Daily Score Blog

The Northwest Energy Coalition has just published a great primer on one of our favorite systemic solutions: decoupling utilities’ profits from their energy sales. Decoupling is an obscure but crucially important innovation that supercharges natural gas and electric power (and water) utilities’ incentive to help their customers conserve. Basically, it’s a pricing plan that ensures utilities still profit even if their customers buy less energy from them.

Several additional utilities in the Northwest have won decoupled rates from regulators: NW Natural in Oregon, Cascade Natural Gas in Oregon and Washington, and Spokane’s Avista—all for natural gas; and, for electricity, the Idaho Power Company.

The addition of these new utilities to the ranks of the decoupled is very good news, because the efficiency and climate protection gains that decoupling unleashes are a very big deal

Speaking of tracking the reasons Puget Sound’s roads and transit package failed--here’s a chance for Puget Sound residents to put in your two cents about the Proposition 1 vote and where to go from here.

Take Sound Transit's survey here:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/soundtransit

You can let Sound Transit hear your voice on transportation solutions in the region, congestion pricing, the taxes we pay for driving (and the costs we don’t pay), and other fascinating things (well, we think they are fascinating!) you read about here on the Daily Score.

We've argued before that one of the surprising reasons why Puget Sound's roads-and-transit package failed was that voters were concerned about climate emissions. Today, there's new polling data that buttresses our claim.

The poll finds that 20 percent of "no"-voters cited global warming as a reason for opposing the measure. This is an astonishing figure -- one I believe that's totally unprecedented, anywhere. (Someone please correct me if I'm wrong!) 

Below, I've cherry-picked a few interesting newspaper tidbits for your reading pleasure:

I'm anguished. For almost six weeks I've been meaning to post on Cold Facts About Our Warm Planet, a four-part TV series from Seattle's KIRO that you can view online. But I couldn't decide what I wanted to say.

On the one hand, it's terrific. The series is some of the best local TV coverage I've ever seen on climate. Focusing on disruptions to the Northwest's natural heritage, it includes great photography, good reporting on a range of issues, and unusually clear explanations of how climate change disrupts snowpack, forests, wildlife, and so on. So there's that.

On the other hand, some elements stink. I almost stopped watching after minute or two when the narrator intones, "Is it real or is it a hoax?"

A hoax? Seriously?

Are we still doing that? Or is that just what happens when a writer phones in a hackneyed script ?

Look, I hate to sound pugnacious -- no, really -- but in late 2007, framing a climate change series under the banner of "possible hoax" is just stupid. It's a bit different, I might add, than simply questioning the scientific veracity of global warming. That would a stupid exercise too -- for reasons too obvious to point out -- but it wouldn't be nearly as obnoxious as calling it a "hoax." Is climate change really in the same category as the Loch Ness Monster?

Hooray -- today's papers bring two pieces of good news!

First, Washington State rejected plans for a new coal-fired power plant, because the proposed plant would boost climate-warming emissions:

In a critical first test of a new state law meant to block construction of power plants that spew climate-changing gases, a state panel soundly rejected plans for a 793-megawatt plant in Kalama, Cowlitz County, that would be fueled by coal or oil-refinery waste.

That's great news: not only because of this particular plant, but also because it demonstrates that legal measures to curb climate change are actually beginning to have an effect.

And second, the US Energy Information Administration is reporting that GHG emissions in the US fell in 2006 (pdf link)-- the first decline since 2001.  My guess is that, even in the absence of  a comprehensive climate policy, higher energy prices are beginning to take the edge off energy appetite.  Of course, the decline was modest -- only about 1.5 percent -- and much of it could be attributed to mild weather. Still, when it comes to the climate, I'll take my good news where I can get it.

On the heels of the year's biggest travel week, some interesting news:

Consumers purchased an average 9.32 million barrels of gasoline a day in the week ended Nov. 23, down 1.7 percent from the same week last year.... It was the fifth consecutive week that demand at the pump dropped compared with a year earlier.

The price [of gas] was 38 percent higher than a year earlier.

That's right, population rose, but gas consumption fell, year-over-year.  Measured per person, it's a decline of about 3 percent -- not huge, but still noteworthy.

So does this mean that higher prices are starting to take a bite out of our appetite for fuel?  That a slowing economy is making consumers tighten their belts?  Either way, as long as it isn't a temporary blip in the data, it's a trend worth paying attention to.

...go ahead and say goodbye to the next half hour of your life.

That's if you're lucky.

I don't know what to say about this article -- which is largely a critique of a grandfathered "cap & trade" system for reducing greenhouse emissions. 

On the one hand, I shouldn't complain.  Any serious discussion in the press of climate policy is welcome. 

But on the other hand -- jeez, is it so hard to get climate policy right?

My problem isn't so much that the article gets things wrong, (though it does). Instead, it's that  it  tells at most half the story of cap and trade -- and maybe not even the important half.

Blame me. It’s my fault the Northwest does not treat bicycling with respect.

How? Bear with me, and I’ll explain.

For those of us south of the 49th parallel, tomorrow marks the one day every year that we set aside just for giving thanks.  And we obviously have lots to be thankful for.  I, for one, will be thankful not to have to do much writing over the long weekend. 

More importantly, for most of us in Cascadia, extremes of hunger and famine are a largely a thing of the past.  But where food is concerned, abundant doesn't necessarily mean sustainable -- the environmental impacts of our food system are still great, and the incentives food system is still geared more towards ensuring hyper-abundance than towards promoting healthy, balanced eating.

So in case you've looking for a little light reading after a heavy meal, we've compiled links to some of our favorite food-related posts over the last several years, after the jump.

Oh, and thank you to everyone who reads and contributes to Sightline -- we couldn't do it without you.

Last time I checked, oil prices were hovering just below $100 per barrel. This reminds me of something I used to obsess about: high oil prices hit some places harder than others.

All else being equal, oil-efficient economies are more insulated from oil price shocks than are economies that require large oil inputs to function. I'm not talking about the amount of oil consumption, but about the "oil-intensity" of an economy. New York state consumes a lot of oil and it also produces a lot of wealth. Other states, such as Louisiana, consume a lot of oil, but don't produce anywhere near as much wealth per unit of energy. (In fact, New York produces five times as much wealth per barrel of oil as Louisiana.)

Just so, when oil prices skyrocket, Rhode Island suffers less pain than Texas. And Massachusetts feels less of a pinch than Wyoming. So at the risk of oversimplification, I'll propose a little schema for the future: 

1. If the future is likely to bring high oil prices; and..
2. We'd like to remain prosperous; then..
3. We should probably start weaning our economies from petroleum.

Brilliant, I know.

I guess, one potential lesson here is that our big capital investments shouldn't expose us to decades of oil price shocks. (Yeah, I'm talking to you, highway.) They should insulate us from high oil prices. (Oh, hi there, compact walkable neighborhood.)

So, how do all 50 states stack up? And how does the Northwest fare? Find out below the jump...

Here's an interesting biodiesel stat:

[T]he region's supply of fryer grease is limited. Each Oregonian contributes about a gallon of used cooking oil a year to the grease market, according to Sequential Pacific. If all the used grease went to biodiesel production, the state's producers would have only half of what they need to meet demand for the fuel.

That's really not much grease -- especially considering that Oregon residents consume about a gallon and a half of highway fuels per person each day. So as much as I love biodiesel, fryer grease just isn't going to power rush hour.

When it comes to climate, we’ve been watching California for a while and wondering why the climate buzz is particularly loud in Cali. Does citizen concern spur lawmakers into action or does state action spur buzz among citizens? Or both?

Nowadays it’s definitely both. Californians are ahead of the curve when it comes to opinions about both threats from climate pollution and potential opportunities; they’re savvy about policy options, and regional impacts.

According to the pollsters, quoted in the San Francisco Chronicle, “one of the striking findings of the poll was that there was little difference in views on warming based on party affiliation.” In my opinion, this is at least partly because GOP Governor Schwarzenegger has taken a lead on climate policy, allowing party lines to blur when it comes to responsible choices for all Californians who are thinking about the future they’d like to leave their kids and grandkids. (When he's talking about climate, Arnie mentions the legacy we’re leaving our grandchildren in almost every speech these days.)

Here are some findings from a poll released last Friday that surveyed more than 1,000 state residents.

I was at a club on Saturday night celebrating a friend’s birthday and found myself – no, not on the dance floor – trying to talk over loud, pounding music about China’s energy policies.

A friend of a friend had remarked that the US shouldn’t bother reducing emissions if China kept on the track it’s on. So, I was glad I’d recently written up a practical, three-step how-to guide for debunking this very line.

It’s true that China’s galloping economy means that the country’s total emissions are on the rise -- big time. But this week, in a comprehensive report on renewable energy in China, Worldwatch Institute provided another couple of talking points to add to my list of reasons why the US can’t afford to sit around while China gets busy. You see, China may be leading the world in emissions -- but they're leading on some green fronts too:

Some unfinished business: I’ve been thinking and writing about Bicycle Neglect now for half a year, and I still have not defined the term—an oversight that I’ll rectify right away.

Bicycle Neglect is a syndrome with four mutually reinforcing symptoms: