For the sixth consecutive year, Green Strategies’ President Roger Ballentine co-chaired the Aspen Institute’s annual multi-day forum on energy innovation and decarbonization. The 2020 Winter Energy Forum was held in February in Aspen Colorado.
Please utilize the hyperlink to view the full report published from the forum, “Unlocking Mid-Century Deep Decarbonization.”
This report was prepared by Green Strategies, Inc in conjunction with The NorthBridge Group and the Columbia University Center on Global Energy Policy. See below for the report’s abstract and a downloadable PDF of the full text.
By adopting and implementing aggressive renewable energy goals, leading companies have enabled the development of multiple gigawatts (GW) of new renewable generation capacity and demonstrated the ability of corporate buyers to reshape the energy landscape. From 2014 to 2018, large companies announced transactions with off-site renewable energy projects representing over 15 GW of capacity – equal to around one-quarter of all such new renewable generation capacity installed across the country in that same period. This is a great success story.
To achieve mid-century targets for limiting global warming, experts indicate that the U.S. electric grid must achieve full decarbonization by 2050 (if not sooner) – an immense challenge given the current reliance on fossil generators and given the likely future demands for generation arising from the electrification of other sectors. The fastest and most certain pathway to a decarbonized grid is one that utilizes a broad portfolio of zero-carbon resources that can provide firm and dispatchable power to complement intermittent generation. Large energy buyers can accelerate this urgently needed transition to a zero-carbon grid with a new generation of procurement targets and practices. A next generation of goals would prioritize all zero-carbon electricity options, including but not limited to wind and solar, and involve an expanded range of procurement objectives and activities that seek to maximize the carbon impact of procurement and reduce a buyer’s consumption of grid-supplied fossil generation at more times and at more locations.
In this paper, we explore how a “next generation” of corporate electricity procurement strategies and goals could accelerate grid decarbonization to meet science-driven targets. Our analysis covers: A) the imperative of a zero-carbon grid and how a pathway that prioritizes a broad portfolio of zero-carbon generation best aligns with reaching that goal; B) the achievements – and shortcomings – of current corporate renewable energy procurement efforts; C) the possible elements and objectives of next generation corporate procurement strategies; D) example transaction structures for next generation corporate procurements and the potential barriers those transactions might find in today’s marketplace; and E) other challenges corporate buyers might face in adopting and executing next generation goals.
To download, find the download icon on the bottom banner of the embedded PDF.
Green Strategies Report on Next Generation Corporate Procurement - Revised 5-2020The burning of municipal waste seems to be included as a qualifying source of “clean energy” in a recent House proposal to transition the United States to a sustainable, low carbon future.
A key plank of the CLEAN Future Act proposal, introduced in January by House Democrats, is achieving “net-zero emissions from the electricity sector” through the use of a Clean Energy Standard (CES), which Democrats will likely pass this year ahead of the election.
The CES would require retail electricity suppliers to obtain 100% of their electricity from “clean energy sources” by 2050. That is the right way to go.
However, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, burning municipal solid waste (MSW) emits nearly as much CO2 per unit of energy as coal—and almost twice as much as burning natural gas. This is not the way to get to net-zero.
The European Commission announced in December 2019 a new classification system to guide the growing number of private and public capital investors who want to put capital to work in ways that will not only generate strong returns, but will also have a positive environmental impact.
Democrats in the House understand that the Europeans are on to something: reducing waste and investing in low carbon development is both an ecological imperative and a roadmap for economic growth. But these lawmakers may be overlooking one important plank in the European sustainable growth plan: don’t burn garbage to make electricity.
The EU classification system tells investors what types of projects and activities should be considered “green.” To put it mildly, burning municipal solid waste (MSW) to make electricity did not make the list.
Waste incineration is included in the commission’s list of activities that could cause “significant harm to environmental objectives.” (Article 12). Two of those environmental objectives are climate change mitigation and the promotion of a “circular” economy.
The commission was likely well aware of European analyses finding that waste incineration for energy production is almost twice as carbon intensive as the EU grid average and thus works against the goal of a zero carbon grid. In Article 9, the commission lists “minimising incineration” of waste as among the activities that can make a “[s]ubstantial contribution to the circular economy.”
Incentivizing the burning of our garbage also undercuts incentives for waste reduction and hurts the recycling sector—and at a very bad time. The U.S. recycling industry is in crisis. At the end of 2017, China severely restricted the import of U.S. recyclables.
Prior to that, we were exporting about a third of waste plastic for recycling to China; in 2018 that number was less than 5%. Hundreds of towns and cities across the United States have either shut down or greatly reduced their recycling programs.
The language in the House Clean Energy Standard appears to suggest that the eligible waste incineration facilities should be limited to those that use “postrecycled” waste. Given the collapsing of our recycling industry, waste truly void of recyclable materials may only exist in theory.
Even before China’s import restrictions, half of the carbon dioxide emissions from waste incineration came from plastic; today even less is being diverted. While not yet in the legislative text of the CLEAN Future Act, the authors note that other issues to be addressed include “recycling and waste management.” But any additional—and badly needed—policies to promote recycling will be hindered by the voracious appetite for fuel posed by waste-to-energy facilities.
A more sustainable and lower carbon economy means a more resilient, efficient, and equitable economy that can grow and create more wealth by mitigating the headwinds of climate change and resource constraints that are otherwise a drag on economic growth.
We need lower carbon energy; we need to reduce waste; and we need to create clean economy jobs. We do not need to burn our trash for energy.
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Bureau of National Affairs, Inc. or its owners.
Roger Ballentine is the president of Green Strategies Inc. He served as chairman of the White House Climate Change Task Force under President Bill Clinton.
Originally published in Bloomberg Environment.
Working on environmental issues for a living is not for the faint of heart. It always feels like there are too many problems and too few solutions — and even the solutions can turn out to be problems.
One big problem getting a lot of attention is plastic waste. Everyone has heard the admonition to “reduce, reuse, and recycle.” The increasingly ubiquitous use of reusable water bottles, shopping bags, and straws are signs that we are getting better at reducing and reusing. When it comes to recycling, however, we may be heading in the wrong direction. Prior to severe new international restrictions on imports enacted in 2018, the U.S. was sending 4,000 shipping containers of materials per day to China for recycling — including about a third of our waste plastic. In 2018, China accepted only about 4.5% of our plastic. Since these restrictions took effect, hundreds of towns and cities across the country have either shut down or greatly reduced their recycling programs. Our waste is piling up.
And perhaps the mother of all environmental problems is climate change. The International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the world’s leading authority on the issue, has declared that in order to avoid the worst effects of climate change we need to transition to a net-zero carbon economy by mid-century. Such “economy-wide” decarbonization includes electricity, heavy industry, transportation, and agriculture. Of these sectors, electricity might be the most important. If we can decarbonize the grid, we not only eliminate the tremendous amount of greenhouse gases we emit in producing electricity, we also then can electrify other sectors (like transportation, the production of heat, and some industrial processes) knowing they in turn will be powered by climate-friendly energy. But today, about two-thirds of our electric grid is powered by greenhouse gas-emitting fossil energy. We have a long way to go.
What do these two problems have to do with each other? One of the ways we have dealt with municipal solid waste in the U.S. is to incinerate it. And through incineration, you can produce electricity that is then put on the grid (termed “waste-to-energy” or “WTE”). Some states deem WTE to be “renewable energy” and include it in policies that subsidize and support other forms of renewable energy, like wind and solar. Now, in the face of mounting waste including more and more plastic, the incineration industry believes that we can kill two birds with one stone: dispose of our mounting waste with more incineration and help fight climate change with more “renewable energy.” Sounds great, right?
Um, no.
Regarding “bird #1” — the plastic and waste crisis — incineration is not the answer. In addition to causing local air pollution and health impacts, more demand for waste streams that include otherwise recyclable materials will further undercut the economics of our already struggling recycling. And if incineration is seen by consumers as a “solution” to our plastics crisis, it could undermine our progress on improving reduction and reuse behaviors. The WTE stone might just kill the wrong bird.
“Bird #2” — climate change — is the big bird, and unfortunately, the WTE “stone” badly misses its target. Whether WTE is “renewable” is debatable. It’s also irrelevant. What the climate cares about — and what matters in our efforts to decarbonize the grid — are greenhouse gas emissions. Those of us who work on climate change support wind and solar because they are zero emission, not because they are “renewable.” To decarbonize the grid, we need all forms of zero-carbon generation — and we need a lot more of it. Stated differently, we need to stop adding carbon-intensive generation — such as waste incineration — to our energy mix and rapidly phase out the dirty generation we have.
Adding more waste-to-energy generation would set us back in our critical need to decarbonize the grid. Even before China’s import restrictions, half of the carbon dioxide emissions from waste incineration came from plastic. Plastic is made from fossil fuels and contains a lot of embedded carbon which is released to the atmosphere when combusted. With declining recycling rates, we will have only more plastic in our waste stream. The dirty secret (literally) is that the energy produced from this mixed waste incineration is nearly as greenhouse gas intensive as coal and worse than natural gas. To make matters worse, some states include WTE in “renewable” energy subsidy programs, which means this dirty source of energy competes directly with zero emission renewables like wind and solar.
The urgent task of decarbonizing our electric grid is immensely challenging. At a time that we must rapidly add clean energy to the grid, we cannot afford to take a step backward with waste-to-energy. Our only option is to move forward.
Roger Ballentine is the president of Green Strategies, Inc. He served as chairman of the White House Climate Change Task Force under President Bill Clinton.
Originally published by Energy News.
This week, the Aspen Institute released its Summary Report of their 2019 Winter Energy Roundtable: Decarbonizing the Electricity Sector & Beyond. Roger Ballentine, co-author of the report along with Jim Connaughton and Dave Grossman, has been co-chair of the Aspen Institute’s Clean Energy Forum for seven years.
The latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report has intensified the focus on measures to achieve deep decarbonization. For the United States, most experts say that, if the aim is to be on a 1.5°C pathway, the United States must transition to a net-zero carbon profile economy-wide by around mid-century, going negative thereafter.
At the 2019 Aspen Institute Winter Energy Roundtable, February 25-28, ~50 executives, entrepreneurs, policy makers and thought leaders gathered to tackle how the US can achieve economy-wide decarbonization on a scientifically called-for timeline while ensuring national economic competitiveness and a just transition.
During these discussions, the group agreed that there are five basic elements necessary to decarbonize the energy system: (1) employ energy efficiency to the maximum degree; (2) decarbonize the electricity supply; (3) electrify other sectors as much as possible, including heat, transportation, and industrial processes; (4) use zero-carbon fuels for the areas that cannot be effectively electrified; and (5) use carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) and carbon dioxide removal (CDR) for areas where fossil fuels are still needed and for achieving negative emissions.
Read the report to learn more about these five elements or contact us directly.
