Ella Baker Center
  for Human Rights

18
300 ideas/100 days

• Economic Policy
• Climate Policy
• Energy Policy
• National Security
• Agriculture
• Buildings
• Mobility
• Federal emissions
• Natural resources
• Ocean Ecology
• Mitigation/adaptation
• Public health/safety
• International policy
• Climate Leadership

Issued Dec. 4, 2007
19
Aggressive goals

• Reduce federal emissions 30 by 2020, 80-90 by
  2050
• Cut oil consumption in half by 2025
• Offset all U.S. oil imports by 2040
• Achieve zero-net-carbon buildings by 2030
• Reduce energy consumption 25 by 2020
• Obtain 25 of electricity from renewables by 2025
• Reduce vehicle miles traveled 20 by 2020, 50 by
  2050
• De-carbonize federal subsidies
• De-carbonize international aid trade
• Form Organization of Petroleum Importing
  Countries (OPIC)
• Make carbon visible in EISs, budget requests,
  consumer products

20
Doing the Homework

• Analysis of Presidential authority
• Boundaries
• Responsibilities
• Statutory basis
• Whos Who in Climate Action
• Climate Plum Book
• Policy data base
• Agency mission statements
• White papers on key issues

21
Enhance national security

• Cut oil consumption in half by 2020 offset all
  imports by 2040
• Stop subsidizing carbon now
• CAFE of 50 mpg by 2020 200 mpg by 2050
• Create Organization of Petroleum Importing
  Countries (OPIC)
• Avoid new security liabilities
• LNG
• Uranium

22
Unleash innovation

• 1 billion in platinum carrot awards
• 1 billion annually for State Energy Program
• 2 billion annually in energy block grants
• Redirect Rural Utility Service, etc., to spark
  rural renaissance
• Promote deployment through small business
  development
• Train 35,000 youth annually in green trades

23
Practice stewardship

• Declare atmospheric commons
• Cut GHG 30 below 1990 by 2020
• Implement upstream cap auction
• Regulate GHG under Clean Air Act
• Make federal government carbon-neutral by 2050
• Achieve zero-energy buildings by 2030
• Cut VMT 20 by 2020 50 by 2050
• Reduce energy demand 25 by 2020 50 by 2030
• Obtain 25 of electricity from renewables by 2025

24
Prevent carbon lock-in

• Ban construction of new coal plants without CCS
• Disinvest in new high-carbon fuels
• Liquid fuels from coal
• Oil shale
• Increase CAFÉ to 50mpg by 2020
• Develop zero-carbon national model building code
  reward early adopters
• Adaptive design
• Zero net energy

25
Correct market signals

• Price greenhouse gases
• De-subsidize carbon
• Create life-cycle, full-cost performance
  standards
• Require utilities to disclose risks
• Jump-start markets with government procurement

26
Maximize Energy Efficiency

• Fix appliance efficiency standards
• De-couple utility rates
• Extend expand energy efficiency tax incentives
• Ramp down mortgage interest deductions for
  MacMansions
• Expand use of ESPCs

27
Deploy clean energy

• Define clean to include life-cycle costs
• Implement feed-in tariffs
• Develop national smart grid
• Expand distributed energy generation
• Extend grids to stranded renewables
• Redirect federal grant, loan loan guarantee
  programs to EERE projects
• Triple RD, including energy storage
• Extend PTC/ITC for 15 years

28
Fix incentives

• Provide stable, long-term incentives
• Make incentives big enough (5-10 of investment)
• Provide privileged access to grid
• Dont cap total amount of RE
• Reduce transaction costs i.e., approval
  process, etc.
• Reinforce market with government procurement

29
Address Equity

• Launch national training for green jobs
• Create Climate Enterprise Zones direct
  Empowerment Zone/Enterprise Community program to
  high-impact areas
• Fund Weatherization Assistance Program at 2
  billion annually
• Institute border adjustments for imports
• Offer incentives for retooling carbon industries
• Encourage oil companies to increase capital
  investment in renewables

30
Support adaptation

• Use auction revenues and/or redirected subsidies
  to fund local adaptation efforts
• Focus federal climate research on local, social,
  economic climate impacts
• Improve intergovernmental communications on
  disaster response, public health, etc.
• Develop national water management strategy
• Remap hazard areas prevent development
• Require resilient building designs
• Rapidly reforest areas destroyed by fire/pests
• Fold adaptation into infrastructure projects
• Seek preemptive emergency authority from
  Congress

31
Lead internationally

• Decarbonize international aid trade
• Design complementarity into trading regime
• Allow climate policy to trump trade in WTO
• Count leakage in US emissions
• Promote universal but differentiated commitments
  to GHG reductions
• Retool Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean
  Technology Development and Climate
• Seek early Executive Agreement with China

32
Lead by example

• Biggest energy consumer
• 18 billion annually, or 1.5 of U.S. total
• 500,000 buildings
• 630,000 vehicles worldwide
• 5 billion miles annually
• 350 million gallons gasoline equivalent each year
• 1.6 of national CO2 emissions
• Purchasing power Indirect impacts triple direct
  impacts
• World-class laboratories
• 700 RD facilities
• 100,000 scientists engineers

National Renewable Energy Laboratory Golden, CO.
33
Candidates Climate Positions

• We have many advantages in the fight against
  global warming, but time is not one of them.

• I dont believe that climate change is just an
  issue thats convenient to bring up during a
  campaign. I believe its one of the greatest
  moral challenges of our time.

34
Candidates Climate Positions

• Obama
• Reduce emissions 80 below 1990 by 2050 with a
  cap and trade system with 100 auction of
  allowances
• 25 national RPS by 2025
• Invest 150B over 10 years in bringing clean
  energy to market.
• Establish a national low carbon fuel standard
• Improve energy efficiency 50 by 2030
• Restore US leadership on climate

• McCain
• Reduce carbon 60 below 1990 by 2050 using a cap
  and trade system.
• Develop an adaptation plan based on national and
  regional climate impact models.
• Engage with the UN to develop an international
  agreement on climate.
• Ensure rapid technology introduction - wants to
  develop programs that accelerate development of
  technologies across the valley of death.

35
Policy Changes in the Air

• Carbon pricing
• Disappearing subsidies for fossil fuels
• National RPS/EEPS
• Moratorium on conventional coal plants
• Investment in smart grid
• Carbon reporting risk disclosure
• Nuclear power, with conditions
• Pressure for climate-friendly regulation
• Decoupling
• Interconnection standards
• Feed-In Tariffs
• Net metering
• Climate action plans
• Statewide goals for renewables efficiency

36
Carbon Pricing

• Carbon tax vs. cap-and-auction
• Upstream vs. downstream
• When can we expect a bill?
• PCAPs recommended criteria
• Transparent
• Low administrative costs
• 100 auction
• Works with international efforts
• Flexible
• Equitable
• Economy-wide
• Reductions measured in
• absolute tons
• 30 cut by 2020 80 by 2050

37
Subsidy reform

• Case against subsidies
• They distort market signals while carbon pricing
  tries to correct them
• Classic corporate welfare
• Money needed elsewhere

38
Renewable Portfolio Standards

• 10 by 2015, 25 by 2025 (Obama)
• 100 in 10 years (Gore)
• 30 by 2020,
• 50 by 2050
• (PCAP)
• No specific goal
• (McCain)

39
Potential role of renewables
Source American Solar Energy Society
40
Energy efficiency goals

• Reduce consumption 15 below projected demand by
  2020 (Obama)
• Cut 25 by 2020
• Cut 50 by 2050
• (PCAP)
• No specifics (McCain)

41
Coal-fired generation

• Ban new conventional
• plants (Obama PCAP)
• 151 proposed by 2007
• 87 stopped by 2008
• Clean coal technology
• Count life-cycle CO2
• Count environmental
• damage
• Continue research
• but dont wait

42
Smart Grid

• Outdated grid inhibiting wind/solar
• Private investment underway
• Texas invests 4.9 billion
• Excel pilots in Boulder
• T. Boone Pickens plan
• Philip Anshutz plans
• 3 billion, 900-mile line
• Policies
• Overcome balkanization
• Reduce red tape (McCain)
• Make major investment
• (Obama)

43
Carbon reporting

• Excel agrees to disclose risks to investors
• Carbon pricing
• Climate impacts (drought, etc.)
• Lawsuits/court decisions
• Legislation
• Utility lobbies have read the writing on the
  wall Justin McCann, Standard Poors

Excel CEO Dick Kelly
44
Nuclear power

• McCain 45 plants now, 100 long-term
• Obama Solve storage, proliferation, safety
  problems
• PCAP Same as Obama

45
Federal vs. State regulation

• Provide incentives to states (Obama, McCain,
  PCAP)
• PCAP 1 billion/year, divided among states that
• Decouple rates
• Map renewables extend grid
• Promote distributed power co-generation
• Create interconnection standards
• Implement net metering
• Use feed-in tariffs
• Implement climate action plans
• Establish RPSs

46
New Frames

• You cant solve a problem by thinking the way
  you did when you created it.

47
Frame No.1

• Politics is the art of compromise.
  Unfortunately, the atmosphere has stopped
  negotiating.

48
48
49
49
50
Changes in climate are already causing harm
Major floods per decade, 1950-2000
Theres a consistent 50-year upward trend in
every region except Oceania.
51
Harm is already occurring (continued)
Major wildfires by decade, 1950-2000
The trend has been sharply upward everywhere.
52
Harm is already occurring (continued) WHO
estimates climate change already causing 150,000
premature deaths/yr in 2000
53
Spaceship Earth is becoming Greenhouse Earth
54
Frame No. 2

• Climate change is not an environmental issue. It
  involves
• Economic stability
• Energy security
• Public health safety
• Health care costs
• Housing costs
• Cost of government
• National security

55
Frame No. 2, cont.

• We wont fight climate change to save the
  environment. Well fight climate change to save
  prosperity.

Randy Udall, Founder Association for the Study of
Peak Oil
56
Frame No. 3

• Theres a difference between problem solving and
  problem switching.

57
Frame No. 4

• The abundance of a resource is not a mandate to
  consume it.

58
Frame No. 4, cont.

• If cheap and plentiful are our criteria, choose
  the ultimate power plant sunlight.
• Price 0.00
• Supply 5 billion yrs
• Delivery 8 minutes

Sun at X-ray wavelengths from Japans Yohkoh
Satellite
59
Frame No. 5

• Smart technologies can only go so far
• to accommodate stupid behavior.

Can 55,000 orbiting space-based mirrors, each 100
square meters, reflect sunlight to offset half
our growth in CO2?
60
Frame No. 6

• Its time to
• redefine
• national
• security.

61
Frame No. 6, cont.
A PV panel is as important as an M-16 rifle a
plug-in hybrid is as important as a tank.
A 21st Century Weapons System
62
Frame No. 6, cont.
21st Century Weapons System (deployed)
63
Frame No. 6, cont.
21st Century Air Force
64
Frame No. 7

• Baby steps arent enough.

Incrementalism is innovations worst enemy. We
dont want continuous improvement, we want
radical change. Sam Walton
65
Frame No. 8

• We suffer from the myth of separation.
• Conservation and biology are not hobbies they
  are a survival practice.

Harvard Biologist Edward O. Wilson
66
Frame No. 8, cont.
Earth Rise Apollo 8, Christmas Eve 1968
67
Frame No. 9

• We are the invasive species.

Clear-cutting in Washington State
68
Frame No. 9, cont.

• We have learned to walk on the Moon

69
Frame No. 9, cont.

• but we havent learned to walk on the Earth

70
Frame No. 9, cont.

• Even on the Moon, we could not get along without
  a car.

71
Frame No. 10

• If we insist on ruining the planet,
• we have to stop calling ourselves
• the most intelligent species

72
The 2008 Election

• Americans can always be counted on to do the
  right thing...after they have exhausted all other
  possibilities. Sir Winston Churchill

(We now have exhausted all other possibilities.)
73
Wanted A Uniter

• We need a little less Pluribus and a little more
  Unum. Ken Burns

74
bill.becker_at_cudenver.edu www.climateactionprojec
t.com