Iowa Global Warming

Massachusetts state officials on Friday announced new energy efficiency standards for utilities that aim to be the most ambitious in the nation.

The plan calls for a statewide reduction of 2.4 percent in electricity use and 1.15 percent in natural gas use annually for three years. The savings are to be achieved largely through $1.6 billion in incentives for utility customers who take certain steps to conserve energy, like insulating their houses or replacing conventional light bulbs with compact fluorescent ones.

The reductions were mandated by the Green Communities Act, passed by the state legislature in 2008. But the bill did not specify the reduction goals or how they were to be reached. The State Department of Public Utilities approved the specifics late Thursday.

Utilities, regulators and energy advocates haggled for months to reach the 2.4 percent annual reduction goal, a figure considered to be close to the upper limit of what can be achieved annually through such programs. The utilities’ success in reaching that goal will be measured in a way that accounts for outside factors like normal growth in the demand for electricity — which averages just under 2 percent a year — and the recession, which can decrease energy use.

“The Green Communities Act established energy efficiency as the Commonwealth’s ‘first fuel’ — what we look to first to power our homes and our economy,” Ian A. Bowles, the state’s secretary for energy and environmental affairs, said in a written statement.

“We are off and running,” Mr. Bowles said, “pulling out all the stops to cut energy waste, save money and reduce greenhouse gas emissions in buildings across Massachusetts.”

At the heart of the plan is a quadrupling of annual spending for consumer outreach and conservation incentive programs to about $600 million from $150 million. Money will be available to consumers for services like free energy audits, and rebates will be offered for the purchase of energy-efficient appliances and air-conditioners.

Massachusetts officials say the state will surpass California in spending per person on conservation measures. It is assumed that the conservation initiatives will translate reliably into energy savings.

The nonprofit American Council for an Energy- Efficient Economy ranked California No. 1 and Massachusetts No. 2 respectively in its 2009 survey of the most energy-efficient states. Steve Nadel, its executive director, said that while a switch in those rankings was not certain, it was likely.

“If Massachusetts does everything in the plan that was approved today,” Mr. Nadel said, “I’ll say there is a very good chance they will pass California in our score. We always like a little friendly competition between the states.”

Officials in Massachusetts said that the plan’s upfront cost of more than $1 billion would be covered partly through fees paid by consumers and partly through auctioning pollution allowances and through other revenue sources. Massachusetts auctions these allowances as part of the 10-state carbon trading system called the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.

Under the system, states impose caps on the amounts of carbon dioxide that power plants can emit and hold an auction for emissions permits under those caps. Eighty percent of revenue from the auction in Massachusetts is intended to go into the efficiency program.

Consumers will eventually reap $6 billion in savings on their utility bills from the efficiency plan, even after accounting for the added fees, the officials predicted.

A study by Environment Northeast, a local advocacy group, estimated that putting the measures into effect would also create 25,000 jobs.

“The job creation and consumer savings will provide timely relief across the state, and carbon pollution will be slashed,” said Sam Krasnow, a lawyer with the organization who sits on the council that helped devise the plan.

Original story here

by Phillip Brasher pbrasher@dmreg.com

Washington, D.C. – Construction of wind farms surged in Iowa and nationwide in 2009 after Congress included new financial incentives for the industry in the economic stimulus bill.

Industry officials say construction should continue relatively strong this year with the incentives still in effect. They say that long-term growth will hinge in part on whether Congress enacts a mandate for renewable energy and clears the way for new long-distance transmission lines.

The industry grew by 39 percent last year, adding 9,922 megawatts of generation capacity to exceed 35,000 megawatts nationwide, the American Wind Energy Association said in a report being issued today. About 4,040 megawatts of that new capacity came on line in the last three months of the year.

Iowa, which held on to its ranking as the No. 2 wind power producer, added 534 turbines in 2009 that can produce 879 megawatts. The majority – 393 – of those turbines, with a capacity of 618 megawatts, went on line in the fourth quarter.

Construction of new wind farms stalled in early 2009 after the meltdown on Wall Street and the freeze in the credit markets. Investment banks traditionally financed new wind farms by purchasing wind-production tax credits to offset income and lower their tax bills. However, in 2009 that tax credit was of little use to banks that were struggling financially, so Congress stepped in and created a new tax credit for the developers themselves as part of the stimulus bill passed in 2009. Companies that can’t benefit from the 30 percent tax credit were given the option of getting an equivalent grant directly from the government.

“It was extraordinary the impact that lifeline had,” Denise Bode, CEO of the wind association, said of the new subsidy. “The industry was dead in the water” in early 2009, she said.

The new incentives had less of an impact on companies that make wind turbines, blades and other parts. The wind industry gained 1,500 to 2,000 jobs overall last year, but that was only because employment for the new wind farms offset a drop of as many as 2,000 jobs in manufacturing, according to the association.

Texas extended its lead over Iowa in wind power by adding 2,292 megawatts of capacity in 2009, boosting the state’s total to 9,410 megawatts.

California remained No. 3 with 2,794 megawatts but added just 277 megawatts in 2009.

Bode said construction nationwide should continue fairly strong in 2010 ahead of the expiration of the incentives, but she stopped short of predicting it could reach 2009’s level.

She also said the industry’s long-term growth, and particularly the future of turbine manufacturing, depend on whether Congress enacts a renewable electricity mandate. Such a policy, she said, “sends the right signal to these manufacturers who are saying, ‘Where do I put my next factory? Do I put it in China or the U.S.?’ ”

A leading transmission company in Iowa, ITC-Midwest, has 9,000 megawatts of requests pending for connecting proposed projects, two-thirds of which are in Iowa and most of the rest in Minnesota. The company expects about 400 to 700 megawatts of those projects to be connected this year. ITC-Midwest, which operates lines purchased from Alliant Energy, connected 716 megawatts of wind power in 2009.

“We haven’t seen any slowdown in requests moving forward,” said Doug Collins, executive director of ITC-Midwest.

Like Bode, the company believes additional action from Congress would help speed development of the wind industry in the long term.

A bill passed by the Senate Energy Committee in 2009 would require utilities to get up to 15 percent of their power from wind and other renewable sources by 2021. It would also give federal regulators authority to intervene in disputes among states over paying for and locating the new long-distance transmission lines that would carry power from wind farms to urban areas.

ITC-Midwest’s parent company has proposed a 3,000-mile network of transmission lines called the Green Power Express to carry power from as far west as the Dakotas to Illinois and possibly Indiana.

The renewable power bill was intended to be married to broader legislation, now stalled in the Senate, that would set up a cap-and-trade system for regulating greenhouse gas emissions. Democratic leaders have not said whether they would take up the renewable power bill separately.

full story here

The Iowa ethanol industry plans to ask the legislature to pass a bill requiring that all motor gasoline in the state carry at least 10 percent ethanol.

Despite being the largest ethanol producer in the U.S., Iowa has never mandated ethanol use in gasoline sold within the state.

But Monte Shaw, executive vice president of the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association, noted that the percentage of fuel sold in Iowa with ethanol blended in has been stuck around 75 percent while the percentage of ethanol-blended gasoline now stands at 80 percent in the rest of the nation.

“Iowa is lagging behind the rest of the country in ethanol use,” Shaw said to the annual summit of the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association.

Shaw estimated that the approximately 100 million gallons of ethanol now sold in Iowa would be increased to about 140 million gallons were a state mandate passed.

Iowa is the nation’s largest producer of ethanol, with about 3.2 billion gallons produced at its 39 ethanol production plants last year. The vast majority of the ethanol produced in the state is sent to the rest of the country.

Even so, Iowa has never mandated ethanol use within its own borders. The federal government has stair-step requirements for ethanol use, rising from 10.5 billion gallons last year to 12 billion gallons this year and eventually to 36 billion gallons after the year 2020.

Gov. Chet Culver told the annual meeting that an E10 blend mandate is a “step in the right direction.”

“This can make a statement about our commitment to biofuels and solidfy our position as a national leader in the green economy,” Culver said.

The legislative outlook for a state mandate is unclear. Last year the Iowa Senate approved a bill requiring all diesel fuel sold in the state contain 5 percent biodiesel, made primarily from soybean oil. But that bill failed to come up in the House.

Mona Bond, vice president for public affairs for the Iowa Petroleum Marketers Association said the group is “adamantly opposed” to an ethanol mandate.

State Representative Annette Sweeney (R.-Alden) said she has brought the matter up with the Republican caucus.

“I know there’s interest in the bill and there will be more once the case is made for how important the ethanol industry is to Iowa,” said Sweeney, who attended the renewable fuels summit Monday.

Sweeney, who farms in Hardin County, noted recent U.S. Department of Agriculture reports showing a surplus of more than 1.5 billion bushels of corn.

“Ethanol has been so important to Iowa’s corn growers, and there is a question now what to do with the surplus,” Sweeney said.

The ethanol industry is awaiting a final decision from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on approval to increase the allowable blend of ethanol in unleaded gasoline from the current 10 percent to 15 percent.

Such an increase is estimated to add another 7 billion gallons to the annual demand for ethanol.

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How Big Oil and Big Coal mounted one of the most aggressive lobbying campaigns in history to block progress on global warming

JEFF GOODELL

This was supposed to be the transformative moment on global warming, the tipping point when America proved to the world that capitalism has a conscience, that we take the fate of the planet seriously. According to the script, Congress would pass a landmark bill committing the U.S. to deep cuts in carbon emissions. President Obama would then arrive in Copenhagen for the international climate summit, armed with the moral and political capital he needed to challenge the rest of the world to do the same. After all, wasn’t this the kind of bold move the Norwegians were anticipating when they awarded Obama the Nobel Peace Prize?

As we now know, it didn’t work out that way. Obama arrived in Copenhagen last month without any legislation committing the U.S. to reduce carbon pollution. Instead of reaching agreement on how to stop cooking the planet, the summit devolved into bickering over who bears the most blame for turning up the heat. The world once again missed an opportunity to avert disaster — and the delay is likely to have deadly consequences. In recent years, we have moved from talking about the possibility of climate change to watching it unfold before our eyes. The Arctic is melting, wildfires are turning into infernos, warm-weather insects are devouring forests, droughts are getting longer and more lethal. And the more we learn about climate change, the more it becomes apparent how enormous the risks are. Just a few years ago, researchers estimated that sea levels would likely rise 17 inches by 2100. Now they believe it could be three feet or more — a cataclysmic shift that would doom many of the world’s cities, including London and New Orleans, and create tens of millions of climate refugees.

Our collective response to the emerging catastrophe verges on suicidal. World leaders have been talking about tackling climate change for nearly 20 years now — yet carbon emissions keep going up and up. “We are in a race against time,” says Rep. Jay Inslee, a Democrat from Washington who has fought for sharp reductions in planet-warming pollution. “Mother Nature isn’t sitting around waiting for us to get our political act together.” In fact, our failure to confront global warming is more than simply political incompetence. Over the past year, the corporations and special interests most responsible for climate change waged an all-out war to prevent Congress from cracking down on carbon pollution in time for Copenhagen. The oil and coal industries deployed an unprecedented army of lobbyists, spent millions on misleading studies and engaged in outright deception to derail climate legislation. “It was the most aggressive and corrupt lobbying campaign I’ve ever seen,” says Paul Begala, a veteran Democratic consultant.

Page 1 of 6  full story here

 PHILIP BRASHER • pbrasher@dmreg.com

 With a sweeping climate bill stalled in the Senate, attention could turn to a smaller measure that would boost usage of renewable electricity, a potential boost to Iowa’s wind industry.

The bill, passed by a Senate committee in June, would require that utilities increase their use of renewable power by up to 15 percent by 2021 and make it easier to build the interstate transmission lines needed for wind projects. The bill also includes provisions to increase the energy efficiency of buildings and appliances.

President Barack Obama has been pushing for more far-reaching legislation that would impose caps on greenhouse gas emissions by utilities, refiners and other industries. However, a bill similar to one that passed the House has gone nowhere in the Senate amid opposition from moderate Democrats.

“I’m not sure Democrats want to discuss that stuff during an election year,” said Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Ia. But he said he does expect the Senate to consider a narrower bill that would include the renewable electricity mandate, which he supports.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., insists that he’s going forward with the broader bill, which would include the renewable power provisions. But several others who have resisted the climate bill, including Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., have been pushing for the energy bill as an alternative.

The smaller bill, with the renewable power provisions, had bipartisan support in committee so it should be far easier to pass than the climate legislation, said Frank Maisano, an energy industry lobbyist. Democrats already have been struggling to pass health care reform.

“The fact that they’re going to struggle to find the votes for health care gives you even harder pause that they’re going to try again” with the climate legislation, Maisano said.

The smaller bill would give the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission legal authority to settle disputes among states that have stalled development of long-distance transmission lines. The panel needs increased authority to get lines built, said John Norris, an Iowan who is the commission’s newest member.

Environmentalists have mixed views about that bill. Their top priority is to put limits on greenhouse gas emissions, and the renewable power mandate isn’t as tough as some groups want. The bill also would open the eastern Gulf of Mexico to oil and gas exploration.

But the legislation doesn’t go far enough to reduce carbon emissions and create a long-term market for alternative energy, including Iowa’s wind power, said Nathaniel Baer, an energy specialist with the Iowa Environmental Council.

“We need a comprehensive piece of legislation that creates that long-term certainty that this is where the U.S. is headed for decades,” he said.

Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Ia., is taking a similar stance. He “believes that just doing an energy bill doesn’t fully deliver a commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” spokesman Grant Gustafson said.

The climate legislation would force utilities and other companies subject to the carbon caps to either reduce their emissions or buy credits on the market. Farmers could benefit from the legislation by undertaking carbon-saving measures, such as planting trees or reducing tillage, that would qualify for credits they could sell to companies that need them.

However, many farm groups are fighting the legislation because of the potential impact on land use and energy costs. An Agriculture Department study released in December gave opponents of the legislation fresh ammunition because of its estimate that as many as 59 million acres of cropland could be converted to forests as result of the legislation.

The prospect for such a shift in land “scares me. I think it should scare anyone involved in farming,” said Craig Hill, vice president of the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation.

The legislation also has run into opposition from some utilities, including MidAmerican Energy, who claim it would drive up electricity prices. MidAmerican has not endorsed the smaller bill but supports that approach, a spokesman said.

The Environmental Protection Agency is threatening to impose limits of its own on greenhouse gas emissions, a move intended to prod Congress to pass a climate bill. The top Republican on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, is planning to force the Senate to vote on stripping the agency of its authority over carbon emissions, at least temporarily.

Energy analyst Kevin Book said he expected such a measure to fail because Democrats will be reluctant to defy their party’s leadership this early in the year.

full story here

Board will ask the EPA to mandate protective liners, groundwater monitoring at disposal sites

Jason Hancock- The Iowa Independent

The Iowa Environmental Protection Commission (EPC) voted unanimously Tuesday to draft a letter urging strict federal regulation of coal combustion waste.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency originally promised to release draft regulations on coal ash disposal by the end of 2009, and in doing so, open the rules up for public comment. That deadline was pushed back indefinitely last month following revelations of differences between the EPA and White House officials. And as The Iowa Independent reported in December, a potential loophole in those guidelines — designating coal ash as a hazardous material if it’s kept wet and non-hazardous if it’s moved to a dry landfill — has many worried that the federal rules won’t adequately deal with the issues in Iowa.

Last month Cedar Rapids-based environmental law center Plains Justice, along with Washington, D.C.,-based Environmental Integrity Project and Earthjustice, called on the EPC to publicly support federal regulations designating all coal ash as a hazardous waste. The EPC, a nine-member board charged with advising the state on environmental policy, has agreed and will demand federal regulators craft new rules that address the public health risks associated with current disposal practices.

“Recent delays in EPA action is of concern to the EPC and we felt that it is important to let EPA know that the commission feels that new rules are necessary and important to assure protection of public health and the environment in Iowa,” said Susan Heathcote, a member of the EPC.

In Iowa, there are four coal ash disposal sites that are considered dry landfills and have received state waivers allowing them to accept ash without protective liners to prevent toxins such as mercury, zinc, lead, arsenic and selenium from leeching into groundwater. The sites are also not required to test groundwater to see if the pollution is already taking place.

An EPA report released last year found the cancer risk to be 1 in 2,000 from exposure to arsenic in drinking water for residents living near unlined landfills containing coal ash and coal refuse, which is 500 times the level usually regarded as safe by current federal regulations.

Gov. Chet Culver and legislative leaders have said that once the EPA releases draft rules the state will determine whether to work on its own regulations. The Iowa Department of Natural Resources began drafting tougher coal ash regulations in 2008 before opposition from site owners and coal-burning businesses, along with uncertainty about what regulations the federal government may eventually impose, caused the effort to stall.

Heathcote said the EPC also considered updating the state’s coal ash disposal rules last year, but that effort was abandoned based on the original promise from the EPA to issue its own rules by year’s end.

“Since Iowa would need to comply with any new federal requirements for coal ash disposal, and since the and the time-frame for federal action was relatively short, the DNR staff recommended, and the EPC agreed, to postpone action on state rules until we saw what EPA would propose in the federal rules,” she said

Full story here

by Dar Danielson on January 14, 2010

The state Transportation Commission approved spending several million federal dollars this week for projects designed to improve trails, cut pollution and get more kids to walk to school. Craig Markley of the Department of Transportation says $4.5 million was approved for 15 projects in Iowa’s “Clean Air Attainment Program.”

Markley says it’s an application-based program that awards funds based on the highest potential for reducing traffic congestion and pollution. The projects included street improvements and fixing traffic lights to make the flow of traffic more efficient. The commission approved $1.7 million dollars for the “Safe Routes to School” program.

Markley says the purpose of the program is to increase the number of elementary and middle school students who walk or ride bikes to school. The funding is available to local governments, private nonprofit groups, regional organizations, public or private schools. He says it can be used for variety of projects.

He says it can be used for sidewalk improvements, street calming or speed reduction, bicycle crossings, curriculum or promotional materials to encourage kids to walk or bike to school, and also for enforcement activities. The commission also approved nearly five million dollars for what are called “Transportation Enhancement Programs.”

One of the largest projects spends $750,000 on the Milwaukee Railroad Shops Historic District in Sioux City. Markley says it provides a place for people to come in and get our of their vehicles, it also has a walking trail and a one mile segment of the Big Sioux River Trail. The Siouxland Historical Railroad Association and Sioux City are conducting the project. there’s also $350,000 for the Stuart Rock Island Depot restoration.

Markley says this is phase two of this project as they received funding a couple of years ago for some outside maintenance work. You can see more about the projects on the Iowa Department of Transportation’s website at: www.iowadot.org.

Iowa’s Clean Air Attainment Program projects and approved funding amounts are listed below.
·73rd Street/Hickman Road Intersection Improvements (Windsor Heights), $388,000
·86th Street and Douglas Avenue Intersection Improvements (Urbandale), $480,000
·A Avenue Northeast from Seventh Street to 10th Street Traffic Signal Interconnect and Detection Upgrade (Cedar apids), $74,850
·Bi-State Clean Air Partnership (CAP) “Make Outdoor Air Quality Visible” (Bi-State Regional Commission), $40,000
·Citywide, Fixed-Time Signal Upgrade (Des Moines), $320,000
·Cottage Grove Avenue Southeast and Forest Drive Southeast Traffic Control and Capacity Improvements (Cedar Rapids), $514,160
·Des Moines River Trail, Phase 1 (Des Moines), $426,526
·Gordon Drive (Iowa 12) Traffic Signal Coordination (Sioux City), $545,995
·Keyline Transit Medical Loop (Dubuque), $300,160
·Kirkwood Boulevard Southwest and 76th Avenue Southwest Traffic Control and Capacity Improvements (Cedar Rapids), $239,200
·Route No. 7 Fort Des Moines/Hubbell Service Improvements (Des Moines Area Regional Transit Authority), $224,250
·Route No. 11 Jordan Creek/Mills Civic Parkway Service Improvements (Des Moines Area Regional Transit Authority), $42,011
·Traffic-Adaptive Signal Control System, Jordan Creek Parkway (West Des Moines), $216,000
·U.S. 30/Iowa 1 Intersection Improvements (Mount Vernon), $373,419
·U.S. 151/Iowa 13 and Mount Vernon Road (Linn County Road E-48) Signalization (Linn County and Iowa Department of Transportation), $352,000
Transportation Enhancement Program projects and approved funding amounts:
Trail and bicycle facility
·Cedar Valley Nature Trail Reconstruction and Surfacing Phase 3 (Linn County Conservation Board), $750,000
·Flint River Trail (Des Moines County and Burlington), $474,345
·Heart of Iowa Nature Trail Phase VII and VIII, Surfacing and Bridge Completion (Story County Conservation Board), $381,600
·Khrushchev in Iowa Trail (Guthrie County and Creating Great Places), $365,000
·Rolling Prairie Trail Bridge (Butler County Conservation Board), $210,000
·Urban Youth Corps (Iowa Department of Transportation), $100,000
Scenic and environmental
·Des Moines River Greenbelt Scenic Overlook on the High Trestle Trail (Boone County Conservation Board and Polk County Conservation Board), $140,000
·Iowa’s Living Roadways Projects™ Program (Trees Forever and Iowa DOT), $400,000
·Roadside Beautification/Maintenance Reduction: County Highways (Integrated Roadside Vegetation Management, University of Northern Iowa and Iowa DOT), $225,000
·U.S. 63 Streetscape Enhancements (Waterloo), $476,938 

Historic and archaeological
·Archaeological Survey of the Glenwood Resource Center (Golden Hills RC&D), $292,402
·Milwaukee Railroad Shops Historic District: Alternative Transportation Project (Siouxland Historical Railroad ssociation and Sioux City), $750,000
·Stuart Rock Island Depot Restoration (Stuart), $350,000
Safe Routes to School projects:
Noninfrastructure
·Clinton County School District Safe Routes to School Plan (East Central Intergovernmental Association), $50,000
·Delaware County School District Safe Routes to School Plan (East Central Intergovernmental Association), $50,000
·Iowa Safe Routes to School (Iowa Bicycle Coalition), $136,295
·Pleasant Valley Community School District Safe Routes to School Study and Plan (Pleasant Valley Community School District), $7,000
·Safe Routes to School: I-WALK Model (Iowa Department of Public Health), $209,916
·Noninfrastructure costs for recommended infrastructure projects, $7,000

Infrastructure
·Anita Chestnut Street Safe Routes to School (Anita), $151,200
·Belmond Sidewalk Program (Belmond), $43,812
·Cedar Heights Elementary Safe Routes to School Project (Cedar Falls), $76,450
·Harrison Elementary Sidewalks (plus $1,000 for noninfrastructure activities) (Cedar Rapids), $131,353
·Hubbell Elementary School Enhanced School Crossings (Des Moines), $120,000
·Lincoln Elementary School Safe Routes to School Project (Waterloo), $154,620
·Polk Elementary Sidewalks (plus $1,000 for noninfrastructure activities) (Cedar Rapids), $116,220
·Richardson Elementary School Priority Improvements Project (Fort Madison), $77,356
·Sioux Center Schools Sidewalk Improvement Project (plus $5,000 for noninfrastructure activities) (Sioux Center), $136,530
·Spencer School Sidewalk Improvement Program (Spencer), $79,475
·Sunnyside Sidewalk Extension to Aldo Leopold Middle School (Burlington), $186,80

Full article here

Group seeks ban on burning trash in Iowa cities, towns

by O. Kay Henderson on January 19, 2010

The Iowa Environmental Council is pushing for a ban that would forbid burning trash within the city limits of any Iowa town or city.  The group lobbied state legislators to enact the ban last year, but it failed to pass.

“We’re hoping to get similar legislation introduced this year with maybe some better definitions of what constitutes trash and figure out how we can phase that in over a period of time, based on the size of the municipality,” says Iowa Environmental Council executive director Marian Riggs Gelb. 

According to Gelb, more than a third of Iowa cities and towns still allow residents to burn trash within the city limits.  Gelb says air quality has become a concern in some areas, with state officials issuing warnings to Iowans who have health problems to avoid outdoor activities because “fine particulate matter” in the air has exceeded federal standards. The Iowa Environmental Council argues a ban on trash burning in Iowa cities could improve air quality.

“It’s one way to try to address what is becoming a bigger and bigger issue in Iowa,” Gelb says.  “So we’re looking at trying to do what we can within the constraints available to us.” 

Today is the Iowa Environmental Council’s “lobby day” at the statehouse.  The group and its affiliates have set up tables in the rotunda of the capitol and council members are meeting individually with legislators to discuss the group’s priorities.  The Iowa Environmental Council is made up of 54 different organizations, ranging from church groups to the Iowa chapter of the American Institute of Architects.

Full article here

Community-by-community response to climate change offers Iowa its best chance to become a national leader in sustainability

By Beth Dalbey

Cypress Villages, a 145-acre subdivision taking shape on organically-certified land north of Fairfield, aims to be Iowa’s first community to be completely LEED-Platinum — the U.S. Green Building Council’s highest designation.

The low-powered radio station KRUU-FM is believed to be the only one in the country to use solar energy to power its broadcast booth and signal.

And Fairfiled Mayor Ed Malloy is listed alongside big-city counterparts New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom and Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels on a list of the 15 greenest mayors in the United States compiled by the Grist, a Seattle-based online provider of environmental news.

So, building a sustainable future may not seem like a big leap in a small city where living “off the grid” rates not even a raised eyebrow. But a strategic plan to institutionalize sustainable living is “blazing a trail” for other small Iowa cities, said Brian Crowe, a program manager for the Iowa Power Fund.

Fairfield, population 9,500, received an $80,000 Power Fund grant to develop its Go-Green Strategic Plan, which sets forth a broad vision of sustainability upheld by solid goals, aims and objectives its architects think will significantly lighten the city’s carbon footprint.

Impressed by a cultural predisposition to sustainable living in Fairfield, Crowe and the Power Fund board thought Fairfield could serve as a model for other cities of similar size. “There’s really no roadmap at this point,” Crowe said.

Easily duplicated strengths in Fairfield’s plan include methods to establish both baselines in areas such as carbon impact and criteria to measure success, he said. “It’s hard to manage what you don’t measure, and I was pleased to see they are looking at that.”

Crowe thinks a community-by-community response to climate change offers Iowa its best chance to become a national leader in sustainability. “If progress can be measured and quantified, and there is someone on the ground to make sure the program is implemented, it could mean a great deal for Iowa,” he said. “For the things we’re good in — biofuels development and wind development — we’re certainly among the leaders in the nation, But we’ve certainly got a long way to go when you look at energy efficiency as a whole, because a lot of the low-hanging-fruit work has been done.”

‘Big-time accountability’

The sweeping plan addressing environmental, economic and social needs envisions, among other things, wind projects, a local foods system supplying as much as 40 percent of Fairfield’s produce needs, and an already vibrant entrepreneurial spirit burgeoning with new business growth to support green technologies and services.

Support for the plan is broad and those committing to it do so strongly, said Malloy, the sparkplug behind the initiative and Fairfield’s mayor since 2001. For example, he said, the Dexter Corp., a washing machine factory with a foundry operation, offers a $1,000 cash incentive to employees purchasing hybrid vehicles. But he acknowledges that not everyone in the city believes that human activity is a contributing factor to climate change, or that humans can mitigate their influence, meaning the city’s sustainability council faces an ongoing educational hurdle.

“The focus from the beginning has been on how we can create a culture where we voluntarily do the right thing in terms of managing our resources, capturing their economic benefits and leveraging them in local commerce, in particular, foods, where we’re burning a lot of fuel to get it here, and recycling,” he said. “The bigger vision is how we build and design the community going into the future, whether in designing buildings or managing our natural resources in a way that’s more responsible.”

Scott Timm, Fairfield’s community sustainability director, who was hired in a partnership between the city and Iowa State University Extension Service, said “big-time accountability” makes the difference between a feel-good set of values and a plan with teeth.

Businesses and institutions pledging to implement the plan run the gamut from already sustainable projects like Gamble’s Abundance Eco Village to emissions-belching factories, and include elected councils and boards, schools and health-care institutions, cultural organizations, service industries and retail businesses. They’ve signed off on what they’ll do and when they’ll do it, Timm said.

Plan architects also got creative — and practical, For example, an invitation to join the new Green Business Council, made up of the town’s top CEOs, doesn’t come with an expectation for dues, but rather that the business will invest that money in sustainable practices.

Timm said Fairfield’s methodology — holding community conversations facilitated by the Institute for Decision Making at the University of Northern Iowa and involving every corner of the community — is a valuable lesson for other cities with an eye on sustainability.

“There are common themes almost everyone can agree on,” he said. “We’re not asking everybody to go off the grid, we’re just looking for ways to tighten things up, promote healthier ways of living and conserving resources. It’s not radical New Age hippie stuff, but values everybody can buy into.”

The sustainability council is working with the Iowa Interfaith Power & Light Group (Iowa IPL), which offers a faith-based response to climate change. The three-year-old organization brings together the voices of Christian, Jewish, Muslim and other faith communities arguing that environmental stewardship is a spiritual concern.

It’s a smart bit of strategy, Timm said, because “if the religious communities don’t get behind this movement, we are in serious trouble.”

By following the plan relating to energy audits of government-owned buildings and schools, Timm said it’s realistic to expect Fairfield can not only offset a proposed 7 percent utility increase, but also achieve deep. Gas and electricity costs for city-owned facilities run about $500,000 annually, and saving just 30 percent of that — a realistic goal, the plan’s architects say — amounts to at least one salary for a city employee, an all important consideration during a sour economy.

“That’s the low-hanging fruit,” Timm said.

Another thing Fairfield did correctly was tap into funding streams, like the Iowa Power Fund, a state program supporting energy innovation and independence.

“If you can really work with your local city government and the utility companies and look into where there are funding options — state or federal — you can get some amazing projects moving,” Timm said. “There is some serious funding out there.”

Changing behaviors

Dubuque Sustainability Coordinator Cori Burbach said Fairfield’s strides help guide similar efforts in hers and other Iowa cities. She took part in a sustainable communities workshop Timm hosted last fall and was impressed by intricacies in Fairfield’s plan. “I was really impressed with the local foods program, and the involvement of the local school district and university,” Burbach said. “Getting local foods into the schools is really exciting.”

Both the Fairfield Community School District and Maharishi University of Management also have developed educational curricula around the principles of sustainability. The university offers what officials say is the country’s first four-year bachelor of science degree in sustainable living with some four dozen courses. Energy independence pioneer Gamble, an assistant professor for the new department, said the breadth of courses epitomize the overarching goals of Fairfield’s sustainability goals.

“The sustainable department has morphed from a biology department with six students to a sustainable living department with 90 fulltime students,” he said. “Students are involved in innovative enterprises, like a 1,000-gallon-per-day capacity biodiesel cooperative, and wind generator and solar projects.”

The building housing the department was slated for demolition, but students convinced university higher-ups to leave it standing and allow them to refurbish it using green technology.

Timm said the schools’ efforts go a long way toward institutionalizing sustainable living in Fairfield.

“My impression is that Fairfield is a community of people who want to do good things,” said Timm, whose first full day as a Fairfield resident coincided with a Labor Day concert by the Beach Boys, where Mayor Malloy proclaimed bandleader and sometime Fairfield resident Mike Love “energy czar for a day.”

“We’re finding that people want to get plugged in, and that they aren’t afraid to try something new and to find ways to change their behavior,” he said. “That’s the real key, looking at ways to change behavior.”

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By James B. Martin-Schramm via the Cedar Rapids Gazette

The international community recently gathered in Copenhagen to discuss climate policy and to develop an agreement to replace the Kyoto Protocol when it expires in 2012. Even a cursory reading of the daily news reveals that this was a very contentious meeting.

Global warming poses enormous risks. The means to mitigate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and adapt to climate change require substantial financial resources. There is a great deal at stake economically, politically and ecologically.

How to best address and resolve the challenges posed by climate change is not only an economic or political question, it is also an ethical one. I co-teach a course on ethics, energy and climate policy. I developed the following ethical guidelines to assess various climate policy proposals:

Temporal dimensions

Current urgency. Given the dire consequences associated with rapid climate change, climate policy proposals should be evaluated on the extent to which they address what Martin Luther King, Jr. famously termed “the fierce urgency of Now.”

Future adequacy. The proposed level and timetable of reductions in GHG emissions must be sufficient to avoid catastrophic consequences associated with climate change.

Historical responsibility. A greater share of the burden associated with reducing GHG emissions must fall on those who have been major emitters in the past.

Existing capacity. Those with more financial and technological resources should bear a greater share of the cost of reducing emissions than those who have much less.

Political viability. A morally praiseworthy climate proposal must have sufficient political support to make it realistic and viable.

Structural Dimensions

Scientific integrity. Climate policies must be based on the best current science and have the capacity to be revised in light of future scientific findings.

Sectoral comprehensiveness. An ethically adequate climate policy should spread GHG reduction requirements over all sectors of an economy rather than lay the burden or blame on one or more particular industries.

International integration. Since the planet’s atmosphere does not recognize political boundaries, national climate policies must be consistent with international agreements and be integrated with them.

Resource sharing. Morally praiseworthy climate proposals should contain mechanisms to transfer resources so that the poor can bear the cost and acquire the technologies necessary to mitigate emissions in the present and adapt to climate change in the future.

Economic efficiency. Climate policies that achieve the greatest measures of ecological and social well-being at the least economic cost are morally preferred.

Procedural dimensions

 Policy transparency. It is vital that all parties be able to comprehend the impact of a climate policy upon them.

 Emissions verifiability. With several principal greenhouse gases and emission sources spread around the world, climate policies must identify ways to verify emission reductions with confidence and accuracy.

Political incorruptibility. The auctioning of emission allowances and/or the collection of taxes on GHG emissions will generate fiscal obligations that the rich and powerful will seek to avoid, as well as enormous revenue streams that some will try to misappropriate. Climate policies must not easily be corrupted and abused by the rich and powerful.

 Implementational subsidiarity. While the focus must be on global reductions of greenhouse gas concentrations, better climate policies will empower those closest to the source of the emissions to decide how best to achieve the reductions.

Now that the Copenhagen conference has ended, it is clear that international discussions about climate policy will continue in 2010. I hope policy makers will consider these and other ethical guidelines as they formulate a legally binding agreement to replace the Kyoto Protocol.

James B. Martin-Schramm is a professor of religion at Luther College in Decorah. He also is the research chair in Luther’s Center for Ethics and Public Life.

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