GREEN GROWTH: FROM RELIGION TO REALITY - Sustainia

Chapter 53 What green growth policy is possible atthe federal level?These conditions, taken in sum, mean that it is extremelydifficult to pass legislation leading to even moderate actionon climate change at the federal level. In practice,this has meant that action at the federal level has beenlimited to a few specific areas.3.1 Official channels for federal energy policyFirst, some legislation has passed as crisis response. TheAmerican Recovery and Reinvestment Act, passed toprovide stimulus during the recent economic crisis, includedsignificant funding of various forms for renewableenergy and efficiency measures.Second, the US executive branch does have relativelywide-ranging powers over many areas of regulation andfederal policy; in some cases these are, at least potentially,comparable to those found in the elite bureaucratic organizationsin nations such as Japan or France. In areasrelevant to energy policy, these include:1) The Department of Energy: The Department of Energyhandles US energy-related policy issues; its missionis to “Ensure America's security and prosperity by addressingits energy, environmental, and nuclear challengesthrough transformative science and technologysolutions.” (DOE 2011) In practice it is a major distributorof clean energy- and efficiency-related funding,administers green energy loan guarantee programs,and acts as a sponsor of basic and applied research inenergy (the DoE operates a variety of research institutionsincluding, for instance, the Lawrence BerkeleyNational Laboratories). It also oversees the Energy InformationAgency, an extremely useful storehouse ofdomestic and international energy information.2) The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC):FERC has authority over the national energy grid. Inpractice, however, its actual authority is limited largelyto truly national-level issues, such as the regulationof the transmission, reliability, and wholesale sales ofelectricity between states. More local distribution systemsand pricing are administered at the local level,with FERC holding advisory powers at best. Thus,FERC’s powers over important grid and generation issuesare very limited, with even multi-state, regionalplanning handled by state consortia (FERC 2011; Fox-Penner 2010; NERC 2011).3) The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA): Courtshave ruled that the EPA has the power to regulategreenhouse gases. But how this power will be deployed2is still being determined. It has not, thus far,been a major influence. The EPA also currently administerssome focused programs with emissionsimpact, such as the Energy Star program, an energyefficiency standards program.4) Various R&D units such as the newly created AdvancedResearch Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA-E), as well as existing units in the national labs, EPA,and Department of Defence, support basic research,innovation, and commercialization of products relevantto energy. The assistance provided by theseprograms can range from very basic research to testingto creating demand for prototype or early-stageproducts and helping innovations to overcome the“valley of death” between initial innovation and earlycommercialization.The direct effects of executive-branch action are thusquite limited overall, relative to the more sweeping programsin some European nations. They are also not wellcoordinated from the perspective of overall strategy.They represent instead a somewhat haphazard concatenationof various programs initiated at different pointsin time in response to different stimuli. In practice, thisall boils down to four major areas of effect on the stateenvironment."In other words, we see no obvious bias that suggeststhe US is using stimulus funding to effectively favorany particular macro-level strategy on how to reduceemissions"3.2 Practical effects of federal energy policy on thestate policy environment1) Funding: Various channels – such as stimulus funding,guaranteed loan programs, and support for researchand development, as well as a variety of indirect fundingroutes such as tax credits and deductions – channelmeaningful amounts of subsidy into all stages of theresearch and commercialization chain for energy technologies.The largest chunk of direct funding in therecent past has been the stimulus bill; “green stimulus”funds have dwarfed other on-going non-stimulus directgreen energy spending. Stimulus spending seemsto have been fairly evenly distributed, with major sumsin all the important emissions reductions areas – renewableenergy, efficiency and weatherization, transportation,grid technologies, and carbon capture andstorage all received large chunks of funding. In otherwords, we see no obvious bias that suggests the US isusing stimulus funding to effectively favor any particularmacro-level strategy on how to reduce emissions.While we do not see any major redistributive biases inhow funding is allocated by state, there is a reinforcing effecton the existing distribution of industry and researchin the US. For example, Michigan, with its automobileindustry, has received the largest share of transportationstimulus funds from the DoE. Similarly, states with majornational research labs and strong university systems (likeCalifornia and Colorado) have been particularly successfulin competing for research funds. Thus, the distribu-2 Or even if it will be deployed,given legislative efforts to stripthis power from the EPA.46