* This isn’t getting a whole lot of play in the big media, but it’s significant…
(S)ix of the 12 [Midwestern] governors signed a greenhouse gas accord that would set up a cap-and-trade system to reduce the gases over the coming decades. The governors haven’t agreed yet on how much emissions will be lowered, but several states are developing plans to cut emissions 60% to 80%.
Environmental groups hailed the agreement as significant because it would put the Midwest in a position to capitalize on its strength in renewable energy, such as wind and biofuels, as movement builds to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.
“The Midwest is now breaking the logjam when it comes to changing global-warming policy in this country,” said Howard Learner, director of the Environmental Law and Policy Center.
Congress will take notice that states that rely heavily on coal are ready to reduce emissions, he said
That includes Illinois, where Gov. Rod Blagojevich this week made the “difficult” decision to sign on to the accord, Learner said; the task was tougher for Blagojevich than for most Midwestern governors because Illinois is a coal-mining state with coal-mining jobs and 60 coal-fired power plants.
Those six states were Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin. Illinois ranks sixth in the nation for the most carbon dioxide emissions from power plants. Indiana, which didn’t sign the agreement but did sign onto other pledges, ranks third.
* Gov. Blagojevich’s statement…
“I’m proud to join my fellow Midwestern governors to strengthen our energy security and fight global warming. America’s heartland is ready to lead our nation toward a smarter, cleaner energy future because Illinois and the Midwest can’t – and won’t – wait for federal action,” said Gov. Blagojevich. “We can have economic prosperity, energy security and a healthy environment at the same time – because innovation and investment in next-generation clean technologies will make us more competitive and create jobs, while saving energy and cutting greenhouse gases.”
* This is part of a national move to try to do something about an issue that has Washington, DC paralyzed…
The Midwestern governors expressed similar impatience with the slow pace in Washington on global warming and energy issues. They have banded together to set up a regional emissions control program, to expand production of biofuels and to cooperate on environmental and energy infrastructure projects, like an interstate pipeline for moving carbon emissions from power plants to underground storage vaults.
Gov. James E. Doyle of Wisconsin, a Democrat who is chairman of the Midwestern Governors Association, said that the individual states in his region were all moving independently toward greater energy efficiency and planned to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and that it made sense to work in concert.
“In the absence of a federal plan we have to move forward,” Mr. Doyle said, speaking from Milwaukee, where he was the chairman of an energy summit meeting of the Midwestern governors. “On top of that, this recognizes that, federal plan or no federal plan, the Midwest is uniquely positioned to be a major force in the developing new energy world.”
He predicted that sooner or later Washington would adopt a national cap-and-trade system for carbon emissions, but he was not optimistic that it would act before President Bush leaves office.
* Some details…
2 percent energy efficiency improvement in natural gas and electricity by 2015 and 2 percent annually thereafter. And the leaders pledge to have at least one commercial advanced coal gasification facility delivering power by 2012, capable of being fitted for carbon capture. Also by that year, they agree to site and permit a pipeline to transport that carbon dioxide for use in enhanced oil and gas recovery.
All the details are here.
Discuss.
- Crimefighter - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 10:29 am:
And of course China still pollutes all they want. Ugh.
- GoBearsss - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 10:33 am:
Again, the states show how progress can be made while the national politicos scream at each other with the same tired refrains they were using 20 and 30 years ago.
I always say - If you like politics for the fight, go to D.C. But if you like politics for the people, go to your local statehouse or city hall.
- Kiyoshi Martinez - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 10:44 am:
“Illinois’ coal reserves contain more Btu’s than the oil reserves of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.” [Source, PDF file]
I’m pretty sure I read somewhere that while Illinois has a really big coal-mining industry, a sizable (possibly a majority) of the coal it produces isn’t burned in our own coal-powered plans because it’s too “dirty.”
While we can set more restrictive emission standards for our own power plants, what of all that coal we mine and ship out of state to be burned where emission standards aren’t so tough? The positive environmental impact could potentially be negated if that’s the case.
So, the question to really ask here is if these policies address that issue, of whether or not we’ll be exporting less “dirty” coal to be burned elsewhere. Anyone know if the agreement Blagojevich signed addresses this topic? I’d be curious to know if it did.
I don’t have time to look up the specifics, but perhaps someone with more knowledge/time on the topic can expand on this.
- Six Degrees of Separation - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 10:50 am:
Go Bearsssss
If IL could harness all the wind power from our local politicians, we could reduce our greenhouse gas emissions overnight.
- Angry Chicagoan - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 10:56 am:
Pleased to see Pawlenty from Minnesota signing on for it; it’s good to see that bona fide conservatives as well as liberals see this is a problem. Maybe we should limit imports from China on environmental grounds.
- Rebecca Stanfield - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 11:07 am:
The region’s govs have realized that clean energy makes good economic sense (more jobs, more gross state product, more disposable income), and that it’s good politics to be firmly on the side of addressing the threat of global warming. The more we align our energy economy with the inevitable need to dramatically reduce our global warming pollution, but better we’ll be poised to compete in the economy of the 21st Century. So the agreement is momentus and its great that Governor Blagojevich has stepped up to the plate.
- Ghost - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 11:18 am:
It looks like form over subtance. They agreed to do somthing, but have no somthing they have agreed to.
An actual commitment and plan would have been more remarkable. (such as some program to subsidize or encourage the new coal burning power plants that pipe emissions into the ground). This looks more like yet another situation where the governor talks a good game, but lacks any real plan. Without required goals or actual laws effectuatiung anything, this is much to do about nothing.
- plutocrat03 - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 11:22 am:
Yet another feel good do nothing agreement.
Gost has a point. I have been monitring the countries who signed on to the Kyoto protocos and have watched them struggle with the costs of the reduction in greenhouse gasses. Not pretty.
Who will tell the truth and monitor how many jobs are to be lost because of pie in the sky pontificating?
- Rich Miller - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 11:25 am:
Click the links. This isn’t a do-nothing agreement. The energy efficiency stuff is important, for example.
- Jack Darin - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 11:26 am:
Kiyoshi -
Illinois coal is “dirtier” in some ways (like the stuff that causes acid rain), but it is “cleaner” in others (like it has less mercury).
As far as global warming goes, there isn’t much difference between Midwest coal and the Wyoming coal that is mostly burned in Illinois.
Great to see Illinois helping to lead the way. Couple this with the new clean energy law (25% renewables by 2025, major new efficiency programs), and we are heading down the right road for a change.
Here’s my
post from yesterday.
- kimsch - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 11:31 am:
Six Degrees - The “wind power” of the politicians is all Carbon Dioxide!
Although I’ll gladly sell them offsets. I won’t talk as much so they can talk all they want. Let’s see, what would be a good price? $2,000 a week. That’d work. $5,000 a week would be better, but I’d accept $2,000.
- Squideshi - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 12:23 pm:
Governor Blagojevich said, “…the Midwest can’t – and won’t – wait for federal action…investment in next-generation clean technologies will make us more competitive and create jobs, while saving energy and cutting greenhouse gases.”
In 2006, Rich Whitney said, “…that doesn’t mean that we can or should simply wait for action at the global or the federal level. We can’t afford to wait…a serious effort to build a sustainable energy future…will be good for our economy, creating tens of thousands of new, quality jobs.”
I think that’s pretty strikingly similar rhetoric. Are Greens having an impact on the system even before being elected? Is the Governor picking up on this language as a response to Whitney’s candidacy? The real question is, will Blagojevich really and truly adopt the whole platform and not just the words? If not, it’s just greenwashing.
- ids - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 1:31 pm:
Look at the details and it’s a “greenhouse gas agreement” that does not commit to reducing GHG.
Increasing energy efficiency and renewable energy sources does not decrease GHG if power demand is rising and exporting energy is ignored. It follows the White House propaganda of an improving carbon intensity model.
Increasing biofules does nothing for improving GHG.
Carbon and capture is a sinkhole for public funding for Big Coal and a pipe dream for GHG reductions.
A cap-and-trade without details is less than nothing. If it gives free credits and allows bogus offsets, like the Lieberman-Warner national plan, it is a step backwards.
Overall, it’s a nice headline for Ill enviros fundraising.
Kiyoshi has a good point. Coal and dirty power export is a great place for a carbon tax that can be used to build sustainable energy and public transportation.
Jack Darin is wrong again. Wyoming coal is less energy intense than Ill coal. It takes more (20-30%) of it to produce the same amount of energy, and that much more CO2.
- Rebecca Stanfield - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 1:48 pm:
I think everyone can agree with the blogger who said that unless the plan becomes enforceable standards adopted by law it won’t be meaningful. BUT, that’s a far cry from concluding that the agreement is bogus. This is an agreement to cap carbon in the midwest, as other regions have done. The Governor has set at target of 1990 levels by 2020 in Illinois and now we have the opportunity to create a regional carbon market as the Northeast and western states are already doing. It means that the midwest is not going to be a dumping ground for the dirtiest coal projects in the nation and it means we’re going to invest in efficiency and renewables to meet the targets. It’s a good vision and now we need to challenge the Governors and our state legislators to make it a reality.
- VanillaMan - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 1:49 pm:
I think it is nice.
Kinda like watching a group of 800 pound men sign a Weight Watchers contract to lose 650 pounds each - someday, somehow. And the signing ceremony is held at an all-you-can-eat buffet.
Or like a group of alcoholics swearing off another drop of booze while bellied up to a pub.
That is why environmentalism is so hot politically, it is a wonderful promise with a bright future - kinda like Brazil’s.
- Ghost - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 2:01 pm:
–Click the links. This isn’t a do-nothing agreement. The energy efficiency stuff is important, for example–
you mean like this part of it?
“Establish quantifiable goals for energy efficiency. Policy-makers need to
determine what level of efficiency improvement is economically achievable for
their jurisdiction to meet the regional goal. If each state identified targets for
megawatt-hours and therms saved, it would be possible to determine what role
each jurisdiction can play in achieving the region’s overall 2 percent energy
efficiency objective. Progress should be continually measured and evaluated, and
adjustments should be made as necessary…”
This just says get totgehter and decide what, if anything, you want to do. Of cirtical note…there is no penalty provision or mandated golas. This is just empty words. Nothing in there about how Illinois will actually meet these goals, where the money will come from, and what happens if we do not. Put in some penalties or enforcement teeth for States that do not meet the goal. Identify mandated changes. This is just empty words, form over subatance. Worse, it makes people think a solution is in place, and takes pressure off of the feds to come up with enforceable and mandated reductions.
This “agreement” does not come wityh a real plan to implement it, and the Gov has not identified one. If we do not comply with it, no penalty. its an empty promise, form over substance.
- Ghost - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 2:04 pm:
I should clarify, by mandated goals I mean a “you must achieve x by x date, or you lose y.
There are empty goals of we will do x by year 2012… there is no penalty and no indication of how we are going to get all the private business etc to make these changes. Without teeth we are just gumbing our ideal.
- snidely whiplash - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 3:37 pm:
Great. Another reason for jobs to go running off to Indiana.
I’d say the hot air coming off politicians like Hot Rod does a lot more global warming than does the coal industry.
- Enviro-zealot - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 4:27 pm:
Advancing an enforceable cap and trade program to reduce greenhouse gases through the legislature would be a huge challenge for the Governor. He has yet to introduce or get behind a major piece of environmental legislation in the General Assembly. His natural allies, the mainstream environmental groups, have little clout outside the Chicago area. Many downstate environmentalists, particularly at the grassroots level, are angry at him for gutting DNR and allowing our state parks and other natural resources to deteriorate. So I wonder whether there will be enough support to counter the utilities, manufacturers and labor unions. These interests will oppose any effort to create a state or regional greenhouse gas reduction program, preferring nothing or a national approach at best. My initial reaction is that this announcement was a media opportunity for him, but I hope the Governor proves me wrong and takes this problem seriously.
- PCC - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 5:04 pm:
@crimefighter: The United States needs to lead global action, not wait for other nations to follow. Just because I was born in the USA doesn’t give me some magical right to pollute 10X more than someone born in China or India. Most buildings in Shanghai don’t even have central HEAT — you call that “polluting all they want”?
Of course, I’d really prefer if our “green” governor and “green” mayor would take real action to preserve and enhance what’s really green around here: our ability to get around on transit.
- plutocrat03 - Friday, Nov 16, 07 @ 6:22 pm:
Rich I beg to differ as far as the value of this agreement. I am someone who is technically based and can smell political BS from a mile away. This document reeks. It will do nothing positive and certainly will cause bad things to happen to little people.
The energy efficiency is horse hockey. Do you for a moment believe that generators of electricity are not trying to get the maximum efficiency from what they are burning? Companies spend millions of dollars trying to improve the performance of turbines by a fraction of a percent, much less 2 percent per year and for how long. It is easy for someone who is technically ignorant to dictate improvements in efficiency. Reality is that there are limits to what can be done. What do you do next? limit the kilowatts people can use?
All this will do is drive up the cost of utilities and cost jobs in the region.
There has not been a single solitary scientific paper which has defined the parameter of the problem of global warming and how it is caused by humans. I have read the entire UN report on climate change and find it to be a political polemic and not at all scientific.
The stampede the scientifically illiterate are trying to lead toward draconian changes to human behavior will cause more damage to the world than the ‘evil’ of the alleged human caused global warming.
- Sahims2 - Saturday, Nov 17, 07 @ 5:39 pm:
Funny how the democrats are steadfastly holding onto the global warming bandwagon when more and more scientists are starting to decry against it, the founder of the weather channel has denounced it as nothing more than a farce. Also notice how it’s this country that’s the real enemy to the environment when we have the strictess emission laws on the planet. Nothing mentioned about the 3rd world countries that pollute or China who is putting a new coal fired power plant online every 2 days. Why? Because they don’t have the money to spend on this dog and pony show - America is far richer than these other countries and the socialist liberals out there is using this as a means to redistribute the wealth of America to the others on a global scale. If it keeps on, we’ll all be standing around reading from the little red book, wearing the same shopworn clothing…..that is, the working class will, the others that want this will hang on to their wealth and build fences to keep us out.