Category Archives: Legislation
GHG Emission Targets v. Limits: The Constitutionality of Executive Orders S-3-05 and B-30-15
Recently, Legislative Counsel Dian F. Boyer wrote an opinion answering questions from State Senator Jean Fuller of California’s 16th Senate District regarding California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 (commonly known as AB 32) and Executive Branch Authority. The nonbinding … Continue reading
Water Reliability and Renewable Energy Overgeneration
The issue of renewable energy integration and overgeneration is square and center in California. The California System Operator (CAISO) along with other state regulators have studied or commissioned third-party studies to evaluate both the scope of overgeneration and means to … Continue reading
Constitutional Reform of the California Public Utilities Commission
Assembly Members Gatto, Levine, and Wilk introduced a bipartisan State Assembly Constitutional Amendment (ACA) 11 on March 9, 2016 to reform the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC). What does this proposed constitutional amendment mean for California and for the CPUC?
Achieving Mandatory GHG Reduction under a Regional Independent Systems Operator
A structural question arises when evaluating the California Independent System Operator (CAISO) expansion. What will drive the greenhouse gas (GHG) reductions in a regional independent system operator (ISO) or regional transmission operator (RTO) that spans multiple states and out of … Continue reading
Renewable Energy Credits and Carbon Offset Credits
(Many thanks to Cameron Bernhardt for research and writing for this post) While EPIC has written about renewable energy credits in California in the past, this constitutes the first of a series of blog posts related to renewable energy credits … Continue reading
Center for Biological Diversity et al., v. California Department of Fish and Wildlife, and the Newhall Land and Farming Company: the Burden of CEQA Land Use GHG Emission Reduction Analysis at the Local Level
The Center for Biological Diversity et al., v. California Department of Fish and Wildlife, and The Newhall Land and Farming Company, 62 Cal.4th 204 (2015)(hereafter, the Newhall Land case) addresses three issues: 1) whether the project level environmental impact report … Continue reading
Addressing the Role of Electric Vehicles in Greenhouse Gas Reduction: California Independent System Operator Action
Source: Kempton and Tomic 2005. Journal of Power Sources This is the third post in a series looking at legislative and regulatory action addressing Electric Vehicle (EV) greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reductions(See previous posts on the CPUC and State Legislative … Continue reading
COPs and CAPs: Goals for stabilization of carbon emissions
The COP21 talks and events started on Monday November 30, 2015. Though California is not a nation, and therefore not a member of the UNFCCC, there are 8 California lawmakers accompanying Governor Brown to the Conference. While the US government, … Continue reading
INDCs and Why Cities are Important for Global Climate Action
As we approach UNFCCC’s 21st session of the Conference of Parties (COP 21) to take place November 30 – December 11 in Paris, expectations are high that more than 190 nations will be able to come to some kind of … Continue reading
Unpacking SB 350: CAISO Regional Expansion
The Governor signed SB 350 into law on October 7, 2015 (Chapter 547). SB 350, the Clean Energy and Pollution Reduction Act of 2015, makes changes to the state RPS, energy efficiency, and several other programs and statutes. This post … Continue reading