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A conversation with Kajsa Hendrickson, Carbon180’s director of policy
This week I spoke with Kajsa Hendrickson, director of policy at Carbon180, about why they’re eager to talk about the social concerns involved in direct air capture (DAC) and how conflicts over carbon pipelines are hurting DAC projects too. We talk a lot about renewables here on The Fight but DAC is a crucial part of decarbonization and it has a host of conflicts that’ll be familiar to our readers.
The following is an abridged version of our conversation. Let’s get started…
How do the conflicts over DAC compare to fights against solar and wind farms?
“There are a lot of overlaps in the conflicts that can exist between DAC and more traditional energy systems. That is the reality. The difference is, so much of DAC is being funded by the federal government so we want to see those higher standards come into play about where communities should be engaged, what engagement should entail.”
“Plus, DAC is fundamentally a public good. The goal of it is to do something that is benefiting all of us writ large and that’s why it can’t follow traditional extractive models coming out of even some of the solar industry.”
What do you mean by solar being extractive?
“The approach to communities tends to be, cool, his project is coming in, there’s going to be some jobs, here’s how it’s going. And there might be a community benefits process there.
“What we’d like to see with DAC, whether it’s funded by DOE or not, is ideally communities get a choice as to whether or not a project comes to them. Communities get some form of prior engagement in determining whether or not they’d like to host a DAC site.”
How does the conflict over the Summit Carbon Solutions CO2 pipeline impact local support for other forms of carbon management, especially DAC?
“Infrastructure around CO2 is going to be a pain point. We at Carbon180 don’t really advocate for or support CCS. That being said, how the pipelines are being deployed, how developers engage with communities on CCS, is going to very much influence DAC. We fundamentally see DAC as serving a public good and CCS not necessary, but that doesn’t change the fact they’re likely going to have shared infrastructure and that the two of them are often going to be paired together.”
“I can’t speak to any of the particular specific details on the Summit pipeline other than that we have been hearing concerns about that, and concerns about what that means for the CO2 landscape as a whole. Just like any other burgeoning industry, negative handling of any particular project is going to look bad for the rest of them. I’d love to see developers proactively engage communities effectively, focusing on their rights, to allow CO2 storage.”
So there’s a blast radius from Summit’s controversy?
“Very much so. DAC and CCS often get conflated. Well informed organizations still refer to them interchangeably. Regardless of whether we like it or not, pipelines are going to be an extremely big expense for DAC, something that doesn’t have as much of an immediate [thing] it’s selling – it’s already facing an uphill financial battle.”
Some in the environmental justice activism space are against DAC. What would you say to an activist who is a no on DAC?
“It’s funny because I actually have several friends who work in environmental justice and I have this conversation with them.”
“What I would say is that we’re a boat in the middle of the ocean. We have holes in the middle of the boat that are the carbon coming into the air. And first thing, foremost, we’ve got to plug the holes. You don’t prioritize bailing out the water before closing the holes. That’s why decarbonization and DAC have to go hand in hand, it can’t be one or the other.”
“I understand where the criticisms come from. Is DAC a false climate solution? Is this something that’s going to allow us to continue to perpetuate fossil fuels?”
“As we are decarbonizing, by the time we get decarbonized, we won’t be able to just scale up DAC at that point. We have to scale up now so by the time we get decarbonized we’re able to get those legacy emissions.”
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State legislatures are now a crucial battleground for the future of renewable energy, as Republican lawmakers seek massive restrictions and punitive measures on new solar and wind projects.
Once a hyperlocal affair, the campaign to curtail renewable energy development now includes state-wide setbacks, regulations, and taxes curtailing wind and solar power. As we previously reported, Oklahoma is one of those states – and may as soon as this year enact mandatory setback requirements on wind power facilities, despite getting nearly half its electricity from wind farms. According to a Heatmap Pro analysis, these rules would affect 65 of Oklahoma’s 77 counties.
Oklahoma is far from alone in potentially restricting land use. In Arizona, the State House last month passed legislation that according to one analysis would lock wind developers off more than 90% of all land in the state. Roughly half of the remaining available acreage would be on Native tribal lands and in or near national parks, which are especially tough areas to build wind turbines. The bill is currently pending before the state Senate. There isn’t much wind energy in Arizona but utilities, who’ve been mostly mum on the legislation so far, have been trying to build more wind and solar in order to wean off coal and gas power. Unfortunately, according to the Arizona Republic, this legislation was reportedly prompted by the backlash to a specific new wind project: Lava Run, a 500-megawatt wind project in the state’s White Mountains opposed by nearby residents.
When asked if the project would ultimately be built, Repsol – Lava Run’s developer – simply told me the company “believes that wind energy in Arizona represents an opportunity to benefit local communities and the state as a whole.”
Republican states have passed legislation to restrict renewables development in certain areas before, so this isn’t exactly a novel development. Florida last year banned all offshore wind projects, and in Ohio, a recent law empowering localities to block solar and wind projects has significantly curtailed industry investment in the state. Wisconsin Republicans are trying to enact similar legislation as soon as this year.
But the sweeping quickness of this legislative effort is striking – and transcends land use rules. Elsewhere, development restrictions may come in the form of tax increases, like in Idaho where the chief revenue committee in the state House has unanimously approved legislation that would institute a per-foot excise tax on individual wind turbines taller than 100 feet without local approval. (The average wind turbine is 320-feet tall.) In Missouri, Republican state legislators are advancing legislation that would create additional taxes for building solar projects on agricultural land, a proposal that echoes an effort underway in the U.S. Congress to strip tax benefits from such projects. And Ohio Republicans have introduced plans to axe all existing state subsidies for solar project construction and operation.
Then there’s the situation in Texas, where state Republican lawmakers are expected to revive a bill requiring solar and wind projects to get express approval from the Public Utilities Commission – a process that fossil fuel projects do not have to go through. The state is the nation’s top producer of renewable energy, generating over 169,000 gigawatt-hours last year.
The legislation passed one legislative chamber in the previous session and environmental activists are starting to sound the alarm that it could get even greater traction this go-around. Luke Metzger, executive director of Environment America’s Texas division, told me that if it becomes law, it would likely undermine investor confidence in developing solar and wind in Texas for the foreseeable future. “It’s very unclear if they could get a permit” under the bill, Metzger said. “If some wealthy Texans didn’t want a solar farm near their ranch, they could convince the PUC to reject their permit.”
Metzger said he is also worried that Texas acting to restrict renewables would produce similar regulation in other parts of the country given the state’s legacy role as a conservative policy braintrust.
“You could have this ripple effect that could end the industry,” Metzger said, “at least in several other states.”
The aggressive and rapid approach sweeping state legislatures has yet to get a national spotlight, so I'm curious how the renewables trade groups are handling these bills.
I asked American Clean Power and the Solar Energy Industries Association if they have any data on the rise of anti-renewables legislation and whether they have comments on this trend. Neither organization responded with data on how many states may soon pass renewables restrictions, but they did get back to me quite fast with comments. SEIA provided a statement from Sarah Birmingham, their vice president of state affairs, noting that energy demand “is rising across the country and we need all the electricity we can get, fast.” The group also pointed to polling it commissioned on solar energy popularity in Texas and a report it just happened torelease in January touting the benefits solar can provide to the state’s revenue base.
ACP meanwhile provided me with a similar statement to SEIA’s, defending renewables and criticizing state bills restricting solar and wind project development.
“Reducing their growth at state and local levels stifles innovation, raises consumer energy costs, and hinders a cleaner, more reliable grid, leaving communities vulnerable to energy shortages,” said spokesman Jason Ryan.
It’s clear some legislators agree with ACP. In Montana, legislation targeting wind turbine height is stuttering after a large cadre of industry representatives and property owners complained it would kill development entirely and kneecap tax revenue to the sparsely populated state. And in Mississippi, lawmakers appear to have abandoned efforts to enact a one-year moratorium on wind turbines for a study on the industry’s impacts on agriculture.
But it’s only March. I guess we’ll have to wait and see how aggressive – and how public – the fight over these bills this year will become.
A conversation with Katharine Kollins of the Southeastern Wind Coalition
This week’s conversation is with Katharine Kollins of the Southeastern Wind Coalition, an advocacy group that supports offshore wind development in the American Southeast. I wanted to talk with Katherine about whether there are any silver linings in the offshore wind space, and to my surprise she actually had one! Here’s to hope springing eternal – and Trump leaving Coastal Virginia intact.
The following conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.
Tell me about the Southeast. What does offshore wind look like there?
The Southeast is interesting. In Virginia, we have a project that is more in the first mover status – the very large Coastal Virginia wind project – which is already under construction.
As you move further south, I would say all of those projects are later stage than what we see in the Northeast. We get a taste of both of those project stages and how the current administration is affecting them. I believe that the Coastal Virginia wind project will continue construction. They’re already a year and a half into a three year phase of construction. That project is expected to be generating electricity next year.
What about the rest?
The rest – no other project has an offtake agreement in the Southeast. North Carolina is getting closer to defining an offtake agreement through the state’s carbon plan process. That’s a back and forth between Duke Energy and the North Carolina Utilities Commission to produce a least-cost electricity portfolio that also gradually reduces the state’s carbon emissions, and offshore wind is as far in that process as we have ever seen in the state. Right now, the utility is responsible for issuing an acquisition RFI (request for information) – it does put the request out there for the developers in the lease areas off of North Carolina and ask them to submit rough estimates for what their projects might cost to be included in Duke’s portfolio. They’re in the process of that and it needs to wrap up by July 1st.
Before we move on to Coastal Virginia, is it your hope this state level effort further south is able to progress through Trump?
Yes. Even in a best case scenario, we’re still looking at a 2032 or 2033 [completion date]. I still think that’s possible.
Have you seen similar conflicts in the Southeast over stuff like wildlife that we see in the Northeast?
We certainly hear those arguments but they don’t come out as strongly. That could be because projects just aren’t as far along as they are in the Northeast – we don’t have any cable landing sites yet. Our projects are all further offshore than many of those in the Northeast, so they don’t come with the same visual impact concerns which is helpful.
I think as we get further in the development process, certainly there will be more conversations around those things but part of what our organization does as well is come in early and try to talk to folks so there’s more information out there for citizens to understand what offshore wind might really mean, what it might feel like, what it might mean for the economy and the environment – before we start choosing a cable landing site. We’ve got a good runway here.
On Coastal Virginia, my concern is that there seems to be enough time for some shenanigans to go on. Is it just your hope here that the project is able to continue without impediment?
I would say hope but it’s also reasonable-ness. This project has already invested $6 billion of ratepayer funds to generate 2,600 megawatts of electricity. To pull the plug on that would mean the federal government was telling Virginians that even though they spent $6 billion dollars to build clean energy development off their coast, the federal government could step in and take that away.
I don’t think that is a reasonable thing to do. So my hope is that the project is able to continue construction and generate that clean electricity for Virginians.
You’ve seen too, a lot of support – bipartisan support – for CVOW. Jen Kiggans, the congresswoman from the Hampton Roads area, has been more outspoken than many in Congress about the importance of the economic value of the CVOW project as well as the need for new electricity and the demand this project is going to help meet.
Have you found in light of the recent election that organizations like yourself are helpful for offshore wind development, and do you feel like more voices are needed to speak out on what the Trump administration has done? We haven’t seen any litigation or blue states in the Northeast stridently or forcefully go to bat yet.
I think there’s many issues folks are grappling with right now and deciding where to put their political capital. Those processes are still under way. There are so many places to focus our attention right now and just a lot on Congress’ plate right now, so they’ve got to figure out which issues they are going to spend the most time on. And what’s winnable for them.
There are a lot of things folks are focused on right now. And maybe that’s part of the plan – spread our people’s ability to speak, or dilute the ability to speak. If you look at the trade associations and NGOs working on offshore wind, we’re working harder than ever. We are consistently looking at, who do we get the message out to about the benefits of offshore wind?
When you think beyond the organizations like ours that speak explicitly to the benefits of offshore wind – could we use more? Always. You can always use more voices speaking out about an energy technology that is very much part of our future, part of our economic and environmental future, and I don’t think you could have too many people speaking out in favor of offshore wind.
If we’re thinking about politicians, right now there’s a lot on people’s plate. The dust has yet to settle.
Here are the week’s top conflicts around clean energy in the U.S.
1. Barnstable County, Massachusetts – The SouthCoast offshore wind project will now be delayed for at least four years, developer Ocean Winds said on Friday, confirming my previous reporting that projects Biden seemed to fully approve were still at risk from Trump.
2. Albany County, New York – A judge in this county has cast a cloud over tax abatement calculations for essentially all solar and wind projects in the state.
3. Greene County, North Carolina – No more new solar farms here, at least for now.
4. Logan County, Ohio – Sayonara, Grange Solar.
5. Fannin County, Texas – The battery backlash we’ve warned you is on the horizon has spread to the small town of Savoy, north of Dallas, where residents are protesting en masse against an Engie battery storage project under construction.