MINNESOTA LEGISLATURE IN THE HOT SEAT
Minnesota’s Climate Change Advisory Group casts its vote for global warming solutions

Last week, the Minnesota Climate Change Advisory Group (MCCAG) finished an 11-month process to determine the best policies to reduce Minnesota’s global warming emissions. The group approved a suite of policies that would achieve a 30 percent reduction in global warming pollution by 2025—signaling strong support for global warming solutions from a broad cross-section of Minnesota’s economy. In a joint hearing before the legislature’s environment and energy committees this month, MCCAG facilitators Center for Climate Strategies reported that Minnesota’s stakeholder process is the largest ever undertaken to develop consensus-based climate policy in the United States.

Among the most promising policy solutions is an overarching framework that limits and lowers global warming pollution through a market-based system known as cap and trade. Aggressive implementation of electric and natural gas utility conservation improvement programs and adoption of California’s clean car standards also top the list of policy solutions that achieve the greatest reduction in emissions at the lowest cost. MCCAG concluded that if the group’s recommended policies were implemented in full, Minnesota would achieve its mandated emissions reductions goals at a net savings to the economy.

For more information, listen to a Minnesota Public Radio Midday interview with two members of MCCAG, including Fresh Energy’s J. Drake Hamilton.

MINNESOTA JOINS EPA LAWSUIT
Attorney General sues over tailpipe emissions; EPA documents show staff favored California’s right to limit emissions

Minnesota Attorney General Lori Swanson announced this month that she is joining 16 other states in suing the Environmental Protection Agency to preserve states’ ability to regulate vehicle emissions. The lawsuit is in response to EPA administrator Stephen Johnson’s refusal to grant a waiver to California to set its own standard for vehicle emissions. Johnson argued that the California standards would cause confusion and be less efficient than having a single federal regulation, citing the recent energy bill passage which included an increase in CAFE standards to 35 mpg by 2020. California’s proposed standard would reduce greenhouse gas emissions from cars and light-duty trucks by 30 percent in models produced by 2016 and beyond.

Although EPA has refused to make public the documents containing agency recommendations on the California waiver, Senator Barbara Boxer (D-Calif) and her aides were allowed to review the documents. Excerpts from a presentation given for Administrator Johnson showed that EPA staff concluded that California has “compelling and extraordinary conditions” to justify giving it a waiver to impose global warming pollution limits on vehicles. Twelve other states have already adopted the California standards and are ready for implementation.

WHAT YOU CAN DO
Urge Minnesota decision makers to require cleaner cars

One of the most promising recommendations from the Minnesota Climate Change Advisory Group, California’s clean car standards have the potential to reach significantly higher reductions in vehicle emissions than the recently increased federal CAFE standards. According to analysis by the Transportation and Land Use technical working group (PDF), Minnesota can reduce global warming emissions more than 13 million metric tons by 2025, with a conservative estimate of a net savings of $39 per ton of emissions saved.

The 2008 Minnesota State Legislature will soon be discussing the possible adoption of these vehicle emission standards, and policymakers need to hear from you that this is one measure we can’t afford to let pass us by. Please contact your state senator and representative and ask them to support the swift passage of clean car standards for Minnesota. A House hearing may be scheduled on this bill as early as mid-February 2008. Read more about clean car standards.

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Fresh Energy works daily for smart energy policies and regulations that enhance our economies, protect human health and communities, restore our environment, and move us toward energy independence. www.fresh-energy.org