Renewable energy: Southern activists build case for nationwide standard

RENEWABLE ENERGY: Southern activists build case for nationwide standard
(02/27/2009)

Katherine Ling and Ben Geman, E&E reporters

Southern state environmentalists are ramping up efforts to show that a nationwide renewable power standard -- a pillar of the Democratic energy agenda -- would not burden Southeastern states.

Senate prospects for a renewable electricity standard, or RES, remain uncertain as Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chairman Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) readies energy legislation that Democrats want to bring to the floor this spring.

Some lawmakers and utilities from the Southeast allege their states lack enough wind and solar power to meet an RES, which requires power companies to supply escalating amounts of power from renewables. Such utilities would have to purchase credits or make other payments because they cannot meet the targets, which could raise costs.

But activists hope to convince Southeastern lawmakers and utilities -- or at least their constituents -- that a standard would jump-start a biomass industry, create jobs and not cause electricity prices to jump.

The Union of Concerned Scientists and the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy released new studies ahead of a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee hearing on renewables yesterday that seek to dispel these arguments.

A UCS study said all consumers, including in the Southeast, could save up to $94 billion on their energy bills by 2030 if utilities obtained 25 percent of their electricity from renewable energy by 2025.

A Southern Alliance for Clean Energy study was updated Monday with a complete, current list of available resources for the Southeast. The study claims the region has enough renewable energy resources to provide 5 percent of its retail electric sales today and more than 15 percent of the forecasted electricity demand by 2015.

Meanwhile, Energy and Environment Subcommittee Chairman Ed Markey (D-Mass.) pointed to Energy Information Administration findings that the Southeast could potentially have enough renewable energy to sell credits to other states using its biomass resources through 2019.

"A federal renewable electricity standard will allow us to harness potential from every region of the country -- from wind across middle America, to biomass in the Southeast, to solar in the Southwest," Markey said. "Every part of the country can benefit and contribute."

But Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.) insisted a national standard ignores regional differences and would escalate electricity bills unless more low-carbon emission sources of energy were also included in such a mandate, such as nuclear, clean coal and waste to energy. "Keeping nuclear off the table is a mistake," Upton said.

Markey responded while nuclear is an important part of the solution to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, including it in an RES would gut the bill and result in an inadequate investment and development of renewable energy. Environmental groups also oppose including nuclear power.

In 20 years the United States would regret not aggressively developing its renewable energy sector when it has to import renewable energy components from Germany and China, Markey warned. "If we don't move they will move," he said. "This is a job creation engine. It will be a central part of the debate of climate change over the next several months."

Markey introduced legislation this month that sets a standard of 25 percent of electricity from renewable energy by 2025.

In the 110th Congress, the House passed an energy bill that set a standard of 15 percent by 2020 but allowed about a fourth of the mandate to be met with efficiency measures. But the provision stalled in the Senate and also faced a White House veto threat from then-President George W. Bush.

President Obama supports a nationwide standard and his platform included a 25 percent by 2025 target.

In the Senate

Bingaman has introduced a somewhat less aggressive measure that requires power providers to obtain 16 percent of their supply from renewables by 2019, and 20 percent in 2021 and for almost two decades thereafter. The plan allows 25 percent of the target to be met with utility demand reduction programs.

Advocates of an RES are hopeful the expanded Democratic majorities and supportive president can get a standard across the finish line. Last year's election saw some opponents of an RES replaced with supporters, including freshman Sens. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) and Mark Udall (D-Colo.), who have offered their own plan that goes further than Bingaman's.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), the energy committee's top Republican, predicts Bingaman's current plan does not have enough support. "If you are to define it as it has been tentatively rolled out by Senator Bingaman, I don't believe we have got that 60," she said.

Murkowski does not back an RES, arguing that a broader array of sources, including nuclear and hydropower, should be included, and warning that there is not yet adequate transmission to transport the increased renewable power the policy requires.

Hydropower is not included either. "I happen to believe we might be able to reach a reasonable accommodation, a reasonable compromise, but again we have to be looking at how we define what a renewable energy standard is," Murkowski said.

But one environmentalist said advocates hope to win support from moderate Republicans, including the two Maine GOP senators, who have backed the idea in the past. "There has always been a cadre of Republicans in the Senate that has always supported a renewable energy standard," said the activist.

Republican backing may be needed to offset the concerns among some Democrats. Arkansas Democratic Sens. Blanche Lincoln and Mark Pryor both expressed reservations yesterday.

"I think it is a wonderful national priority but I think it is going to have to have local solutions, and that means parity along all the different regions of the country and I hope that is what we will work toward," said Lincoln, stating the South could be left "high and dry" due to exclusion of nuclear and hydropower.

"The thing that I will be looking for is can we do it in such a way that does not punish a state like Arkansas that just cannot produce a lot of wind," Pryor said.

Bingaman has said he hoped to include the renewables mandate in the energy bill the committee is working on but has also noted an RES could move on the Senate floor if there is not a committee agreement.