Compilation of Recommendations to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions in New York State

Compilation of Recommendations to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions in New York State Kate Marsh, Neely McKee and Jordan Gerow Introduction by Michael B. Gerrard July 30, 2020 Introduction and User Guide Michael B. Gerrard Andrew Sabin Professor of Professional Practice Faculty Director, Sabin Center for Climate Change Law Columbia Law School The Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA) was passed by both houses of the New York State legislature and signed into law by Governor Andrew Cuomo in June 2019. It took effect on January 1, 2020. It requires total statewide greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to be 40% below 1990 levels in 2030 and 85% below 1990 levels in 2050, with an aspirational goal of a 100% reduction in 2050. It is one of the strongest climate change laws in the world, and people everywhere are watching its implementation for models of what can be done elsewhere. The CLCPA establishes a Climate Action Council of 22 members (12 of whom are the heads of state agencies) to devise a “scoping plan” for how the law will be implemented. It will form several advisory committees, and will work with special advisory groups on environmental justice and on “just transition.” A draft plan is due in January 2022. After hearings and other public consultation, a final plan is due in January 2023. By January 2024, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation is required to promulgate regulations “to ensure compliance with the statewide emission reduction limits.” This process of requiring an agency to devise a scoping plan for implementation is modeled after California’s Global Warming Solutions Act, AB32. Over the years many recommendations have been made as to what substantive actions New York can take to lower its GHG footprint. The purpose of this Compilation of Recommendations document is to assemble in one place all of the published recommendations, organized by subject matter, for the use of the Climate Action Council, its advisory committees, the state officials who will be responsible for implementing the law, and members of the environmental, environmental justice, business and other communities who will be monitoring the preparation of the scoping plan and the implementation of its recommendations. This is the second New York Climate Action Council. The first was established by Governor David Paterson in 2009. It consisted of the heads of many state agencies. Working with several large technical advisory committees, it issued an interim report in November 2010 with a great many specific recommendations. Governor Cuomo took office two months later and the report was largely shelved, though parts of it morphed into what became the State Energy Plan. Since then many government agencies, nongovernmental organizations, business groups, academic centers, think tanks and others have issued reports with specific ideas about actions New York could take to transition away from the use of fossil fuels and to lower GHG emissions. This document has endeavored to locate these reports and set forth their recommendations. Another effort has been based on reports issued in 2014 and 2015, Pathways to Deep Decarbonization in the United States, prepared for the Sustainable Development Solutions Network and the Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI) by 1 Energy + Environmental Economics (E3). It set forth detailed technical pathways for the U.S. to reduce its GHG emissions. Based on this report, Professor John Dernbach and I led a project that led to the publication by the Environmental Law Institute in 2019 of a large book, Legal Pathways to Deep Decarbonization in the United States. This book contains more than 1,500 recommendations for federal, state and local actions to follow the pathways identified by the technical reports, as well as other actions that go beyond those reports. The book also contains detailed descriptions of the current state of the law on the matters it covers and legal analyses of its recommendations. Professor Dernbach and I then launched a project, which I describe in this article, to recruit pro bono lawyers to draft the model laws recommended by the Legal Pathways book. This project has also created a web site, Model Laws for Deep Decarbonization in the United States, where we are posting these model laws as well as large numbers of other existing and model laws and other resources. As of this writing, 1,829 items are posted there. The Compilation of Recommendations document includes the relevant recommendations for state action in the Legal Pathways book (denoted as “LPDD Recommendations”), and links to the model laws and other resources posted on the web site (denoted as “LPDD Resources”). This document, the Compilation of Recommendations, begins with a detailed table of contents. Its headings have links that will take the reader to the relevant section. After the table of contents is a list of the sources of recommendations, with links to all of them. The recommendations in the document are all keyed to their sources so the reader can find where they came from. For each topic, where applicable we begin with a list of current New York actions, followed by the LPDD recommendations; the LPDD resources, recommendations from others; discussion and analyses of the relevant issues; and other relevant resources. Inclusion of a recommendation in the Compilation of Recommendations is not an endorsement. Indeed, some of the recommendations contradict each other. Our purpose was to compile the recommendations that others have made, so that the Climate Action Council and others will have in front of them a large set of potential actions from which to choose. We have also created a related resource, the New York State Climate Law Tracker. It is a web site that monitors the implementation of the CLCPA and three other related New York statutes - - the Community Risk and Resiliency Act of 2014 (CRRA), the Environmental Justice Law of 2019, and the Accelerated Renewable Energy Growth and Community Benefits Act of 2020. The web site displays the deadlines set forth in these four laws and indicates which have been met, which are overdue, and which are upcoming or ongoing. Another of our trackers, the New York City Climate Law Tracker, similarly tracks implementation of the Climate Mobilization Act of 2019, including Local law 97. The CLCPA concerns reduction in GHG emissions. The CRRA concerns adaptation to the impacts of climate change. Since this compilation is designed to assist in the implementation of CLCPA, it does not cover adaptation measures. 2 The Compilation of Recommendations, the New York State Climate Law Tracker and the New York City climate Law Tracker are living documents. If readers identify additional or new sets of recommendations, errors or omissions, or new developments, please send them to my Sabin Center colleague Hillary Aidun, [email protected]. This document is the work of three people working under my supervision. Kate Marsh and Neely McKee are students at Columbia College who spent the summer of 2020 working (remotely) for the Sabin Center creating this document, with the support of the Laidlaw Undergraduate Research and Leadership Program. Jordan Gerow is an attorney working with the LPDD project who created the Model Laws to Deep Decarbonization website, and has inserted the LPDD recommendations and resource links. I am most appreciative of the diligent efforts of Kate, Neely and Jordan in creating a document that we hope will be helpful in achieving the important and essential ambitions of the CLCPA. July 30, 2020 3 Table of Contents Introduction and User Guide 1 Table of Contents 4 Key to Sources 8 Transportation 27 Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure 27 Electric Vehicle Purchases and Incentives (Light Duty ZEVs) 30 Autonomous Vehicles 33 Fuel Economy and Maintenance for Gasoline and Diesel Vehicles 35 Bicycles and Walking 37 Heavy Duty Vehicles 40 Freight Management 44 School Buses 47 Public Transit 50 Transportation Demand Management 56 Telecommuting 57 Carpooling 58 Aviation 60 Shipping 61 Tolls and Pricing 64 Land Use and Local Government 66 Zoning for High-Density & Mixed-Use Development 66 Transit-Oriented Development 68 Buildings and Energy Efficiency 71 Standards for New Buildings 71 Standards for Existing Buildings 74 Smart Thermostats 83 Green, White and Cool Roofs 84 Solar Hot Water 87 Building Heating Systems (End Use Electrification)– Electrification, Heat Pumps 88 Cooking – Electrification 101 District Energy / Combined Heat and Power 102 Thermal Storage 105 Modular Buildings 106 Tenant Programs 108 Appliance Standards 110 Low-Carbon Building Materials 113 Consumer Awareness and Education 115 Building Energy and Emissions Disclosure 119 4 Government Procurement 124 Energy Intensive Industries 128 Cement 128 Primary Metals (Steel and Aluminum) 134 Refrigerants, HFCs 135 Bitcoin Mining 136 Natural Gas Production, Processing and Distribution 140 Industrial Process Incentives 143 Low Carbon Thermal Solutions / Industrial Heat Emissions 145 Miscellaneous 149 Electricity Generation Closure of Existing Fossil Fuel Facilities 150 Closure of Existing Natural Gas Plants 154 Controls on New Fossil Fuel Facilities 158 Onshore Wind 160 Offshore Wind 164 Land-Based Facilities for Offshore Wind 171 Utility-Scale Solar 172 Distributed Solar 174 Community Solar 178 Hydropower – In-state 185 Hydropower – Out-of-state; Canada 187 Geothermal 190 Nuclear 192 Emergency Generators 195 Transmission 196 Grid Planning 207 Storage 212

Load more