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Moving Cars in the Right Direction, By Michael Brune, Sierra Club

March 4, 2014 in Environment, EV News, Pollution

Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune Photo courtesy of Sierra Club

Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune
Photo courtesy of Sierra Club

Everybody knows that standing in front of a moving car is dangerous, but what about standing behind one? Currently, four out of ten Americans live in a place where the air is sometimes dangerous to breathe, thanks in part to smog from cars and trucks. Today, the Obama administration finalized cleaner tailpipe standards that will help us all breathe easier.

Beginning in 2017, these cleaner tailpipe standards will require that refiners produce cleaner-burning, lower-sulfur gasoline, and that automakers use advanced pollution control technology on new cars. Although the impact of cleaner new cars will be felt over time, the cleaner gasoline will be used by all cars, old and new, and reduce pollution almost immediately. In the first year alone, smog-forming NOx emissions will be reduced by 260,000 tons. That’s like taking 33 million cars off the road — nearly two out of every ten cars in the U.S.

Cleaner tailpipe standards mean cleaner air, and cleaner air has real health benefits. Smog pollution, or ground-level ozone, can cause asthma attacks, respiratory disease, and even premature death. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that by 2030 these cleaner tailpipe standards will prevent roughly 2,000 premature deaths a year, along with reducing hospital admissions and asthma attacks.

That’s good news for everyone, but it’s especially important for families who live near a major road. According to the American Lung Association, living or working near a major roadway results in a greater risk of health problems, especially for children and teenagers.

Disappointingly, the oil industry did everything it could to derail or delay these health-protecting standards. They failed in part because the standards will dramatically clean our air for less than a penny a gallon, all while creating jobs. A study by Navigant Economics found that these standards would create almost 5,400 permanent jobs in the operation and maintenance of new refinery equipment, as well as more than 24,000 new jobs during the three years it takes to install that equipment.

The economic and employment benefits of the standards explain the strong support for them from automakers, auto parts manufacturers, and the United Auto Workers.

These cleaner tailpipe standards mark the third time that President Obama has acted to make our cars and trucks cleaner and more efficient. In 2012, finalizing historic vehicle standards of 54.5 miles per gallon was the biggest single step any country had ever taken to reduce climate-disrupting pollution. Then, just two weeks ago, the president directed his administration to move forward with the next round of fuel-economy standards for tractor-trailers and delivery trucks.

Eventually, cars and trucks that run on gas will be found in museums instead of garages, and the smog and health problems they caused will only be bad memories. Until that day, though, we can be thankful for these standards, which will eliminate so much pollution for so little cost.

This article is a repost (3-3-14), credit: Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune.

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Electric Car Sales Surge, 90+ Cities Celebrate National Plug In Day

September 27, 2013 in Electric Vehicles, EV Campaigns, EV enthusiast, EV News

EV victory lap and test drives at third annual event, Sept. 28-29

Graphic courtesy of Plug In America

Graphic courtesy of Plug In America

WASHINGTON, D.C.  – The 3rd annual National Plug In Day on September 28-29 will highlight accelerated growth in the electric vehicle market. From Amsterdam to Hawaii, prospective buyers will learn about electric vehicles (EVs) at events in more than 90 cities where communities are supporting the clean-air benefits and fuel cost-savings of EVs.

Plug-in vehicles by Nissan, GM, Tesla, Mitsubishi, Toyota, Ford, Honda and other automakers will be available for test rides and test drives. The number of plug-in models available rose from seven in 2010 to 13 in 2011, 20 in 2012 and 28 in 2013.

Events will vary. In Philadelphia, U.S. Congressman Chaka Fattah will speak and test drive an electric car. In Las Vegas, event participants will be treated to a solar EV charging canopy. In Seattle, speed enthusiasts will drag race their EVs. In Long Beach, CA, upwards of 100 electric vehicles are expected to be available for viewing and test drives, and the mayor has issued a proclamation in honor of the day and local EV leaders. In Amsterdam, the E-Challenge will roll out more than 250 EVs through its city center. And stock car racer Leilani Münter will showcase her Tesla at Octoberfest in Charlotte, NC.

“Americans are finding out how liberating it can be to drive electric. We noticed a significant increase in electric vehicle sales following the last National Plug In Day, and the numbers keep rising,” said Plug In America president Richard Kelly. “More EVs are hitting the pavement, and they are selling. We’ve gone from 345 electric vehicles sold in December 2010 to 18,000 by December 2011 to 70,000 by the end of 2012. Last month American consumers bought more than 11,000 EVs, doubling EV sales from the previous month. To date, more than 130,000 EVs have been sold in the U.S. since late 2010 – with sales effectively growing by about 200% a year.”

“I’m going to let you in on a little secret: Today automakers are competing on innovation and efficiency, America has cut its oil use by 10 percent in the past eight years, and EVs are a big part of that success,” said Michael Brune, Sierra Club executive director. “National Plug In Day is our chance to take our electric cars on a victory lap. Sales are exploding, plug-in technology is beating gasoline-powered cars while saving Americans money on gas and reducing pollution.”

Plug In America, the Sierra Club, and the Electric Auto Association are organizing National Plug In Day, with many other partners and sponsors at the local level. For more information about National Plug In Day and a list of events, visit http://www.pluginday.org.

About Plug In America: Plug In America is leading the nation’s plug-in vehicle movement. The nonprofit organization works to accelerate the shift to plug-in vehicles powered by clean, affordable, domestic electricity to reduce our nation’s dependence on petroleum and improve the global environment. We drive electric. You can, too.  www.pluginamerica.org.

About the Sierra Cub: The Sierra Club is America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with more than 2.3 million members and supporters nationwide. The Sierra Club’s Beyond Oil campaign advocates for a switch to electric vehicles as one important way to reduce emissions and cut our dependence on oil.  For more information, visit www.sierraclub.org/EVGuide.

About the Electric Auto Association: The Electric Auto Association, formed in 1967, is a nonprofit educational organization with 75 chapters worldwide that promotes the advancement and widespread adoption of electric vehicles.  www.electricauto.org.

This article is a repost, credit: Plug In America.

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Back in the Game, By Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director

June 25, 2013 in Environment, EV News, Politics

Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director Photo courtesy of Sierra Club

Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director
Photo courtesy of Sierra Club

This afternoon, I had a short meeting with President Obama that left me more convinced than ever that he’s serious about tackling the climate crisis. Sure enough, later under a sweltering Maryland sun at Georgetown University, I watched him calmly and forcefully restate the case for taking action on the climate crisis in one of the most important speeches of his presidency. He also outlined a Climate Action Plan that will help curb carbon pollution, develop clean energy sources, promote energy efficiency, and assert American global leadership on climate issues. Taken together, the new policies directly address what the president rightly calls “the global threat of our time.”

Coming on the heels of an unprecedented string of extreme weather disasters, the plan recognizes that we must work on both the causes and the consequences of climate disruption.

But the two most significant commitments the president made were bona fide game-changers: First, he said that he will use the full authority of the Clean Air Act to limit air pollution from both new and existing power plants. Second, he declared that he will not approve the Keystone XL pipeline if it harms the climate, because to do so would not be in the national interest.

The science on Keystone’s potentially catastrophic effect on climate could not be more clear. The rejection of this carbon pollution pipeline will be a major climate disaster averted.

Coal-fired power plants, however, are a disaster that has persisted for far too long and, as I listened to the president’s speech, I shared the exuberance of the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal activists and so many others in the movement who have fought to end this injustice. Coal-fired power plants are currently responsible for nearly one-third of U.S. carbon pollution; although only a decade ago, that share was greater than one-half. The recent and welcome decline in U.S. carbon emissions to 1986 levels is the result of a decade-long trend away from using coal to generate electricity. Extending clean-air standards to older coal plants, many of which have been polluting for decades, will speed that trend. Not only will this significantly reduce our carbon pollution, but it will also save tens of thousands of lives, since the plants emit many other toxic air pollutants, from sulfur dioxide to mercury.

To meet the challenge of the climate crisis, however, we must do much more than simply celebrate the end of the Coal Age — we need to hasten a new era of smart, clean energy, energy efficiency, and the jobs that support them. Here, too, the president’s plan lays out a practical vision for the future. The president is justifiably proud that generation of renewable energy from wind and solar doubled during his first term; now he has committed to seeing it double again. One of the ways his administration will make that happen is by responsibly siting more renewable-energy projects on public lands. The goal is to install enough such projects to power 6 million homes by 2020.

Other major initiatives will promote energy efficiency in both the public and private sectors, begin the critical work of developing a “smart grid” energy infrastructure, raise the bar on fuel economy standards for heavy-duty vehicles, and tackle the problem of climate-polluting hydrofluorocarbons and methane. Leakage and flaring of methane, which currently accounts for 9 percent of U.S. carbon pollution (and has a global warming potential that is more than 20 times greater than carbon dioxide), is one of the reasons why natural gas doesn’t deserve its reputation as a “cleaner” fossil fuel.

Is everything in the Climate Action Plan workable — or even a good idea to begin with? Of course not. Some ideas, like pursuing “clean coal” technology, investing in nuclear power, fracking, and building oversea markets for U.S. natural gas are either wrong-headed or dead ends. On balance, though, the plan offers a way for our nation to move forward strongly. Even if not every path offered is a good one — it’s never been clearer what our destination must be, and that this president wants to get us there.

Beyond the president’s specific commitments, however, the most important takeaway from his speech is that he is determined to “personally own” this issue. That means taking responsibility in the face of what he has called a “moral obligation.” He is far from alone in recognizing such an obligation. A national poll earlier this year found that 93 percent of Americans agree that we have “a moral obligation to future generations to leave them a planet that is not polluted or damaged.”

Although the president’s desire to save the planet certainly resonates with environmentalists like myself and the Sierra Club’s  2.1 million members and supporters, that alone can’t account for the overwhelming support of more than 90 percent of the American population. Our “moral obligation to future generations,” though, is a different matter. If I ever need to get re-energized about fighting the climate crisis, all I need to do is look into the eyes of my kids. I know the same is true for President Obama. His exact words today: “As a president, as a father, and as an American, I’m here to say we need to act.”

The president’s plan may one day be seen as a critical turning point, but let’s not forget that this struggle is far from over. The president himself emphasized that this will be a long and rocky road. In the near term, at least, powerful special interests will continue to throw up roadblocks and obstacles at every turn. Congress, for its part, has resolutely and shamefully shirked its own moral obligation. What matters today, though, is that President Barack Obama today has reasserted his leadership on climate with both words and deeds. For that, he deserves both our deepest gratitude and our whole-hearted support (and here’s where you can send it to him).

Hope is back in the game. Let’s win it.

This article is a repost, credit: Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director, http://sierraclub.typepad.com/michaelbrune/2013/06/obama-climate-speech-climate-action-plan.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+michaelbrune+%28Michael+Brune+Blog%29.

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LNG Exports: The Wrong Side of History. By Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director

May 29, 2013 in Environment, EV News

Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director Photo courtesy of Sierra Club

Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director
Photo courtesy of Sierra Club

Most Americans have probably heard about the “boom” in natural gas, with U.S. production up by one-third since 2005. Besides historically low natural gas prices, one consequence is that companies like Exxon Mobil are now pushing the federal government to approve permits for more than 20 liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminals. Big fossil fuel’s goal is to sell U.S. natural gas overseas, where it can fetch a higher price. Is that really such a good idea?

Future generations will be incredulous that we ever debated the wisdom of increasing LNG exports. The permits that the Department of Energy is considering would export as much as 45 percent of current U.S. gas production. Once the terminals are built, trade agreements like the Trans Pacific Partnership currently being negotiated could make it difficult to impossible to limit how much gas we actually export. The result will be higher domestic prices as well a lot more drilling for natural gas — primarily by fracking.

So far, the Department of Energy has failed to consider the environmental and health consequences of such a radical increase in natural gas drilling. They really should, because both the potential risks and the known harms are enormous. Here are five environmental reasons why LNG exports are a very bad idea:

1. The current shale-gas rush has already had serious effects on our air quality. As the Department of Energy’s own Shale Gas Subcommittee reported: “Significant air quality impacts from oil and gas operations in Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and Texas are well documented, and air quality issues are of increasing concern in the Marcellus region (in parts of Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and New York).”

Because of natural gas drilling, parts of rural Wyoming now have smog worse than that of downtown Los Angeles. This air pollution doesn’t just spoil the view — it’s been linked to respiratory disease, heart failure, and premature death.

2. Increased fracking will endanger and further strain increasingly scarce water resources. A single fracking well can require up to 5 million gallons of water. And because that water is contaminated during the fracking process, most of it must be considered toxic waste and can never be used for human consumption again. Meanwhile, contamination of surface and groundwater sources from spills and leaks remains an ever-present risk.

3. Intense gas production can transform entire regions — and not for the better. We’re talking hundreds of thousands of new wells, along with a vast infrastructure of roads, pipelines, and support facilities. Pennsylvania’s forests have already been decimated by fracking wells — we could see that pattern repeated from New York to Monterey.

4. Higher natural gas prices could help revive the fortunes of the declining coal-fired power industry. At a time when we should be working to move as fast as possible beyond all fossil fuels, burning more coal is beyond crazy — it’s suicidal.

5. Which brings us to what may be the most important reason of all why we shouldn’t ramp up gas production so we can export LNG: Increased use of any fossil fuel is the wrong move if we want to limit climate disruption. The International Energy Agency estimates that to have a shot at keeping global warming within a range that is potentially survivable, we need to keep two-thirds of our known oil, coal, and natural gas reserves in the ground.

LNG export terminals are the latest example of how the Obama administration’s “all of the above” energy approach is misguided and fundamentally at odds with its stated priority of fighting climate change. How can we justify taking a huge additional percentage of U.S. fossil fuel reserves and selling them overseas for profit at the expense of countless future generations? Then again, people once made economic arguments for perpetuating the slave trade and other morally repugnant enterprises. They were profoundly wrong. Let’s not give history a reason to say the same of us.

Take action: Tell President Obama that exporting liquefied natural gas to other countries is the wrong choice for our nation. 

This article is a repost, credit: Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director, http://sierraclub.typepad.com/michaelbrune/.

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The Overview Effect, By Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director

May 17, 2013 in Environment, EV News

Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director Photo courtesy of Sierra Club

Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director
Photo courtesy of Sierra Club

Few of us will ever venture past the 60-mile boundary that separates Earth and outer space. If you do, though, you’re likely to experience something known as “the overview effect” — a cognitive shift in how you perceive our planet. Political boundaries disappear, and our atmosphere, which seemed like a boundless expanse of blue from the ground, is suddenly revealed to be a paper-thin shield between life and the dark void of space.

Last week, the fragility of that thin blue shield was underscored by the news that we’ve reached a daily average of 400 parts per million (ppm) of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere. That’s the highest level in at least 3 million years. In less than two centuries, we’ve increased atmospheric CO2 by 42 percent — by burning fossil fuels, degrading our forests, and disturbing our soils. And it’s still going up.

Although the notion of sending Congress, the president, and every other decision maker into outer space has some appeal, it’s not exactly the most practical thing. Yet the climate crisis demands the same kind of cognitive shift experienced by astronauts: We cannot let that CO2 ppm number keep ticking up, and the best way to stop it is to stop burning fossil fuels and replace them with renewable energy as fast as we can.

Unfortunately, although President Obama has spoken eloquently about the climate crisis, the energy policies of his administration too often say “business as usual,” not “cognitive shift.” Here are just three examples:

First, on the same day that the 400-ppm milestone was reported, the administration released its National Strategy for the Arctic Region. Ironically, although the report correctly notes that the Arctic will be severely affected by climate disruption, it also includes talking points that could have come straight out of the Bush administration, including this sentence:

Continuing to responsibly develop Arctic oil and gas resources aligns with the United States “all of the above” approach to developing new domestic energy sources, including renewables, expanding oil and gas production, and increasing efficiency and conservation efforts to reduce our reliance on imported oil and strengthen our nation’s energy security.

Wrong. Although the parenthetical nod to renewables is nice, any “all of the above” policy that furthers our dependence on oil and gas doesn’t strengthen our energy security. Instead, it increases our climate insecurity. As Shell Oil learned the hard way, there are many good reasons why it’s a bad idea to attempt offshore drilling in the Arctic. We only need this one, though: If we are serious about addressing the climate crisis, then oil under the Arctic Ocean needs to stay there.

Example #2 — Just yesterday, the Bureau of Land Management released new proposed regulations for fracking natural gas on public lands. The new rules are disappointing for many reasons: Drillers won’t be required to disclose what chemicals they’re using, there is no requirement for baseline water testing, and there are no setback requirements to govern how close to homes and schools drilling can happen. Once again, though, the policy documents an even bigger failure to grasp a fundamental principle: If we’re serious about the climate crisis, then the last thing we should be doing is opening up still more federal land to drilling and fracking for fossil fuels.

Lastly, of course, there is the issue of tar-sands crude and the Keystone XL pipeline. I’ve written many times about the risks of both, but the bottom line is that allowing tar sands extraction to expand will undermine the progress that has been made to reduce carbon pollution elsewhere in the economy.

The good news: We still have time to act. Through clean-energy technology, smart policies, and responsible leadership, we can spare future generations the “worst-case scenario” for climate disruption. To make that happen, though, the biggest change has to occur on the inside first — a cognitive shift away from the fossil-fuel world we’ve known our entire lives.

We can’t literally escape gravity to stare in awe at our amazingly beautiful planet and suddenly comprehend what’s at stake — but we can make the journey in our hearts and minds. Once we do — whether we’re sitting behind a desk in the Oval Office or on a back-porch swing in Salinas, Kansas — we can see the better world that lies beyond coal, oil, and gas.

This article is a repost, credit: Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director, http://sierraclub.typepad.com/michaelbrune/.

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Six Months After Sandy, By Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director

May 1, 2013 in Environment, EV News

Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director Photo courtesy of Sierra Club

Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director
Photo courtesy of Sierra Club

If all goes well, my parents will finally get to return home today. They live on the New Jersey Shore, on Chadwick Beach Island, next to Barnegat Bay. My brother, sisters, and I all grew up in the house, which my dad built with my uncle, almost fifty years ago.

Six months ago, Sandy took it apart.

By the time it hit the eastern seaboard, Sandy was an unusual hybrid of a post-tropical cyclone and an upper level low system. “Superstorms” like Sandy could develop without the influence of climate disruption, but warmer ocean temperatures and a shifting jet stream unquestionably have increased the odds. The scariest thing about Sandy is that such a freak of weather may no longer be so freakish.

A new norm of extreme weather is a daunting prospect. In Sandy’s case, the damage to my childhood home was part of the worst U.S. natural disaster since hurricanes Katrina and Rita — much more than $50 billion in damages and at least 72 deaths. But Sandy also destroyed something intangible — our complacency. No longer can we assign the consequences of climate disruption to some distant future. When Sandy struck, the future rose with the sea and smashed into us head on. The question it left behind was this: What do we do about it?

For the past 100 days, Sierra Club members and supporters have answered that question loudly and clearly. We gathered in Washington, D.C., for the largest climate rally in history. We held town hall meetings and grassroots rallies across the country. And we helped send more than a million messages to Barack Obama — telling him that we want bold action on climate disruption.

For his part, the president answered Sandy’s challenge by talking about the climate crisis in his strongest words yet, both in the State of the Union and his inaugural address.

The president’s words were welcome, but words will not be enough. Here are five critical actions we need him to take:

  1. Reject the toxic Keystone XL pipeline.
  2. Protect our water from coal plant pollution.
  3. Close loopholes on fracking and protect our wildlands from oil and gas development.
  4. Finalize strong standards for cleaner tailpipe emissions.
  5. Move forward with standards against industrial pollution.

Each of these actions is within President Obama’s power right now. If he’s serious about addressing climate disruption, not one of them is optional.

Meanwhile, we have to keep our own voices raised. If you haven’t added yours yet – you can do it here. Together, we will move forward on climate — and we need our president to lead the way.

This article is a repost, credit: Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director, http://sierraclub.typepad.com/michaelbrune/.

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The Sun Is Rising in the West, By Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director

April 29, 2013 in Environment, EV News

Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director Photo courtesy of Sierra Club

Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director
Photo courtesy of Sierra Club

When Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa announced a few weeks ago that his city would be off coal power entirely by 2025, it was both exciting and, as Al Gore put it, “a really big deal.”

It was also only part of the story.

The other part — also a really big deal — is that L.A. is rapidly locking in new sources of energy to replace dirty fossil fuels. One of them — the Antelope Valley Solar Projects that officially broke ground on Friday — represents large-scale renewable energy technology at its best and its brightest. When completed in 2015, these solar projects will provide 579 megawatts of clean energy (enough to power about 400,000 homes). Every one of those megawatts will replace energy that would otherwise come from dirty fossil fuels like coal and natural gas. In the process, they’ll eliminate more than 775,000 tons of carbon pollution per year (not to mention quite a lot of air and water pollution).

Fantastic as those stats are, though, they wouldn’t mean as much if this project did not succeed in a couple of other important ways.

Here in the United States, we’re lucky to have abundant renewable energy resources — wind, sun, and hydro. In theory, it’s enough to power our entire country several times over. But we need to be smart about where and how we access that energy. The rim of the Grand Canyon, for instance, would never be anyone’s first choice for a wind farm.

In the case of Antelope Valley, the project has been a model of smart planning. In fact, Sierra Club volunteers worked closely with the developers almost from the beginning to improve the project. The project site was private land that had no threatened or endangered species. It’s located near existing transmission lines. It will require a lot less water than the previous use for the land — growing alfalfa.

Another way the Antelope Valley Solar Projects succeed is economically. Here’s the proof: Early this year, the original developer of the project, SunPower, was acquired by MidAmerican Renewables, a subsidiary of MidAmerican Energy Holdings Company, which is controlled by Berkshire Hathaway. The primary shareholder, chairman, and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, of course, is Warren Buffett, who is considered the most successful investor of the 20th century. MidAmerican has a portfolio of more than 1,830 megawatts of renewable energy assets, including wind, geothermal, solar, and hydro assets.

The next time someone tries to tell you that renewable energy isn’t a good investment, point out that it’s good enough for Warren Buffett. (Before you send the Oracle of Omaha a clean-energy mash note, though, be sure to read the just-published Sierra magazine article about a more problematic part of his portfolio. Mr. Buffett should take care to avoid the carbon bubble and move out of dirty fuels entirely.)

The Antelope Valley Solar Projects are part of a remarkable surge in solar solutions. Last month, all of the new power-generation capacity added in the U.S. came from solar power. In the first three months of 2013, we added twice as much new solar capacity to the U.S. grid as in all of 2012. Projects like the ones in Antelope Valley are great for the environment and for our clean-energy future. If they show dirty fuel investors how they can profit from clean energy instead, that’s good, too.

This article is a repost, credit: Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director, http://sierraclub.typepad.com/michaelbrune/.