Iowa Global Warming

 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

By Perry Beeman, Des Moines Register

Environmentalists expect to spend most of the legislative session trying to fend off budget-cutters rather than attempting to push through new programs to protect air and water.

Several environmental officials say the environment probably will get even less attention than usual given the budget crisis and an election looming.

Rep. Donovan Olson, a Boone Democrat who leads the House environment committee, said: “We won’t be creating any new programs and we won’t be allocating any new state dollars. So that really limits our action for our next session. We just won’t be doing that much.”

Marian Gelb of the Iowa Environmental Council, a nonprofit coalition of green groups and individuals, and Richard Leopold, director of the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, agreed. Leopold described the coming session as “pretty meek and mild.”

Here’s what’s likely to come up:

Climate

By the end of this year, a state task force will submit a firmer set of recommendations for cutting greenhouse gases to fight climate change. There’s also work to look more closely at benefits and costs of various actions.

Little action is expected in this Legislature, except setting the scene for votes in the next one.

But Neil Hamilton, a professor at Drake University who attended the recent Copenhagen climate talks, said Iowans should pursue many climate-related actions because they help the environment in a broader sense.

Some plantings do a good job of sweeping heat-trapping carbon from the air, but also reduce soil erosion.

Renewable energy sources such as wind can help diversify the energy mix, reduce dependence on foreign oil, and, yes, limit carbon dioxide emissions, Hamilton added.

“This really is an economic question” as much as an environmental one, he said.

Livestock

Adam Mason, state policy organizing director for the nonprofit Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement, said CCI members will pressure Gov. Chet Culver to make good on his campaign pledge to push for local control of livestock confinements.

“If Culver expects to be around more than one term, we need to see something out of him,” Mason said. “I’m going to hammer away that he campaigned on that.

“This is an issue that resonates, and it’s one that will come up again in November.”

Erin Seidler, Culver’s spokeswoman, said, “The governor is committed to local control for livestock confinement, but unfortunately there hasn’t been consensus in the Iowa Legislature to get it done.”

The local-control legislation has been so controversial among lawmakers that leaders have declined to even have a floor debate. In addition, Democratic leaders in the Legislature at times have been at odds with Culver, a fellow Democrat.

CCI also wants the state to set bigger buffer zones between confinements and homes, for example. And the group wants permit requirements to extend to even smaller livestock operations.

The chances of any of that happening: slim.

“Realistically, it’s probably not going to move this year,” Mason said.

Sen. Donovan Olson, a Boone Democrat, said lawmakers are so divided on the local-control issue that advocates would be better off looking for some way to gain ground in an incremental way, short of the full-fledged yielding of power to local authorities.

Trails and more

The Iowa Environmental Council and other organizations are pushing to prevent cuts to the Resources Enhancement and Protection program, which has been pulling in a record $18 million from gambling receipts the past few years. That still is short of the $20 million authorized by legislation.

The program pays for trails, public land and historic preservation, for example.

“We’re going to work hard to keep REAP funded,” Gelb, of the Iowa Environmental Council, said. “It’s realistic to expect it is going to take a hit. We’ll make an effort to keep that as small as possible.”

Leopold, the DNR director, said he hasn’t heard of specific plans to cut cash for the program. However, with 10 percent cuts spreading across state government, a small cut is possible, he added.

Air quality

The Iowa Department of Natural Resources and the Iowa Environment Council both support legislation, introduced in the last session, that would ban open burning in cities and immediately surrounding areas.

Neither thinks it will pass. The move is designed to protect asthmatics and others from lung damage.

“Realistically, I don’t think they are going to give it time,” Leopold said.

Also in the air: legislation that would limit the idling of diesel trucks.

Long-term financing

Voters will cast ballots in November on a measure that would devote 0.375 percent of any future sales tax increase to natural resources projects.

A $2.5 million public campaign is expected to begin this summer. Lawmakers are expected to consider legislation that would lay out how the estimated $150 million a year would be distributed from a constitutionally protected account.

The money won’t be available unless voters approve the measure, and lawmakers later vote to increase the sales tax.

Story is here

In the month since the House of Representatives passed the American Clean Energy and Security Act, the conversation about renewable energy and climate change has gotten more intense in Iowa. Letters to the editor and editorials fill the opinion pages on what should be done in the US Senate. Sometimes the Iowa Global Warming Campaign’s work can be frustrating, especially when huge companies like Warren Buffett’s MidAmerican Energy runs a full scale media campaign designed to mislead Iowans about the costs of action, but the experience is rewarding nonetheless. In an unprecedented move, the Iowa Utility Board is accepting public comments on what the American Clean Energy and Security Act will mean for Iowa. I’m not sure that the Iowa Utilities Board should be making a statement on federal climate legislation, but we will be working to get the right answers incorporated in any recommendation the IUB makes.

We know that transitioning to a clean energy economy will create jobs and improve America’s economic security, but that’s not why I came to work here. What good are rock-bottom numbers on your utility bill if it’s not safe for your children to go outside because of scorching temperatures? What good is 7 cents per kilowatt hour coal electricity when our grandchildren will find half of the species on earth have gone extinct? What good is a small utility bill if millions of homeless climate refugees come to our shores? What good are low energy prices when food prices have tripled due to good farmland turning to desert? I realize that these things can be hard to imagine – climate change is a crisis in slow motion – but we have to realistically look at the costs of inaction. The business-as-usual scenario of burning ever increasing amounts of fossil fuels will assuredly doom future generations of Iowans with more climate-induced catastrophes.

I’m tempted to ask “will we let America lose the clean energy race?” but the stakes are higher than that. Delaying strong action on climate change dooms all of the world’s economies, constraining them with violent weather, useless farmland, disease outbreaks, lost natural resources, and rising oceans.

I decided to spend my summer in Iowa because I believe we can change the way we do things for the better. We are not helpless in stopping the effects of climate change. We can take action to reduce our emissions of dangerous greenhouse gases like CO2 and make a more durable energy and transportation infrastructure. The US Senate needs to pass robust energy and climate legislation this year, and I implore Senators Harkin and Grassley to be leaders in making laws that will effectively deal with the problem of climate change.

Drew

The House’s approval of the Waxman-Markey climate change bill earlier this month was a remarkable political achievement and an important beginning to the task of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. But in all the last-minute wheeling and dealing, the House bill acquired two big loopholes that the Senate must close.

The first loophole involves coal-fired power plants. Coal is the world’s most abundant fossil fuel — producing more than half the electricity in the United States — and also its dirtiest, with twice the carbon content of natural gas.

The House bill would limit emissions from coal-fired power plants in two ways. It imposes a cap on emissions from all industrial facilities that tightens slowly over time. It also sets tough performance standards on new power plants permitted after 2009, requiring emissions reductions of 50 percent or more. The bill would help underwrite advanced technologies capable of capturing carbon dioxide and storing it underground.

Read the rest of the article here.

It’s nothing new for America’s farmers and ranchers to worry about the weather. Will there be enough rain for the crops and grazing lands? Will it stop at planting and harvest time, and before our creeks and rivers jump their banks?

What is new is that farmers and ranchers should be very concerned about the long-term changes in our climate. The science is clear: Changes in the climate will affect growing seasons, bring on more intense storms and potentially make it more difficult for farmers and ranchers to make ends meet.

While we can’t do much about the short-term weather forecast, we can – and we must – act now to reduce atmospheric greenhouse gases, like carbon dioxide, which cause climate change.

This issue is too important for agriculture and forestry to sit on the sidelines. The opportunities it offers farmers and ranchers through a carbon market and a new energy economy are too promising to delay. Because, when we address climate change, we will not only fend off a looming climate crisis, but we will revitalize rural America.

Read the rest of Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack’s piece here.

When our children, and our children’s children, learn about this period of U.S. history, let us hope the extramarital travails of South Carolina’s governor will be no more than a footnote. Let us hope they are taught that this year, the U.S. Congress passed a new kind of law, one that not only reduced harmful greenhouse-gas emissions but set the United States on a new trajectory to a more just, healthy and sustainable future.

The U.S. House of Representatives did just that late last month when it passed the American Clean Energy and Security Act. The bill in its current form does not go nearly far enough in reducing emissions and is overladen with giveaways to powerful business lobbies, but it aims in the right direction. If our children are to have a world in which they have the luxury to study history, this bill (or a stronger version) must become law.

Some have balked at the price tag on this legislation, but that amount is trivial when compared with the price of inaction. In June, the U.S. Global Change Research Program, an interagency team of scientists, published a “game changing” report laying out the consequences of climate change to the United States if we do not act now. Among its findings: a rise in mean temperatures of 7.5 to 11 degrees Fahrenheit (turning Iowa’s climate into Mississippi’s by 2095), dramatic loss of coastal areas to sea-level rise and erosion, and a breakdown in the water cycle that will leave the southern half of the country in perpetual drought while subjecting the northern half – including Iowa – to torrential downpours and flooding. We are already beginning to feel these impacts: Temperatures have risen 2 degrees over the last half-century, and over the past century, the heaviest 1 percent of downpours increased 20 percent. The damage these trends will have on the economy is measured in trillions of dollars.

Read the rest of the Des Moines Register article here.

L’AQUILA, Italy — The world’s major industrial nations and newly emerging powers failed to agree Wednesday on specific cuts in heat-trapping gases by 2050, undercutting an effort to build a global consensus to fight climate change, according to people following the talks.

Group of 8As President Obama arrived for three days of meetings, negotiators for the world’s 17 leading polluters dropped a proposal to cut global greenhouse gas emissions by 50 percent by mid-century, and emissions from the most advanced economies by 80 percent. But both the G-8 and the developing countries agreed to set a goal of stopping world temperatures from rising by more than 2 degrees Celsius from pre-industrial levels.

The discussion of climate change was among the top priorities of world leaders as they gathered here for the annual summit meeting of the Group of 8 powers. Mr. Obama invited counterparts from China, India, Brazil, South Africa, Mexico and others to join the G-8 here on Thursday for a parallel “Major Economies Forum” representing the producers of 80 percent of the world’s greenhouse gases. But since President Hu Jintao of China abruptly left Italy to deal with unrest at home, the chances of making further progress seemed to evaporate.

Read the rest of the article here.

So the House passed the Waxman-Markey climate-change bill. In political terms, it was a remarkable achievement.

But 212 representatives voted no. A handful of these no votes came from representatives who considered the bill too weak, but most rejected the bill because they rejected the whole notion that we have to do something about greenhouse gases.

And as I watched the deniers make their arguments, I couldn’t help thinking that I was watching a form of treason — treason against the planet.

To fully appreciate the irresponsibility and immorality of climate-change denial, you need to know about the grim turn taken by the latest climate research.

The fact is that the planet is changing faster than even pessimists expected: ice caps are shrinking, arid zones spreading, at a terrifying rate. And according to a number of recent studies, catastrophe — a rise in temperature so large as to be almost unthinkable — can no longer be considered a mere possibility. It is, instead, the most likely outcome if we continue along our present course.

Thus researchers at M.I.T., who were previously predicting a temperature rise of a little more than 4 degrees by the end of this century, are now predicting a rise of more than 9 degrees. Why? Global greenhouse gas emissions are rising faster than expected; some mitigating factors, like absorption of carbon dioxide by the oceans, are turning out to be weaker than hoped; and there’s growing evidence that climate change is self-reinforcing — that, for example, rising temperatures will cause some arctic tundra to defrost, releasing even more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

Read the rest of Paul Krugman’s article here.

Each year, the University of Iowa’s International Programs hosts teachers from around the state for a program focused on what Iowans need to know about the rest of the world.

This year, the topic is global climate change and its political implications, said Buffy Quintero, International Programs Outreach Coordinator, who is helping organize this year’s event.

“The purpose is to give teachers the most current and up-to-date information on global climate change and to share our expertise,” Quintero said. “It is one of the most critical issues facing the next generation and our generation.”

More than 20 teachers from around Iowa will attend UI’s International Programs Summer Institute for Teachers. The program runs from Monday through the week.

The programming is primarily for the teachers attending the institute, but two lectures will be open to anyone.

Read the rest of the article here.

Just two years after a rare, eye-opening voyage through the Northwest Passage, Iowan David Thoreson is attempting to circumnavigate North and South America in a continuous sailboat trip – something that’s never been done before.

The 13-month voyage, which launched Sunday in Seattle, promises gut-wrenching dangers and personal costs. But at age 49, Thoreson has found his life’s purpose on the planet’s edges.

Far from the serene waters of his home near Lake Okoboji, where he steered his grandfather’s 5-horsepower fishing boat as a youngster, Thoreson and three other sailors have a goal greater than the explorer’s ego-building firsts: Draw attention to the planet’s peril from global warming and pollution.

Read the rest of the article here.