Mission: What Is Our Fundamental Identity

Working Team: Minimal Environmental Impact 12 September 2011 6:00p – 7:30p MEETING #5 Citizens League Conference Room

Members Present: Jim Alders, Jack Ray, Stephen Rueff, Jessica Schaum, Erik Tomlinson

Staff Present: Annie Levenson-Falk, Daniel Negron

Meeting outcomes:  Review and Edit Draft – Agree on changes and process to finalize draft

1. Welcome & Introductions

 Everyone present introduced themselves

2. Review and negotiate agenda

 Material handed out was reviewed.  It was decided Annie would run the meeting.  The idea that we should look at other teams’ drafts was brought up. We will discuss if time allows.

3. Discussion of drafts  Zero or Minimal Environmental Impact? o Need to better acknowledge in the draft that the zero impact goal is unattainable. . This is what we mean when we say it’s an “aspirational goal.” . AGREEMENT: Explain that better. o Zero is impossible - we could set goal of “minimal environmental impact” instead of “zero.” . You can always make incremental improvements to reduce environmental impact, but you can never reach zero o What are the judgments you have to make to see if you’re approaching “minimal impact?” . There are emissions rates that don’t overly harm environment . Needs to be balanced – how much resources we invest towards this goal vs. other societal goals, balanced with affordability of electricity, etc. . At a minimum, we need to diminish impact per consumer because population is growing o Zero impact isn’t possible, but sustainable impact must be achieved. Make sure sustainability comes through strongly . Stephen’s version (9/3 draft) includes some potential tools of to measure that

1 o AGREEMENT: The goal: continuous improvement toward minimal environmental impact . The change will take time.

 Carbon/Climate Change o The words “carbon” and “climate” needed to mentioned, because they are missing from the drafts and are important factors. o Put the state and federal minimum carbon laws or standards in the draft as a baseline . Talk about steps MN has already taken to address climate change. MN is leader on renewable energy standards  Could fit with the “environmental protection” part of the triple bottom line discussion . It will be for Phase 2 to evaluate these standards o We don’t need to declare what side of the climate change debate we’re on. As a society, we’re better off the better the system performs. Carbon is one measure of system performance. . The debate will be over how much of our resources do you put to reducing carbon emissions and how fast. The answer depends partially on your position on climate change. This is for Phase 2. o AGREEMENT: Jessica and Jack will work with Erin to write up information about current standards

 Externalities/Transparency in Costs o Covered in the drafts: “full, complete and accurate” from 9/3 draft o MN PUC has set values for a number of externalities that must be used in utility resource planning (when utilities say how they plan to meet the needs of their customers) o The efficiency working team has spent a lot of time talking about externalities and is covering it in their draft as well o AGREEMENT: Stephen will follow up with Jim Alders to get background information for document

 Other discussion o Convenience, social supports and cultural norms paragraph (in 9/6 draft) is not convincing . Do we want anything in the draft about consumer behavior and education on how people use electricity and how it could be used more efficiently? . Do we address that some factors maybe cultural norms? . Discussion did not come to conclusions on this point, other than a sense that this needs some improvement

o Conservation and efficiency: . If we’re lucky, we won’t need efficiency and conservation in 2040 (if electricity is cheap/free, plentiful, no environmental impacts), but likely we will . Important even though it may be part of the “how,” not “what” we want to achieve.

2 . Do these concepts belong in this document?  Get towards tactics of achieving minimal environmental impact  Concepts are on a much higher level than some of the other tactics we have discussed (e.g. green buildings)  Another working team is working on efficiency, so the concept will be in the final synthesized document. Don’t need to worry too much about it.  We don’t know what 2040 will look like, and predictions we make will be wrong. But we should articulate some big ideas, e.g. conservation  It’s not only about emissions/discharge, it’s also about how we use electricity. It’s a little bit of a bridge to the “how,” but worth acknowledging . AGREEMENT: Move to end of document o AGREEMENTS: Changes from 9/6 draft . Under economics, rather than “most important driver of behavior and lever of change,” say “an important driver…” . Don’t say “Minnesota could be worldwide leader…” . Jevons paradox: take out “rate of.” It increases consumption, not rate of consumption o Cost is always a factor. o We did not discuss which of the 3 drafts people favored. Some comments (not committee agreements): . 9/3 draft not necessarily intended as a stand-alone document. It does not carry over much of the first draft . 9/6 draft:  Incorporates good points from the first draft and the 9/3 draft, good structure  The categories of drivers reflect our Post It exercise. Some members like that, but we don’t need to feel completely tied to everything from our discussions o A question was brought up about the September 3rd draft, page 2 the first bullet point, the question was who pays? o Who is the audience that should be written to? . Primary: Members working on Phase 2 – this will be framing document . More broadly . Not at the level of something that will interest most legislators; they want to see policy proposals . Externally, we would use a short summary rather than the full synthesized report in most situations

3 4. Next Steps and Evaluation  Next Steps: o A subgroup for carbon and climate was created to discuss the facts and figures. o Stephen will ask Jim Horan to write the next draft o The next draft will be due Monday (9/19) o The comments will be due from all members the following Monday (9/26) o A new draft will be prepared by leadership by following Monday (10/3) o October 10th will be the following meeting.

 See other assignments and agreements throughout notes

 Average Score: 3.6, range 3.5-4  Comments:  At the last meeting, we agreed members would comment on draft between meetings, and no one did (aside from Jim Horan, Stephen, and Erik who worked on drafts).  There has been quite a bit of trouble communicating with one another and mention that CitiZing may not be user friendly. Some working teams have chosen to do everything via email (reply all), which may work better.