Sustainability - - A Focus On Carbon

What if cutting greenhouse gas emissions (GHG), especially CO2, is not the same as increasing the share of electricity generated using renewables? Which would you pick? As an economist, such questions interest me. This kind of question interests me because we face a slew of problems and we have a limited amount of effort available to help solve them.  If we are able to cut CO2 emissions at a lower cost one way rather than some other way, why pick the more costly approach? For many folks, there is no question of deciding between cutting GHG and installing more renewables. They are assumed to be one in the same. Is there any evidence to suggest otherwise? Actually, there is. Electricity planning analysis performed by the Northwest Power Planning Council (NWPPC) is but one such body of work. In their 7th Power Plan, which was released at the beginning of 2016, is a chapter that addresses this very issue. Here's another source. What the NWPPC found is that cheaper and more e...

Surely, defining a carbon footprint isn't difficult, right?  There are various on-line tools available to allow anyone to do just that. This is an issue I've been investigating.  My reason for doing so arises from a concern that policy analysis and decision-making is as solid as the data are upon which they rest.  Recently, I came across a passage in a report titled Carbon Emissions – a Northwest Perspective that summed up the challenge, "There are multiple ways to tabulate a carbon footprint and this report’s approach will differ from others.  If carbon regulations are passed on the state or regional level then agreeing on a methodology for defining a carbon footprint will be critical."  This excerpt zeros in on the issue of using data that are consistent in their development. To date, my review of methods in California, Oregon, and Washington indicate that each state uses somewhat different approaches to develop the raw data used to define carbon footpri...