September, 25 2008, 08:00am EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Jenny Powers, 212/727-4566 and Kate Slusark, 212/727-4592
Landmark U.S. Global Warming Plan for Power Plants Launches
First-of-its-Kind Effort to Reduce Pollution Offers Northeast Head-Start Toward Clean Energy Economy
NEW YORK
In a landmark move to build a clean energy economy and cut global warming pollution, Northeastern states today kicked off the world's first emissions trading market that will promote efficiency and cut pollution from power plants. The new approach will reduce carbon dioxide pollution to a level 10 percent below current emissions by 2019, while rewarding smart companies that outperform new pollution limits and lowering energy costs for consumers.
"Today is a bold step forward for our clean energy future and the fight against global warming. The new system is good for consumers, good for the economy and good for our climate," said Dale Bryk, senior attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). "This new energy plan is straight-forward, highly cost-effective and creates a clean energy pathway for the rest of the country to follow. It is the shape of things to come."
Known as the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), this system creates a pollution trading market that sets new limits on the amount of global warming pollution power plants can emit. Plants will need to hold permits for every ton of pollution; those that find low cost ways to reduce emissions will need to purchase fewer permits, or allowances, and can sell any unused allowances to less-efficient plants that need them.
This is the first mandatory cap and trade energy system for global warming pollution ever implemented in the U.S., and the first time in the world this kind of system has put allowances up for sale, rather than distributing them for free. The structure gives power plant owners a financial incentive to reduce pollution and will encourage the development of cleaner sources of energy. Almost all of the revenue generated by the auction of allowances will be directed to state energy efficiency programs, thereby further developing a cleaner power sector and lowering energy bills for residential, commercial and industrial energy consumers.
The first quarterly auction of pollution allowances takes place today, and power plants in all participating states will be fully operating under the new system by 2009. Participation in RGGI offers companies in the Northeast a competitive edge as the federal government pollution limits take shape. Although the Bush administration has steadfastly rejected concrete cuts in emissions, there is pressure in both parties to adopt national legislation to curb global warming pollution.
"RGGI provides a competitive advantage to Northeastern companies," said Luis Martinez, attorney with NRDC's energy program. "These companies are leapfrogging competition both at home and abroad by getting more productivity out of less energy. It's smart business, and they will reap the rewards as will consumers in the region."
RGGI is expected to lower utility bills by helping consumers and businesses use energy more efficiently. In fact, an analysis commissioned by the RGGI states concluded that the state climate accord would save typical residential customers over $100 per year on their energy bills.
"Consumers will not have to make a choice between environmental preservation and their pocketbooks," said Dale Bryk. "This system is designed to protect both."
RGGI sets an example for the federal government to establish an energy efficiency plan for the entire country, and similar multi-state climate pacts are in development among western states and Midwestern states. California is on the cusp of creating an economy-wide pollution reduction plan.
Six of the 10 states participating in the new system held their first allowances auction today - Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Vermont. The remaining participating states will hold their first auction in December - Delaware New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York. Today's auction will be the first of 14 auctions that will take place before the end of the first three-year compliance period. Auctions will continue on a quarterly basis thereafter.
Leading companies operating in the region that have backed the new system include Bank of America, Staples, National Grid, Pfizer, PSEG and the association of large energy users called The Energy Consortium.
The new approach is similar to the highly successful program introduced by President George H.W. Bush in the early 1990s to address the acid rain problem. That program has achieved better results at a much lower cost than even optimists estimated at the time of its launch.
The Northeast program would also allow states outside of the region to participate, and might eventually be extended to cover not just power plants but all stationary global warming pollution sources, as well as additional global warming pollution, such as methane and sulfur dioxide.
NRDC works to safeguard the earth--its people, its plants and animals, and the natural systems on which all life depends. We combine the power of more than three million members and online activists with the expertise of some 700 scientists, lawyers, and policy advocates across the globe to ensure the rights of all people to the air, the water, and the wild.
(212) 727-2700LATEST NEWS
Investigation Reveals Global Collagen Demand Driving Deforestation, Right Abuses in Brazil
"Did you sprinkle a little collagen in your smoothie this morning? Might be worth looking into where it came from," said one reporter.
Mar 06, 2023
Global demand for collagen—touted as an anti-aging "wonder product"—is driving deforestation and abuses against Indigenous people in Brazil, an investigation published Monday revealed.
The investigation—which involved numerous media outlets and organizations including the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ), the Pulitzer Center's Rainforest Investigations Network, the Center for Climate Crime Analysis, ITV, O Joio e O Trigo, and The Guardian—is the first to link bovine collagen with tropical forest loss and violence against Indigenous people, according to its collaborators.
"While collagen's most evangelical users claim the protein can improve hair, skin, nails, and joints, slowing the aging process, it has a dubious effect on the health of the planet," Elisângela Mendonça, Andrew Wasley, and Fábio Zuker wrote in the report.
"Collagen can be extracted from fish, pig and cattle skin, but behind the wildly popular 'bovine' variety in particular lies an opaque industry driving the destruction of tropical forests and fueling violence and human rights abuses in the Brazilian Amazon," the trio added.
\u201cEXCLUSIVE \ud83c\udf0eWe spent months digging into the supply chains for Brazilian bovine collagen \n\nSpoiler alert: they are highly complicated, with numerous middlemen involved, but unlike beef, soy& palm oil, collagen companies have no obligation to track their environmental impacts yet.\u201d— Elis\u00e2ngela Mendon\u00e7a (@Elis\u00e2ngela Mendon\u00e7a) 1678107982
The report's authors linked at least 1,000 square miles of deforestation to the supply chains of two major Brazilian players in the $4 billion annual collagen industry. Some of the collagen is tied to Vital Proteins, a Nestlé-owned U.S. brand whose chief creative officer is the actress Jennifer Aniston.
Collagen is called a "byproduct" of the cattle industry, which is responsible for 80% of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. But experts interviewed for the report said that the "byproduct" narrative is largely a myth.
"I wouldn't call any of them byproducts," Rick Jacobsen, commodity policy manager at the U.K.-based Environmental Investigation Agency, told the report's authors. "The margins for the meat industry are quite narrow, so all of the saleable parts of the animal are built into the business model."
\u201cDid you sprinkle a little collagen in your smoothie this morning? Might be worth looking into where it came from. Fantastic/horrifying investigation from @lilimendonca + colleagues #Brazil https://t.co/R9zbcysBnQ\u201d— Stephanie Nolen (@Stephanie Nolen) 1678115903
The publication also cast doubt on claims made by collagen promoters.
The Guardian reports:
While there are studies suggesting taking collagen orally can improve joint and skin health, Harvard School of Public Health cautions potential conflicts of interest exist as most if not all of the research is either funded by the industry or carried out by scientists affiliated with it.
Collagen companies have no obligation to track its environmental impacts. Unlike beef, soya, palm oil, and other food commodities, collagen is also not covered by forthcoming due diligence legislation in the [European Union and United Kingdom] designed to tackle deforestation.
"It's important to ensure that this type of regulation covers all key products that could be linked to deforestation," Jacobsen stressed.
Nestlé responded to the report by stating it has contacted its collagen supplier to look into the investigation's claims, while assuring it is working to "ensure its products are deforestation-free by 2025."
Vital Proteins told its buyers after TBIJ contacted them for comment that it would "end sourcing from the Amazon region effective immediately."
In addition to harming the environment, the collagen industry is fueling human rights crimes, Indigenous leaders and other critics say.
\u201c\ud83d\udea8REVEALED: #Nestl\u00e9 brand sells collagen linked to deforestation and invasion of Indigenous lands in Brazil. \n\n@pulitzercenter RIN Fellow @lilimendonca, @ZukerFabio & @Andrew_Wasley report for @TBIJ. Read here \ud83d\udc49 https://t.co/z0kxMJFnO8 \n\n\u2795 \ud83e\uddf5 1/5\u201d— Rainforest Investigations Network (RIN) (@Rainforest Investigations Network (RIN)) 1678111914
As Mendonça, Wasley, and Zuker noted:
With sales of beef, leather, and collagen booming, more and more forest has been felled and replaced by pastures in recent years, with land often seized illegally. Virtual impunity for land-grabbing during the [former President Jair] Bolsonaro government also fueled attacks on traditional communities. In 2021, the third year of his presidency, there were 305 invasions of Indigenous lands. This is three times more than the 2018 figures reported by the Catholic Church's Indigenous Missionary Council.
"No cattle ranching expansion in the Amazon can take place without violence," Bruno Malheiro, a geographer and professor at the Federal University of Southern and Southeastern Pará, told the authors.
In January—his first month in office—leftist Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who has vowed to protect Indigenous peoples and rainforests from deforestation, oversaw a 61% drop in forest destruction over 2022 levels.
Kátia Silene Akrãtikatêjê, leader of the Akrãtikatêjê Gavião Indigenous people, said her constituents feel "surrounded" and "suffocated" in a "process of territorial confinement" amid creeping deforestation. Last September, a Gavião village was burned to the ground, and residents believe it was no accident.
Land capitalists "destroy what is theirs, and invade what is ours," the Akrãtikatêjê Gavião chief said. "I can't understand why they destroy everything."
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Defusing 'Methane Bombs' Key to Averting Climate Catastrophe: Experts
"The current rise in methane looks very scary indeed," said one researcher. "So removing the super-emitters is a no-brainer to slow the rise—you get a lot of bang for your buck."
Mar 06, 2023
More than 1,000 "super-emitter" incidents—human-caused methane leaks of at least one tonne per hour—were detected worldwide last year, mostly at oil and gas facilities, and policymakers must prioritize cutting this planet-heating pollution to avoid "triggering catastrophic climate tipping points."
That's according to Monday reporting from The Guardian, which also warned of the risks posed by 55 global "methane bombs," which are defined as "fossil fuel extraction sites where gas leaks alone from future production would release levels of methane equivalent to 30 years of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions."
Emissions and atmospheric concentrations of methane—a potent gas that traps roughly 80 times more heat than carbon dioxide (CO2) over a 20-year period—have soared at an alarming rate in recent years and are responsible for an estimated 30% of global warming today. This surge jeopardizes the goal of limiting temperature rise to 1.5°C above preindustrial levels—beyond which impacts of the climate emergency will grow increasingly dire, especially for the world's poor who have done the least to cause the deadly crisis.
But at the same time, swiftly slashing methane pollution represents one of humanity's best opportunities for lifesaving climate action. Reducing methane emissions by 45% by 2030 would prevent 0.3°C of heating by the 2040s, according to the United Nations Environment Program, which says achieving this is entirely possible with enough political will.
"The current rise in methane looks very scary indeed," earth scientist Euan Nisbet of Royal Holloway, University of London, told The Guardian. "Methane acceleration is perhaps the largest factor challenging our Paris agreement goals. So removing the super-emitters is a no-brainer to slow the rise—you get a lot of bang for your buck."
According to The Guardian:
The methane super-emitter sites were detected by analysis of satellite data [conducted by the company Kayrros], with the U.S., Russia, and Turkmenistan responsible for the largest number from fossil fuel facilities. The biggest event was a leak of 427 tonnes an hour in August, near Turkmenistan's Caspian coast and a major pipeline. That single leak was equivalent to the rate of emissions from 67 million cars, or the hourly national emissions of France.
Future methane emissions from fossil fuel sites—the methane bombs—are also forecast to be huge, threatening the entire global "carbon budget" limit required to keep heating below 1.5°C. More than half of these fields are already in production, including the three biggest methane bombs, which are all in North America.
The fossil fuel industry is responsible for about 40% of annual anthropogenic methane emissions, compared with roughly 40% from industrial agriculture and another 20% from rotting waste in landfills.
But "tackling leaks from fossil fuel sites is the fastest and cheapest way to slash methane emissions," The Guardian reported. "Some leaks are deliberate, venting the unwanted gas released from underground while drilling for oil into the air, and some are accidental, from badly maintained or poorly regulated equipment."
Lena Höglund-Isaksson from the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in Austria told the newspaper that even a temporary breach of the 1.5°C threshold—something scientists warn has a 50% chance of happening by 2026, especially with a looming El Niño pattern—could "trigger irreversible effects" from multiple tipping points.
"Methane is the worst thing in the struggle to hold back the [climate] domino pieces because it's pushing them over very quickly," added Kjell Kühne of Leeds University and the Leave it in the Ground Initiative. "Having so many methane bombs out there is really worrisome."
Last May, Kühne and other researchers sounded the alarm about nearly 200 "carbon bombs," or massive oil and gas projects that threaten to unleash 646 billion tonnes of CO2 emissions and doom efforts to preserve a livable planet.
A new analysis from the same team of researchers has identified 55 "methane bombs." These are oil and gas fields "where leakage alone from the full exploitation of the resources would result in emissions equivalent to at least a billion tonnes of CO2," The Guardian explained. "Gas fields also produce methane, which is sold to customers and burned, pumping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. When these emissions are combined with the leaked methane, the list of bombs that would result in global heating equivalent to 1 billion tonnes of CO2 swells to 112."
"In the scientists' central estimate, the total emissions from these 112 methane bombs would be equivalent to 463 billion tonnes of CO2—more than a decade of current global emissions from all fossil fuels," the newspaper noted. "The methane bomb emissions are also significantly higher than the emissions limit of 380 billion tonnes of CO2 from all sources needed to keep global heating below 1.5°C, according to the Global Carbon Budget's recent estimate."
Kühne said that he is "amazed how long this list is, and how many of these giant projects are still being pushed forward."
"The impacts of methane are front-loaded—they happen very soon after its emission. Last year's gas leaks are killing people this year," he warned. "At the same time, methane is a huge opportunity to reduce global heating. That is the unrealized potential in defusing methane bombs, to stop runaway climate change. I think it might be the last opportunity because we're already seeing some of these tipping elements tip over. We're in a climate emergency and [stopping fossil fuel methane leaks] is top of the list."
The Global Methane Pledge, an initiative launched at COP26 and now endorsed by 150 countries, aims to slash global methane emissions by at least 30% below 2020 levels by 2030.
As part of the United States' commitment to that pledge, the Biden administration in November unveiled an updated action plan for reducing national methane emissions. While welcoming the move, climate justice campaigners stressed that much more must be done.
"The EPA has taken an important step forward by issuing a robust standard for methane emissions from oil and gas operations, including a 'super-emitter program' aimed at the most egregious polluters," Rachel Cleetus, policy director and lead economist for the Climate and Energy Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said at the time. "Ultimately, to meet global climate goals, we need to go well beyond this effort and actually sharply taper down fossil fuels."
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Judy Heumann, 'Mother of Disability Rights Movement,' Dies at 75
"Disability only becomes a tragedy when society fails to provide the things we need to lead our lives—job opportunities or barrier-free buildings, for example," Heumann told one reporter.
Mar 06, 2023
Disability rights advocates were joined by labor leaders, progressive politicians, and other advocates for justice on Monday in mourning the death of influential activist Judy Heumann, who began decades of advocacy work fighting for employment as a teacher and was credited with paving the way for numerous federal laws to protect people with disabilities. She was 75 and died on March 4.
Known as the "mother of the disability rights movement," Heumann's first experience with advocacy work came in 1970 after she was denied employment at a New York City public school, with the school citing her "paralysis of both lower extremities" as the reason and saying she would not be able to evacuate students and herself in case of a fire.
The denial harkened back to her treatment as a young child, when a school principal stopped Heumann's mother from enrolling her in kindergarten and said her wheelchair—which she used as a result of contracting polio at 18 months—rendered her a "fire hazard."
Heumann sued the New York City school district and won her case, becoming the city's first teacher who used a wheelchair and drawing national attention to the issue of discrimination against people with disabilities. One newspaper ran an article about the case titled, "You Can Be President, Not Teacher, with Polio," in which Heumann told the outlet, "We're not going to let a hypocritical society give us a token education and then bury us."
"Disability only becomes a tragedy when society fails to provide the things we need to lead our lives—job opportunities or barrier-free buildings, for example," she told journalist Joseph Shapiro years later. "It is not a tragedy to me that I'm living in a wheelchair."
Seven years later Heumann led more than 100 people in San Francisco in joining nationwide protests to demand that President Jimmy Carter's health, education, and welfare secretary, James Califano, implement a crucial statute within the 1973 Rehabilitation Act.
The law had been signed by President Richard Nixon and included Section 504, which prohibited institutions that receive federal funding from discriminating against disabled people. Califano delayed implementing the provision and failed to meet a deadline—April 4, 1977—set by disability rights advocates. The next day Heumann led a sit-in at a government office which turned into a weekslong occupation, culminating in Califano signing Section 504 on April 28. According toThe New York Times, Heumann's action was the "longest nonviolent occupation of a federal building in American history."
"We will no longer allow the government to oppress disabled individuals," Heumann told a representative for Califano at one meeting. "We want the law enforced. We want no more segregation."
\u201cutterly heartbroken to hear about the passing of disability rights activist judy heumann. what an incomparable loss of a woman who deserves to be celebrated and mourned in equal measure by us all \ud83d\udc94\u201d— lucy (@lucy) 1677994873
Section 504 paved the way for the Americans With Disabilities Act, which extended protections to the private sector.
"Judy's impact is vast," said the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund. "Each action she took built on the one before it. In her early life, she learned perseverance and patience from witnessing her mother's ongoing advocacy to have her go to school with her non-disabled peers... Those years of segregation sparked her thinking about disability and identity."
Becky Pringle, president of the National Education Association, noted that Heumann's work was instrumental in securing the passage of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, then known as the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, in 1975.
\u201cStudents & families everywhere have lost a true friend & tireless advocate. Judy Heumann won NEA\u2019s Friend of Education award for her pioneering work in disability justice, making landmark legislation like IDEA & the ADA reality. Her legacy lives on in all who strive for equity.\u201d— Becky Pringle (@Becky Pringle) 1678118399
Organizer Ady Barkan, who has amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), wrote on social media that Heumann's decades of advocacy made it possible for people with disabilities to take part in numerous aspects of public life.
"We owe so much to Judy Heumann," he said.
\u201cThis weekend, Rachael, Carl, Willow, and I went to the UCSB basketball game. We sat right on the court, near the Gauchos' bench, in accessible seats. The staff went out of their way to be helpful. \n\nWe owe so much to Judy Heumann.\u201d— Ady Barkan (@Ady Barkan) 1678094483
Heumann served for eight years in the Clinton administration as assistant secretary of the office of special education and rehabilitation services and for seven years in the Obama administration as the State Department's first special adviser for international disability rights.
"I join the disability community in mourning the passing of Judy Heumann," said Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont. "From leading the 504 sit-ins to fighting for the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act, Judy dedicated her life to advancing the rights of people with disabilities. We must continue her work."
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