Oregon’s largest utility, Portland General Electric (PGE), announced it’s moving forward on a plan to stop burning coal at the state’s only operating coal plant. The investor-owned utility, which serves Portland, much of the surrounding metropolitan area, and the state’s capitol, Salem, informed the Oregon Public Utility Commission (OPUC) that it intends to pursue a plant that would either shut down the 550 megawatt coal-fired Boardman Plant or completely switch fuel sources by 2020.

According to a company press release, PGE submitted its most recent integrated resource plan (IRP) to the OPUC in November, proposing to install extensive emissions control retrofits on the Boardman Plant, at an estimated cost of $520 million to $560 million. These controls would allow the plant, located in northeastern Oregon along the Columbia River, to continue to operate despite new, stricter emissions rules from the state Environmental Quality Commission (EQC).

“Our preliminary analysis shows that an alternative plan may be the best option for our customers and we intend to pursue that,” said Jim Piro, PGE’s President and CEO. “We need to complete our analysis and determine whether we have enough support to move forward, but we feel it’s important to let people know that this is our preferred path.”

According to PGE:

The company chose not to include a proposal in its IRP to cease Boardman operations in 2020 because such a plan would not be actionable under the EQC rules; however, further discussion with environmental regulators and other stakeholders suggests that there may be support for a rule change.

“Right now state regulations give us very few options – either shut the plant prematurely at a tremendous cost to customers or install very expensive new controls despite uncertainty about future carbon regulation and technological developments,” Piro said. “We think an alternative plan could reduce cost and risk for our customers while giving us time to develop replacement resources or convert to a different fuel, but we’ll need changes in state rules and help from our stakeholders to accomplish that.”

Piro noted that if agreement on an alternative plan can’t be reached, PGE will continue to seek approval for installation of all required emissions controls and continued operation of the plant – the best option available to customers under current state rules.

PGE intends to work with the OPUC to establish a new schedule for review of resource planning decisions regarding the Boardman Plant.

Closure of the Boardman Plant would mark the end of coal-fired electricity generation within Oregon and the closure of the largest single source of air pollutants in the state (if not west of the Rockies). The aging coal plant was first built in the 1970s and predates the more stringent air emissions requirements of the Clean Air Act.

One commentator at OregonLive.com notes:

According to documents filed for their Title V Permit renewal in 2006 (a five-year permit), in 2003 PGE Boardman released 5 million tons of CO2, and in a given year emits 28,000 tons of sulfur and nitrogen oxides along with hundreds of tons of particulate matter, major causes of cardiac disease, low birth weight, SIDS, lung cancer, heart attack, stroke, and asthma. Plus Boardman annually emits enough mercury (221 lbs.) to contaminate 2.6 million acres of water, or four times the surface area of all Oregon lakes.

However, Boardman’s closure would not be the end of Oregon’s dependence on coal.

While most Oregon residents assume their electricity comes predominantly from the famous hydroelectric dams on the Columbia River and the region’s other mighty waterways, coal actually provides just shy of 40% of the state’s electricity supply as of 2007, and is the second largest power source after hydropower. While most of the state’s publicly-owned utilities receive their power from the federal hydropower system managed by the Bonneville Power Administration, the state’s two big investor-owned utilities have largely been barred from accessing BPA’s hydropower since the 1970s and now get a big slug of their power from coal.

PGE currently relies on coal for 38.9% of it’s electricity supply, while Pacific Power, the state’s other major utility (parent company PacifiCorp) relies on coal for over two-thirds of the electricity they supply to customers throughout the state. Both utilities import electricity from coal-fired power plants located in the intermountain region, including Montana, Utah and Wyoming.

The Ted Sickinger has more on the potential Boardman closure at the Oregonian here

The incredibly destructive coal mining practice known as “mountaintop removal” causes “pervasive and irreversible” damage to human health and the environment, according to an authoritative scientific study released today.

The comprehensive and far-reaching scientific review, entitled “Mountaintop Mining Consequences“, was conducted by members of the National Academy of Sciences and is being published in the prestigious journal Science.

The study summarized dozens of pre-existing scientific papers analyzing the impacts of mountaintop removal mining, a type of surface coal mining that uses huge amounts of explosives to blast away the tops of mountains to expose coal seams. The resulting debris (aka the former mountain) are typically disposed of through a practice known as “valley fills,” where tons of mining debris are dumped into neighboring valleys, burying miles of headwater streams and valley ecosystems.

According to a press release on the study:

…the authors outline severe environmental degradation taking place at mining sites and downstream. The practice destroys extensive tracts of deciduous forests and buries small streams that play essential roles in the overall health of entire watersheds. Waterborne contaminants enter streams that remain below valley fills and can be transported great distances into larger bodies of water.

Mountaintop removal mining has already buried more than 800 miles of Appalachian streams and destroyed hundreds of square miles of woodlands in one of America’s biodiversity hotspots, all while both the U.S. EPA and state environmental agencies have allowed the destructive practice to continue. That’s left it to activists to slow these projects down and prevent their irreversible damages.

The new scientific study condemned federal and state regulation of mountaintop removal mining operations, concluding that “Current attempts to regulate [mountaintop mining and associated valley fill] practices are inadequate,” and that “Regulators should no longer ignore rigorous science.”

Environmental and Appalachian community advocates hailed the study as a powerful indictment against mountaintop removal mining, according to Appalachian Voices, an environmental non-profit working to bring coalfield residents together to end mountain removal.

Opponents of mountaintop removal expressed disappointment over the Obama Administration’s fluctuating stance on mountaintop removal, citing inconsistencies with statements made by President Obama about restoring science to a more prominent position in agency decision-making. The new study was released just days after the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency approved the expansion of the largest mountaintop removal coal mine in West Virginia.

Appalachian coalfield residents have long been aware of the obvious and major impacts mountaintop removal mining has on the health of local communities and verdant Appalachian ecosystems. Appalachian Voices is hopeful that the study will embolden the Obama Administration to take more decisive action to ultimately end the practice.

In a recent interview the President told the political news organization, Politico, “It’s about listening to what our scientists have to say, even when it’s inconvenient-especially when it’s inconvenient.” Yet last year, the Obama Administration released a multi-agency plan that called for more strict enforcement of laws regulating mountaintop removal but stopped short of prohibiting the practice

“The scientific study released today comes as little surprise to us living in the Central Appalachian coal mining region,” says Nina McCoy from Martin County, Ky., site of a large coal sludge dam break that overtook the county in 2000. “This should be the evidence the Obama Administration needs to close the floodgates on new mountaintop removal permits and stop the poisoning of our people.”

The EPA recently told National Public Radio’s Diane Rehm Show that the agency does not believe it has the authority to stop permitting mountaintop removal outright. Critics counter that there are other avenues through which the Administration could effectively end the practice.

“The EPA has made commendable efforts to reduce the impacts of mountaintop removal on downstream water quality, but this study shows that mitigating and regulating the wholesale destruction of Appalachian Mountains is just not effective,” said Dr. Matthew Wasson, ecologist for Appalachian Voices and director of the campaign to end mountaintop removal on iLoveMountains.org.

“The President has the power to end mountaintop removal through any number of agency actions,” Wasson added, “and he should call on Congress to pass the Clean Water Protection Act, a bill designed to end mountaintop removal-but the message from this study is that he’s out of excuses for allowing mountaintop removal to continue.”

Ken Ward Jr. of Coal Tattoo, Andy Revkin of DotEarth at the NYTimes and David Roberts at Grist all have more. See iLoveMountains.org for more resources on mountaintop removal, and to take action.

[Update, 3:00 pm Pacific time: National Public Radio just carried this story on their evening news. The online version includes a collection of photos documenting the practice of mountaintop removal coal mining.]

This post was originally published at WattHead.org – Energy News and Commentary

The new years season is often one of reflection, a time to look back at the events of the last year and ponder their implications for the course ahead, while setting new intentions for the coming year.

There is much to be said and much to ponder and many emotions to sort out. I hope we all have the time to reflect, plan and renew our resolve in the coming weeks. For now, I only want to share these words with my fellow climate activists. They are not mine, but I find them as apt as any, and a succinct summary of what has been, for me, an increasingly powerful realization:

What came out of Copenhagen is nothing but a faint promise. To make it something real, much less what’s needed, will require intense pressure from civil society, elites, businesses, enlightened governments, and ordinary citizens. And guess what? If there is a robust, legally binding treaty signed in Mexico next year, with sufficient targets and timetables … intense pressure will still be required.

This will be a century-long fight. If the green movement is going to sustain itself over time, it might be wise to try to avoid the emotional roller coaster of “last chances” and “historic failures.” That’s a recipe for burnout. There will be no cathartic moment, no final breakthrough, only a war of inches won by sheer persistence and creativity.

(more here)

Persistence and creativity. Those are two traits that are most certainly not in short supply among the many young clean energy and climate leaders I know. That gives me hope. If the right lessons are learned from the past year, the course ahead will ultimately be successful.

Here’s to 2010, and to the long, critical road ahead.

Mountaintop Removal Mining to Destroy 6,600 Acres-and Wind Potential

Appalachian community advocates and environmentalists across the nation are expressing outrage that mountaintop removal coal mining operations have begun on Coal River Mountain in West Virginia, a mountain that has become symbolic in the nationwide campaign to end mountaintop removal mining. The West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection told the Charleston Gazette on Monday that blasting had begun last week, confirming local reports of blasts and smoke that were witnessed on Friday near the Brushy Fork coal slurry impoundment, the largest slurry dam in Appalachia with the capacity to hold 8.2 billion gallons. Slurry is the by-product of coal washing and processing operations and contains high levels of toxic heavy metals like mercury, selenium and lead.

For the last two years, local residents have campaigned for the opportunity to place a commercial-scale wind farm on Coal River Mountain instead of the mountaintop removal mining that has been permitted by the state. The Coal River Wind campaign has focused on asking West Virginia Governor Joe Manchin to rescind the mining permits for Coal River Mountain. So far, Governor Manchin has denied the group’s request.

“The Coal River Wind Campaign has been a symbol of hope for the people of the Coal River Valley,” said Lorelei Scarbro, organizer for Coal River Mountain Watch. “My neighbors are excited about the idea of jobs that allow them to produce energy in a way that is sustainable. Coal River Mountain, the last standing mountain in the valley, should remain intact as a symbol for a new day in the Appalachian coalfields.”

With no response from Governor Manchin’s office, residents and environmental groups are now looking to the Obama administration to intervene.

A wind resources assessment and economic study commissioned by Coal River Mountain Watch in 2008 revealed that Coal River Mountain-which has the highest peaks ever slated for mining in the state-has enough wind potential to provide electricity for over 85,000 homes and would create more jobs over the expected life of the turbines than the proposed mountaintop removal mine. The study also stated that the proposed wind farm would help diversify the local economy in an area historically dependent upon temporary coal mining jobs, and would pump $20 million per year in direct local spending during construction and $2 million per year thereafter.

Current plans for mountaintop removal operations would eventually impact 6,600 acres on Coal River Mountain and fill in 18 valleys with the resulting waste and debris. Over 10 square miles of what environmentalists call the most bio-diverse ecosystem in the United States would be affected. Bo Webb, a resident of town of Peach Tree-a community directly downhill from an existing mountaintop removal operation near Coal River Mountain-said, “My community is already being forced to endure silica blasting dust, boulders, mudslides and floods from a mountaintop removal operation on Cherry Pond Mountain. The annihilation of Coal River Mountain will leave us trapped in the middle beneath both mountains of destruction.”

In addition to the economic and environmental concerns, residents are worried about the stability of blasting less than two hundred yards from a coal sludge impoundment. According to coalimpoundment.org-maintained by Wheeling Jesuit University-the Brushy Fork impoundment is a Class C dam, in which “failure would cause possible loss of human life.” If the Brushy Fork impoundment were to fail, the first communities in danger would be the towns of Pettus and Whitesville, where residents would have 12-18 minutes to evacuate before they were overtaken by floodwaters and slurry. The emergency evacuation plan, should the dam be breached, calls for notifying residents “personally,” or “by loudspeaker or bullhorn, or other means deemed necessary.”

In 2000, a coal slurry impoundment owned by a Massey subsidiary failed and spilled over 300 million gallons of slurry into the Big Sandy River in Martin County, KY. The EPA called the dam failure the “worst environmental disaster east of the Mississippi.” According to EPA testing, the spill-more than 30 times larger than the Exxon Valdez disaster-destroyed destroyed nearly all aquatic life for more than 50 miles downstream of the spill. And in 1972, a 132-million gallon impoundment in Logan County, W.Va., failed, killing 125 people and leaving over 4,000 more homeless.

The permits for mining on Coal River Mountains are owned by Massey Energy, one the largest coal mining companies in central Appalachia. In 2008, Massey paid $20 million to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in the largest settlement to date for violating the Clean Water Act more than 4,500 times in seven years.

According to a recent story by Associated Press reporter Vicki Smith, Google Earth has taken interest in the plight of Coal River Mountain and created a video about the Coal River Wind Project to present at the climate talks to be held in Copenhagen in December.

“What kind of message will it send to the international community if this priceless mountain with so much renewable energy potential is currently being destroyed for a decade’s worth of coal?” asked Matt Wasson, Program Director for Appalachian Voices, a regional environmental organization. “It would look a lot more like a continuation of the last administration’s policies, rather than a commitment to a new energy future.”

For more information, please visit www.coalriverwind.org and www.iLoveMountains.org/coalriver.

- – - – - -
Contact:
Lorelei Scarbro, Coal River Mountain Watch, (304) 854-2182
Matt Wasson, Appalachian Voices, (828) 262-1500
- – - – - -

Climate change legislation recently passed by the U.S. House of Representatives and now under consideration in the Senate will “succeed in perpetuating business as usual and fail to avert catastrophic climate change,” according to a new Greenpeace report quietly released yesterday.

Titled “Business as Usual,” the report was prepared on behalf of Greenpeace by David Sassoon, who publishes the climate news site, SolveClimate. It is written as a “plain-spoken” analysis meant to be “a call to action to the President of the United States,” according to the document.

“In order for federal climate legislation worthy of this nation to pass Congress, we see no alternative to active and principled engagement from the Oval Office,” Greenpeace writes.

The report levels five key criticisms of current Congressional legislation, calling attention to what Greenpeace describes as “five points of maximum danger” that the environmental group argues must be addressed to ensure climate legislation is capable of spurring “a swift transition to a clean energy future.”

While we certainly don’t share Greenpeace’s position on all (most) climate matters, this new report levels a pointed and impassioned critique of current Congressional climate action well grounded in the details of the pending legislation. Here’s a ‘Cliffs notes’ version of the full report below the fold…

1. “Congress is threatening to preempt the Clean Air Act from regulating greenhouse gas emissions from the biggest sources in the nation.”

   Greenpeace is referring to a section of the House-passed Waxman-Markey bill that would prevent the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency from regulating point-source emitters of greenhouse gases under existing provisions of the Clean Air Act (e.g. emissions performance standards or new source review).

   After a 2007 Supreme Court ruling that deemed greenhouse gases were a harmful pollutant, the EPA has been moving ahead with regulations under existing Clean Air Act authority to limit greenhouse gas emissions from major stationary sources such as coal plants. Environmental groups have argued that such regulatory authority is critical to protect public health even if Congress moves to establish a cap and trade system to limit economy-wide emissions of greenhouse gases. “Absent EPA authority,” Greenpeace writes, “large loopholes and handouts in both the Senate and House version of the climate bill will make it difficult, if not impossible, for the nation to depart from the trajectory of business as usual for decades. EPA involvement is not an either-or proposition.”

   As Greenpeace notes, initial drafts of the Senate’s “Clean Energy Jobs and America’s Power Act” refrains from limiting EPA’s authority to regulate emissions. “This is perhaps the most significant difference between the House and Senate versions of the legislation and a critical issue of paramount importance,” Greenpeace writes.

   While the House-passed bill does establish a new emissions performance standard for coal-fired power plants that would eventually require the capture and storage of CO2 emissions, the upcoming standards “grandfather,” or exempt, close to 40 new coal plants now in the permitting or construction process, according to Greenpeace.

   Referring to coal plants similarly grandfathered into the Clean Air Act, the report contends, “It is yet another bubble of special case coal plants whose burden will be felt for decades to come and slow the arrival of the clean energy future, unless the EPA remains empowered to do its job on behalf of ordinary citizens.”

2. “[B]oth the House and Senate’s [emissions reduction] targets are weak and timid in the short term and wishful thinking in the long term.”

   Greenpeace criticizes Congressional climate legislation’s 2020 emissions reduction targets – 17% below 2005 levels in the House bill and 20% below 2005 levels in the Senate bill, or just 4-7% below 1990 levels – as “far short both of what science demands and what our European allies have committed to achieve.” The EU has committed to cut emissions 20% below 1990 levels by contrast, Greenpeace notes, and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has recommended cuts of 25-40% below 1990 levels.

   While the Breakthrough Institute has long argued that a focus on emissions reduction targets and not concrete, actionable plans to drive clean energy technology development and deployment is misguided, the report accurately notes that modest emissions targets undermine the carbon price signal intended to drive a transition to cleaner energy sources under the legislation’s cap and trade program. Both the U.S. EPA and Congressional Budget Office project carbon prices under the House’s Waxman-Markey bill will remain between $10 and $20 per ton for at least the first decade of the bill’s cap and trade program – equivalent to a change of just 10-20 cents in a gallon of gasoline, for reference.

   “[W]e are being asked to make a leap of faith,” Greenpeace writes, “that a carbon price signal–however weak–will conspire with market forces to squeeze carbon out of our economy. It is impossible to ignore the reality that the weak cap undermines the foundation of the theory, fundamental to its integrity. It is as if we are imposing a price on carbon that nobody really has to pay…”

   With the economic recession driving U.S. emissions levels significantly lower than historic 2005 levels, the House bill’s emissions cap may not require any emissions cuts at all for up to five years, likely collapsing carbon prices to at or near the lowest levels permitted by the legislation, according to Breakthrough Institute analysis.

3. “There is probably no better indication of the persistence of business as usual than the fact that both the House and Senate climate legislation prioritize support for the primary industrial source of greenhouse gases… coal.”

   Greenpeace notes that 9% of the value of emissions permits created under the Waxman-Markey bill’s cap and trade program are devoted to the coal industry, while just 6% are invested in energy efficiency and renewable energy. This includes not only incentives for the commercial deployment of carbon capture and storage technology at coal-fired power plants, but also billions in windfall-profit generating free allowances for the merchant operators of existing, conventional coal-fired power plants. (see Breakthrough’s updated Waxman-Markey allowance allocation summary here.)

   In addition, the House-passed bill establishes a new utility-industry-run Carbon Storage and Research Corporation funded with $10 billion raised from electricity ratepayers over the next ten years. According to Greenpeace, $500 million of this funding is “designated simply for ‘administrative expenses’ to be spent at the discretion of [the] new corporation’s officers.”

   Greenpeace accurately notes, “There is no parallel provision in the bill to set up a federally created corporation to support solar or wind or geothermal energy development, even though the House legislation is called the American Clean Energy and Security Act.” Likewise, no other low-carbon energy technology enjoys the kind of bonus allowance allocation devoted to CCS deployment under the House bill’s cap and trade program.

4. “Handouts and loopholes are legion.”

   Greenpeace notes that the bill’s already modest emissions reduction objectives are further undermined by “the set of provisions permitting an enormous number of offsets to substitute for pollution reduction.” Both the House and Senate bills allow regulated polluters to purchase up to two billion tons of offsets each year instead of reducing their own emissions.

   “It is as if a man with heart trouble and diabetes who weights 360 points is encouraged by his doctor to pay someone else to go on a diet for him,” Greenpeace writes, lampooning the logic of offsetting. “To be fair,” the report continues, “the economic thinking behind offsets has a narrow theoretical validity.”

   However, actual experience with offset markets indicates that fraud and gaming are difficult if not impossible, from a practical perspective, to eliminate. As Greenpeace writes, “The fact is that the allure of immense profits has mostly produced massive instances of cheating in the offset market, with the environment left to suffer the consequences.” Extending their metaphor, they continue, “The fat patient will stay fat; the other man paid to go a diet will do no such thing; and the doctor will walk away satisfied.”

   If offsets played a limited role in the functioning of the cap and trade system, likely fraud and policing challenges would potentially be minor issues. But as Greenpeace notes, “The number of offsets pending legislation authorized on an annual basis is truly astonishing: Two billion tons worth. That is equivalent to one quarter of annual US emissions–or the first 75 poinds of flesh our fat man would shed on a diet.” Greenpeace accurately notes that the practical implication of such massive offsetting would be to delay any required cuts in actual U.S. industrial emissions “for almost another two decades. If that is not business as usual, nothing is,” Greenpeace concludes.

   Greenpeace pointedly notes that some “have found ways to rationalize the offsets as necessary, even playing the role of apologist for bad policy.” (Gee, who could they be talking about…). They continue:

   “They make the argument about offsets that there simply won’t be enough to go around. … They are saying, in essence, don’t worry, offsets won’t be a problem, they don’t really exist. … We would be naive to assume that corporate lobbyists secured authorization for two billion tons of offsets without having a plan for where to find them and how to use them. It is money that no profit-maximizing organization is going to leave on a table unclaimed…”

   Greenpeace identifies hydrofluorocarbon (HFCs), an industrial gas and very potent “super greenhouse gas,” and forest preservation projects as potentially huge sources of offsets for U.S. and global markets. Furthermore, as Congressional legislation has moved forward, more and more sources of offsets have been permitted in successive drafts, including expanded agricultural offsets in the House bill and various sources of methane in the Senate bill.

5. “What is especially dangerous, and frankly Orwellian, is that the American Clean Energy and Security Act and the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act both provide insufficient and grudging support to clean energy!”

   Greenpeace finally notes that the bill provides very little effective support for renewable energy. “What state governments and private enterprise are doing to promote the adoption of clean energy already surpasses what the federal government is now proposing to do,” the report states.

   The report cites yet another analysis, this one from ICF International, concluding that “existing organic growth of business as usual in the clean energy sector will be enough to surpass the target” in the House bill’s renewable electricity standard. After exemptions are included, Greenpeace notes, as Breakthrough has, that the bill’s nominal 20% “Combined Efficiency and Renewable Electricity Standard” amounts to a real requirement of less than 10%, “a goal that the states alone will achieve with current RPS policies.”

   The report notes the disparity between financial support and direct public investments provided for renewable energy — and research and development in particular — relative to incentives for CCS in the House bill, and support for nuclear power expected to be included in the Senate bill . But as Breakthrough has noted, overall investments for all low-carbon energy sources, including CCS, totals just $9 billion per year from allowance revenue in the House bill (at a $15/ton average price) – a figure that appears in the report via a quote from the Brookings Institution’s Mark Muro.

   Greenpeace contrasts this level of support, less than one-fifth what Breakthrough advocates, with President Obama’s remarks to the UN General Assembly that “the US will move forward with investments to transform our energy economy.”

   “The climate bill undermines this aim,” Greenpeace contends. The report points to direct and proactive incentives provided for renewable energy deployment in Germany, a feed-in tariff “financed by a modest rate increase spread across the entire population,” as an alternative approach to accomplish President Obama’s objective “to make clean energy the profitable kind of energy.”

In concluding, Greenpeace notes that a good number of both “optimists” and “apologists” within the climate advocacy community have continued to support, even champion, current Congressional climate legislation.

“The optimists seem to believe that a price signal, no matter how weak or undermined by handouts and loopholes, will provide the impetus to help us get started to turn the corner on climate change,” Greenpeace writes, noting that the Clean Air Act and Social Security legislation are often referenced “as federal measures that started out weak and grew effective over time.”

This historical analogy is “ultimately unpersuasive,” Greenpeace contends. “The Clean Air Act, for example, did not send hundreds of billions of dollars in handouts and loopholes to the very polluters it was trying to regulate,” the report points out. “The pending legislation does.”

Greenpeace further rejects oft-repeated appeals to, “Don’t let perfect be the energy of the good.” That line of reasoning is “a good argument used to poor purposes,” Greenpeace says, retorting, “Rather, let us stand firm not to adopt legislation that locks in a permanent and endless fossil fuel future, let us insist that this constellation of great leaders be the enemy of impending catastrophe.”

“There are apologists who go a step further than the optimists,” Greenpeace continues, those who “argue suddenly that it doesn’t matter if you allocate carbon credits for free, rather than auction them; or that offsets might not be [a] bad thing after all; or that the big bet we’re placing on technology to capture and bury carbon emissions will actually bring the demise of coal as an energy source.”

Greenpeace writes:

“There is all manner of spinning–well-intentioned, disingenuous, self-serving–among supporters of climate action, and it has become almost impossible to separate political calculus from scientific necessity. … Many supporters of climate action find themselves forced to grasp a flimsy hope–that we just need to get something started–anything–and strengthen it later. And so we witness the cheerleading to which we cannot lend our voice. … Politics as usual will only produce its corollary, business as usual.”

Well there’s certainly at least one voice amongst the climate community who won’t pull any punches as the Congressional debate moves forward.

[Updated with video from press event below...]

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce reversed their position on climate change policy this morning, throwing their full support behind Congressional climate legislation.

Citing overwhelming scientific consensus that climate change poses dire risks to human societies and will be unquestionably “bad for business,” the Chamber released a press statement and held a briefing at the Washington D.C. Press Club to announce the group’s new position:

“There is only one sound way to do business: that’s to support a strong climate-change bill quickly, so that this December in Copenhagen, President Obama can lead the entire business world in ensuring our long-term prosperity. … The Kerry-Boxer Bill is a good start to a strong climate bill, and the Chamber will work with Senators Kerry and Boxer to strengthen it”

Does this about face from the previously staunchly anti-climate bill Chamber sound too good to be true? It is.

Only a few minutes into the event at the Press Club, a Chamber of Commerce spokesperson showed up to confront “the Chamber of Commerce spokesperson” at the podium as a hoax. A flurry of calls to reporters later, and the Chamber had strongly reiterated the not-so-leading business group’s true position on Congressional climate policy:

“An actual Chamber spokesman, J.P. Fielder, said the group remains as staunchly opposed as ever to the climate bill,” reports a Wall Street Journal blog. Phew, good to know the Chamber remains “staunchly opposed” to any real proposals for Congressional climate legislation.

As the WSJ makes clear:

“[Chamber President Tom] Donohue has been vociferous in his opposition “cap and trade” legislation favored by the White House that would make industries pay for carbon emissions. That position has resulted in the defection of big chamber members including Exelon Corp., PNM Resources, Pacific Gas & Electric and Apple Inc. Others, including Xerox, Lockheed Martin and Caterpillar, are under pressure from environmentalists and shareholder activists to do the same.”

[Update: Here's video of the "real" Chamber of Commerce representative confronting the prankster Chamber of Commerce representative. Will the real Chamber please stand up?!]

The Chamber quickly blamed the hoax on the infamous pranksters, the Yes Men, before removing the blog post and replacing it with a simple statement that today’s announcement, “Is a prank.” According to the WSJ, the Chamber now claims the fake press release is the latest in “a campaign against the group’s climate stance” by an unnamed “youth environmental group.”

Reuters, CNBC, Fox and a National Journal blog all apparently reported the prank announcement as real news before corrections were quickly issued and the stories were pulled. Here are the Fox and CNBC reports and screenshots of the Reuters and National Journal stories before they were pulled (click to enlarge):

EPA is expected to announce decisions this week on over 100 pending permits for new or expanded coal mining projects utilizing mountaintop removal (MTR), which uses huge amounts of explosives to decapitate mountains and access the coal beneath, dumping the remains of these once-verdant Appalachian peaks directly on top of neighboring valleys and streams.

Mountaintop removal mining has already buried more than 800 miles of Appalachian streams and destroyed hundreds of square miles of woodlands in one of America’s biodiversity hotspots, all while both the U.S. EPA and state environmental agencies have done little to curtail the practice. That’s left it to activists to slow these projects down and prevent their irreversible damages.

But if recent news that the EPA is seeking to revoke the permit for the largest mountaintop removal mining project in West Virginia history is any indicator, the agency may finally be earning the “Protection” part of their name.

With a self-imposed, September 8th deadline now expired, the EPA is expected to issue an “initial list” this week identifying pending mountaintop removal projects that pose potential environmental concerns.

The projects under EPA review have already been approved by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (the Corps), which has primary responsibility for approving surface mining projects. Any projects that EPA decides will have no “significant” environmental impact will sail forward “without further coordination with EPA,” according to agency procedures (kindly explained by Coal Tattoo‘s Ken Ward Jr. here).

Projects posing an environmental risk – and any sane person is hard pressed to explain how blowing up a mountain has no environmental impact – will instead show up on a list sent to the Corps, triggering a process of further review and ultimately – if EPA does it’s job right – the rejection of some if not all of these proposed mountaintop removal projects under the Clean Water Act.

For better or worse, the forthcoming EPA list of environmentally risky projects will mark an important step closer to the establishment of clear, public standards for what level of environmental impact the agency will allow or prohibit at MTR sites proposed throughout Appalachia. The EPA has so far avoided establishing any such clear public standard.

With hundreds of mountaintop removal sites now in the balance, this is the moment of truth for the EPA, Administrator Lisa Jackson, and President Obama to make good on promises to reign in this clearly environmentally devastating practice.

As EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson explained on National Public Radio last week:

EPA has committed to reviewing [mountaintop removal mining] projects. It’s been a contentious issue from the start, certainly in Appalachia. We are in the process of reviewing about 84 permits right now that were put on hold by litigation. And in the next few weeks we’re going to have to make a determination under the Clean Water Act as to whether those permits can meet the Clean Water Act standards or whether they should be held up and potentially ultimately vetoed. EPA has the authority to veto the permits. The permits themselves are issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. So EPA plays sort of an oversight role there.

As we wait for the EPA’s decision on the dozens of pending MTR permits, the Agency moved forward on a seperate front to block the largest proposed mountaintop removal site in West Virginia history in letter sent to the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers late last week.

Read the full story at www.WattHead.org, the new home of WattHead – Energy News and Commentary

This excerpt seemed particularly relevant to our young readers here…

[Jesse Jenkins]: Jules, you hold what I continue to be a distinguished position, as one of the youngest members of the Oregon House of Representatives, is that right?

[Oregon State Representative, Jules Kopel-Bailey]: Second youngest, yes.

Do you have any particular advice for young Oregonians – or others in other states – who are looking to have an impact on the state political process, really engaging at the grassroots level, or are even thinking about running for office themselves someday?

Well, I’ll support the old Nike slogan and say, Just do it!

I’m speaking here to all the folks who are my age and younger – I first ran for office when I was 27 years old, I was elected about the time I was 28 and I’m now coming out of my first legislative session and I’m 29 – and the reality is that this up and coming generation has as much to contribute as anybody. And whether that means you run for office yourself, or you go down to the Capitol and meet with legislatures and you make your voice heard, or you get involved in an organization that is doing work around political involvement – however you choose to do it, or you political standpoint, make your voice heard and go out there and just do it.

I’d personally recommend that your listeners really think about running for office some day. It is a citizen legislature in Oregon and in many states, and it functions only when the citizenry is involved and is not only taking an interest in an expressing their views, but also steps up and runs for office themselves. There’s always a temptation to think, maybe if I wait a little bit long, get a little bit older. You have an opinion, you have a perspective to bring to the table, and you should step up and do it.

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To change the subject a little bit, with several import terminals proposed on Oregon’s coast,liquefied natural gas has really become a hot button issue in Oregon in recent years. Grassroots opposition is pretty strong and the Oregon Legislature considered legislation this session that would fast track the contentious siting of the pipelines that are needed to bring LNG from coastal terminals to natural gas markets in Oregon’s Willamette Valley cities and even farther, to the big natural gas markets in California, where much of the LNG would ultimately be destined. Can you tell us about this LNG fight and where it now stands?

We had two bills related to [LNG]. We had a bill that I co-sponsored, along with a number of other representatives and senators, that would have put limitations on the ability of the state to site energy facilities [like LNG terminals] and essentially ensure that we are being responsible about how we make our energy investments and whether or not we need LNG in the future. Unfortunately, that bill did not move forward. But the other bill, the bill that you referenced around changing permitting processes for projects that include pipelines, that bill also did not move forward, and I did vote against that legislation on the floor of the House. So that bill was not successful, it did not make it out of the Senate.

So the status of the LNG fight in Oregon is pretty unclear and it’s really up to the grassroots to really get out there and make their voices continually heard. I think they were heard this last session, and [the LNG legislative battles] are the evidence of the impacts grassroots activism can have on local governments. But again, continued vigilance is necessary.

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Well thanks Jules, those are all the questions I have, and I’d like to give you a chance to say any closing remarks if you’d like.

Well Jesse, I really appreciate the chance to be on this show. You and I have had a chance to interact in a number of capacities, and I still remember you speech at our Focus the Nation event in Portland [in January 2008]. And really, I’ve just been inspired by the folks that have been out there and have made their voices heard, through Focus the Nation, through grassroots organization. I think you saw the reaction that our top elected officials got at the Focus the Nation event, and that changed the course of what was going to happen in public policy. So it really is true that the people who are the ones who show and make their voices heard, run for office, come to a town hall, go to your state capitol, talk to your legislators – those are the kinds of people who are going to make a big impact.

You can listen to the podcast and read a transcript of the extended interview at theEnergyCollective.com

An update on the story that just keeps on giving: the unfolding saga of the forged letters fraudulently sent by DC lobby firm Bonner and Associates on behalf of dirty coal interests in a deceitful attempt to kill Congressional clean energy and climate legislation.

In June, employees at Bonner and Associates, on a contract for the dirty coal front group, the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (subcontracted via the Hawthorne Group), sent letters to several Congressional offices fraudulently posing as black, Hispanic, women’s and senior citizen’s groups urging votes against the American Clean Energy and Security Act (the Waxman-Markey bill).

Now, Brad Johnson at the WonkRoom reports:

The American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE) is dumping Bonner & Associates, the Astroturf firm that forged letters to Congress attacking clean energy legislation on its behalf. … ACCCE spokesman Joe Lucas told National Journal that his organization “did nothing wrong”:

“We will not be working with Mr. Bonner again. ACCCE did nothing wrong. Looking back, there would be many things we would do differently.“

In fact, ACCCE covered up the fraud and is now throwing Bonner under the bus. The coal coalition had been informed by the Hawthorn Group, its primary contractor, days before the pivotal House vote on the energy legislation. But ACCCE kept silent, failing to notify lawmakers or the defrauded organizations. ACCCE continues to employ the Hawthorn Group and the notorious voter-fraud company Lincoln Strategy Group.

Makes you wonder, what else is the dirty energy lobby up to…

The global community should be investing $300 billion annually to combat global warming, according to UN climate chief Yvo de Boer (pictured). De Boer, the Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention of Climate Change, says the world needs to be spending $100 billion annually to help vulnerable communities adapt to the impacts of climate change, and another $200 billion each year to shift the global energy mix away from fossil fuels.

“The world will need a phenomenal amount of money to change its energy supply from fossil fuels to cleaner sources and to adapt to climate change,” de Boer said Friday.

According to a UN Environment Program news update:

With 110 days left until the Copenhagen Climate Conference, only “limited progress” was made at the most recent United Nations climate change talks where financing to cut and cope with climate change proved to be a major sticking point among negotiators. …
De Boer estimates the annual cost of climate change adaptation at US$100 billion per year. This is the amount needed to cope with natural disasters such as flooding and drought that will result from increased warming. Meanwhile, he pegs the cost of cutting global emissions at US$200 billion annually.

Currently, the draft text contains 200 brackets indicating points of disagreement between negotiators, who differ on who should bear the financial burden of the climate change challenge.

Nevertheless, De Boer stressed that a U.N. climate pact to be agreed upon in Copenhagen should set up a fair mechanism for raising long-term funds, rather than compel countries to contribute specific amount. “A robust burden-sharing formula is the most important thing.”

De Boer also recommended that countries participating in the Copenhagen Conference, open negotiations with some cash on the table, perhaps US$10 billion.

At the G8 Summit in July, UNEP Executive Director, Achim Steiner noted that a successful Copenhagen Summit depended on the political will of world leaders to make good on their Green Economy pledges which entails investing heavily in renewable energies and energy efficiency.

A fair and “robust burden-sharing formula” would presumably imply that as the world’s richest nation and the world’s largest contributor to cumulative global greenhouse gas emissions, the United States would contribute something like 1/4 to 1/3rd of the total global investments required to adapt to and mitigate the climate threat. That would imply $50-66 billion annually to invest in clean energy and energy efficiency and a contribution of $25-33 billion annually to global adaptation efforts, for a total of $75-99b/year.

Where exactly is that money going to come from? An excellent question, and one that seems neglected by the Waxman-Markey climate and energy bill now winding it’s way through Congress. After political concessions to (attempt to) silence industry opposition. That bill would invest just about $10b annually in clean energy and efficiency and devote just about $1.6b for domestic adaptation efforts and $1.9b for international technology transfer efforts (all values assuming a $15/ton CO2 price, and scale proportionately at other CO2 prices).

The clean energy and efficiency investments in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (the stimulus bill) put us in the right ballpark – at least on the mitigation front – investing over $60 billion annually in America’s efforts to build a new clean energy economy. But those short-term investments will expire by the end of 2010, and without an effort to build on and extend this critical clean energy spending, the U.S. will be left without sufficient funding to fulfill our fair share of global climate investments.

With the climate advocacy community primarily focused to date on establishing (and protecting already compromised) emissions reduction targets and “caps,” the Waxman-Markey bill looks poised to leave the United States a long way from the level of commitment to clean energy and adaptation investments called for the UNFCC Secretariat. We’re running out of time to change that picture…