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TODAY Wednesday 18 February 1998 Each weekday. Conn Nugent on what's new in the world, on the site.

 

TODAY IN THE WORLD: Optimistic Feds and the Future of Kyoto

There are optimists and there are optimists. My old boss -- Bernard Lown of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War -- always used to say that optimism is an historical duty. Americans in particular believe in the possibility of improvement through organized activities: OK, let's try this.

This spirit of can-do-ism informs an interesting article in the 30 January issue of Science. It's called "A Road Map for US Carbon Reductions," and it's written by four federal employees: Joseph Romm, Mark Levine, Marilyn Brown, and Eric Petersen. Romm and Petersen are with the Department of Energy in Washington; Levine is at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory; Brown is at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The national labs are significant centers of inside-government techno-optimism these days. The Lawrence Berkeley/Oak Ridge study on carbon-reduction scenarios issued last September was a useful political counterweight to the doleful projections of the oil company think tanks and the Administration's own economic advisors.

Here, severely truncated, is what the authors say we should do in the four big carbon-emitting economic sectors so as to comply with the Kyoto goal of reducing US greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2010:

• Utilities. Establish a national system whereby carbon emissions permits can be traded at a cost of $25 to $50 a ton. That's the big step. In addition, the feds should step up R&D in renewables (as well as "advanced fossil fuel technologies" and "technologies to extend the operating lifetimes to existing nuclear plants"), and couple electrical deregulation with incentives for using natural gas, renewables, and co-generation systems. The higher the per-ton price of the carbon trading permits, the greater the reductions; at $50 a ton, reductions could equal 22% of forecast emissions for the utility sector.
• Industry. The aim here is to reduce industrial emissions 10 to 17% lower than forecasts. "These reductions can be achieved only if industry directs about 3% of its annual investment in manufacturing to cost-effective energy efficiency and low-carbon technologies. Much of this may be achieved through voluntary agreements between industry and government, but domestic trading of carbon will also be important." Enforce the Clean Air Act strictly, but allow "credits for end-use efficiency." Expand government/private partnerships in the three industries that produce 80% of industrial carbons: forest products, chemicals, and metals.
• Buildings. The least ambitious sectoral goal (7 to 10% reductions below forecasts) is for buildings, and the means to achieve that goal include the carrots of tax incentives for "super-efficient equipment" and the sticks of "the existing authority of the federal government to issue consensus-based standards for equipment and appliances." Significant expectations are invested in the potential for more "public-private R&D partnerships."
• Transportation. Here the authors look for carbon emission reductions 15% below forecast, but they admit that success depends on reversing current trends in vehicle weight, horsepower, and miles traveled. Their key expectation is that the fuel economy of new cars will be enhanced significantly, from today's 27.5 miles per gallon to about 40 mpg in 2010. Similar achievements would be needed in light trucks and heavy trucks. The authors point to recent encouraging developments in new-generation auto prototypes and say that the main problem will be to find out how to make those new cars acceptable in the marketplace.

The four authors take care to avoid charges of naivete -- they say that businesses and consumers may cussedly misread their own self-interests in energy efficiency, they admit that new technologies may not be as cost-effective as anticipated, and, in a concluding understatement, note that "the policies we describe may face political obstacles."

You bet. But it's not as if this is a politically-unconscious secenario. Conspicuous by their absence are two policy tools often touted as the best ways to achieve emission reductions: carbon taxes and mandatory fuel efficiency levels for vehicles (aka CAFE standards). May we surmise that the roadmap sketched by the authors doesn't allow for itineraries already proven unpopular in the public opinion polls? Do we all agree now that it's just not politic to talk about mandatory anything? Can you say the word "tax" aloud? Fair enough, I suppose. The authors are on the federal payroll, after all, and there's no argument here against the proposition that Kyoto commitments must be sold to the American public in a spirit of up-and-at-'em win/win economic boosterism. It's just that I suspect that -- absent an unanticipated sharp increase in the price of oil and coal -- it will require more robust incentives and disincentives to go where the authors want us to go.

 

TODAY ON THE SITE

Is recycling a moral issue? Which is to say, is it always good? Good for the recycler? Good for the preservation of nature? Good for the environmental movement? Follow Greg Breining as he patiently analyzes whether his office should buy recycled-paper stationery. Check preconceptions at the door, please.

 

Recent "Today" columns:

2/17: The New Great Game
2/13: Windmills
2/12: Stuart Eizenstat's Smart Bomb
2/11: Alligator in the Coal Mine
2/10: Inconvenient Public Opinion
2/9: Remember Penn Station
2/6: Adam Smith and Automobile Efficiency
2/5: Clean Water, Naturally
2/4: Roll, Storms, Roll
2/3: Land Purchase Fever
2/2: Groundhog Day in the Persian Gulf
1/30: Trees and Hormones
1/29: Things To Come (2)
1/28: Things To Come
1/27: 'Bye, 'Bye Brazil
1/26: Jaywalking and Jaydriving
1/23: Good Biotech, Bad Biotech
1/22: No More Roads
1/21: Swordfish

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