The House Committee on Energy and Commerce, chaired by Frank Pallone, Jr (D-NJ), released an ambitious new climate plan to ensure the United States achieves net-zero greenhouse gas pollution by 2050.
The House Committee on Energy and Commerce released an ambitious new climate plan, CLEAN Future Act, ... [+]
Supported by Environment and Climate Change Subcommittee Chairman Paul Tonko (D-NY) and Energy Subcommittee Chairman Bobby L. Rush (D-IL), the Climate Leadership and Environmental Action for our Nation’s (CLEAN) Future Act is a comprehensive proposal of sector-specific and economy-wide solutions to address the climate crisis.
More detailed and reasonable than the Green New Deal proposal, this draft legislation incorporates both proven and novel concepts to lower emissions. The Act includes economy-wide policies that will empower states to lead the transition to a clean economy, provide investment in federal, state, local, and private sector clean economy transition efforts, train the clean economy workforce of the future, and integrate climate change into U.S. national security planning.
On the plus side, the legislation doesn’t stipulate which energy sources or strategies qualify so isn’t pushing a renewables-only mix which we know cannot be achieved in this century. On the minus side, it does not call out nuclear and hydro, which all climate scientists say are necessary to achieve deep decarbonization in this century.
In drafting this legislation, the Committee held 15 hearings addressing the climate crisis, including seven focused on how best to facilitate deep decarbonization of various sectors of our economy. They split the policy over eight sectors:
Power Sector - proposes nationwide technology-neutral Clean Electricity Standards requiring all retail electricity suppliers to provide an increasing supply of clean energy to consumers starting in 2022, rising to 100% clean energy by 2050. Suppliers may come up with acceptable alternative compliance plans. Suppliers may buy and trade clean energy credits from one another or purchase them via auction, making this sound like a cap and trade system, at least for electricity.
Building Sector - The legislation aims to improve the efficiency of new and existing buildings, as well as the equipment and appliances that operate within them. The Act establishes national energy savings targets for continued improvement of building energy codes, leading to a requirement of zero-energy-ready buildings by 2030. The Act incorporates several additional measures to reduce building emissions.
Transportation Sector - The draft legislation reduces transportation emissions, the largest source of GHG emissions, by improving vehicle efficiency, accelerating the transition to low- to zero-carbon fuels and building the infrastructure needed for a clean transportation system. The bill directs EPA to set new, increasingly stringent greenhouse gas emission standards for light-, medium-, and heavy-duty vehicles, including non-road modes of transportation. It further requires year-over-year improvements to those standards.
Industrial Sector - The Act establishes a Buy Clean Program that sets performance targets to steadily reduce emissions from construction materials and products used in projects that receive federal funding which turns out to be the vast majority of construction projects in America.
National Climate Target for Federal Agencies - The CLEAN Future Act directs all federal agencies to use all existing authorities to put the country on a path toward net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. The draft legislation directs the Environmental Protection Agency to evaluate each agency’s plans, make recommendations and report on progress each year.
State Climate Plans - The Act empowers the states to complete the transition to a net-zero economy, using the Clean Air Act as a model. The bill sets a national climate standard of net-zero greenhouse gas pollution in each state by 2050, but states are granted flexibility to develop their own plans based on their policy preferences, priorities and circumstances, and states may work independently or cooperatively.
National Climate Bank - The CLEAN Future Act establishes a first-of-its-kind National Climate Bank to help states, cities, communities and companies in the transition to a clean economy. The Bank, championed by Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-MI), will mobilize public and private investments to provide financing for low- and zero-emissions energy technologies, climate resiliency, building efficiency and electrification, industrial decarbonization, grid modernization, agriculture projects, and clean transportation. The Act requires the Bank to prioritize investments in communities that are disproportionately affected by the impacts of climate change, including frontline, rural, low-income and environmental justice communities.
Environmental Justice - The draft legislation requires that states’ individual climate plans and state implementation plans for other hazardous air pollutants proactively consider the needs of frontline and environmental justice communities. The draft also includes grant programs to allow impacted communities to participate in the permitting and regulation of petrochemical facilities in their neighborhoods. It further protects these groups by implementing strong new coal ash disposal requirements and repealing oil and gas production exemptions from landmark environmental laws.
This last point will face major pushback from the fossil fuel industries who have enjoyed a free pass for the last century.
The CLEAN Future Act also features a suite of complementary policies, including proposals to remove barriers to clean energy, reduce super-pollutants like methane, and spur investments in grid modernization and energy efficiency programs.
This legislation just sets a framework of what we should do. The scientific and technological challenges are still the same. The limitations of each technology are still the same. The material needs, the energy back-up and storage needs to address the huge problem of intermittency, and the plethora of fossil fuel whose use in poor countries, and whose sale by states and countries dependent on its revenue, will be difficult to stem.
But it’s good to have a plan.
The Committee is requesting feedback and recommendations as it refines the legislation, which can be submitted to CleanFuture@mail.house.gov.
