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More trains, fewer planes and automobiles American PRIDE Alternative to Lieberman-Kerry Climate bill -short executive summary by Gar Lipow 16 May 2010 8:52 AM
This is the executive summary of the American PRIDE (Promote Renewable Infrastructure & Develop Efficiency) proposal. The PRIDE proposal is a two decade ~400 billion a year jobs bill that makes a profit, while creating two to five million new jobs per year, reducing U.S. oil use by a third within ten years, and reducing U.S. greenhouse gases around 60% by 2020. It phases out close to 90% of U.S. emissions by 2030 and reduces greenhouse gas pollution to around zero by 2040.
***Possible technical means***
To show that this political proposal is reality based, it includes one feasible technical path for carrying out the policy proposed without claiming this path is the best implementation.
The proposal documents that solar and wind energy (along with hydro and geothermal) can produce almost 90% of U.S. electricity by 2020, and almost all by 2030 [1].
It also outlines the potential for major energy savings and use of solar water and space heating in buildings, and for substituting renewable electricity for most remaining needs in the buildings sector.
In transportation we fund sidewalks and bike paths and encourage smart development. We electrify buses in the short run and build new light rail in the long run. Telecommuting and on-line shopping also can reduce miles driven. Electric car manufacturing might become large scale beginning in 2020, but that is not certain. We can replace most long haul trucking with greatly upgraded electric freight rail. The proposal also discusses means of reducing emissions from air traffic, shipping, boating and pipelines.
In industry the proposal focuses on indirect means of saving emissions. These include longer product lifespans, less packaging, substituting less greenhouse gas intensive materials (such as Grancrete[2] for Portland cement), reducing solid waste in manufacturing and increased recycling. It also discusses direct methods such as more efficient boilers, and more efficient pumps and motors, and process changes such as producing steel via Direct Reduction rather than Basic Oxygen Furnaces.
In agriculture, animal husbandry and forestry it discusses green grazing, holistic soil management and other techniques that drastically reduce inputs and transform the production of row crops, meat and fiber from net greenhouse gas emitters to net greenhouse gas sequestrators.
****Policy to produce these results*****
The proposal advocates a double renewable standard to require 75% of electricity generated be from wind and sun, and 80% from renewable or ultra-low carbon sources by 2020 - 50% subsidized
It discusses funding mini-utilities that in turn fund efficiency improvements and renewables in buildings, along with conversion from direct use of fuel to renewable electricity - either produced on site, or purchased from the renewable grid.
Mini-utilities would be legally responsible for reducing direct emissions in buildings within their districts by 77% per capita compared to 2008 per capita average greenhouse gas pollution in comparable climate zones. Financing would be reinforced by regulations that required the same 77% emissions reductions.
Transport improvement would include public financing for upgrading and electrifying freight rail(pdf) so that it could move 85% of the ton-miles currently carried by long haul trucking[3]. Public investment would also fund at least a 100,000 miles of new light rail, more if electric cars were not practical by 2020. For short term savings we would fund electrification of the most heavily used bus routes, and also fund preservation of existing transit - thus breaking the vicious cycle where fares rise and routes are cut whenever use of transit increases due to a poor economy or high fuel prices. Just as importantly, we would fund the "other public transit" - bicycle paths and sidewalks.
We would fund internet improvements so that everyone in the U.S. had access to world-class broadband, and encourage more telecommuting and shopping on-line. Regulations charging employers for employee commuting and business travel emissions would encourage managers to support telecommuting, use of transit, bicycles and so forth. Subsidizing delivery costs could encourage greater use of internet shopping; it would also encourage shopping by bicycle, transit and walking, since packages could be delivered rather than carried by customers.
Starting in 2014, the automobile fleet should have to meet an average standard of 40 mpg. From 2020 forward, new cars will either be fully electric, or capable of running 50 miles on an electric battery before switching to gasoline. If manufacturers cannot produce a full fleet meeting those standards, then resources that would have gone into creating electric cars will be used to massively deploy light rail beyond the 100,000 miles specified.
Air travel emissions will be reduced via banning of most private jets, requiring airlines to drastically reduce contrails and cumulus clouds created by air travel, a freeze on new airports, and a freeze on airport expansion of any sort that does not reduce emissions. The proposal also contains means of reducing water travel and pipeline emissions.
The proposal reduces industrial emissions by rules that indirectly increase industrial efficiency. Life-cycle emissions are reduced via lifespan requirement, regulations requiring multi-year warranties for most manufactured goods, and manufacturer responsibility for product end-of-life. Regulations will also require reductions in embodied emissions in construction and manufactured goods at the same time reductions in operating emissions are required. These will be supplemented by water, toxics, and solid waste rules.
Direct standards for boiler efficiency, and for pumping and motor efficiency will reduce emissions. As the grid is decarbonized, we will also require that at least 25% of processes currently driven by direct fueling be powered by electricity instead. Once the grid is mostly renewable (in 2020) this requirement will be gradually raised to 65%, as most remaining use of fossil fuels for electricity generation is phased out.
In agriculture and forestry subsidies will be switched from industrial meat and corn and ethanol and logging to green grazing, row crops and forestry that use holistic soil management to drastically lower dirty inputs, and to build rather than destroy soil and biological diversity. This will be reinforced by requiring the same changes we subsidize.
To prevent rebound effects, to drive change in industry and to generally reinforce these public investments and regulations, the proposal also advocates an emissions fee where most of the revenue generated is returned in equal amounts to the public.
You can download this executive summary as a word document at: http://nohairshirts.com/AmericanPrideExecSummary.doc You can download this executive summary as an acrobat pdf at: http://nohairshirts.com/AmericanPrideExecSummary.pdf
You can download the full proposal as a word document at: http://nohairshirts.com/AmericanPRIDEcbill.doc You can download as an acrobat pdf at: http://nohairshirts.com/AmericanPRIDEcbill.pdf .
------------Notes--------------- [1] Archer, Cristina L., and Mark Z. Jacobson. "Evaluation of Global Wind Power." 110, no. D12 30-Jun 2005. American Geophysical Union. http://www.stanford.edu/group/efmh/winds/2004jd005462.pdf. D12110 DOI:10.1029/2004JD005462. Accessed 20-Jan-2008
Gerhard Knies, Deserts as Sustainable Powerhouses and Inexhaustible Waterworks for the World, Sep-2006). Sep 2006. Trans-Mediterranean Renewable Energy Cooperation - (Formed by The Club of Rome, The Hamburg Climate Protection Foundation, and the National Energy Research Center of Jordan., 3/Jan/2007 .
Mark Z Jacobson & Mark A. Delucchi, "A Plan for a Sustainable Future: How to Get all Power from Wind, Water and Solar Power by 2030", Scientific American (Nov, 2009)
[2] Grancrete, Inc., ,Grancrete: New Materials for a New World http://www.grancrete.net/faq/ (Accessed April 8, 2010)
[3] Drake et al., Evaluating the Creation of a Parallel Non-Oil Transportation System in an Oil Constrained Future, (Arlington: Millenium Institute, Jan-2008),1-18, http://www.millenniuminstitute.net/resources/elibrary/papers/Transportation_MI09.pdf (accessed Jan-31-2010).