While there have been a large number of analyses of the potential ramifications of regulation of greenhouse gas emissions under the U.S. Clean Air Act (CAA), very few have assessed the potential economic impacts. A recent piece in the journal Review of Environmental Economics & Policy does just this, and also compares economic impacts vis-a-vis legislative alternatives.  The article also discusses options to increase compliance flexibility, thereby potentially maximizing emissions reductions. This would be a an excellent student reading.

Among the article’s take-aways:

1. New CAA regulations that took effect in 2011 will reduce light vehicle emissions by 21 percent by 2030, “making them among the most stringent standards in the world.” Moreover, even more stringent regulations that are being developed, and would take effect;
2. Once a pollutant is made subject to CAA jurisdiction in any context, it extends to stationary sources, which means that greenhouse gases from such sources are now subject to New Source Review, which, inter alia, mandates Best Available Control Technology for new or substantially modified existing facilities;
3. The third tool in the CAA’s belt, regulatory standards, covering stationary sources, will have the greatest impact on greenhouse gas emissions. This includes the potential to treat GHGs as a hazardous pollutant under CAA §112, regulation of greenhouse gases by establishing National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQs) under CAA §108–110, regulation of U.S. emissions based on their international impact, or performance standards under ;
4. The use of performance standards is the most “effective and practical approach” to address greenhouse gas emissions under the CAA
• Benefits of this approach, which includes New Source Performance Standards, include the ability to build on existing standards, a relatively quick regulatory process, and consideration of cost in setting standards, unlike under NAAQS;
• Potential disadvantages of performance standards include the threat that courts might require the EPA to issue GHG NAAQs since they supercede CAA §111(d), discouraging the EPA from expending limited resources on performance standards; performance standards are technical and data intensive; and regulations of individual sources will likely prove more expensive than economy-wide standards
5. A flexible performance standard under §111(d) could reduce greenhouse gas emissions by  5–10 percent in the coal sector—as much as about 3 percent of total U.S. emissions—without changing the level of electricity generation, at costs more modest than national climate change legislation that passed the U.S. House in 2009;
6. However, in the longer term, at least, regulation under the CAA could neither facilitate the most efficient opportunities for emissions reductions, nor would it provide the same level of long-term regulatory certainty essential to drive requisite investments.

DISCCRS VII Interdisciplinary Climate Change Research Symposium
http://disccrs.org/disccrsposter.pdf

Dates: October 13-20, 2012

Location: La Foret Conference and Retreat Center
Colorado Springs, CO

Application Deadline: February 29, 2012
Participation limited to 30 early-career Ph.D. scholars
Airfare and on-site expenses are supported through grants from NSF and NASA
http://disccrs.org

Eligibility: Ph.D. requirements completed between August 1, 2009 – February 29, 2012 in any natural or social science field relevant to the study of climate change, its impacts, or its societal implications. U.S. citizens and residents have preference though limited funds are available for non-U.S. participation.
See http://disccrs.org/files/DISCCRS_VI_Symposium_Scholars.pdf for information on the previous symposium scholars, and http://disccrs.org/files/DISCCRS_VI_Symposium_Report.pdf for information on the symposium experience.

Since 2003, DISCCRS has hosted symposia for early-career researchers to catalyze formation of interdisciplinary collegial networks, while fostering skills to better prepare graduates to conduct collaborative research and respond to the myriad challenges posed by climate change and its impacts. Participants will share their research; engage in discussions with peers, mentors, and funding agency representatives; and participate in communication and team training. Thirty early-career scholars will be selected through a review process with the expectation that invitees will become leaders in their chosen fields. Airfare and on-site expenses are supported through grants from NSF and NASA.

Symposium Application Instructions
http://disccrs.org/application_instructions

DISCCRS Resources

Webpage http://disccrs.org: The DISCCRS webpage includes information about symposia, a Ph.D. dissertation registry, news and links to other climate research sites, DISCCRS symposium and program reports and publications from the symposia, information.

Online Ph.D. Dissertation Registry http://disccrs.org/register: Join over 2500 climate change researchers by registering your Ph.D. dissertation and adding your abstract to our fully searchable database. Or browse the registry to identify other climate change researchers.

Career Resources http://disccrs.org/career: In addition to the Dissertation Registry, the DISCCRS website includes a wealth of valuable resources for finding a job, developing your professional skills, locating funding opportunities, crafting grant proposals and more.

Electronic Newsletter: With weekly climate-change job listings, news stories, funding opportunities and more, our weekly e-newsletter is automatically provided to anyone who registers their Ph.D. You can also subscribe at: http://disccrs.org/subscribe

The University of Houston Law Center is hosting a mock U.S. Supreme Court argument on climate change tort liability at the University of Houston Law Center on Jan. 19, 2012. The bench includes John Cruden, Ken Starr and former Texas Supreme Court Judge Tom Phillips.  Rick Faulk and David Axelrad will present the arguments, and we’ll then have an extended analysis and discussion with student input afterward.

The event can be viewed at the following address, either during the event (12pm CST), or thereafter: http://law.lecturecapture.uh.edu/uh/Viewer/?peid=eb2054cae15b48ecafc0bfe7fd15b11f1d

The University of Sussex would like to invite applications for the MSc in ‘Climate Change and Development’ for entry in September 2012. Scholarship information is provided below.

This is a unique course that aims to provide state-of-the-art training for the rapidly expanding market for development professionals with specialisation in climate change.  The programme is strongly multidisciplinary. Students will acquire specialist knowledge of the causes and consequences of climate change, the implications for developing countries, and the policy and practice of efforts to mitigate and adapt to a changing climate. Courses are taught by leading researchers in these fields from the world renowned Institute for Development Studies (IDS), the Geography Department and Science and Technology Policy Research Unit (SPRU).

Scholarships

Up to ten partial scholarships of £3,000 are available. The scholarships will be awarded to students who possess the highest academic ability and potential (not made on the basis of financial need). The deadline for scholarship applications is 1st May 2012.

Further information on the programme and the on-line application process

<http://www.sussex.ac.uk/study/pg/2012/taught/3931/25103>

Applications for scholarships should be made on the Climate Change application form:

<http://www.sussex.ac.uk/study/funding/2012/opportunities/view/61>

Further information about the climate change network at Sussex see

<www.sussex.ac.uk/climatechange>

Tel: +44 (0)1273 877686

Email: pg.enquiries@sussex.ac.uk

Almost 3000 non-science major undergraduates at the University of Chicago have taken PHSC13400, Global Warming: Understanding the Forecast, since Ray Pierrehumbert and I (David Archer) first developed it back in 1995.  The class is now available online,  Open Climate 101. The course is free, and one can obtain a certificate after completion of the course if one obtains a sufficiently high score on an online examination.

UNU’s Institute for Sustainability and Peace is pleased to announce postgraduate level courses on ‘Building Resilience to Climate Change’. The courses run for five weeks in Tokyo (Japan) from 20^th February to 23^rd March 2012.

Following two courses will be offered, each with duration of 2 weeks:

• Course-1: Science, Impacts and Vulnerability’
• Course-2: Approaches to Adaptation

In addition, week-long hands on training in ‘Remote sensing and Geographic Information Systems (GIS)’ will also be provided.  Please refer to the attached brochure for detailed information.

Priority will be given to students who are currently enrolled in a postgraduate programme.  However, the courses are also open to young faculty members, researchers and practitioners who have completed master’s degree and are working in the relevant field.

Limited competitive fellowships are available for the deserving candidates from the developing countries. The application deadline is now extended to 20^th January, 2012 (31^st January, 2012 for applicants from Japan).

• More information about the courses is available at: http://isp.unu.edu/grad/credited/cecar/index.html

A new United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) Synthesis Report has assessed whether the pledges made by States in recent years at UNFCCC meetings are consistent with holding temperature increases to either 1.4 or 2C above pre-industrial levels; the study also suggests measures that could be taken to reach this objective. Among other purposes that this study could be used in climate change courses would be as a source of data for simulated negotiations or a “solutions” module. Among the take-aways of the report:

1. Total anthropogenic emissions (fossil fuel and land use emissions) in 2009 were estimated at 49.5 GtCO2e;
2. Carbon dioxide concentrations in 2010 were pegged at 388.5ppm, methane at 1870ppb and nitrous oxide at 323ppb;
3. It is “likely” (greater than 66% probability) that limiting global emissions to 44 GtCO2e in 2020 would put the world on a path to limiting temperature increases to 2C during the 21st Century; in 2050, emissions would have had to drop to 21 GtCO2e to meet this objective;
4. If countries implement their lower ambition pledges made at the Copenhagen and Cancun meetings of the UNFCCC, and are subject to “lenient” accounting rules (including LULUCF credits and surplus emission units), it will result in annual emissions of 55 GtCO2e in 2020, compared to 56 GtCO2e without the Copenhagen pledges; in the best case scenario, i.e. including all the conditional pledges of the Parties at Copenhagen and Cancun and strict accounting rules, emissions top out at an estimated 51 GtCO2e, still leaving a substantial gap in terms of the level of obligations necessary to avoid a 2C temperature increase. Expressed a different way, the reductions of Annex I States are now pegged at somewhere between a 4% reduction bellow 1990 levels up to 11% above those levels, for the least ambitious scenario, to 16-18% below 1990 levels for the most ambitious scenario. In either case, this is well below the 25-40% reductions that the IPCC has suggested are necessary to avoid more than a 2C temperature increase;
5. Since the last assessment by UNEP of emissions pledges, countries have clarified their pledges in a manner that increases projected levels of emissions during this century;
6. There are several measures that could help us close the “emissions gap”:
• Renewable energy sources could contribute up to 38% of electricity production by 2020, resulting in an emission reduction potential of 1.5-25 GtCO2e;
• Reductions from the industrial sector of 2.2-3.9 GtCO2e are possible, including use of best available technologies or practices, the use of fossil fuels as feedstocks in chemicals processing, etc.;
• Reductions in the transportation sector could reach 1.4-2.0 GtCO2e by 2020;
• Forestry practices could reduce emissions from 1.3-4.2 GtCO2e annually by 2020;
• Opportunities exist to reduce non-carbon dioxide emissions, including methane production from landfill and wastewater, the source of 50% of anthropogenic methane emissions;
• Potential reductions at the international level in the aviation and shipping sectors are in the order of 1.7-2.5 GtCO2e in 2020.

Noticeably absent in UNEP’s assessment of potential measures that can be taken to further reduce emissions are any discussion of the the costs of these interventions or their political viability. This could be a good starting point for class discussion. Also, one could try to tease out the assumptions that UNEP used to assess the impacts of lenient v. stringent implementation of emissions pledges.

From where I sit, Climate Action Tracker, a project of several organizations including Ecofys, PIK and Climate Analytics,  is a “must see” site for climate change instructors, providing a regular updated snapshot of the climatic implications of commitments made by the parties to the UNFCCC and Kyoto Protocol and potential successor instruments. The Tracker’s latest report assesses the implications of State GHG reduction pledge after the Durban (17th COP). Among the conclusions of the report:

1. While the agreements reached at Durban include a work plan to enhance mitigation ambitions to close the “ambition gap” between current pledges by the Parties and what’s necessary to avoid passing the 2C threshold, there’s no assurances these ambitions will be raised; indeed, developed countries have not increased the ambition of their pledges despite such a call in the Cancun Agreement of 16COP;
2. Current international reduction targets and national pledges put global emissions on track for a total of 66 GtCO2e/yr. in 2020, assuming confirmed unconditional pledges and lenient accounting rules. There is a substantial gap from the 44GtGtCO2e/yr. that would put us on track to keep temperature increases to below 2C vis-a-vis pre-industrial levels;
• Should governments implement the most stringent reductions proposed to date, coupled with the most stringent accounting measures for developed States, the gap would drop, but only to 9 GtCO2e/yr.
3. If we are to achieve emissions at a level consistent with the below 2C pathway, assuming we can achieve an emissions rate of  44GtGtCO2e/yr.  by 2020, emissions will have to decline by 2% annually to 2050. However, if 2020 emissions are in line with current pledges, then the reduction rate will have to be 3.8% per year, with huge implications in terms of societal costs and technological feasibility;
4. Current pledges put us on track for warming of 3.5C, with a range of 2.9-4.4C, and an atmospheric concentration of 690 ppmv.

The report also provides a good analysis of the implications of temperature increases of 2C, 3C and 4C. Moreover, it outlines several options to close the “ambition gap,” including improved accounting procedures, moving to the top of their conditional pledges and reducing fossil fuel subsidies. This section could provide a good jumping off point to discuss  issues e.g. the political viability of such proposals and the assumptions that underlie them.

The Durban agreements provide a mandate with which all greenhouse-gas emitting countries will commit to a common UN legal regime as early as possible but no later than 2015. Country parties also agreed that the new deal will take effect no later than 2020. For the first time, major emerging economies have agreed to negotiate a legal arrangement to reduce their national greenhouse gas emissions.
EU’s Climate Commissioner Connie Hedegaard notes that “outcome with legal force” is unclear consensus language but at least uses the term legal, an improvement over the Bali Roadmap.
The new Green Climate Fund (GCF) has been established and can facilitate the dispersal of funds to poor countries. One of the areas still in need of work involves making substantial sums of money available now that the Green Climate Fund has been operationalized. The recommendation to raise funding via international shipping fees on carbon emissions was not retained in the final text. Yet, work done at COP 17 in Durban may result in a global deal on maritime emissions at the IMO Assembly in 2013.
The new Climate Technology Centre and Network is well positioned to greatly enhance the diffusion of pro-poor, ecosystem based, environmentally sound technologies. The Climate Technology Centre and Network can help coordinate Green Climate Fund financing to share R&D as well as existing mitigation and adaptation technologies. The annual Durban Forum is tasked with tracking capacity-building progress. The new Adaptation Committee is tasked with coordinating distribution of Green Climate Fund financing to low-income country adaptation measures, many of which will depend upon environmentally sound technology. Now that the Technology Mechanism is being established, low-income parties can develop and submit project proposals. These developments increase the ability of countries to cooperate to reach Cancun commitments agreed to last year, building upon innovative funding through the Green Climate Fund and adaptation coordination through the Adaptation Committee. Energy and ingenuity are core to bringing the Durban agreements to life. While we still struggle to agree on what constitutes a timely and robust response to climate destabilization, innovation is fueling common ground upon which to build multilateral trust.
Discussing the TRIPS / UNFCCC nexus on technology transfer can help close the 6-11 gigaton(ne) greenhouse gas gap. Retaining trust needs to go beyond postponing controversy. Addressing Intellectual property rights is within political reach and should be addressed in an open and inclusive manner. It appears that the Global Environment Facility (GEF) will support the operationalization and activities of the technology mechanism. It remains important to provide a framework for innovation hubs that ensure “environmentally sound” technology transfer. Life cycle analysis, capacity building, and cultural sensitivity can become central discussions. Knowledge portals can share best practices may through on-line uploading/downloading of innovations. This can help spread environmentally sound distributed power, battery innovation, rainwater harvesting, drip irrigation, culturally sound solar cookers and a wide array of other environmentally sound technologies. In addition to online clearinghouse capacity building, a network of innovation centers to facilitate diffusion of climate friendly innovations can now become a reality through the new Technology Mechanism.
Taking Stock – we are still on track for an unacceptable 3 to 4 °C rise in average world temperatures. Much remains to be done to get on track to limit average global temperatures to the political target of 2 or the scientific target of 1.5°C.
To address the urgency chasm, actions need to occur at every level and at a much greater pace. Among these actions, countries can strengthen pledges, implement strict emission accounting procedures that address carry-over and double counting.

It is important to realize that the journey is still a long one but to celebrate the significant international legal accomplishment set forth in Durban. The alliance among the EU, small island states, and least developed countries began to melt China, India, US frozen stances. Key emitting countries are now working together to flesh out a single legal arrangement to bring down greenhouse gasses. Innovation development, demonstration, and diffusion can help further enhance trust and close the emissions gap. While a political breakthrough, the success of the Durban agreement rests upon the ability of the international community to ramp up funding in order to accomplish both form and content – pledges and action.
Poor countries within the G77 reached out beyond larger emerging economies, encouraging major emerging economies to take on mitigation commitments. Collectively developing countries insisted Kyoto not end at an African gathering. The Kyoto Protocol has been extended, without Canada, Japan and Russia but including the newly listed greenhouse gas called nitrogen trifluoride that is used in semiconductor manufacturing. The EU conditioned extending the Kyoto Protocol upon launching new negotiations toward a comprehensive legal arrangement. Japan, Australia, Canada, Russia and the US insisted that a new agreement include major developing countries commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The Durban Platform encompasses this diplomatic agreement. It is officially known as the “Ad Hoc Working Group on the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action” and has begun to be referred to as AG-DP.
Another highly debated issue was included, namely to allow carbon capture and storage projects in the Clean Development Mechanism program under the Kyoto Protocol. A portion of these credits would be set-aside in a reserve given the uncertainty regarding carbon capture.
The details of project reporting as well as national appropriate mitigation action reporting continue to be worked out. Forestry discussions are also still underway. Countries agreed to increased transparency and accountability via detailed guidelines for biennial emissions reporting, subject to expert review and formal consultation among countries. Developed countries and funding institutions are to submit assistance strategies. Countries are also continuing efforts to enhance shared understanding of the water / climate nexus. Doing so can help achieve effective, reasonable, and equitable (1) mitigation, (2) adaptation, (3) environmentally sound technology diffusion, and (4) funding.
Climate adaptation and mitigation measures are to be coordinated with nationally defined development to achieve genuine sustainable development. The international community is now tasked with meaningful follow through on commitments agreed to in the Durban agreements.

Technorati Tags: Climate Change, Durban Platform, Green Climate Fund, Technology Mechanism, UNFCCC

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