Thursday, May 11, 2017

Diesel and coal; standards and bans

Alberta's coal-fired power plant operators are planning to cheaply convert plants to burn natural gas. National emissions standards should not be relaxed to extend the life of what will still be high-emission power plants.

Europe votes for stricter pollution laws on power plants | Power Engineering
Power plants in the EU will have to cut the amount of toxic pollutants such as nitrogen oxides they emit under new rules approved by a majority of member states.
Friday’s decision imposes stricter limits on emissions of pollutants such as nitrogen oxide, sulphur dioxide, mercury and particulate matter from large combustion plants in Europe.
The European Power Plant Suppliers Association (EPPSA) said they welcomed the move by the Industrial Emissions Directive (IED) Article 75 Committee members on the Best Available Techniques Reference Document for Large Combustion Plants (LCP BREF).
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Several countries which are heavily reliant on coal, such as Poland, Bulgaria, Germany and the Czech Republic, were opposed to the changes.
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National authorities will be able to use a derogation, or form of exemption, when costs would be disproportionate compared with the environmental benefits, while respecting environmental safeguards
...EPPSA also said it believes that for most of the existing LCPs, the implementation of the conclusions are economically and technically feasible through the state-of-the-art technologies currently available in the market.
Some history from the United States indicates the saving of some emissions reductions, such as mercury, may not justify the costs, whereas the reduction of others do - often in conjunction with reducing mercury. Courts ruled the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had not properly considered compliance costs, in 2015, but did not require the rule rescinded and subsequently rejected attempts to nullify the standard. Meanwhile, most plants had complied with the rule - or closed.

The new EU power plant emissions regulations appear to borrow wisely from the American experience.
For an example of negative outcome due to policies designed solely to encourage one fuel/outcome, one might look to Europe's experience with diesel in automobiles - as Maximilian Auffhammer has done in Save the California Waiver! How a “little” California vehicle standard prevented an urban “airmaggedon”:

Wednesday, May 3, 2017

California politicians propose new emissions pricing regime for 2020

Making sure the climate transition benefits low-income neighborhoods and communities of color isn’t just the right way to pursue climate policy. In California, where policies to price carbon require a two-thirds vote before becoming law, it may turn out to be the only way.
The quote is from Danny Cullenward, which is a name I found in the first article I saw on a new proposal that would replace California's current cap and trade carbon pricing program (to which Ontario is linking). From the Wahington Post's As Trump reverses climate actions, California considers a bold new step:
...a new proposal, announced Monday, would replace California’s current cap and trade carbon pricing program, its flagship effort to reduce the state’s greenhouse gas emissions, with an updated — and, according to supporters, more socially progressive — scheme. 
“The state and the federal government were until recently working hand in hand on these issues,” said Danny Cullenward, an energy economist, lawyer and research associate with environmental research organization Near Zero, who helped advise the development of the new proposal. “In an era of the Trump administration, carbon pricing is one of the few tools that the state has to whatever the federal government does.”
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The new proposal establishes another cap-and-trade program — which will extend either until 2030 or until the state meets its 40 percent emissions reduction goal, whichever comes first — with some notable updates intended to make it more effective and more socially responsible.