The two biggest concerns about domestic offsets in climate legislation — the possibility they will be riddled with fraud and/or that they will overwhelm the “genuine” emissions reductions — are I think, largely unwarranted.  The fact that Waxman-Markey potentially allows a substantial amount of domestic offsets is no reason whatsoever oppose it.

As readers know, I do not like rip-offsets.  I do not like them in DC.  I do not like them in Chicago.

I would not like them here or there. I would not like them anywhere.  And, yes, I have a 2-year-old daughter who likes Dr. Seuss.

But, seriously, there are two fundamental reasons I urge people not to buy offsets:

1. The market is unregulated, so you have no idea what you are buying. And most every time the media — or I — look into a specific offset, it turns out to be a project that would’ve happened anyway or, worse, had already been up and running for years.  In short, your money is unlikely to be bringing about new emissions reductions.  Thus you aren’t “offsetting” anything.
2. This country has no cap on emissions.  Therefore, offsets don’t add up to anything. They don’t assuredly take you off the business-as-usual emissions path.  It is wonderful to promote new wind projects — although the vast majority of wind-related offsets probably don’t do that (see “Schendler Part II: Good RECs vs. Bad RECs“) — but absent a cap on emissions, that project doesn’t necessarily actually lead to any net emissions reductions.

If, however, we passed comprehensive energy and climate legislation like Waxman-Markey, we would immediately solve both of those problems.  Yes, on paper, Waxman-Markey allows polluters to purchase some 1 billion tons of domestic offsets (see bill summary here), which is nearly 15% of total U.S. emissions.  And that seems like it would vitiate the near-term target of a 20% emissions cut in 2020.

But the EPA, in its preliminary modeling of the bill (here), finds that only a small fraction of that billion tons of domestic offsets would in fact ever be used, as this figure shows:

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UPDATE:  Talk about journalistic malpractice.  Greenwire (subs. req’d, reprinted below) now reports that “Comments accusing U.S. EPA of ignoring the economic consequences of regulating greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act that were included in a White House document publicized today were written by a Small Business Administration office headed by someone appointed by President George W. Bush.”

Seriously, what is the difference between blogging and journalism?  My answer is at the end.  Your comments are welcome, as always.

The climate misreporting of the day goes to ABC News’ Senior White House Correspondent Jake Tapper and the AP’s Dina Cappiello.  Tapper’s blog today runs the sensational but untrue headline:

Obama Administration Memo Warns of Harm to Economy if Greenhouse Gases Regulated through Clean Air Act

Tapper then asserts, very incorrectly

The White House has not yet decided to go forward with the [endangerment] finding. There is a 60-day comment period following the finding. As part of this process, the Obama administration requested comment from various departments and agencies on the endangerment finding, which is where the memo came from.

In fact, the White House decided to go forward with the endangerment finding weeks ago.  The 60-day comment period is for public comments, and the memo ain’t part of that process.  But otherwise, the paragraph is spot on!

[If you want to know why I moderate this blog, read Tapper's comments.]

The AP story ran a similarly inaccurate headline:

White House memo challenges EPA finding on warming

Rather than wasting your time with any further discussion of their misreporting, let’s just see what OMB director Peter Orszag has to say.  The OMB is the source of this “White House memo” and apparently journalists don’t interview sources anymore.  Orszag explains on his blog:

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Conservatives are typically known for their message discipline.  But something about global warming seems to get them where they live, as it were.  They feel compelled to try to convince the public that carbon dioxide is harmless and the secret agenda of environmentalists is to regulate literally every aspect of your lives (see Krauthammer, Part 2: The real reason conservatives don’t believe in climate science).

As a result, individual members of Congress just make up the most bizarre and self-contradictory attacks imaginable.  That is clearest with Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX), the ranking Republican of the House Energy and Commerce Committee (see links below).  Today’s befuddled argument for inaction from Barton was first published by Think Progress.

In a new interview with Newsmax, Barton continued his nonsensical approach to the issue, claiming that the Obama administration’s efforts to regulate carbon dioxide would potentially “close down the New York and Boston marathons“:

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Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), in a Senate hearing on the EPA budget this morning, decried the extraordinary amount of spending by corporate global warming polluters to lobby Congress. Reading from a report on new lobbying disclosures, Whitehouse noted that carbon polluters such as electric utilities and oil and gas companies have spent nearly $80 million on lobbying just in the first quarter of 2009. Whitehouse concludes:

So if we wonder why the Senate is the last place in America that still doesn’t get it – that climate change is a real problem for people and that carbon pollution is something that people should pay for when they emit it, big utilities, big industry — gee, connect the dots.

Watch it:

“For as long as there’s been pollution,” Sen. Whitehouse explained, “there has been a constant battle with polluters who don’t want to pay the costs of their pollution, either preventing or cleaning it up”:

They’d like to just dump it and have it be somebody else’s problem. There’s absolutely nothing new about that. Polluters don’t want to pay. What’s new is our understanding of what the costs are of carbon pollution. Economic costs, environmental costs, wildlife and habitat costs, and as we’ve recently learned, very significant national security costs.

The E&E News story Whitehouse entered in the Congressional Record explains how pollution lobbyists are vastly outspending environmental groups and clean energy companies: Read more

A forthcoming study in Geophysical Research Letters (subs. req’d) finds what countless other studies in the past decade have found — changes in the sun are not responsible for the global warming in recent decades.

In particular, the study debunks the notion that changes in cloud cover driven by cosmic rays are a major factor in climate change:

Changes in cosmic rays during a solar cycle are two orders of magnitude too small to account for the observed changes in cloud properties; consequently, we conclude that the hypothesized effect is too small to play a significant role in current climate change.

Of course, this finding merely adds to a vast body of scientific literature on this subject that makes clear the sun’s contribution to the accelerated warming of the last few decades is minimal.

For instance, the Naval Research Laboratory and NASA reported in September that, “if anything,” the sun contributed “a very slight overall cooling in the past 25 years.” The study, “How natural and anthropogenic influences alter global and regional surface temperatures: 1889 to 2006,” found:

According to this analysis, solar forcing contributed negligible long-term warming in the past 25 years and 10% of the warming in the past 100 years.

A major 2007 study concluded:

Here we show that over the past 20 years, all the trends in the Sun that could have had an influence on the Earth’s climate have been in the opposite direction to that required to explain the observed rise in global mean temperatures.

Since the science doesn’t support their position, the most extreme science deniers, like Marc Morano, often just assert that studies which disprove their case actually prove their case.  Morano famously did just that back in December when he ran the screaming headline

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Drought and floods cut rice harvest back 95%!

Australia continues to suffer under the effects of climate change as a food shortages are added to its ever increasing list of woes (see also “Australia today offers horrific glimpse of U.S. Southwest, much of planet, post-2040, if we don’t slash emissions soon” and “Australia faces collapse as climate change kicks in”).

The rice harvest has been ravaged by both drought and flooding, with the NSW Riverina expected to deliver just 5 per cent of its normal output.

About 65,000 tonnes are expected to be harvested this year in the nation’s rice growing heartland – down from 1.2 million tonnes in a typical year – while trial crops in northeast NSW have been destroyed by heavy rainfall. Mike Hedditch, from the ricegrower-owned company SunRice, said so far 56,000 tonnes of paddy had come in.

‘We expect harvest to wrap up with receives of around 65,000 tonnes,’ he said.

Early forecasts for a 75,000-tonne crop in the Riverina were not realized, after a heat wave in February damaged flowering.

In German Suburb, Life Goes On Without Cars
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Last week, President Obama and Vice President Biden urged the Democrats on the House energy committee during a White House meeting to take “quick action” on comprehensive green economy legislation. Negotiations over how much industries will be subsidized to make the transition to clean energy have stalled subcommittee negotiations over the American Clean Energy and Security (ACES) Act. In a moment of candor, ACES co-sponsor Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA), the chair of the subcommittee in question, explained that fellow Democrats acting as representatives for climate polluters were holding up the bill:

If we can reach agreement with the coal sector, with the steel, with the auto sector, with the refining sector on our committee, which is very representative of the Congress as a whole, then we believe that’ll be a template for passage in the Senate, as well. Because the agreements we’ll reach will be the very same agreements that those industry leaders … will be able to represent to senators are the basis for passage of legislation that they can support.

Members of Markey’s energy and environment subcommittee with strong ties to those sectors include Rep. Mike Doyle (D-PA: $50,942 from steel), Rep. Baron Hill (D-IN: $113,033 from auto), Rep. Jim Matheson (D-UT: $177,946 from coal), and Rep. Gene Green (D-TX: $330,613 from oil). The trade publication E&E News has identified 13 members of the 34-member subcommittee as swing votes. These “maybe” officials have received an average of $678,570 in lifetime contributions from those sectors, as opposed to $149,397 for the nine “yes” votes:

Average lifetime contributions from the automotive, steel & chemical, oil & gas, and mining & utility sectors to members of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce and its Energy & Environment Subcommittee (Center for Responsive Politics). Position on Waxman-Markey American Clean Energy and Security Act estimated by E&E News. Chart by the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

The average energy committee member opposed or wavering on the green economy legislation has received six times as much lifetime climate polluter cash as the average supporter:

Carbon-sector contributions to members of the House Committee on Energy & Commerce. Click to enlarge.

The obstructionist politicians working to weaken the ACES Act are ironically threatening the future of the industries who fill their campaign coffers. The nation needs to set strong standards for energy efficiency, renewable energy, and global warming pollution in order to compete in the 21st century economy. “Limiting greenhouse gas emissions will enhance U.S. competitiveness,” Center for American Progress senior fellow Jake Caldwell writes. “A carbon cap-and-trade program will reduce emissions and send a predictable price signal on carbon, which in turn will spur major investment in energy efficient and low-carbon technologies, foster innovation and upgrades, and create jobs and export led growth in clean energy technology.”

When the incomplete draft of the ACES Act was unveiled at the end of March, co-sponsors Markey and Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), chair of the Energy and Commerce Committee, indicated that they planned to conduct a markup of the bill in Markey’s subcommittee before going to the full committee. After the meeting with Obama, Waxman announced that he could potentially bypass Markey’s subcommittee “and mark up the legislation before the entire 59-member panel.”

E&E News Projected Vote Breakdown For Waxman-Markey American Clean Energy and Security Act: Read more

Giving utilities free allocations is a much maligned strategy to go by comments here.  So I thought that when Bill Johnson — CEO, president and chairman of Progress Energy, “which serves 3.1 million customers in the Carolinas and Florida” — offered his reasonable-sounding defense in Energy Daily (subs. req’d), readers might be interested in hearing the other side.  Seemed only fair since I so recently dissed Progress (see “What do you get when you buy a nuke? You get a lot of delays and rate increases”¦.“)

To the casual observer, it might seem logical to assume that coal-burning electric utilities would be opposed to regulating greenhouse gas emissions. But while we are often conveniently cast as the villains by some in the debate, Progress Energy and other coal-based electric utilities strongly support a federal cap-and-trade program to reduce carbon emissions.

We also believe strongly that to succeed, such a program must have clear objectives and achievable targets based on science and technology, and it must be affordable for customers.

In short, utilities support getting the biggest reductions at the least cost to consumers. And we believe that if federal policy changes are developed and implemented in the right way, the carbon-reduction targets that President Obama has laid out are potentially achievable.

Here’s the right way: Establish a cap-and-trade program, administered through state regulatory commissions, that allocates allowances to utilities based on historical emissions, and reduces allowances over time. This is a proven method that drives significant emission reductions and technological innovation, and ensures consumers get the benefit of all reductions and allowances.

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