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BIDEN TRYING TO DELIVER ON CLEAN ENERGY MANUFACTURING HUB PLEDGE: President Biden this afternoon will direct federal agencies to tighten the requirements products must meet in order to be considered made in the U.S.
The executive order will also request federal agencies make it tougher for the government to justify buying foreign-made products because they are cheaper.
On clean energy, Biden has his work cut out for him: China has come to dominate manufacturing the materials needed for clean energy, including wind turbines, solar panels, and lithium-ion batteries needed for electric cars and battery storage. The European Union, too, increasingly focused on building out manufacturing capacity for batteries, wind energy, and hydrogen as part of its broader climate strategy.
But the U.S. clean energy manufacturing sector’s roots have begun to rot.
For example, whereas in 2009 the U.S. had double the wind capacity and five times the solar capacity as China, 10 years later China had deployed double the wind and triple the solar power as the U.S., wrote Sarah Ladislaw and Nikos Tsafos of the Center for Strategic and International Studies in a Foreign Policy article in the fall. The U.S. share of solar panel manufacturing has fallen from 30% in the late 1990s to just 1% now.
The government’s purchasing power has a lot of sway: As the White House fact sheet notes, nearly $600 billion in federal spending goes to contracting for goods and services alone.
Clean energy advocates are hoping the Biden administration will also direct more of the government’s purchasing power to renewable energy, electric cars, and other clean energy technologies.
He could also take those steps through executive action by requiring federal agencies to buy increasing amounts of renewable energy, directing the Defense Department and other agencies to explore low-carbon fuels, switching over the federal government’s fleet to electric vehicles, and demanding federal agencies lower their carbon footprint.
We’ll be watching to see whether Biden’s more detailed climate executive actions (expected to be coming Wednesday) include any directives on clean energy procurement.
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KERRY WORKING ON NEW PARIS EMISSIONS REDUCTION TARGET: “We have already launched our work to prepare a new U.S. Nationally Determined Contribution that meets the urgency of the challenge, and we aim to announce our NDC as soon as practicable,” Biden climate envoy John Kerry told the Climate Adaptation Summit this morning.
What’s in an NDC? When Kerry was secretary of state, President Barack Obama had pledged the U.S. would reduce emissions 26% to 28% below 2005 levels by 2025. Ahead of the next U.N climate conference in November, referred to as COP 26, Biden is expected to submit a new emissions reduction target, known as an NDC, that will be even more aggressive and go out to the year 2030.
Kerry emphasized the need to hold global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, the more ambitious goal of the Paris Agreement. The world is on pace for between 3.7 degrees and 4 degrees Celsius of warming, Kerry said.
“We intend to do everything we can to ensure COP 26 results in ambitious climate action in which all major emitter countries raise ambition significantly and in which we protect those who are most vulnerable,” Kerry said.
Kerry promised Biden would “make good” on the U.S. finance pledge to help poor countries deal with the effects of climate change and shift to clean energy after former President Donald Trump refused to participate. The Obama administration committed $3 billion to the so-called Green Climate Fund, but the U.S. paid only $1 billion of that before Trump took office.
BIDEN STILL FOR FILIBUSTER: “He has spoken to this many times. His position has not changed,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters Friday.
Removing the rule would mean Biden could try to pass more expansive climate bills with just a simple majority in the Senate.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has pushed Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to commit to Democrats keeping the filibuster as part of a power-sharing agreement providing the rules for the split 50-50 Senate. Schumer, however, has not budged in his reluctance to take that option off the table if Republicans block Democrats’ agenda.
LNG LOBBY GROUP SUPPORTS METHANE REGULATIONS: The Center for Liquified Natural Gas is the latest industry group signaling openness to support direct regulations of methane pursued by the Biden administration.
The center, which represents companies exporting natural gas, announced this morning its adoption of principles to address methane emissions, including supporting “well-designed government policies.”
“The most effective methane policies and regulations are scientifically sound, cost-effective, and flexible to allow for efficient implementation, future technology deployment, and continuous improvements,” the center said.
That statement is less direct than other industry groups such as the Chamber of Commerce, American Petroleum Institute, and Edison Electric Institute that said last week they support regulation of methane from new and existing sources. But Charlie Riedl, executive director of the Center for Liquefied Natural Gas, recently told Josh that Trump’s removal of methane regulations could hurt the economic competitiveness of U.S. LNG.
ON THE HOTLINE: Biden talked climate change in several calls with foreign leaders this past weekend.
Biden “acknowledged” Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s “disappointment” regarding the new president’s decision to reject the Keystone XL pipeline, according to a White House readout, but the two leaders are eager to bury the hatchet and “work together to achieve a net-zero emissions future.”
U.K’s conservative Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who is playing host to the next U.N. climate conference, COP 26, sees the climate issue as a “shared challenge” with Biden, the White House said in a recap of a call Saturday. Both Trudeau and Johnson have taken recent actions to bolster their governments’ climate plans. Canada is planning to raise its carbon price and the UK is ending its support for fossil fuel projects overseas, along with banning new sales of petroleum and diesel cars by 2030.
Biden also spoke with President Emmanuel Macron of France yesterday about “the need for close coordination, including through multilateral organizations, in tackling common challenges such as climate change.”
BIDEN TAPS NEW NRC CHAIR: The Biden administration on Friday appointed Democratic commissioner Christopher Hanson as chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Hanson replaces Republican Kristine Svinicki, the longest serving member of the NRC who resigned as chairman this month. Nuclear industry groups urged Hanson to continue focusing on a process initiated under Svinicki to modernize approvals of smaller advanced nuclear reactors.
“The NRC’s continued progress to become a transformed, modern regulator is essential as we move toward a decarbonized economy,” said Maria Korsnick, president and CEO of the Nuclear Energy Institute.
The commission is now short a member and is split among two Republicans and two Democrats.
EPA SEEKS PAUSE IN LAWSUITS OVER ALL TRUMP RULES: The request, issued in a letter Friday by EPA’s acting general counsel Melissa Hoffer, comes on the heels of Biden’s executive order last week asking the EPA to review nearly 50 Trump-era deregulatory actions.
The request allows new EPA leadership an opportunity “to review the underlying rule or matter,” Hoffer said in a letter. It’s likely the Biden EPA could decide to change its stance in much of the litigation, especially lawsuits over Trump rulemakings that weakened greenhouse gas mandates. That could help the Biden team’s quest to rewrite and tighten those environmental rules.
Worth noting: Hoffer joined the EPA from the Massachusetts attorney general’s office, where she oversaw the energy and environment bureau and led the state’s work challenging the Trump administration’s environmental rollbacks.
CORPORATIONS CALL ON BIDEN TO BACK RENEWABLES: Dozens of major corporations that are the leading U.S. energy customers are calling on the Biden administration to improve electricity markets to allow greater renewable energy adoption, support a buildout of clean energy transmission, and increase funding for demonstration and early deployment of clean energy technologies.
The statement released today was coordinated by the Renewable Energy Buyers Alliance, and it was signed by corporations including Amazon, Microsoft, Johnson and Johnson, McDonald’s, Target, Unilever, and Walmart. In total, the signing companies represent more than $5.8 trillion in revenue and employ more than 13.5 million people.
UTILITIES FALLING SHORT ON CLIMATE PLEDGES: Utilities are failing to fulfill their climate pledges and are not doing enough to retire coal plants, stop building new gas plants, and build clean energy, according to a report this morning by the Sierra Club and Leah Stokes, an assistant professor of environmental politics at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
The report analyzed the plans and announcements of 50 different investor-owned utilities, comprising 79 operating companies, that remain the most invested in fossil fuel generation.
Despite 33 of these companies having a public climate goal, the report found there is a “stark difference” between utilities’ existing coal and gas generation (1,310 million megawatt-hours) and how much clean energy they plan to add this decade (only 250 million MWh).
The companies have committed to retire just 25% of their coal generation by 2030.
Meanwhile, 32 of the operating companies included are planning to build new gas plants — totaling over 36 gigawatts through 2030.
The Rundown
Reuters BP’s oil exploration team swept aside in climate revolution
Bloomberg Renewables beat fossil fuels in EU for first time last year
Wall Street Journal World’s ice is melting faster than ever, climate scientists say
Financial Times Shale producers fear drilling binge will spoil good times
Bloomberg China’s sweeping climate goals meet resistance on the ground
Calendar
WEDNESDAY | JAN. 27
9:30 a.m. 106 Dirksen. The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee holds a confirmation hearing for Jennifer Granholm to be the Secretary of Energy.
