Activists are calling it the “Power Mad Power Grab”, plus more news, this week in CIB:
- Legislative Watch: Nightmare on Jones Street
- Climate Change Update: Legislators Receive Dose of Snake Oil
- Nuclear Update: Duke Pulls the Plug
- Administrative Watch: Duke Files Next Rate Hike Request
- Education & Resources: Greenhouse Gas Emissions Data
Legislative Watch: Nightmare on Jones Street
Current leadership in the General Assembly–especially in the Senate–seems to be abandoning any pretense of interest in or respect for scientific knowledge or public viewpoints not in keeping with their own political philosophy. In what public interest advocates are calling a “power mad power grab”, the N.C. Senate last week swiftly approved legislation which would strip key state regulatory boards of all current members, and reconstitute narrower boards with little regard for scientific experience or environmental concern.
SB 10, the so-called “Government Reduction and Efficiency Act”, would target the most important state commissions for environmental protection (especially the Environmental Management Commission, Utilities Commission, and Coastal Resources Commission). It would impose the new legislature’s and governor’s undiluted biases on the oversight of electric power generation, air and water pollution control, and management of coastal land and resources in our state.
Some results would be obvious. This would immediately put appointment of the entire Utilities Commission–which controls electric rates, power plant construction financing, and incentives for renewable energy development–in the hands of a new governor who has spent essentially his entire professional career working for a single giant power company, Duke Energy. Perhaps it truly would be more efficient to simply designate the Duke Energy Board of Directors as the new state Utilities Commission.
The impacts on the environmental regulatory boards would be nearly as flagrant. In addition to stripping the Environmental Management Commission (EMC) of all current members, the bill would shrink the EMC from 19 to 13 members. Eliminated from the commission would be seats reserved for persons trained in biology/ecology, fish and wildlife conservation, and local government. The bill would also eliminate the requirement that most members of the commission not derive significant income from persons/companies subject to its permitting or enforcement authority. (Besides the obvious risk of corruption or the appearance of corruption, that last revision could lead the federal government to revoke the state’s authority over water pollution discharge permitting altogether.)
The Coastal Resources Commission (CRC) likewise would be stripped of its current membership and shrunk from 15 to 11 members. Eliminated from the CRC’s membership would be seats reserved for the following areas of experience/expertise: conservation organization, commercial fishing, wildlife or sport fishing, marine ecology, coastal forestry, and coastal agriculture. The CRC would still have seats reserved for land owners or developers, although there would no longer be any requirement that most members of the commission actually live in the coastal area. The CRC would also be stripped of any requirement that most of its members not derive significant income from land development, construction, real estate, or lobbying.
In other words, the stage would be set for all three of these critical boards to come under the unchallenged control of those special economic interests that they were intended to regulate. It would eliminate the critical existing mix of technical expertise from a variety of perspectives (citizens, scientists, business, and industry). By throwing out the established system of staggered member terms and firing all current members at once, it would dissolve four decades of non-partisan experience. It would create a system of environmental regulation designed to fail to protect public health and natural resources.
Less than a week after being unveiled, SB 10 was approved by the Senate on a near-party-line vote and sent to the House. Tellingly, even some members of the majority party in the House are expressing concern about the precipitous and radical nature of the bill. Public interest and good-government advocates around the state have expressed alarm and outrage. We hope that the House will sit on this unwise bill while cooler heads have time to reveal the depth of its errors.
CIB‘s own Dan Besse represented NCLCV at a news event about SB 10 in Greensboro on Friday. Besse, who has served on two of the affected commissions, argued that the bill would take decades of experience from the commissions and result in weaker environmental regulations. See more here.
For more perspectives on this issue, see here.
Climate Change Update: Legislators Receive Dose of Snake Oil
Legislators were also treated last week to a visit from one of the most notorious purveyors of climate change-denial snake oil, one John Droz. Droz is employed as a “Senior Fellow” by the American Tradition Institute, a group that targets environmental regulation for criticism. Readers may recall Droz as the “expert” brought in by the groups behind last session’s efforts to declare that sea level really isn’t rising, despite all the evidence to the contrary.
Droz appeared at the invitation of Sen. George Cleveland (R-Onslow), and spoke to a mixed audience of legislators and staff from the Dept. of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR). DENR division heads and senior managers were apparently encouraged to attend by new DENR Secretary John Skvarla–which says unfortunate things about Skvarla’s own level of understanding of this issue.
Droz’s most recent appearance in the North Carolina halls of government brought another round of snark from Scientific American in a blog post entitled “Still Bringing the Science Crazy in NC.” Most of that piece is amusing, in a black humor kind of way, but its closing line is wince-worthy: “North Carolina’s current prosperity has been built on science and education, and current political leadership has declared war on both.” Ouch.
Nuclear Update: Duke Pulls the Plug
Duke Energy last week announced that it has made the smart choice on the crippled Crystal River Nuclear Plant it inherited through its acquisition of Progress Energy last year. Duke is pulling the plug on any further efforts to repair the snake-bitten nuclear reactor in Florida. The company will forgo the dubious investment of as much as $3.4 billion (and rising) in a third round of repair attempts, and instead retire it and write off the remaining value of the plant.
In that move, Duke takes advantage of an agreement between Progress and Florida regulators that ratepayers of that state will be required to pay for $1.65 billion in costs already incurred in connection with the plant, so long as the plant’s owners just stop pouring still more dollars into efforts to get the thing running again.
Legislators, regulators, and members of the public weighing the wisdom of pursuing the so-called “nuclear renaissance” of renewed nuclear plant construction should take note. Duke admits that the closing/retirement process of the Crystal River plant could take 60 years before the plant is decontaminated, dismantled, and the site made available for some productive use again. Some nuclear skeptics go further, to openly question whether it is realistic to expect that large commercial reactor sites will be safely and economically opened to new use in mere decades. We are, after all, dealing with wastes that may take hundreds or even thousands of years to decay to safe radioactivity levels.
Administrative Watch: Duke Files Next Rate Hike Request
Duke Energy also last week filed its formal request for another rate increase to its North Carolina customers–while its previous rate hike is still under court challenge by the N.C. Attorney General. This time, Duke is requesting an average hike of 9.7 percent.
That ‘average’ increase, however, includes a ‘weighted’ average residential rate increase of 11.8 percent; and the typical monthly bill for the category in which most residential customers are found would go up by 14 percent.
Duke claims it needs this additional increase to help pay for another $3.8 billion it has sunk into the capital costs of two new power plants and upgrades to its nuclear plants and transmission network since 2011.
If the General Assembly finishes rushing through its commission-stripping bill, SB 10, perhaps this most recent Duke rate hike request can be decided by the new Utilities Commission entirely appointed by Duke’s career employee, Gov. Pat McCrory.
Education & Resources: Greenhouse Gas Emissions Data
The EPA last week posted on its website the second year of data on greenhouse gas emissions, sorted by gas, sector, and geographic region (like county or state). EPA now has available two years of data for 29 source categories.
Students of the facts on climate change (alas, we’re not talking about Mr. Droz here) may find this information of value in exploring questions of what sources are primarily responsible for climate impacts, and which ones may be being impacted by regulatory action (or the lack of it).
To access the EPA reporting program data tools, see here.
That’s our report for this week.
