Green Wombat

Silicon Valley's Carbon Conundrum

Silicon Valley these days is the epicenter of all things green, home to renewable energy entrepreneurs, ecologically minded venture capitalists and global warming-fighting CEOs. Moreover, Sustainable Silicon Valley, a coalition of tech giants, utilities like PG&E (PCG), local governments and non-profits, has set a target of slashing the region's greenhouse gas emissions 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2010. The valley is, in local parlance, eating its own dog food. On Tuesday, the group released its annual CO2 report. While some individual companies have dramatically cut their carbon footprints and the valley's overall emissions have fallen slightly since 2000, Sustainable Silicon Valley won't realize its ambitious 2010 goal. "Unless a miracle happens between 2007 and 2010, it’s highly unlikely," Sustainable Silicon Valley executive director Rick Row told Green Wombat.

Why? Blame it on the car in carbon. A whopping 56 percent of Silicon Valley's greenhouse gas emissions came from the tail pipe in 2006 (compared to 40 percent for California as a whole). A trip down one of the valley's traffic-choked freeways is a graphic reminder of the region's dependence on and love affair with the automobile. The bottom line is that you can cover Applied Materials (AMAT), Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) and other companies in solar panels but you won't make significant strides in cutting carbon emissions until you deal with the monster in the garage. "We don’t have traditional city centers and clear corridors that people can commute along," says Row. "The problem with cars is that people only think about the marginal costs of driving" not the global impact.

Some Silicon Valley companies are trying to cut their employees' commute. About half of Sun Microsystems' (JAVA) workers telecommute while Google (GOOG) and Yahoo (YHOO) dispatch biodiesel-powered shuttles to ferry employees to corporate campuses. Those companies and others also offer subsidies toward the purchase of fuel efficient cars and encourage car-pooling. But the Sustainable Silicon Valley report underscores the necessity of replacing the infernal combustion engine with electric motors and fuels cells. While valley VCs have invested in local electric car company Tesla Motors and various biofuel startups, they and the region's legions of entrepreneurs have appeared more interested in solar energy and other green plays than solving the car carbon conundrum.

PG&E's Green Power

With PG&E in the news with its bid to become the nation's leading solar utility, Business 2.0's feature on the San Francisco company is timely. The story appears in the October - and last - issue of the magazine and is available online. The piece, written by Katherine Ellison and edited by Green Wombat, looks at PG&E's (PCG) effort to remake itself as a cutting edge utility for a carbon-constrained world.

The U.S.'s Dirtiest Power Plants

The non-profit Environmental Integrity Project has released a list of the most planet-warming power plants in the nation. The watchdog group, headed by former U.S. Environmental Protection Agency enforcement official Eric Schaeffer, analyzed EPA records to rank the 50 power plants that emit the most pounds of carbon dioxide per megawatt of electricity generated.
The plants contributing the most to global warming in terms of total tons of C02 emitted - electric utilities account for 40 percent of the U.S.'s greenhouse gas emissions - are concentrated in a dozen states: Texas,  Pennsylvania, Indiana, Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, Ohio, West Virginia, Wyoming, Florida, Kentucky, and New Mexico. The nation's dirtiest plant in total C02 emissions is Southern's (SO) Scherer facility in Georgia, according to the report.  Texas is home to the most dirty power plants - five - including two owned by TXU (TXU). The study reports that CO2 emissions have held steady over the past five years but notes that "a wave of new coal-fired power plants are being permitted and built across the country" that will result in an estimated 34 percent spike in greenhouse gas emissions between 2005 and 2030. "If any new coal plants are built, they must be required to dramatically reduce carbon dioxide emissions from current levels," the report's authors state. The study also tracks the most polluting plants in terms of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and mercury emissions.

Report: U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions Fell in 2006

photo: johnny blood
Energy-related greenhouse gas emissions in the United States declined 1.3 percent last year, according to a report released today by the U.S. Department of Energy. The survey by DOE's Energy Information Administration notes that 2006 saw the biggest drop in the economy's "carbon intensity" - carbon dioxide emissions per dollar of gross domestic product - since 1990. Good news to be sure but climate change skeptics and ExxonMobil shouldn't get too excited. Weather conditions and the vagaries of the economy played a big role in the emissions remission. Meanwhile, the long-term prognosis remains grim: Between 1991 and 2006 U.S. energy-related greenhouse gas emissions rose 18 percent. And yesterday a report published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences showed that global C02 emissions are accelerating rapidly, with the growth rate tripling between 2000 and 2004. That's due in part to the runaway Chinese economy.

In 2006, the U.S. benefited from a warmer winter and a cooler summer, which meant fewer people were turning up the thermostat or cranking the air conditioning. "The resulting decrease in carbon intensity ... was driven by increased use of natural gas, the least carbon-intensive fossil fuel, and greater reliance on non-fossil fuels," the DOE states. The report does offer a glimmer of hope for the future: Although industrial output grew by 3.9 percent in 2006, related greenhouse gas emissions dropped by an estimated 1.2 percent.

Pelosi Taps Yahoo Users for Global Warming Legislation Ideas

User-generated legislation? House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is appearing on Yahoo Answers this week to crowdsource ideas to include in bills to combat global warming. Yahoo Answers lets people throw out questions on just about any topic and get replies from the service's 90 million members. The San Francisco Democrat's virtual one-way town meeting is part of Yahoo's (YHOO) "Be a Better Planet" campaign. As of this writing, more than 27,000 people have posted responses to Pelosi's query on what they would like to see included in global warming legislation. Yahoo Answers participants rate each others' responses, and at the moment some of the top suggestions recommend that Congress impose a national greenhouse gas emissions cap; mandate increased vehicle fuel efficiency; and promote mass transit and bicycling to discourage suburban sprawl. Then there's the usual flamers and yahooism. (One top-rated answer urges the speaker to reject "ecomarxism.") Interestingly enough, posts by environmental experts like sustainability guru Lester Brown and eco-celebrities like TV environmental journalist Simran Sethi were given the thumbs-down by Yahoo Answers users, tagged "Answer hidden due to its low rating."

Utah Joins Schwarzenegger's Green Bloc

photo: California Governor's Office
Utah today became the latest western state to join a regional compact to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Utah Governor Jon Huntsman and fellow Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger of California signed the agreement to include Utah in what may eventually result in a western carbon trading market. The Western Regional Climate Action Initiative includes Arizona, California, New Mexico, Oregon and Washington.  The alliance aims to develop a regional cap on greenhouse gas emissions. That will prove a challenge, given the dependence of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah on coal-fired power plants. But those states will soon lose California has a market, given that regulators have banned utilities PG&E (PCG), Southern California Edison (EIX) and San Diego Gas & Electric (SRE) from signing long-term contracts to buy electricity from out-of-state coal-fired plants.

Norway: 100 Percent Clean and Green by 2050

photo: green wombat

Green Wombat is in Norway this week. Today is the Scandinavian country's national holiday - commemorating its independence from Denmark in 1814 - and it seems the whole of Oslo is gathered at the Royal Palace (photo above) for the festivities. Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg recently declared a different sort of independence: "In the period up to 2050, Norway will undertake to reduce global greenhouse  gas emissions equivalent to 100 percent of our own emissions," he said in a speech last month. "This does not mean no emissions .... But it does mean that each tonne of greenhouse gases emitted is to be offset by an equivalent reduction elsewhere. This adds up to zero emissions." Norway finds itself in the particular situation of a country that obtains some 95 percent of its electricity from a renewable source - hydro power - yet is the world's third-largest exporter of oil after Saudi Arabia and Russia. North Sea oil has made Norway exceedingly wealthy yet also fuels global warming. Stoltenberg was sketchy on the details of how Norway would become 100 percent clean and green. But his government has begun a project to develop carbon-capture technology for a natural gas plant, and Norway sequesters C02 from some North Sea gas production under the seabed. The country also offers significant tax breaks for electric cars - which makes the $92,000 Tesla Roadster an affordable car in this country. But maybe Norway will get some advice from the Governator: An Oslo newspaper yesterday reported that the Norwegian environment minister has invited Arnold Schwarzenegger to a climate change summit in August.

GM, Shell Call for Greenhouse Gas Cap

General Motors today became the first automaker to call for a mandatory cap on greenhouse gas emissions and legislation to reduce the threat of global warming. GM (GM) and 11 other industrial behemoths joined a coalition of big corporations and environmental groups that form the United States Climate Action Partnership, or USCAP. Also coming on board were oil giants Shell (RDS-B) and ConocoPhillips (COP), insurance company American International Group (AIG), aluminum maker Alcan (AL), medical instruments company Boston Scientific (BSX), farm equipment maker Deere (DE), Dow Chemical (DOW), pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), financial services firm Marsh (MMC), PepsiCo (PBG), and electronics company Siemens (SI). The Nature Conservancy and the National Wildlife Federation joined USCAP today as  well. The addition of a wide cross-section of the nation's industrial might - with a collective $1.7 trillion in revenues - to the coalition furthers boxes in the Bush administration as Congress prepares to pass legislation to impose a national cap on greenhouse gas emissions followed by some sort of carbon trading market. If your core consistency - the titans of industry - are calling for regulation, it gets a bit difficult to argue that mandatory greenhouse gas reductions will hurt the economy.

GM's call for a gas cap is a watershed. It, along with the other automakers, have fought to quash efforts to regulate vehicle carbon dioxide emissions in California and elsewhere and have long opposed efforts to raise fuel efficiency standards. How GM will reconcile such campaigns with its new call for laws to do what it has opposed for so many years will be interesting, to say the least. “GM is very pleased to join USCAP to proactively address the concerns and applauds its members for recognizing the important role that technology achieving an economy-wide solution,” said GM chairman Rick Wagoner said in a statement. “A central element as we see it is energy diversity – being able vehicles that can be powered by many different energy sources and advanced to help displace petroleum and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”

With this many Fortune 500 companies wanting a seat at the climate change table, a national greenhouse gas law is inevitable. But Democrats and environmentalists will undoubtedly face pressure to water down legislation to make it amenable - and less costly - to corporate America. Set your greenwashing detectors on high.

More on GM's Move

Hawaii Passes Global Warming Legislation

photo: reeflections

Hawaii has become the second U.S. state to pass legislation capping greenhouse gas emissions. Modeled after California's landmark law, Hawaii's Global Warming Solutions Act of 2007 requires the island state to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. A task force would have until the end of 2009 to devise a regulatory plan to achieve the greenhouse gas emissions limits. Like California, Hawaii will consider a carbon trading market as one way to meet the targets. The Democrat-controlled Legislature passed the global warming law late last week by a huge margin, with only four legislators voting against it. Republican Governor Linda Lingle has until July 10 to act on the legislation.

Silicon Valley's Green Fringe Benefits

Sustainable Silicon Valley is a coalition of tech firms and other companies that have joined local governments and agencies to work toward reducing the Valley's greenhouse gas emissions 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2010. The organization has released a survey of what its members are doing to help employees go carbon neutral, given that in the sprawl that is Silicon Valley most people's greenhouse gas emissions are produced driving or while at home. (Only frequent fliers who travel more than 50,000 miles a year emit more.) "To radically reduce CO2 emissions, businesses must think outside the box of the workplace," wrote Bruce Karney of KM-Experts, the consultant that conducted the survey. It asked 14 questions, ranging from whether companies encourage telecommuting to whether they offer charging stations for electric cars.

Subsidizing the purchase of a hybrid or other fuel-efficient car has increasingly become a green fringe benefit in the valley. ETM Electromatic and Hyperion (recently acquired by Oracle (ORCL) ) give workers $5,000 while Integrated Archive Systems dangles a $10,000 incentive to get employees to ditch their SUVs. Google (GOOG) uses internal social networking sites to coordinate carpools while software company Ideas offers preferred parking for hybrids. Drug developer Alza, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) and PARC give employees $1 for each day they bike, walk or carpool to work. PARC - the fabled Palo Alto Research Center - also offers $100 toward a bicycle purchase and maintenance. On the home front, Santa Clara University has distributed a thousand energy-efficient compact fluorescent light bulbs while two renewable energy companies - Akeena Solar and 3 Phases Energy - subsidize employees' installation of solar panels.

Despite the much-publicized greening of Silicon Valley, only 25 companies bothered to respond to the survey. Big name Sustainable Silicon Valley "C02 Pledging Partners" who were no-shows include Cisco Systems (CSCO), eBay (EBAY), Hewlett-Packard (HPQ), Oracle, and Sun Microsystems (SUNW).

The Green Grass Roots: National Climate Change Rally on Saturday

If you happen to be driving through Marin County, California, on Saturday, here's the 411 on why people in polar bear suits are waving signs outside a San Rafael Chevrolet/Hummer dealership. As part of what is being billed as a National Day of Climate Action across the U.S., a "Clean Car Caravan" of hybrids and other green vehicles will cross the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco and deliver petitions to the auto dealership urging General Motors (GM) "to plug in the hybrid and pull the plug on the Hummer." (Though around here you're just as likely to see a '72 Mercedes running on vegetable oil as an H2.) The national event is being organized by Step It Up, the brainchild of noted environmental writer Bill McKibben, to drive a grass-root movement to pressure Congress take immediate action on climate change. Earlier in the day, Bay Area organizers will hold  a clean car rally in San Francisco's Presidio to show off plug-in hybrids, all-electric cars, bio-diesel vehicles and solar-powered buses. Kids can throw pies at a Hummer and make masks of polar bears - whose habitat, as we all know, is fast melting away as climate change intensifies. The San Francisco event is being run by a coalition that includes Working Assets, the Union of Concerned Scientists, Plug In America, NRDC and other environmental groups. Of course in the Bay Area, we'll protest just about anything at the drop of a hat. But what intrigues Green Wombat is whether we're seeing the emergence of a mass protest movement around global warming - a summer of green - one that demands, in part, green tech solutions to climate change.

Another Oil Giant Joins the Green Team

Big Oil is looking less monolithic today with the defection of ConocoPhillips (COP) to a coalition of corporations and environmental groups pushing for a mandatory national cap on greenhouse gas emissions in the United States. The oil company joins BP (BP) in breaking ranks with the industry over global warming. ConocoPhillips chief Jim Mulva said Wednesday that the company would become a member of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership.  The coalition includes the CEOs of such old-line industrial behemoths as Alcoa (AA), Caterpillar (CAT) DuPont (DD) and General Electric (GE) as well as financial services firm Lehman Brothers (LEH). Other companies in the coalition are utilities PG&E Corp. (PCG), FPL (FPL) and Duke Energy (DUK). Joining them are the Natural Resources Defense Council, Environmental Defense, World Resources Institute and the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. "In addition to taking actions in our own businesses, we believe it is important that business should step forward to help devise practical, equitable and cost-effective approaches to address the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere at both a national and international level," Mulva said in a statement. "We believe that a mandatory national framework that links to international programs is most likely to achieve meaningful impact on global greenhouse gas emissions.”

Like his fellow Fortune 500 CEOs, Mulva probably hasn't been born again green. But he, like a growing number of business leaders, have seen climate change bearing down on Corporate America like a Bengali Typhoon, Category 5. Better to have a seat at the table when it comes to regulating greenhouse gas emissions then be swept away by the whirlwind of global warming legislation now before Congress. That presents a dilemma for environmentalists: their new-found friends in pinstripes can provide the heft to finally get climate change legislation passed, if not enacted by this president. But what's it going to cost?

Report: U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions Up 16 Percent Since 1990

With little fanfare, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency this week released its inventory of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States between 1990 and 2005. As Congress considers legislation to cap green gas emissions, the inventory is an important snapshot of which industries will face the biggest challenges in reducing their contribution to global warming. The report also contains some disturbing stats on the jump in extremely potent greenhouse gas emissions from synthetic chemicals used to make computer chips and other products (more on that below.) Total greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. rose 16.3 percent between 1990 and 2005 while the economy grew 55 percent. Carbon dioxide accounted for 84 percent of the U.S.'s greenhouse gas emissions, with 94 percent of the CO2 produced by fossil fuels. With 5 percent of the planet's population, the U.S. in 2005 was responsible for 22 percent of carbon dioxide emitted worldwide from burning fossil fuels. Power plants contribute the most spew, responsible for 41 percent of the nation's C02 emissions in 2005. Cars, trucks and other transportation were the second-biggest emitters, accounting for 33 percent of CO2 that year. Emissions from cement production have grown 38 percent since 1990 - an indication that there will be plenty of opportunity to develop green building technologies in a carbon constrained world. And all that stuff we buy to fill our McMansions? Much of it ends up being burned in municipal waste plants. Rampant consumerism helped fuel a 91 percent increase in carbon emissions from waste combustion between 1990 and 2005.

Off most people's radar screens are greenhouse gas emissions from of a group of synthetic chemicals used in industrial manufacturing - hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), perfluorocarbons (PFCs), and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6). Although they account for only 2.2 percent of the U.S.'s greenhouse gas emissions, the chemicals are extremely potent. SF6, for instance, has a global warming potential 23,900 times that of carbon dioxide. Since 1990, emissions from these chemicals has spiked 83 percent. "SF6 and PFCs have extremely long atmospheric lifetimes, resulting in their essentially irreversible accumulation in the atmosphere once emitted," the EPA report states. "Sulfur hexafluoride is the most potent greenhouse gas the [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] has evaluated."  Ironically, the chemicals were approved as substitutes for ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons used in air conditioners and refrigerants and the big jump in emissions comes from those uses. The chemicals are also used by companies like Intel (INTC) and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) to make semiconductors, and in industrial manufacturing to produce aluminum. In addition, they play a role in the transmission and distribution of electricity. The good news is that aluminum makers like Alcoa (AA) have decreased emissions from HFCs, PFCs and SF6s by 84 percent, and other industrial uses of the chemicals have declined dramatically as well. Emissions from chip making, however, rose nearly 50 percent between 1990 and 2005, though they have remained fairly flat in recent years.   

Cow power - and pig power - entrepreneurs could play a key role in reducing methane emissions from manure by capturing the gas and using it to produce electricity.

Australia Bans Traditional Light Bulbs to Combat Global Warming

photo originally uploaded by grizzly
Australia today became the first nation to ban traditional light bulbs, requiring that consumers and businesses install high efficiency lighting to cut greenhouse gas emissions. A month ago a liberal Los Angeles state legislator was widely ridiculed for proposing a similar ban on incandescent bulbs in California. But in this case it's the conservative government of Australian Prime Minister John Howard that is flipping the switch on a 125-year-old technology in a nation of 20 million people. Incandescent light bulbs will be phased out by 2010, eliminating an estimated 4 million metric tons of greenhouse gases annually by 2015, according to the government. "The most effective and immediate way we can reduce greenhouse gas emissions is by using energy more efficiently,” said Australian Environment Minister Malcolm Turnbull in a statement. "The climate change challenge is a global one. I encourage other countries to follow Australia’s lead and make the switch to more energy efficient products like compact fluorescent light bulbs.” CFLs use 70 percent less electricity than traditional bulbs and last 10 times longer. Australia's bulb ban is good news for General Electric (GE), Philips, Honeywell (HON) and other compact fluorescent light bulb manufacturers as well as retailers that sell their products. In the United States, Wal-Mart (WMT) has pledged to sell 100 million CFLs this year.

There's no small irony in the Howard government seeing the light on energy conservation as a solution to global warming.

Report: Carbon Tax a Better Way to Fight Global Warming

photo originally uploaded by uniqueview 

A former Clinton administration commerce department official today released a report arguing that a global tax on companies' greenhouse house gas emissions is a more efficient way to combat global warming than the carbon trading markets endorsed by a host of government officials and corporations like Alcoa (AA), BP, (BP), DuPont (DD), Duke Energy (DUK) and General Electric (GE). "A carbon tax would both directly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and provide powerful incentives for technological progress," wrote Robert  J. Shapiro, a Washington D.C. consultant, veteran think tanker and former under secretary of commerce for economic affairs. "Carbon taxes also should provide greater incentives for companies to develop new, environmentally-friendly technologies or abatement strategies than a cap-and-trade program." Shapiro's study was released by the American Consumer Institute, a free-market oriented Washington group.

Corporations currently are not charged for the economic and environmental impacts of their greenhouse gas emissions, though those "externalities" affect everyone. Under a carbon tax, those consequences would be calculated and a tax imposed accordingly. "Since every government needs revenues, the challenge is to design taxes so they distort those relative prices as little as possible. Part of the answer is to make the base of the tax as broad as possible, so its rate can be low and most people and activities are affected equally," Shapiro wrote. "Carbon taxes generally meet this criterion, although not as well as broad income or consumption taxes. However, their economic drawback of raising the price of carbon-intensive products and operations, relative to those which are not carbon-intensive, is also their environmental purpose." Companies that do not emit greenhouse gases - such as solar and wind producers - or sell greener goods and services - would benefit. The government could use carbon tax revenue to support renewable energy technologies, cut corporate taxes or increase health spending, according to Shapiro.

Austin to Slash Greenhouse Gas Emissions to Fight Global Warming

photo originally uploaded by the chaninator

The mayor of Austin, Texas, today announced the nation's most aggressive plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions, pledging that the Texas state capital and city of 720,000 will go carbon neutral by 2020.  The Austin Climate Protection Plan unveiled by Mayor Will Winn should create plenty of opportunities for green tech entrepreneurs, hybrid automakers like Toyota (TM) and Honda (HMC), and green building companies. The plan requires that all city facilities be powered with renewable energy by 2012 and that Austin's municipal fleet go carbon neutral by 2020 by using electric and alternative fuel vehicles. All city departments will develop and implement climate protection plans to reduce their emissions of planet-warming gases.

Thirty percent of the electricity sold by Austin Energy, the city's municipal-owned utility, must come from renewable sources by 2020. Austin Energy will be required to obtain 100 megawatts of solar power and all new power plants must be carbon neutral - effectively banning coal power in a state where Dallas-based utility TXU (TXU) has enraged environmentalists with its plan to build 11 coal-fired plants. Austin Energy will be required to save 700 megawatts by 2020 through energy efficiency and conservation programs.

Home builders will have to do their part. By 2015, all new homes must be "zero net-energy capable" and energy efficiency in other new construction must increase 75 percent. Austin's climate plan also calls for community programs to allow individual citizens to offset their greenhouse gas emissions. "This isn't just the strongest plan in Texas, it's the strongest plan in the country," said Jim Marston, the regional director of green group Environmental Defense, in a statement. "This is the kind of leadership that makes us proud to live in Austin and hopeful that Texans will accept responsibility for the role we should play in solving this global crisis."

Report: Global Warming to Cost Utility Company Investors

A report prepared for institutional investors puts some cold hard figures on the cost of global warming to electric utility companies worldwide. No surprise that coal-dependent U.S. utilities will see a significant hit on their bottom line if they do not begin to cut their spew and a nationwide cap on greenhouse gas emissions is imposed, as proposed in legislation now before Congress. Utilities like PG&E (PCG) that resell power from cleaner-burning natural gas and renewable energy sources stand to profit while coal-using Southern Company (SO) and American Electric Power (AEP) could lose billions. The report was prepared for the Carbon Disclosure Project, an alliance of 225 institutional investors - managing $31 trillion in assets - that annually asks corporations to reveal their greenhouse gas emissions. This year the report focused on electric utilities, one of the largest sources of planet-warming gases. "No longer can fiduciaries claim to be unaware of what is at stake," the report's authors warned. "Taking climate risks into account is now becoming part of smart financial management. Failure to do so may well be tantamount to an abdication of fiduciary responsibility and indicative of poor management."

About 42 percent of the world's 265 biggest public utilities disclosed emissions data to the project. That information was used to calculate the cost of the utilities' carbon emissions based on the $22 average trading price for a ton of carbon dioxide on the European carbon market, known as the European Trading Scheme. "Remarkably, by this measure few electric utility companies were adding value to the economy," the authors concluded. "The damages they imposed exceeded the surpluses they generated, often by a large margin." The report found that American Electric Power and Southern imposed net annual costs of $3.6 billion and $2.7 billion, respectively. American Electric plants, for instance, emit 146 million tons of greenhouse gases. "These companies must be regarded as quite exposed to future restrictions on greenhouse gas emissions," the report stated. PG&E, on the other hand, emitted 536,000 tons of greenhouse gases and reaped a net benefit of $404 million by the report's methodology. Similarly, nuclear power producer Exelon (EXC) produced a net benefit of $225 million.

The report also calculated the cost to the utilities if a California-style global warming law - requiring a 25 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions - was adopted nationwide. At current emissions levels, such a cap would cost American Electric nearly 7 percent of its annual revenue. Texas utility TXU (TXU), under fire from environmentalists for its coal-power plant building binge, would lose 3 percent of its revenue. Such a cap would cost PG&E just .03 percent of its sales.

California Bans Electricity Purchases from Coal-Fired Power Plants

In a boost for renewable energy companies, the California Public Utilities Commission today effectively banned long-term purchases of "dirty" electricity produced by coal-fired power plants as part of the state's fight against global warming. Most California power plants operate on lower-polluting natural gas but utilities also import power from out-of-state coal-fired plants. To help fulfill California's targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, utilities and other power providers will not be permitted to buy electricity from plants whose emissions are greater than those of a gas-fired plant - 1,100 pounds of carbon dioxide per megawatt hour. Most coal-fired plants exceed that limit, which is an interim standard until California regulators impose a greenhouse gas emissions cap. The standard applies to investment in new power plants and contracts of five years or more. "Today’s decision is an important step in our efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” utilities commissioner John Bohn said in a statement. “Our next task is to harness the power and creativity of the marketplace to address global warming.”
The move means that utilities like PG&E (PCG), Southern California Edison (EIX) and San Diego Gas & Electric (SRE) will need to replace their coal contracts. Given the cost of constructing new natural gas plants in California, the utilities are likely to step up purchases of renewable energy from wind farms and solar power plants. California's investor-owned utilities are already scrambling to meet a state-mandated target that 20 percent of the electricity they sell come from renewable energy sources. The new greenhouse gas standard is also likely to discourage construction of coal-fired power plants in bordering states that were counting on California as a market or source of financing.

CEOs' Push for Global Warming Laws a Boon for Green Tech

A coalition of major industrial corporations and environmental groups today released a proposal for immediate and far-reaching Congressional action to stem global warming that, if adopted, would radically remake the United State's energy system, creating huge new opportunities for green tech companies and investors. The policy recommendations from the United States Climate Action Partnership comes as the new Democratically controlled Congress considers several global warming bills. The coalition includes aluminum maker Alcoa (AA), oil company BP (BP), Caterpillar (CAT) DuPont (DD) and General Electric (GE) and utilities  Duke Energy (DUK), FPL (FPL), PG&E Corp. (PCG) and PNM Resources (PNM) along with green groups Environmental Defense, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Pew Center on Global Climate Change and World Resources Institute. "Failure is not an option," the CEOs state in their policy proposal. "The way we produce and use energy must fundamentally change, both nationally and globally."

The coalition calls for a mandatory climate action program that would set greenhouse gas emission limits on major sectors of the economy, establish a carbon trading market and signifcant investment in renewable energy technologies. The climate action group said the government should dedicate permanent funding for renewable energy research and provide tax credits and loan guarantees to stimulate investment in alternative energy technology.

"There are a number of technologies that are currently available that emit little or no GHGs, such as wind, solar, and nuclear power, hybrid vehicles, and numerous energy efficiency technologies," the coalition said in its policy recommendations. "Rapid advancement and deployment of new, breakthrough technologies are also core elements of any climate change solution. Thus, an effective climate change program must include policies to promote significant research, development and deployment of hyper-efficient end use technologies; low-or zero-GHG emitting technologies; and cost-effective carbon capture and storage, which will be particularly important in the deployment of advanced coal technologies."

ThinkEquity alternative energy analyst David Edwards told Green Wombat that the US-CAP agenda is a boost for green tech. "It’s actually quite momentous to have large corporations, especially the large corporations listed, to step up and ask for broad-reaching and aggressive federal legislation," he said. "It clearly provides good R&D support for the industry, which could help quicken the pace of innovation and cost reduction."

Wal-Mart Backs Corporate Drive for U.S. Global Warming Legislation

Pressure on President Bush to take action on global warming grew Friday night as Wal-Mart (WMT) threw its support to a coalition of major U.S. corporations and environmental groups pressing for the quick implementation of national policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and establish a carbon trading market. The group - called the U.S. Climate Action Partnership - will unveil its climate change initiative on Monday in Washington, D.C. The coalition includes the CEOs of such old-line industrial behemoths as Alcoa (AA), Caterpillar (CAT) DuPont (DD) and General Electric (GE) as well as financial services firm Lehman Brothers (LEH). Other companies in the coalition are utilities PG&E Corp. (PCG), FPL (FPL) and Duke Energy (DUK). Joining them are the Natural Resources Defense Council, Environmental Defense, World Resources Institute and the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. Said Linda Dillman, Wal-Mart's executive vice president for sustainability, in a statement: "We endorse the group's call for strong national policies and market-based programs for greenhouse gas reductions."

Utility Chief Calls on U.S. Government to Regulate Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Set Up Carbon Trading Market

The CEO of the parent company of one of the nation's largest utilities today urged the federal government to establish national limits on greenhouse gas emissions and require targeted reductions to combat global warming. In a speech at the National Press Club, PG&E Corp. (PCG) Chief Executive Peter Darbee also called for a national carbon trading market, an extension of tax credits for renewable energy investment, national energy efficiency standards and the promotion of plug-in hybrids cars. "If you look at U.S. greenhouse gas emissions compared with other nations, the amount is vastly disproportionate to our population.  Our emissions are higher than those of China and India combined, where the population is more than 2.5 billion people," Darbee said, according to his prepared remarks, in accepting an award from the Natural Resources Defense Council. "If you look at our wealth and prosperity relative to other nations, it’s clear that we can afford to make a difference. And, if you look at our tremendous capacity for innovation, it’s clear that we have the human capital to develop the solutions. By signaling to the market that we’re serious about progress on clean energy, we can stimulate investment and engage our best and brightest in this effort."

San Francisco-based PG&E is perhaps the nation's greenest utility and Darbee also appeared on Capitol Hill today to throw his support behind Senate legislation that would cut greenhouse gas emissions from his own industry.  “As the single largest source of emissions in the U.S., the utility sector must play a key role in meeting our national emissions reductions goals," he said in a statement. "This bill will significantly reduce emissions from the utility sector and it will do so by leveraging the innovation and efficiency of the market.” Darbee's speech comes as a raft of global warming bills are being introduced into the new Democrat-controlled Congress. At the Press Club, he urged the government to provide renewable energy investors with some certainty by extending tax credits for more than one or two years at a time and to fund new research into alternative energy. "I’m particularly intrigued by solar thermal technology. PG&E is also exploring the possibility of tidal and wave power off the coast of San Francisco," said Darbee. "Our economy will lead the clean energy revolution, just as we’ve done in hi-tech and biotech."

Darbee's call for national global warming laws is sure to further divide the utility industry. Unlike utitilies in coal-dependent regions, PG&E relies on cleaner natural gas plants to provide most of the electricity it sells. And because California regulates the utility's revenues, PG&E isn't dependent on increasing consumers' power usage to boost profits.

The Top 10 Climate Change Influencers of 2006

It's that time again, when  editors everywhere trot out their end-of year lists - The Most Beautiful People, the Top 10 Trends, etc. etc. Frankly, the Green Wombat couldn't be bothered coming up with a list of his own but we will pass on the 2006 One Degree Hot List: The Year's Most Influential in Global Climate Change. One Degree is a Web spinoff of the Weather Channel that focuses on climate issues. Taking the No. 1 position is, no surprise, Al Gore. "If global climate change reached a tipping point in the public consciousness in 2006, former Vice President Al Gore may well have pushed it over the top," the list editors wrote. "With his unlikely hit film An Inconvenient Truth, Gore became the official climate change spokesman for millions across the globe, presenting possibly the most widely distributed (and highest grossing) science lecture in history." British Prime Minister Tony Blair gets props for making global warming a policy priority while George W. Bush's fierce opposition to such policies is credited with inspiring California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and other Golden State politicians (No. 4) to enact a landmark global warming law. Others making the list include evangelist Richard Cizik for taking climate change to the pulpit; NASA global warming expert James Hansen; and Wal-Mart for its conversion to the green agenda and efforts to promote environmentally sustainable products and practices.

Scientists: Planting Trees No Cure for Global Warming

As Green Wombat reported Thursday, California utility Pacific Gas & Electric will invest in forestry projects to neutralize greenhouse gas emissions from its customers' energy use. Today, scientists presenting research at a San Francisco conference said, in effect, don't bother. At least not in North America and Europe. The reason: computer modeling shows that while trees indeed do remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, in the planet's mid-latitudes their dark leaves also absorb heat and thus have a marginal benefit in reducing global warming, according to Govindasamy Bala, a climate scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California. If the scientists' findings are confirmed by further research, it could spell trouble for corporate efforts to mitigate companies' contributions to global warming by planting trees rather than taking action to actually reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases. "This suggests that planting forests would not slow down global warming," Bala told fellow scientists attending the big American Geophysical Union confab as he showed slides depicting the results of the study he co-authored. Tree-planting also is being used by so-called carbon offset services that promise to neutralize consumers' personal emissions of carbon dioxide from driving, flying and their consumerist lifestyle. It makes more sense, Bala said, to plant trees in the southern hemisphere as tropical forests also absorb more water vapor, creating clouds that cool the planet.  Bala cautioned that his conclusions come from a preliminary investigation based on computer modeling of what would happen if the planet was deforested - temperatures would drop slightly, the scientists found - and not on actual on-the-ground measurements. "Forests have a lot of value in our economy and for ecosystems," Bala emphasized.

California Utility Lets Customers Go Carbon Neutral to Fight Global Warming

headwaters forest photo by Greg King

Pacific Gas & Electric (PCG), one of the nation's largest utilities, will calculate its California customers' individual greenhouse gas emissions based on their energy usage, giving homes and businesses the option to go carbon neutral by paying a small surcharge on their monthly bill that corresponds to how many pounds of carbon dioxide they acutally emit.  PG&E will then use that money to finance environmental projects that reduce greenhouse gases by an equivalent amount. The ClimateSmart program - the first of its kind - differs markedly from other "green guilt" programs that allow people to pay extra to support a utility's purchase of renewable energy. In this case, PG&E customers are paying for real-world reductions in their actual contributions to global warming, according to the utility. PG&E will initially invest in California forestry projects. That's because trees act as carbon sinks, absorbing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. PG&E spokesman Keely Wachs said the utility will preserve forests in danger of being logged as well as pay for new tree planting. "Not only are these projects great ways of reducing CO2 emissions but there are many great environmental co-benefits associated with them," he told Green Wombat. "If we preserve an old-growth forest area with a stream running through it, we also can preserve salmon and other wildlife." 

He said ClimateSmart will launch in mid-2007 and PG&E will soon begin taking bids from landowners, non-profits and others for forest preservation projects. While tree-planting and forest conservation can prove effective in cutting greenhouse gases - just how effective is a subject of scientific debate - the benefit disappears if fire or disease destroy the woodlands.  And of course the full impact on global warming from planting new trees will be years off. Still, PG&E expects ClimateSmart will take at least 2 million tons of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere in its first three years, which would be like removing 350,000 cars from the road for 12 months. If the program is successful PG&E will expand ClimateSmart to include other carbon neutral projects, though Wachs wouldn't specify what those might entail.

Leading the green charge in a brown industry, PG&E itself will commit $1 million to the program and expects to raise at least $20 million from customers in its first three years. The non-profit California Climate Action Registry and independent auditors will certify that ClimateSmart results in actual reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, the utility said. The ClimateSmart surcharge will average about $4.31 a month and participating customers' utility bills will show their monthly greenhouse gas emissions. "It educates our customers and the broader public about the impact of their energy usage," says Wachs.

Made in China: The West's Responsibility for China's Greenhouse Gases

photo uploaded by daechang

At a recent panel discussion on China's green tech boom, it was noted that in a few years China will overtake the United States as the largest emitter of greenhouse gases. That led San Francisco venture capitalist Bryant Tong to repeat a provocative point he had read in a Beijing newspaper: If the West relies on China to be the world's factory, churning out cheap goods that promote our economic prosperity, doesn't it also bear responsibility for helping China reduce its contribution to global warming from the two coal-fired power plants it brings online every week, in part, to satisfy our consumerist desires?  It's worth putting down your iPod (made in Shenzhen) and closing your Dell laptop (assembled in Xiamen) to ponder. Open a bedroom closet or kitchen cabinet and try to find something not made in China. Remove all the China-produced products from your local Wal-Mart hypermart and you probably could squeeze the rest of the merchandise into a 7-Eleven. With discussions beginning on the successor to the Kyoto Protocol, and the need to include China in any future accord, it's sure to be a topic of growing debate.

Wal-Mart Teams Up with Al Gore to Fight Global Warming

When Green Wombat was in Australia last week so was Al Gore, criss-crossing the country to personally train "climate change presenters" - a hand-picked cadre who will hit the road to speak some inconvenient truths to their fellow Aussies. Now Wal-Mart (WMT) has donated $75,000  to help train 1,000 Americans to spread the word as part of Gore's Climate Project. The donation coincides with the release of An Inconvenient Truth on DVD.  The hit documentary will be sold, naturally, at  more than 3,900 Wal-Mart outlets. The company is packaging the DVD with an energy-efficient, greenhouse gas-reducing compact fluorescent light bulb.

HP to Cut Greenhouse Gas Emissions

The timing was probably purely coincidental, but the day after the Democrats swept back to power, Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) has announced that by 2010 it will reduce its carbon dioxide emissions 15 percent below this year's level to help fight global warming. The Palo Alto, California, computer and printer giant said today it will also buy "cost-effective" renewable energy. HP will work with the World Wildlife Fund to obtain and implement technology to reduce energy use at all its facilities worldwide. The company says it will report its greenhouse gas emissions to the World Economic Forum’s Global Greenhouse Gas Registry. HP joins DuPont (DD), Wal-Mart (WMT) and other Fortune 500 companies that have recently embraced the spirit, if not the letter, of the Kyoto Accord. Look for business opportunities to help these behemoths make good on their green pledges.

Global Warming Solution? Carbon Dioxide to be Pumped Under the Ocean Floor

  Sunset @ Bass Strait, Australia 
  Originally uploaded by timparkinson.

An international agreement that regulates the dumping of waste into the world's oceans has been amended to allow carbon dioxide from coal-fired power plants to be pumped beneath the sea floor. Australia led the effort to change the London Convention to permit carbon storage, or geosequestration, as a way to combat global warming. "These technologies are relatively new but have enormous potential to help the world reduce its greenhouse gas emissions," said Australian environment minister Ian Campbell Friday in a statement. Australia, of course, has refused to sign the Kyoto Accord and holds vast coal deposit. In fact, 86 percent of the country's electricity is produced by coal-fired plants. Some environmentalists oppose geosequestration, saying the risks are too high and it does nothing to reduce the planet's reliance on coal and other greenhouse gas-emitting fossil fuels.

California Steaming: The Golden State and Global Warming

 
  Originally uploaded by marymuses.

While ghouls and goblins were trick-or-treating last night, the California Energy Commission issued a scary report on the Golden State's contribution to global warming. In 2004, California released 492 million gross metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. That makes the Bear Republic the nation's second-largest emitter of greenhouse gases and the 12th to 16th largest contributor to global warming on the planet.

However, when put in context the report shows that the California experience offers hope that greenhouse gas emissions be contained. For instance, while the state's economy grew 83 percent between 1990 and 2003 and it had the largest population increase in the country, greenhouse gas emissions rose only 12 percent, due largely to energy efficiency and renewable energy programs. "This demonstrates the potential for
uncoupling economic trends from (greenhouse gas) emissions trends," wrote the report's authors.

Texas, in contrast, has double the carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel burning than California, and Wyoming has the highest per capita emission of greenhouse gases.

The report makes clear, though, that Californians will have to end their love affair with the internal combustion engine if they are to achieve significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. Transportation produces about 41 percent of the state's greenhouse gases.

More Companies Go Kyoto

Thirteen U.S. corporations today pledged to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions between 9 percent and 100 percent over the next decade. The companies, which range from Fortune 100 behemoths like DuPont and Intel to the Sonoma Wine Company, signed up for the Bush administration's voluntary global warming program called Climate Leaders. (The complete list is here.) So far 58 companies have taken the pledge, and to date five companies, including General Motors and IBM, have met their greenhouse gas reduction targets.

Participating companies agree to conduct an inventory of their greenhouse gas emissions and then develop a plan to reduce or offset them. Some smaller companies have gone completely carbon neutral. For instance, Silver Spring, Maryland, printing company Ecoprint reduced its emissions to zero by buying its electricity from a wind farm and purchasing renewable energy credits to offset emissions from employee commutes, manufacturing and heating. Conservation Services Group, a 270-person Westborough, Massachusetts energy consultancy, promised to slash its annual 2,036 metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions to zip by replacing its vehicle fleet with hybrids, curtailing electricity use and buying credits from the Chicago Climate Exchange, a carbon trading market.

As Goes Berkeley, So Goes the Nation?

Part of the fun of living in Berkeley, California, is voting. Sure, there's the usual bond measures and city council candidates - spanning the political spectrum from the left to the far left to the far out left. But in Berkeley we also like to weigh in on topics of international import, and the 2006 election is no exception. For instance, the November 7 ballot features Measure H, which calls on the city council to petition the U.S. House of of Representatives to impeach President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney for various high crimes and misdemeanors. Then there's Measure G, which would have Berkeley reduce its greenhouse gas emissions 80 percent by 2050. The measure, which is advisory but backed by the mayor, urges the city council to set a 10-year emissions reduction target in 2007 and develop a plan to achieve that goal.

Now on many issues Berkeley tends to serve as a bellwether only for Santa Cruz, Santa Monica, Eugene, Boulder and other people's republics. But on the environment the East Bay city has been a national leader: It was the first to adopt curbside recycling, now found in even the reddest of the red states, and in 2003 it began to convert all municipal vehicles to biodiesel.

In one of its periodic forays into foreign policy, Berkeley endorsed the Kyoto Protocol and then proceeded to make its rhetoric reality. Between 2002 and 2005 the city exceeded the Kyoto targets by reducing its greenhouse emissions 14 percent. The city also has joined the Chicago Climate Exchange, the North American carbon trading market. So as New York City and other municipalities now move to limit their own greenhouse gas emissions, they just might want to look to the left coast.

California Global Warming Update

The rubber begins to hit the road on California's landmark global warming law on Oct. 19 when state Air Resources Board members get briefed by their staff on their role and duties in enforcing limits on greenhouse gases. One of California's most powerful environmental agencies - just ask the auto industry - the ARB has been handed the complex job of figuring out how to implement the law's requirement that the state's industrial polluters reduce emissions of greenhouse gases 25 percent by 2020. One thing's for sure, there's a lot of green in it for attorneys and lobbyists as the regulatory battle begins. Stay tuned to the wombat for further developments.

Change a Light Bulb, Save the Planet

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Energy apparently don't share the Bush administration's skepticism about global warming. The agencies' Energy Star program has embarked on a campaign to persuade Americans to replace conventional light bulbs with energy efficient ones "to help reduce the risk of global climate change."

As of today nearly 125,000 people have promised to replace almost 200,000 lightbulbs. That small act alone will eliminate 82 million pounds of greenhouse gases, the EPA says. Energy efficient lightbulbs are more expensive than standard bulbs but use two-thirds less electricity, produce 70 percent less heat and last about 10 times longer. In other words, you'll save money in the long run as well as help the planet.

According to the EPA, 800,000 cars' worth of greenhouse gas emissions could be taken out of the atmosphere if every home in the nation changed at least one light bulb. Now just imagine the environmental payoff if every bulb in every standard-issue McMansion was replaced.....