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May 2, 2016
On April 28, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reported that Greenland's annual ice melt in the summer months had begun on April 11, one of the earliest times on record that at least 10 percent of the ice sheet melt has begun. The melt began due to an unusual circulation of warm air blowing north toward the Arctic. While these warm air currents do happen naturally, climate change is influencing and changing when they occur. Image courtesy of climate.gov.
On April 26, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sent the proposed Clean Energy Incentive Program (CEIP), a part of the final Clean Power Plan, to the Office of Management and Budget for review. EPA said that although the Clean Power Plan is on hold, some states and tribes have indicated they would like to continue preparing for the regulation, and asked for support from EPA. The CEIP incentivizes investment in wind, solar, energy efficiency, and energy efficiency projects in low-income communities, by giving states extra credits to apply to their overall emissions reduction targets. OMB will likely review the proposal over the next 60 days, after which, if approved, the CEIP will be available for public comment.
For more information see:
The Hill, Environment & Energy, Morning Consult
On April 28, 14 states sent a letter to Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Gina McCarthy, asking for more information and assistance on the agency's Clean Power Plan, a regulation on carbon emissions from existing power plants currently halted due to a Supreme Court-issued stay. The states ask EPA to finalize its model rule or rules; give more information about the Clean Energy Incentive Program (CEIP); outline tracking systems for tradeable credits or allowances; clarify evaluation, measurement, and verification systems for energy efficiency; and provide technical assistance on the information. The states include Colorado, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New York, Oregon, Vermont, Rhode Island, Washington, and Virginia.
Bloomberg BNA, Letter
On April 25, Jonathan Pershing, who recently replaced Todd Stern as the U.S. Special Envoy for Climate Change at the US State Department, said he wants to mobilize the "high-ambition" coalition of almost 100 countries, created in the lead-up to the Paris climate talks, to continue work to tackle emissions. Pershing hopes to use the high-ambition coalition to help put an amendment on the Montreal Protocol to limit emissions of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), a group of chemicals commonly used as refrigerants which warm the atmosphere thousands of times more than carbon dioxide. Pershing also aims to use the coalition to tackle shipping and airline emissions, which were not covered by the Paris Agreement. The coalition's members include the European Union, Brazil, Pacific Island States, and progressive Latin American countries.
In related news on April 22, Jonathan Pershing announced that the United States would commit $15 million to help developing countries become more transparent, to help them meet their Paris Agreement commitments on transparency.
E&E Publishing
On April 25, Jonathan Pershing, the State Department's new U.S. Special Envoy for Climate Change, said that Palestine's membership in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will not prevent the United States from supplying funding to the UNFCCC and associated projects. Pershing was responding to a letter sent by 28 Senate Republicans to Secretary of State John Kerry on April 18, saying that U.S. donations to the UNFCCC violated a 1994 law that forbids the United States from funding any UN agency that has an unrecognized country in its membership – like Palestine. Pershing stated, "We do not foresee that there is going to be a constraint."
Politico
On April 28, John Swe Ba, a managing director in the Myanmar Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation, announced that Myanmar was completely stopping logging operations in the country. Swe Ba said that the government would take measures (which will be announced later) to transition the jobs of over 17,000 government employees who work on logging. Logging in Myanmar is monopolized by the government logging company, which subcontracted out to other companies. Northeast Myanmar has had a problem with illegal logging, and it is unclear whether the government will be cracking down on this. Deforestation is a major contributor to climate change, releasing up to a fifth of greenhouse gases globally.
Reuters, WWF
On April 29, a world-wide group of over 270 investors with collective assets valued at over $23 trillion published a guide calling on electric utilities to bring their strategies in line with global ambitions to cut emissions enough to limit global average temperature increase to two degrees C (3.6 degrees F). Lead author of the guide Matthias Narr, a specialist at Robeco, commented, "This guidance is designed to shape constructive engagement between investors and electric utilities through dialogue on the long-term risks and opportunities these companies face from climate change." The guide is the third in a series focusing on how different sectors should address climate change risks and management, following guides on oil and gas, and mining. The Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change (IIGCC) led the guide's production, with help from several other groups of investors.
Reuters, Press Release
On April 25, the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication published new polling revealing that a majority of registered voters across political ideologies think climate change is happening, and an increasing number view climate change as a threat. Although the main findings of the report are consistent with previous surveys showing Democrats are more likely than Republicans to think human-caused climate change is happening, the report shows a distinct difference between conservative Republicans and liberal/moderate Republicans. Conservative Republicans have seen the largest growth, rising 19 percentage points in two years so now 47 percent think climate change is happening, while 71 percent of liberal/moderate Republicans are convinced by climate science.
Bloomberg, Yale Program on Climate Change Communication
On April 27, Republican donor Jay Faison announced he was endorsing Senators Rob Portman (R-OH) and Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) for re-election, and putting "seven figures" into a digital campaign to call attention to their clean energy policies and support them in their election races. "For right or wrong, the Republican party is branded as non-environmental," Jay Faison commented. "We want to help fix [that]." Back in February, Faison announced a new Super PAC with $5 million in funding to spend defending Republicans in Congress with good clean energy and environmental track records. Faison also runs the ClearPath Foundation, launched in June 2015, which is spending $165 million to push Republicans to support climate change and clean energy.
Reuters
On April 28, the United Nations Development Programme, International Labour Organization, Climate Vulnerable Forum and other UN agencies released a joint report finding that unless countries reduce emissions beyond the targets set in the Paris Agreement, rising temperatures will cut up to 10 percent of the daytime working hours in developing countries. The Paris Agreement sets a goal of keeping global average temperature rise to two degrees Celsius, but nations have submitted emissions reductions commitments only sufficient to keep temperatures to an increase of 2.7 degrees C – if they do everything they say they will. Rising temperatures will impact working hours the most in India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Cambodia, Nigeria, Burkina Faso and part of West Africa.
On April 26, a study published in journal Geophysical Research Letters found that in 2014 the Bakken Shale, an area rich in oil and gas which spans North Dakota and some of Montana, was responsible for 1-3 percent of global emissions of ethane, a compound that can form ozone and contribute to climate change. By itself, ethane is a weak greenhouse gas; however, when released in the atmosphere ethane prolongs the life of methane, a greenhouse gas 84 times more powerful than carbon dioxide over 20 years, leading to significant climate impacts. Ethane emissions declined globally from 1987 to 2009, but began to increase again in 2009 or 2010. The study suggests that ethane emissions' increase globally is attributable to increased oil and gas operations in the United States.
Washington Post
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