This January 2010, is a good month for many reasons but none so important as this small and powerful change.
An itchy bitching piece of law coming from Sacramento’s sweat-lodge tent next to the governor’s mansion…
Baby steps in the right direction - from the grand Californicator – doing to the Canadians what they had coming to them…
Love them hard – with Tar and Feathers and ride them on a rail – out of Cali. It’s not just a dislike for the Albertan and the Ottawa legislators and Chief Executives… but their blatant disregard for their fouling the earth. From being the best producers of Acid rain to destroying the vast Northern lands – and rendering the whole of Alberta uninhabitable – You would agree they need a lesson in humility before they start riding camels and having harems at our expense.
Sticking it to them is a sound Political decision for California. How else can you monetize the vast VC investments in clean energy, biofuels, renewables, clean tech innovation and organic chemistry and biotech? If not leveling the playing field between renewables and fossil fuels of the worst kinds.
Tar Sands are subsidized by enormous subsidies – by both Federal and state as well as local Canadian governments – and as such they should be considered unfair competition in the first place.
It is mostly though, a Realpolitik decision for the Earth and the Climate that led California today to indirectly ban Oil produced from the Tar Sands of Alberta from ever coming in your jallopy.
The change in California’s gasoline fuel production intensity regulation – will disqualify Tar Sands – from being an upstream source of oil towards the California refineries.
Not bad for a small piece of legislature.
California passed regulation over Green House gases by determining the pollution of fuels coming into California:
The California Air Resources Board voted 9 to 1 in favor of the complex new rule, which is expected to slash the state’s gasoline consumption by a quarter in the next decade. The move was historic with California, determined to press on with passing a remarkably progressive piece of Climate legislation.
Pretty much first of it’s kind in the world.
Well Done.
The regulation requires producers, refiners and importers of gasoline and diesel to reduce the carbon footprint of their fuel by 10% over the next decade. And it launches the state on an ambitious path toward ratcheting down its overall heat-trapping emissions by 80% by mid-century; a level that some scientists deem necessary to avoid drastic global climate disruption.
A few months ago, the early stages of this legislation that would indirectly ban oil-sands from Alberta were hatched. The struggle had everything you could hope for in a North American contest. Pitting Canada’s resource rich super power against the USA’s innovation dynamo and California’s green wish – the clash was likely to have reverberations across the continent.
California acted in response to the irresponsible mooseheads from the North, who like the old school cartoon Vikings – rape and pillage the earth for purely sort term domestic interests.
Still the nasties and petrol heads don’t give up. Trade associations for the oil, chemical and trucking industries filed suit in federal court in Fresno, to void California’s first-in-the-nation low-carbon fuel initiative.
The struggle is of no small importance, California is estimated to be among the world’s 10 largest economies and more importantly has the largest automobile market in North America. Underscoring this is its famous role as a trend setter for the rest of the US and some cases the world…
The Oil lobbyists and the tar sand babies start crying that all together the oil industry groups will need to stop the trend early or risk a policy spill over.
Tar sands oil special interest groups argue that the policy represents an unfair advantage to California’s fuel produces, breaking federal competition laws. What this really amounts to is the rise of competition to oil producers, not from a single counter source but from steady erosion of singular fuel sources from diverse markets.
Previously such fragmented emerging markets have not been a serious challenger and undoubtedly will be in the near future. However the backing of a market the size of California could have huge implications.
Carbon fuel standard gives both the oil industry and the renewable energy industry, a clear road map to the future. And it also provides incentives to evolve.
Yet the Canadians and the tar sands people, apparently would rather be looking in their rear-view mirror while driving towards the future. So they will fight against the legislation with their white lab smock-coated actors making pronouncements of how the acid rain and toxic water coming to the US from the tar sands is good for your health and in no way impacts your children’s lungs and kidneys, even though it peels the paint from your car…
It’s a pugilistic match. A fight to the death… and the conflict could not be more strange, as Canada and particularly Alberta aims to push itself onto the world stage - through the leverage afforded by its increasingly prominent energy based economy – vs a California which is seeking to capitalise on its innovation culture.
California invests in all renewable and alternative energy technologies to open up new emerging markets to build its strength around the globe leveraging it’s Venture Capital and Private Equity business and Cleantech Energy smarts.
California has already had environmental laws challenged, when automobile manufacturers lobbied against emission efficiency standards. The gear heads lost that battle then – but this marks a new territory that cuts deep into energy politics – and the perilous state of California’s finances will mark a new high tide in conflict of established versus emerging markets.
Demitri Boniface of the Environmental Parliament had this to say: The oil industry needs to prepare for the day when they’ll have to pay for their costs. Polluter pays. Simple.
Still if Fresno judges look at Albertan and oil company lawyers – same as they looked at their Tobacco counterparts – they are in for hosing.
Yours,
Pano
PS:
I put my chips in with the Californicator.
He can deal with the pesky Canadians.
A bit of tar might help…
