Glowing on us

Nuclear + cap-and-trade = bipartisan climate bill? 16

Getting a climate bill through the Senate with some Republican support might be easier than many observers think, but only if it comes with provisions providing a big boost for nuclear energy.

That was one takeaway from Tuesday’s Senate committee hearing on climate change legislation, the first of a series that the Environment and Public Works Committee plans to host this month on climate policy. Committee chair Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) has said she intends to have her panel finish work on a climate and energy bill by early August.

The first hearing made it clear that most Democrats on the panel want a bill that’s stronger than the one the House passed last month. And while a few Republicans on the committee indicated that they are willing to actively participate in drafting climate policy, most of the minority party’s questions dwelt on tired climate-change-skeptic talking points.

But for a handful of Republican senators on the committee, the role of nuclear power in the bill will be a significant deal-maker (or breaker, perhaps). Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) both indicated that support for nuclear energy would be major factors. “For the next 20 years if we really want to deal with global warming, we only have one option ... to double nuclear power plants,” said Alexander.

Both Alexander and Crapo said nuclear should be included in an renewable energy standard, and should play a significant role in a climate and energy package. [Watch Crapo’s questioning of Chu.]

They found a sympathetic ear in the panel of Obama administration officials who testified. Energy Secretary Steven Chu agreed with Alexander that “restarting the nuclear power industry is a very important part of the overall plan” on energy and climate.

“I think nuclear power is going to be an important factor in getting us to a low carbon future,” Chu said, noting that his department has streamlined the process for getting loan guarantees for nuclear. “We want to recapture the lead in industrial nuclear power.”

In a press conference with reporters after the hearing, Chu restated that “nuclear energy has to be a part of the solution,” but would not give a policy prescription. “The Senate is going to have to work through this themselves,” he said.

An Obama administration pep-talk

Chu was joined at the hearing by Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, who each offered support for the Waxman-Markey bill that the House passed last month. The administration officials put very little emphasis on the House bill’s goal of reducing planet-warming emissions, instead focusing on the economic benefits they believe it will create.

“This is a jobs bill, it’s an energy bill,” Jackson told the panel, though she also noted the need for the United States to take the lead in addressing climate change, and what she characterized as a growing desire among the American public to act on this issue.

“I think the tide is turning against the defenders of the status quo. I think Americans want reform that harnesses the country’s can-do spirit,” she said. “This is what the president wants, this is what I want.”

“To solve these challenges the administration and Congress need to work together,” echoed Chu. “The president and I applaud historic action in the House ... I look forward to working with Senate.”

The majority of the witnesses on Tuesday spoke strongly in favor of action. and the dialog between witnesses and Democratic senators was strongly supportive of improving and passing the House bill. Their afternoon panel of the day featured Dow Chemical Vice President of Energy Rich Wells (text of prepared statement); Braddock, Pa., Mayor John Fetterman (statement); and David Hawkins, director of the Climate Center at the Natural Resources Defense Council (statement).

The only dissenting voice heard by the committee belonged to Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour (R), a former big-time lobbyist for energy interests.

Senate once, Senate a thousand times

Democrats on Boxer’s committee appear to be united on the need to pass a climate bill, even if Republicans aren’t on board.

There’s even hope that the environment panel will produce a stronger bill than what came out of the House. The House committee that drafted Waxman-Markey is stacked with more representatives from coal and manufacturing states, while the Senate committee is comprised of many coastal-state, liberal senators who have spoken out in favor of climate action.

In addition to Boxer, the panel includes strong climate action proponents like Tom Carper (D-Del.), Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) Ben Cardin (Md.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Tom Udall (D-N.M.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) It’s not entirely clear how Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Max Baucus (D-Mont.), and Arlen Specter (D-Pa.) would vote on climate legislation. Democrats outnumber Republicans 12 to 7, so they can afford some defections.

Boxer was among the panel’s members who raised questions about the opportunity to improve some components of the bill. Speaking to NRDC’s Hawkins, Boxer asked about how the bill could retain more power for the EPA under the Clean Air Act, which the House bill all but removes. Hawkins suggested that the committee should restore the New Source Review and Performance Review standard provisions of Clean Air Act.

Hawkins also suggested that the Senate bill should create an incentive program that would entice states with tougher emissions reductions goals to adopt federal standards, rather than preempting their plans entirely. There also seemed to be interest among the panel in raising the near-term emissions reductions targets, which in the House bill aim to cut emissions 17 percent by 2020.

Boxer’s committee approved the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act last year, though the bill died on the Senate floor.

The skeptic tank

Led by Sen. James Inhofe (Okla.), the ranking Republican on the committee and an outspoken skeptic of climate change science (of “global warming is the greatest hoax perpetrated on mankind” fame), the panel’s Republicans maligned the House’s bill as a tax scheme that would destroy the economy.

Wyoming Republican John Barrasso used his platform to rehash both the thoroughly debunked “EPA suppression story” as well as the utterly false story about the Office of Management and Budget challenging the SBA’s finding that climate change is a threat to human health.

Kit Bond (R-Mo.) used his opening statement to decry the climate bill’s length, without delving much into substance. “My Missouri constituents deserve to know why it takes 1,427 pages to address energy issues,” said Bond, whose staff circulated an incomprehensible graph that they claim illustrates the “bureaucratic nightmare” that would result from the House climate bill.

The GOP’s star witness of the day, Gov. Barbour, was also highly critical of Democrats for even taking up climate and energy legislation. “It’s hard to believe that at a time when growing our economy is our number one priority Congress is considering a bill that would reduce economic growth,” he said.

Barbour, who previously represented energy giant Southern Company as a lobbyist, is considered a potential candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012.

Next up

Like last year, the much bigger challenge will be securing enough votes to pass a climate bill in the full Senate, where debate is expected to begin in the fall.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has set a deadline of Sept. 18 for committees with jurisdiction over the elements of climate and energy legislation to complete their work, and a vote is expected sometime after that. Other committees expected to take up components of a climate and energy bill include Foreign Relations; Finance; Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry; and Health, Education, Labor and Pensions. The Energy and Natural Resources panel approved an energy package last month that covers most of what would fall under its jurisdiction.

Boxer’s EPW will hold several more hearings over the next weeks on the details of climate legislation. On Thursday, the EPW’s Subcommittee on Clean Air and Nuclear Safety will hold a hearing on the Clean Air Act. There is no specific time frame yet for when we will see a bill.

Kate Sheppard covers energy and environmental politics for Mother Jones. She was previously the political reporter for Grist and a writing fellow at The American Prospect. You can find her work here and follow her on Twitter.

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  1. Royal Enfield's avatar

    Royal Enfield Posted 9:34 pm
    07 Jul 2009

    If there’s a push to have a stronger bill come out of committee that does not have the support it needs, then this has all been an exercise in futility.  It would be wise to take a page out of Waxman’s book and focus on getting it passed on the floor as it is crafted in committee.

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  2. randino Posted 7:10 am
    08 Jul 2009

    With the emphasis on "clean coal" and now "renewable nuclear power" perhaps we should name the Senate Bill the Rube Goldberg or  the Mad Hatter or even the Dr. Strangelove climate bill.  One thing is for certain, this bill will have its goofy to outright crazy side of it, meaning it is a accurate reflection of the politics and society writing it. Randy Cunningham 

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  3. jestbill Posted 10:11 am
    08 Jul 2009

    Are any of the Republicans criticizing the bill for its impact on the abortion debate?I wouldn't be surprised.  Anything to delay, delay, delay.

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  4. Chris Mandic Posted 12:42 pm
    08 Jul 2009

    I really don't understand the aversion to nuclear power. Advanced European and Asian countries are safely using it. TMI and Chernobyl basically happened because of things that people knew not to do at the time, but they did anyway. Since then, safety features have been vastly improved. Build one three hundred feet beneath my house!

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  5. greenpeacetempe Posted 5:57 pm
    08 Jul 2009

    If it takes nukes to get this bill passed, build the nukes! We need a "whatever it takes" attitude. However, nuclear is not "renewable", it's not domestic (we import most of our uranium), and it's expensive.

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    1. UMINER Posted 7:29 pm
      12 Jul 2009

      It doesn't have to be that way, I live in an area where there is plentyof uranium, its easy to mine, and a mill is already here, I own alotmyself as do other miners here, we just need the government to stopregulating it to the point that makes it un-mineable, its as though the government and enviro's want us to buy it from countries that don't likeus as we do our oil. If obama really wanted to create jobs and energyindependence he would work with us instead of against us. 

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      1. jestbill Posted 7:52 pm
        12 Jul 2009

        Well, I suppose, if we had single payer health insurance we wouldn't need to regulate mining like we do (wish we did)...Of course some of the regulations have to do with where it goes and who gets it--Homeland Security has it tough.

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  6. Craig Allen's avatar

    Craig Allen Posted 7:20 pm
    08 Jul 2009

    GreenPeaceTempe,If the new Integrated Fast Reactors were implemented, then the fuel would be predominately domestic as those reactors will mostly run on nuclear waste, eating up the stockpiles that have been left by other reactors and the nuclear weapons industry. See http://bravenewclimate.com/2009/07/01/brave-new-power-for-the-world/

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    1. Nemo Posted 9:49 pm
      08 Jul 2009

      http://www.rmi.org/sitepages/pid601.php"Spent LWR fuel “burned” in IFRs, it’s claimed, could meet all humanity’s energy needs for centuries. But renewables and efficiency can do that forever at far lower cost, with no proliferation, nuclear wastes, or major risks.10 Moreover, any new type of reactor would probably cost even more than today’s models: even if the nuclear part of a new plant were free, the rest—two-thirds of its capital cost—would still be grossly uncompetitive with any efficiency and most renewables, sending out a kilowatt-hour for ~9–13¢/kWh instead of new LWRs’ ~12–18+¢. In contrast, the average U.S. windfarm completed in 2007 sold its power (net of a 1¢/ kWh subsidy that’s a small fraction of nuclear subsidies) for 4.5¢/kWh. Add ~0.4¢ to make it dispatchable whether the wind is blowing or not and you get under a nickel delivered to the grid.""In short, the notion that different or smaller reactors plus wholly new fuel cycles (and, usually, new competitive conditions and political systems) could overcome nuclear energy’s inherent problems is not just decades too late, but fundamentally a fantasy. Fantasies are all right, but people should pay for their own. Investors in and advocates of small-reactor innovations will be disappointed. But in due course, the aging advocates of the half-century-old reactor concepts that never made it to market will retire and die, their credulous young devotees will relearn painful lessons lately forgotten, and the whole nuclear business will complete its slow death of an incurable attack of market forces. Meanwhile, the rest of us shouldn’t be distracted from getting on with the winning investments that make sense, make money, and really do solve the energy, climate, and proliferation problems, led by business for profit."

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      1. Craig Allen's avatar

        Craig Allen Posted 10:09 pm
        08 Jul 2009

        Unfortunately wind and solar have footprints also. The areas of land that will be required seem to be massive. In Australia we have already seen big arrays of wind turbines built in places where they have significant ecological impact. Solar will do the same. Wind and solar in the quanities required will have significant impacts. So it isn't a case of renewables 100% good, nuclear 100% bad.I had hoped that solar and wind would preferentially be built in places where they have less or mininal impact. But that does not seem to be the case. The companies that build them seem to be just as bloody minded about the way they make their business decissions as others. 

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      2. UMINER Posted 7:38 pm
        12 Jul 2009

        It never ceases to amaze me the fanticyworld the libs live in.

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  7. splashy's avatar

    splashy Posted 7:59 pm
    08 Jul 2009

    I really don't understand the attraction to nuclear power. So what if it's being "safely" used, it creates long lasting deadly waste. Why would we want to pass that on to future generations, as it's been passed on to us? There is no regard to the waste piling up.What is with the Republicans. It seems that the dirtier, the most polluting, the most harm to the average person, the better they like it. It's like they want working people to suffer and die as much as possible, as young as possible. It also seems they think they are immune themselves, as though they are a different species.

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    1. Royal Enfield's avatar

      Royal Enfield Posted 9:32 pm
      08 Jul 2009

      Splashy, The attraction to nuclear power is this: we must have baseload power.  There are 2 ways to get tremendous and steady amounts of power, coal and nukes.  Wind is too intermittent, and solar only works during the day.  Storage of electricity is not yet viable either.  Coal is the number one climate threat, nuclear is not.  It's no plot against humanity, it's Energy 101. Energy 102, which neither the republicans nor the democrats seem to get yet is this: the fastest, cheapest and greenest way to address our energy needs is energy efficiency.  One of the slowest, dirtiest, and astronomically expensive ways to do so is with nuclear.   Come hell or high water we are going to get this bill passed and it will include obscene nuclear provisions which the climate community as a whole prefers over catastrophic climate change.  

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  8. Nemo Posted 8:06 pm
    09 Jul 2009

    http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2009/january7/power-010709.html "Wind, water and sun beat other energy alternatives, study finds BY LOUIS BERGERONLM Glasfiberhttp://news.stanford.edu/news/2009/january7/gifs/windfarm_hz.jpgWind power is the most promising alternative source of energy, according to Mark Jacobson.The best ways to improve energy security, mitigate global warming and reduce the number of deaths caused by air pollution are blowing in the wind and rippling in the water, not growing on prairies or glowing inside nuclear power plants, says Mark Z. Jacobson, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Stanford.And "clean coal," which involves capturing carbon emissions and sequestering them in the earth, is not clean at all, he asserts.Jacobson has conducted the first quantitative, scientific evaluation of the proposed, major, energy-related solutions by assessing not only their potential for delivering energy for electricity and vehicles, but also their impacts on global warming, human health, energy security, water supply, space requirements, wildlife, water pollution, reliability and sustainability. His findings indicate that the options that are getting the most attention are between 25 to 1,000 times more polluting than the best available options. The paper with his findings will be published in the next issue of Energy and Environmental Science but is available online now. Jacobson is also director of the Atmosphere/Energy Program at Stanford."

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  9. neosapiens's avatar

    neosapiens Posted 11:58 pm
    12 Jul 2009

    If the choice really were between coal and nuclear, then nuclear would be sensible, but this is not the real choice.  There is explosion of innovation going on right now.  Instead of pouring hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars into a few huge plants that won't come on line for a decade or more, why not open up the playing field to the multitude of entreprenuers and let them compete on the basis of the greatest climate mitigation per dollar?  Millions of small to medium-scale projects and a very few big projects would get the job done more rapidly and at lower cost than a new fleet of massive nuclear plants.  If we commit ourselves to a decade of building out old technology, we'll be starving resources from new, innovative and more cost-effective efforts.   It really gets down to prying control away from the clutches of vested special interests. My guess is that the real reason for touting nuclear plants has more to do with rewarding big political contributors than with implementing cost-effective climate remediation.

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  10. Username's avatar

    Username Posted 6:39 am
    14 Jul 2009

    Great Article.

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