U.S. EPA Rules that Coal Plants Must Have Controls for CO2

President-Elect Barack Obama may not yet have taken office, but it appears the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is taking note of the election results earlier this month.

Late last week, the Environmental Protection Agency’s Environmental Appeals Board ruled that EPA had no valid reason for refusing to limit carbon dioxide emissions from new and proposed coal-fired power plants. As a result of this decision, all new and proposed coal plants will be required to address their emissions from carbon dioxide, which is a major source of climate change. The Associated Press reported that approximately 100 proposed coal plants may be stalled by the ruling, and oil refinery expansion proposals may be stalled as well.

The decision was the result of a lawsuit by the Sierra Club which built upon a 2007 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, Massachusetts v. EPA, which held that carbon dioxide is a pollutant under the federal Clean Air Act. The Sierra Club argued that building new coal plants -- which emit 30% of U.S. global warming pollution -- without controlling their carbon emissions would wipe out all of the other efforts by local and state governments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The U.S. EPA decision can be found here.

Sierra Club press release can be found here.

California Air Resources Board Releases Final AB 32 Scoping Plan

The California Air Resources Board (CARB), led by Chair Mary Nichols, has just released the final version of the AB 32 Scoping Plan, which lays out the steps which the State of California will take in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in compliance with AB 32. 

The Scoping Plan website is available here.

The full Scoping Plan is available here. 

Schwarzenegger Signs Landmark Anti-Sprawl Bill

    This year's legislative session in Sacramento was groundbreaking in many respects. After months of wrangling over the budget, veto threats, and then the highest veto rate in the past 40 years, Gov. Schwarzenegger signed one of the most groundbreaking pieces of legislation of his tenure, Sen. Darrell Steinberg's SB 375. 

    The bill requires the California Air Resources Board to set regional targets for reducing greenhouse-gas emissions, and will allow the state to use $5 billion  of transportation money per year to encourage regions to embrace compact residential development.

    Read more here

California Air Resources Board To Release AB 32 Scoping Plan Next Week

In a speech tonight to the Marin County Sierra Club, Mary Nichols, the Chair of the California Air Resources Board, announced that the latest draft of the AB 32 Scoping Plan will be released by the end of next week.  The Scoping Plan, which had previously been scheduled to be released on October 3rd, is undergoing final edits. 

AB 32, or the Global Warming Solutions Act, requires the California Air Resources Board to issue a "Scoping Plan" by January 1, 2009, which spells out how the state will reduce emissions to 1990 levels by 2020 (a reduction of about 30% over projected levels), then down to 80% below 1990 levels by 2050. 

Earlier in the day, Chair Nichols spoke to a group of Marin County councilmembers about the Marin Clean Energy proposal, a plan to establish a new renewable energy agency in Marin county.  Nichols also described the framework which the Scoping Plan will create for AB 32, and how it will affect local governments. Check back soon for video of Nichols' remarks.