10-R042
2010 -- H 7223
Enacted 01/26/10
H O U S E R E S
O L U T I O N
RESPECTFULLY
REQUESTING THE UNITED STATES SENATE TO HOLD DIRTY COAL PLANTS ACCOUNTABLE IN
THE SENATE ENERGY AND CLIMATE BILL
Introduced By: Representatives Kilmartin, Pacheco, M Rice, Gallison, and Walsh
Date Introduced: January 26, 2010
WHEREAS, Old, clunker
coal plants must be required to meet smokestack-specific
standards; and
WHEREAS, For the same reasons we require cars, air conditioners, and light
bulbs to
meet technology standards, we must also set standards for
coal plants, the nation’s single largest
source of global warming pollution; and
WHEREAS, If we are to
transition smoothly to a clean energy economy and solve global
warming, coal plants – old and new alike – must not be
permitted to keep running on inefficient,
decades-old technology; and
WHEREAS, The pollution cap will not be enough by itself to
significantly cut pollution
from coal plants in the next decade; and
WHEREAS, The cap alone is not sufficient because, consistent with the
U.S. House-
passed bill and legislation under development in the U.S.
Senate, (1) the emissions ceiling likely
will decline relatively slowly for the first decade of the
program; (2) companies likely will
receive free pollution allowances to cover most of their
emissions; and (3) companies will be able
to avoid reducing pollution at their plants by
purchasing offsets generated by projects in the
New Source Review and New Source Performance Standards
for carbon dioxide from existing
coal plants) projects that only 6.9 percent of existing
coal generation capacity will be retired by
2025, with most of the retired capacity occurring at
“marginal units with low capacity” that are
“part of larger plants that
are expected to continue generating”; and
WHEREAS, Singling out
existing stationary sources from complying with emissions and
efficiency standards will give them a massive, unfair leg-up,
tipping the market against clean
sources like wind and solar; and
WHEREAS, The U.S.
Department of Energy projects that electricity demand will be
relatively flat over the next twenty years (an annual average
growth rate of less than one percent),
even before considering the multitude of efficiency gains
that would be achieved by the House-
passed energy bill and other policies; and
WHEREAS, If electricity demand is flat and old coal plants don’t
begin to retire, there
will be a much smaller market for renewables.
Indeed, the EPA’s analysis of the House-passed
energy bill projects that coal will continue to provide
nearly half of the nation’s electricity
through at least 2025; and
WHEREAS, Companies will
be perversely encouraged to keep operating – and even
expand the operation of their oldest and dirtiest coal
plants if they are exempted from modern
pollution standards; and
WHEREAS, Under the
House-passed energy bill, new plants would, in a few years, have
to meet fairly stringent global warming limits, but old
plants would not have to meet any
smokestack-specific standards, even if they are expanded in ways that
drive up pollution. This
loophole invites the industry to ramp up their use of old,
dirty coal plants instead of retrofitting
them to reduce pollution or retiring the oldest dinosaurs
to make way for renewable energy; and
WHEREAS, Moving to clean energy means leaving old, inefficient, and
dirty technology
behind; and
WHEREAS, Just as
emissions standards for automobiles help ensure that the dirtiest
clunkers on the highway are replaced with newer models, so
would effective global warming
pollution standards help ensure that clunker coal plants, many
of them forty to fifty years old,
don’t keep operating indefinitely; and
WHEREAS,
Coal plants impose major costs on the environment and public health. The
tens of billions of dollars a year in public health
damages. And in the meantime, countries like
WHEREAS, Standards for
clunker coal plants will require investment in
infrastructure that will create clean energy jobs. By requiring that
outdated coal plants install
modern technology to reduce global warming pollution, we
will unleash innovation and put
WHEREAS, We cannot stop the worst effects of global warming unless we
start cutting
pollution from coal plants now; and
WHEREAS, A recent report
on “The Future of Coal” by the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology makes clear that there is “no credible
pathway toward GHG stabilization targets
without emissions reductions from existing coal plants.”
Steady reductions in pollution from coal
plants are necessary to achieve the deep cuts in pollution
that science already shows is necessary
by 2030 and later; now, therefore be it
RESOLVED,
That this House of Representatives of the State of
Providence Plantations
hereby respectfully urges Senate Majority Leader Reid, Senator Jack
Reed, and Senator Sheldon
Whitehouse to ensure that the Senate energy and climate bill
preserves the Clean Air Act requirements that coal plants meet
global warming pollution
standards in order to fight global warming and repower
further
RESOLVED,
That the Secretary of State be and he hereby is
authorized and directed to
transmit a duly certified copy of this resolution to The
Honorable Harry Reid, U.S. Senate
Majority Leader, The Honorable Jack
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LC00426
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