CLIMATE JUSTICE

PROGRAM OVERVIEW

Climate change is the most spectacular market failure in history. The enormous economic costs associated with climate disasters such as recent catastrophic wildfires in California and Oregon and unprecedented 2020 and 2021 Atlantic hurricane seasons are high profile examples of the ways in which climate change costs are being borne not by the polluters, but by the public. But the costs don’t end there.

 

Add to climate change costs the heath care and other costs associated with explosions, fracking-related quakes, spills, and other accidents involving fossil fuel infrastructure, transport and storage that have disrupted local economies with disproportionate effects on disadvantaged populations. Then add to that the growing economic liability associated with abandoned, aging toxic infrastructure, mines, and gas fields as fossil fuel resources are depleted and the staggering costs of climate adaptation, such as building sea walls or making our electric grids storm and wildfire resilient.

 

The vast majority of these costs are now being – or will be – borne by taxpayers in violation of one of the bedrock principles of efficient environmental policy: polluter pays. The ‘polluter pays’ principle is an internationally endorsed standard for correcting the market failure of externalities. Allowing the fossil fuel industry – or any industry for that matter – to go about its business without having to bear the full social costs of its activities distorts the efficient operation of free markets by leading to overconsumption of harmful commodities such as coal, oil and gas and unfair competition with sustainable substitutes such as conservation, efficiency, wind, solar and other renewables. One of the core goals of CSE’ Climate Justice Program is to correct this market failure and ensure that the fossil fuel industry, and not taxpayers, pay for the costs of climate change and making the transition to renewable energy.

CURRENT PROJECTS

Rusted Factory

Fossil Fuel Risk Bonds


In 2016, CSE developed a market-based policy mechanism designed to hold owners of fossil fuel infrastructure accountable for the costs of climate adaptation, catastrophic accidents and spills at their facilities, and the eventual dismantling and removal of infrastructure in order to free up the land for more sustainable forms of development. The mechanism – fossil fuel risk bond programs – embody two basic approaches: financial assurance mechanisms and surcharges designed to offset the expected financial costs of climate change to taxpayers. States and counties in many parts of the country have embraced this concept and are moving forward in various ways. View the latest project update here.

White oil storage tanks

No New Fossil Fuel Infrastructure


According to scientists and the International Energy Agency, it will be impossible to achieve the global goal of net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 if new oil, gas and coal infrastructure continues to be approved and constructed. Every new piece of fossil fuel infrastructure approved locks in decades of increased fossil fuel consumption and creates competitive barriers to renewable energy solutions, increased efficiency and conservation. For this reason, CSE has been a staunch opponent to major fossil fuel infrastructure projects across the US. We have and continue to work with non-profit and local government partners to block new oil and gas drilling, coal mines, export facilities, pipelines and storage facilities and advocate for responsible alternatives to these ill-advised projects.

Mass timber building under construction

Resisting False Solutions


Natural gas as a bridge fuel. Clean coal. Mass timber buildings. Burning trees for energy. Carbon offsets. These and many other false climate solutions are getting in the way of real reform. CSE and its partners use our climate impacts expertise to carefully weigh the climate benefits and costs of various solutions proposed to federal, state, and local decision makers to help sort out the good from the bad and ensure that solutions adopted are grounded in good science and sound economics while helping to reverse environmental injustices.

FEATURED WORK

By John Talberth, Daphne Wysham and Richard Mietz 07 Mar, 2024
An overview of risk bonds, how they work, and how they are being implemented in the PNW
By John Talberth 21 Jul, 2023
Council says climate risk disclosure should be required under the State Environmental Policy Act (SEPA)
By Richard Mietz, Ella Carlson, and John Talberth 14 Apr, 2022
There are currently 124 active oil refineries in the United States with an operating capacity of roughly 17.7 million barrels per day. As the transition away from fossil fuels accelerates careful planning is needed to ensure that these facilities don’t degrade and become more dangerous as they continue to operate or become abandoned toxic brownfields that saddle future generations with long term environmental hazards and enormous clean-up costs. As part of its Fossil Fuel Risk Bond Program, Center for Sustainable Economy and its partners have been advocating for state and local governments to take a hard look at what financial resources owners have set aside for compensating victims and repairing damage when catastrophic accidents occur and for dismantling, removing, and restoring sites to their natural condition (DRR) to prepare the ground for beneficial land uses in the future.  In this policy note, CSE compiled data from federal, state, and local agencies to determine the adequacy of financial assurance mechanisms for a sample of 10 active or recently closed oil refineries in four states and found that funding for DRR activities and accidents are far below what is needed. READ full report
By Christopher Still and John Talberth 30 Mar, 2022
It’s no secret that landscapes dominated by clearcuts, logging roads, and timber plantations pose significant public health and safety risks by amplifying the effects of heat waves, drought, water shortages, wildfires, landslides, floods, invasive species and other stressors already on the rise due to climate change. The pool of research documenting these effects is robust, and growing. Recently, CSE teamed up with Dr. Christopher Still at Oregon State University to add to that body of research by comparing and contrasting the effects of the unprecedented 2021 Pacific Northwest heat wave on undisturbed, old growth forest vs. heavily clearcut and degraded forestlands near Cougar Reservoir in Oregon’s central Cascades and in southwest Washington. The technical report is now available and can be viewed and downloaded here . Key findings include: The loss and degradation of primary forests is driving climate change and amplifying the severity of heat waves and droughts. The unprecedented Pacific Northwest heat dome of 2021 provides an opportunity to compare and contrast the climatic responses of undisturbed primary forests to deforested and degraded lands. Using NASA’s Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) data, land surface temperatures of undisturbed vs. deforested and degraded forestlands in western Oregon were compared before, during and after the heat dome event. In two contrasting sites in southwest Washington, tower data from the National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) was used to compare canopy temperatures, ecosystem fluxes of water, net ecosystem carbon exchange, and ecosystem photosynthesis. At the western Oregon region of interest, the mean, maximum, and minimum land surface temperature was always higher on the deforested and degraded lands. During the heat dome event, the undisturbed forest was 5.5 ºC cooler ( 94.8 ºF vs. 104.7 ºF). At the NEON sites in Washington and relative to the undisturbed old growth forest, the degraded (plantation) site was hotter (~4.5 ºC), lost more water, was less efficient at photosynthesis, and experienced a more dramatic impact to carbon cycling, flipping from a sink to a source during the heat dome event. The results suggest that as heat and drought intensify with climate change, maintaining the extent of undisturbed forest and reducing the extent of deforested and degraded lands may be important for mitigating the effects of heat waves, conserving water supplies, and reducing wildfire risk. This technical report will be split into two papers for peer reviewed journals and likely published in the fall. In the meantime, CSE will continue to work with legislators and county commissions in Oregon and Washington to advocate for changes in forest practices and comprehensive land use plans to better protect nearby communities from these growing public health and safety threats. Stay tuned for updates on this work. Read: Still, C., Talberth, J. 2022. Deforestation, Forest Degradation, Heat Waves and Drought. Evidence from the Pacific Northwest Heat Dome of 2021.
By Chad Hanson, Ph.D. and John Talberth, Ph.D. 28 Sep, 2021
As Congress accelerates work to pass two massive new spending bills – the budget Reconciliation ($3.5 trillion) and Infrastructure ($1.2 trillion) packages – lawmakers need to do the math to ensure that money is not thrown to programs that increase greenhouse gas pollution and reduce our ability to overcome the climate crisis. After all, one of the key selling points for each is their claimed climate benefits. Proponents of the Reconciliation package, for example, assert that some clean energy measures included in the bill, along with some in the Infrastructure package, would slash US carbon emissions by 880 million metric tons (0.88 gigatons) of annual CO2 emissions by 2030. However, as discussed below, the very recent elimination of the Clean Energy Performance Program (CEPP) from the Reconciliation package lowers the annual CO2 emissions reduction to only 0.38 gigatons by 2030. Moreover, buried within both bills are expenditures that would take us even further in the opposite direction – among them, massive subsidies for logging and highways that come with a steep carbon footprint. In combination with the elimination of CEPP, these climate-harming aspects of the Reconciliation and Infrastructure packages would actually increase net annual CO2 emissions by 2030 relative to current levels.

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