Author Archives Laura Arnold

Vigo County (IN) Council Denies Tax Abatement for Cypress Creek Renewables solar farm

Posted by Laura Arnold  /   June 10, 2015  /   Posted in solar, Uncategorized  /   No Comments

 

No Tax Abatement for Solar Farm

Brett Edwards

An $8 million solar farm will be making its way to Vigo County, generating power for more than a thousand homes. Cypress Creek Renewables, a California-based company, will be building the farm on U.S. 150 near New Goshen.

Just last month, the Vigo County Council preliminarily approved a 10-year tax abatement for the solar farm. On Tuesday, the council held a public hearing on the issue before taking a final vote. Companies often seek a tax abatement from local entities and it reduces the amount of property taxes a company pays during the set time. Those entities look at a variety of ways that the company contributes to the local economy.

In the case of the new solar farm, it will employ only one person, who will work the grounds and maintain any and all activities. Attorney Mary Soliday represents the company, and said after feedback from the may meeting, they'll reduce their request to be a five year abatement. Soliday said the company feels the solar farm could attract other renewable projects to the county in the future. Well, the council voted to not allow a tax abatement at all. Councilman Bill Thomas feels this particular model does not support what an abatement is about.

"When you build a factory, we give you a 10-year abatement for example. You bring jobs, you bring, those people have to live somewhere. They're going to build houses. That expands our property tax base. They're spending money in our stores," Thomas explained. "That's just not the case in this instance."

Cypress Creek Renewables has already entered into a 20-year purchase agreement with Duke Energy. Construction will last around four months and should provide 60 to 80 jobs.

Indiana Governor Pence continues pledge to use every legal means to stop US EPA carbon rule

Posted by Laura Arnold  /   June 09, 2015  /   Posted in Uncategorized  /   No Comments

American Electric Power plant

GOVERNOR PENCE STATEMENT ON U.S. COURT OF APPEALS STATE OF WEST VIRGINIA ET AL V. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY RULING

Governor Pence Statement on U.S. Court of Appeals State of West Virginia et al v. Environmental Protection Agency Ruling

6/9/2015

Indianapolis - Today, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit dismissed State of West Virginia et al v. Environmental Protection Agency, Case No. 14-1112.  Indiana was one of fourteen petitioners in the case, which asked the Court to review the legality of the EPA’s proposed regulations limiting carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants.  The Court held that it does not have the authority to review proposed agency rules.  In response, Governor Mike Pence issued the following statement.

“The Court’s decision is discouraging, but it does not dampen our resolve to use every legal means at our disposal to stop burdensome regulations. Though the Court declined to let the litigation proceed because of procedural matters, the Court’s decision did not speak to the substance of our claim that the EPA lacks the authority to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants in the way proposed.  We will renew our claim and seek to invalidate the regulations once they are finalized later this summer.”

Contact Information

Kara Brooks
kbrooks@gov.in.gov
317-232-1622

Federal court halts Indiana challenge of power plant rules

Maureen Groppe Star Washington bureau, 12:45 p.m. EDT June 9, 2015

WASHINGTON – A federal appeals court Tuesday put the brakes on a challenge by Indiana and 14 other states to pending federal regulations to curb greenhouse gas emissions from power plants.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit said the rules can't be challenged until they're finalized by the Environmental Protection Agency.

"Petitioners are champing at the bit to challenge EPA's anticipated rule restricting carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants," wrote Judge Brett Kavanaugh. "They want us to do something that they candidly acknowledge we have never done before: review the legality of a proposed rule."

The EPA is expected to finalize the regulations this summer, after reviewing millions of comments it has received since the rule was proposed last June.

Under the initial proposal, Indiana would have to reduce by 20 percent the amount of carbon dioxide generated per unit of electricity by 2030.

Indiana's power plants produce more carbon dioxide than plants in all but three other states. [emphasis added]

Gov. Mike Pence has said the state will "use every legal means at our disposal" to stop the regulations, which he said will cause power rates to go up.

Tomas Carbonell, an attorney for the Environmental Defense Fund - which backed the EPA - said states were trying to do an end run around the public participation process.

"Today's decision is a big win for clean and healthy air, and an important victory for a fair and democratic rulemaking process," he said.

Mike Duncan, head of the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, said the industry group is disappointed in the decision, but is preparing for the next step.

"States and industry are already working to ensure that when the rule is final we are prepared to step in and stop the implementation of these devastating regulations," Duncan said.

The states, as well as two major coal companies, had argued to the appeals court it's already clear the EPA has overreached its authority.

The challengers said the EPA is ignoring a provision in the Clean Air Act that prohibits the agency from regulating a pollutant from a power plant if other types of pollutants from the plants are already being regulated.

The states argue that when the law was amended in 1990, Congress barred the EPA from regulating the same pollution source under the section of the law being used in the pending rule, if that source is already being regulated under a different part of the law. Therefore, because the EPA is already restricting mercury and other hazardous emissions from power plants, they argue, the agency can't now restrict greenhouse gas emissions from the same plants.

The EPA says the restriction in the law is against regulating the same pollutant twice, not regulating different pollutants from the same source.

Contact Maureen Groppe at mgroppe@gannett.com or @mgroppe on Twitter.

LBNL: New Report Released on State and Local PV Program Response to Financial Innovation

Posted by Laura Arnold  /   June 07, 2015  /   Posted in solar  /   No Comments

A Survey of State and Local PV Program Response to Financial Innovation and Disparate Federal Tax Treatment in the Residential PV Sector
The residential PV market in the United States is currently characterized by declining installed costs, dwindling state and local PV incentives, booming demand, a high share of third-party-owned (TPO) systems in the largest markets, a growing appreciation of the benefits that host-ownership can provide, and a recent proliferation of solar loan products designed to encourage host-ownership and capture those benefits. Within this context, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) is pleased to announce the release of a new report  that explores how some state and local PV incentive programs have responded to this dynamic market environment by adapting their incentive offerings to help optimize their expenditures andmaintain their relevance. 

Though by no means uniform, these responses have generally fallen into two camps: (1) differentiating incentive levels between TPO and host-owned systems in recognition of the greater federal tax benefits provided to TPO systems, and/or (2) encouraging the spread of consumer-friendly solar loan offerings as a way to expand the number of available financing options and, in turn, consumer demand for solar. Both courses of action potentially help to preserve increasingly scarce public funding for PV by using incentives more as a tool to fine-tune the market rather than to stimulate it outright, and/or by shifting away from cash disbursements in favor of financial support that can better sustain program fund balances and potentially even provide a return on capital. At the same time, these types of responses are not yet widespread, perhaps in part because they raise questions about the role of state and local PV programs within the solar market, as well as possible impacts on solar deployment--both of which deserve consideration.

 

This report begins by describing the evolution of residential PV finance in the United States since 2007, focusing initially on the first wave of innovation that brought the rise of TPO, followed by the second and current wave of innovation involving solar loans, and paying particular attention to market drivers in each case. It then surveys the varied responses of state and local PV programs to this financial innovation, with most responses falling into one or both of the two broad camps noted above: differentiating incentive levels by ownership type, and/or providing support for solar loans. Finally, it discusses the various tradeoffs, considerations, and implementation challenges that confront program managers when fine-tuning their incentive offerings in these ways.

 

The report, as a well as a summary slide deck, can be downloaded here. LBNL appreciates the funding support of the U.S. Department of Energy's SunShot Initiative.

 

 

John Farrell of ILSR: The Hole in Brian Potts’ WSJ Critique of the “Solar-Panel Craze.”

Posted by Laura Arnold  /   June 03, 2015  /   Posted in solar, Uncategorized  /   No Comments

 The Hole in Brian Potts’ WSJ Critique of the “Solar-Panel Craze.”

| Written by John Farrell |No Comments | Updated on May 26, 2015The content that follows was originally published on the Institute for Local Self-Reliance website at http://www.ilsr.org/the-hole-in-brian-potts-wsj-critique-of-the-solar-panel-craze/

solar panels and mountains - flickr Bart Speelman

In his Sunday Wall Street Journal commentary on May 17, Brian Potts suggests that cost is the bottom line in the electric customer shift to solar, and that rooftop solar costs too much. But his defense of the utility’s view of energy costs leaves a big hole in the big picture: the value of solar energy and the cost of maintaining an antiquated system of monopoly control.

First, his cost estimates don’t add up. He claims utility-scale solar costs 13 cents per kilowatt-hour, but Vote Solar reported that the Palo Alto, CA, municipal utility signed solar contracts for 6.9 cents nearly two years ago. Prices fell 13% in 2014 alone, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association.

The attack on rooftop solar also falls short. The break-even price for a rooftop system in Palo Alto is 10.8 cents over 25 years (calculated with NREL’s System Advisor Model), 50% higher—not 3.5 times higher— than the utility scale solar array. Mr Potts may be right that net metering isn’t the perfect policy for compensating solar producing customers, but that’s because it’s a compromise accounting method to accurately track electricity sent back to the grid. This was done because it is the easiest way for the utilities to accommodate solar with their old meters and antiquated billing systems.

Net metering and Mr Potts both ignore the value of solar energy: to an electric grid that favors energy production in the afternoon and on hot, sunny days; as a zero-volatility fuel source; as a hedge against environmental compliance costs; as a near-zero water consumer in an era of drought. He ignores the numerous state studies that show a net benefit from net metering.

Most notably, Mr Potts ignores the opportunity cost of propping up a dying monopoly business model to fend off innovative entrepreneurs and customers. The rooftop v. utility-scale solar argument is a utility-contrived proxy for their defense of a 20th century model of monopoly control of the utility system.

Until recently, electricity service was similar to water or roads, where a natural monopoly was most efficient. Only a single, standardized electric grid was needed to connect each building. Technology options were limited to steam-powered turbines fueled by coal and oil, or large hydro dams with massive economies of scale. There was very little long-distance transmission of power, as each utility was responsible for electricity service within its own territory. Growth in demand was exploding and monopoly utilities could wield the most cost-effective financing for new power plants. These natural monopolies paid off for customers, with falling costs of reliable electricity even as demand rose rapidly.

But the 21st century electricity system is radically different.

The scale of electricity generation is rapidly shrinking, from coal and nuclear power plants that can power a million homes to solar and wind power plants that power a few to a few hundred nearby homes. Electricity demand has leveled off, so that every unit of new wind and solar power produced for the grid displaces a unit of fossil fuel energy. Batteries and electric vehicles provide new tools for distributed energy storage. Smartphones and smart appliances are giving electricity customers unprecedented opportunities to manage their energy use.

The utilities are loath to allow such competition—and have found spokesmen willing to adopt their “least cost” argument—but letting them cling to their antiquated monopoly is a cost we can’t afford.

This article originally posted at ilsr.org. For timely updates, follow John Farrell on Twitter or get the Democratic Energy weekly update.

Photo credit: Bart Speelman via Flickr (CC BY 2.0 license)

Government Fossil Fuel Subsidies Total a ‘Shocking’ $5.3 Trillion

Posted by Laura Arnold  /   June 01, 2015  /   Posted in Uncategorized  /   No Comments

Government Fossil Fuel Subsidies Total a ‘Shocking’ $5.3 Trillion

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IMF global energy subsidies 2011-2015

Fossil fuel companies will benefit to the tune of $5.3 trillion in 2015 from government energy subsidies. That’s more than all the world’s governments spend on health care, according to new IMF (International Monetary Fund) research.

IMF’s new estimate of post-tax energy subsidies reveals that federal fossil-fuel subsidies “are dramatically higher than previously estimated, and are projected to remain high.” The results are contained in an IMF working paper entitled, “How Large are Global Energy Subsidies?”

Coming in advance of this year’s United Nations climate change conference in Paris this December, IMF’s estimate highlights the potential for governments to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions by eliminating fossil fuel subsidies. Fearing strong opposition from fossil fuel companies and their constituents, government leaders have yet to act decisively to end fossil fuel subsidies — despite ongoing calls from a wide range of public- and private-sector organizations, however.

A “shocking” new estimate of government fossil fuel subsidies

The IMF calls the dramatically higher estimate of government fossil fuel subsidies “shocking,” the Guardian reported. “The vast sum,” moreover, “is largely due to polluters not paying the costs imposed on governments by the burning of coal, oil and gas. These include the harm caused to local populations by air pollution as well as to people across the globe affected by the floods, droughts and storms being driven by climate change.”

IMF global energy subs region

Commenting on IMF’s study, Lord Nicholas Stern, climate economist at the London School of Economics, told the Guardian: “This very important analysis shatters the myth that fossil fuels are cheap by showing just how huge their real costs are. There is no justification for these enormous subsidies for fossil fuels, which distort markets and damages economies, particularly in poorer countries.”

Stern pointed out that even this new, dramatically higher estimate of government fossil fuel subsidies significantly underestimates the true, overall costs of our fossil fuel dependence. “A more complete estimate of the costs due to climate change would show the implicit subsidies for fossil fuels are much bigger even than this report suggests.”

IMF report authors highlight the costs society bears as a result of fossil fuel subsidies:

  • Energy subsidies damage the environment, causing more premature deaths through local air pollution, exacerbating congestion and other adverse side effects of vehicle use, and increasing atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations;
  • Energy subsidies impose large fiscal costs, which need to be financed by some combination of higher public debt, higher tax burdens and crowding out of potentially productive public spending (for example, on health, education and infrastructure), all of which can be a drag on economic growth;
  • Energy subsidies discourage needed investments in energy efficiency, renewables and energy infrastructure, and increase the vulnerability of countries to volatile international energy prices;
  • Energy subsidies are a highly inefficient way to provide support to low-income households since most of the benefits from energy subsidies are typically captured by rich households.

IMF researchers zoomed in on post-tax consumer subsidies in producing their report. Post-tax consumer energy subsidies, IMF explains, “arise when consumer prices are below supply costs plus a tax to reflect environmental damage and an additional tax applied to all consumption goods to raise government revenues.”

2014 was the hottest year on record, according to the world’s national climate research organizations, and the first three months of 2015 has put global mean temperature on course to set a new annual record. The main driver, human-caused greenhouse gas emissions, continue to rise despite best efforts to curtail them.

millenium-development-goals

Governments, and societies globally, stand to benefit greatly were fossil-fuel subsidies to be eliminated, IMF concluded. “These subsidies primarily reflect under-pricing from a domestic (rather than global) perspective, so even unilateral price reform is in countries’ own interests,” according to IMF’s report. “The potential fiscal, environmental and welfare impacts of energy subsidy reform are substantial.”

According to IMF’s report, eliminating fossil fuel subsidies would result in a 20 percent reduction of GHG emissions worldwide. “Ending the subsidies would also slash the number of premature deaths from outdoor air pollution by 50 percent – about 1.6 million lives a year,” according to the Guardian’s report.

Ending fossil fuel subsidies would also add substantial momentum to “green” innovation, job creation and sustainable economic development, IMF highlights. Doing so would be a big step towards achieving the goals set out by the community of nations in the U.N.’s Millennium Development Goals and succeeding Sustainable Development Goals.

Image credits: 1), 2) IMF, “How Large are Global Energy Subsidies?”; 3) UN 

Featured image: Flickr/Tim Evanson

An independent journalist, researcher and writer, my work roams across the nexus where ecology, technology, political economy and sociology intersect and overlap. The lifelong quest for knowledge of the world and self -- not to mention gainful employment -- has led me near and far afield, from Europe, across the Asia-Pacific, Middle East and Africa and back home to the Americas. Twitter: @mightysparrow LinkedIn: andrew burger Google+: Andrew B Email: huginn.muggin@gmail.com

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