New U.S.-E.U. Methane Rules Won’t Affect Temperatures
In March, the US Environmental Protection Agency published new methane emissions regulations for the oil and gas industry. The European Union enacted new rules to reduce methane emissions from the energy sector in May. Agriculture is also being targeted regarding methane. But methane regulations, even if established worldwide, won’t have a measurable effect on global temperatures. However, they will raise costs for energy and food, impacting consumers and businesses.
On March 8, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finalized its rule on methane emissions for the oil and gas sector. The rule is intended to “reduce wasteful methane emissions that endanger communities and fuel the climate crisis.”
The new policy will require companies to pay a penalty of $900 for every ton of methane emitted above limits set by the EPA, starting this year. A legal challenge to the EPA’s new rule has been filed by 24 states.
On May 27, the European Union (EU) announced new regulations on methane emissions from coal, gas, and oil operations. These rules will require energy firms to monitor and report methane emissions and to reduce methane flaring from operations. The rules also apply to international firms that ship hydrocarbon fuels to Europe.
Methane (CH4) is also called natural gas. It is emitted from oil and gas operations from flaring or system leaks. CH4 is also produced through the decay of organic material, such as from municipal solid waste landfills. The EPA and the EU have proposed methane regulations to try to fight global warming.
But nature and human agriculture are larger sources of methane than the energy industry. Termites and other insects emit large amounts of methane. We have about 1.5 billion cows on Earth, and numerous other livestock and wildlife, emitting methane from both the nose end and the tail end.
Methane is a greenhouse gas and part of Earth’s greenhouse effect, which is blamed for global warming. Sunlight, which is high-energy radiation, enters the atmosphere and is absorbed by Earth’s surface. Like any warm body, Earth emits radiation. Since Earth’s temperature is lower than that of the sun, Earth emits lower-energy radiation called infrared radiation or longwave radiation, which is not visible to our eyes.
This longwave radiation seeks to leave Earth’s atmosphere, but almost all of it is absorbed by greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. These gases then re-radiate the absorbed energy, which acts to warm Earth’s surface. The warming caused by the absorption of infrared radiation is called the greenhouse effect. Emissions from human industrial processes add to the effect and increase global temperatures.
But Earth’s greenhouse effect is overwhelmingly a natural effect. Water vapor, not carbon dioxide or methane, is Earth’s dominant greenhouse gas. Water vapor accounts for 70 to 90 percent of the greenhouse effect.
Carbon dioxide (CO2) is the next most important greenhouse gas, but most of the CO2 in the atmosphere comes from nature, such as CO2 emissions from the oceans and the biosphere. Every day, nature puts 20 times as much carbon dioxide into the atmosphere as all human emissions and removes about the same amount. Methane ranks only as a distant third as a greenhouse gas.
The European Union states:
“ … methane’s ability to trap heat in the atmosphere is even stronger than that of carbon dioxide. On a 100-year timescale, methane has 28 times greater global warming potential than carbon dioxide and is 84 times more potent on a 20-year timescale.”
These assertions from the EU and other sources are widely reported, but they are incorrect. Claims about the global warming potential of methane are accurate in the laboratory, but not in the atmosphere.
No one paints a room in their house ten times, because after two coats of paint, no difference is observed. Similarly, greenhouse gases are already saturated in Earth’s atmosphere at the frequencies at which methane absorbs outgoing longwave radiation. Additional methane will have almost no effect.
A 2020 analysis by Wijngaarden and Happer looked at the absorption of outgoing longwave radiation by methane and other greenhouse gases across the radiation spectrum. The researchers found that doubling atmospheric methane, from either natural or human causes, would increase greenhouse gas absorption by only about 0.3 percent, a negligible amount.
Farming has become a target for efforts to reduce methane emissions. Earlier this year, New York Attorney General Letitia James sued JBS, the world’s largest beef producer, over the firm’s methane emissions and for allegedly making misleading sustainability statements to the public. The costs of this litigation will add to food price inflation for consumers.
Earlier this year, the EU sought to impose the Sustainable Use Regulation (SUR) on European farmers. Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, stated that the agricultural sector needed to transition towards a “more sustainable model of production.” Farmers were asked to reduce the size of dairy herds and to limit the use of nitrogen fertilizer to reduce greenhouse gas emissions of methane and nitrous oxide. Germany’s Federal Agricultural Minister, Cem Özdemir, even proposed a consumption tax on meat.
But angry farmers launched intense protests in France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, and other nations. Hundreds of tractors blocked traffic in major cities and police were pelted with eggs and liquid manure. The SUR was defeated, and the EU backed away from additional agricultural regulations, including regulations on methane and the use of nitrogen fertilizer.
Possibly the most bizarre law to reduce emissions was the Australia Carbon Farming Initiative Act of 2011, which awarded carbon credits for killing feral (wild) animals, including:
“… the reduction of methane emissions through the management, in a humane manner, of feral goats, feral dear, feral pigs or feral camels.”
Killing of animals for carbon credits was halted in 2012.
In any case, because of greenhouse gas saturation in the atmosphere, methane regulations across the world will have no measurable effect on global temperatures. But to the extent that they are enacted, these rules will raise the costs of energy and food production and prices to consumers and businesses.
https://heartland.org/opinion/new-u-s-e-u-methane-rules-wont-affect-temperatures/
****************************************************Urban Heat Islands And Record Heat In Las Vegas: Unpacking The Causes Beyond Climate Change
Las Vegas has recently experienced a record-breaking heatwave, with temperatures reaching unprecedented highs spurring absolutely ridiculous headlines like this from The San Francisco Chronicle…
This event has reignited discussions about the causes of such extreme heat, with arguments focusing on urban expansion, population growth, and the Urban Heat Island Effect (UHIE), rather than solely attributing it to increased greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. By examining the ten hottest days in Las Vegas history and the context of urban development, we can better understand the primary factors contributing to these extreme temperatures.
On July 6, 2024, Las Vegas recorded its highest temperature ever, reaching 120°F (48.8°C). This surpasses previous records and prompts a closer examination of historical temperature trends and the contributing factors to such extreme heat.
To understand the trends, we can look at the ten hottest days in Las Vegas history:
120°F (48.8°C) on July 6, 2024
117°F (47.2°C) on June 30, 2013
117°F (47.2°C) on July 19, 2005
116°F (46.7°C) on July 24, 1942
116°F (46.7°C) on July 17, 2005
116°F (46.7°C) on July 15, 2023
115°F (46.1°C) on June 20, 2017
115°F (46.1°C) on July 15, 2020
114°F (45.6°C) on July 8, 2002
114°F (45.6°C) on July 19, 2006
Notably, several of these records were set decades ago, with some dating back over 80 years. This longevity of high-temperature records suggests that factors other than increases in GHGs are significantly influencing these temperatures.
The Urban Heat Island Effect (UHIE) is a phenomenon where urban areas experience higher temperatures than their rural surroundings due to human activities and infrastructure.
Concrete and Asphalt: Urban surfaces like roads and buildings absorb and retain heat, increasing local temperatures.
Lack of Vegetation: Green spaces and trees cool the air through evapotranspiration, a process significantly reduced in densely built environments.
Human Activities: Energy consumption for air conditioning, vehicles, and industrial processes generates additional heat.
Las Vegas has undergone rapid urban expansion and population growth over the past few decades. The city’s population has increased from around 273,000 in 1980 to over 2.3 million in 2020. This urban sprawl has replaced natural desert landscapes with heat-absorbing infrastructure, significantly contributing to local temperature rises.
The temperature record in Las Vegas was set at McCarran International Airport (now Harry Reid International Airport), which has seen substantial growth over the decades. Initially a modest regional facility, the airport has expanded significantly alongside the city’s population boom and tourism industry.
The airport handled nearly 1 million passengers annually in the 1950s, a number that surged to over 50 million passengers by 2019, making it one of the busiest airports in the United States.
This expansion has included multiple runway extensions, terminal upgrades, and increased tarmac area, all contributing to the Urban Heat Island Effect by replacing the natural desert landscape with heat-absorbing infrastructure.
The proximity of temperature monitoring stations to these developments likely amplifies recorded temperatures, further underscoring the impact of urbanization on local climate conditions
While GHG emissions likely play a role in global climate change, the localized effect of UHIE in cities like Las Vegas is significantly more pronounced.
The slow pace at which new temperature records are set, despite accelerating global CO2 levels, suggests that urban factors are significant contributors to extreme heat events.
The assertion that GHGs, particularly CO2, are solely responsible for the record temperatures in Las Vegas is overly simplistic and ignores significant local factors.
Despite the continuous rise in global CO2 levels, which have accelerated over the past decades, temperature records in Las Vegas are not broken annually.
If CO2 were the primary driver of extreme heat, we would expect a more consistent upward trend in temperature records, correlating directly with rising CO2 levels. Instead, several of Las Vegas’s highest temperatures were recorded decades ago, such as 116°F in 1942.
This indicates that other factors, such as urbanization and the UHIE, play a more crucial role in these temperature extremes. Rapid urban expansion and increased heat-retaining infrastructure, like concrete and asphalt, have significantly contributed to localized heating.
Therefore, attributing these record temperatures primarily to GHG emissions overlooks the substantial impact of local environmental changes and urban development.
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Death of Biden’s gas export pause
When the Biden administration paused the approval of new liquefied natural gas exports in January, environmentalists and left-leaning politicians hailed the decision as a watershed moment for the climate movement. After months of pressure from climate activists, the Department of Energy, or DOE, announced that it would rethink how it evaluates the massive export projects that condense fracked gas into a supercooled liquid, known as LNG, and load it onto tankers that ship the fuel for sale in Europe and Asia. In the meantime, the administration committed to keeping the LNG projects awaiting approval in a holding pattern, preventing them from breaking ground.
The surprise move reportedly came about after senior White House officials met with young climate activists who were campaigning against LNG exports, and it seemed to mark a shift in the trajectory of the industry, which had received strong support from both the Obama and Trump administrations. The 350.org founder and writer Bill McKibben said the decision meant that President Biden had “done more to check dirty energy … than any of his predecessors.” (McKibben is also a former Grist board member.)
But just six months later, the pause looks like little more than a speed bump in the rapid growth of an industry that has transformed the global energy mix. Even though the pause incensed oil and gas executives and drew furious protests from Republicans, its application was limited to just a few projects that were in the planning stages; it didn’t affect several large terminals that have already received approval or are under construction, which together will double U.S. export capacity.
And earlier this week, a federal judge appointed by former president Donald Trump struck down the current administration’s policy. The Louisiana judge ruled that the Biden administration still has to consider individual projects for approval even while it ponders a broader shift in LNG export policy, negating the impact of the pause that Biden officials had said would last at least through the end of the year. With Biden facing diminished odds of defeating the former president in the November election, it’s become increasingly likely that his administration will not manage to change the country’s natural gas export policy at all.
“If this is really over — you have a DOE that’s going to go back to a presumption that LNG exports are in the public interest — this will have been a blip,” said Steven Miles, a research fellow and natural gas expert at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. “If this is going to be an opening salvo in an ongoing battle over every step in LNG exports, it’ll be trench warfare. It probably all depends on the election.”
When the DOE announced the pause in January, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm framed it as a necessary attempt to update the government’s criteria for evaluating the massive export terminals that have sprung up along the Gulf of Mexico. The United States had become the world’s largest exporter of liquefied natural gas, but officials still weren’t sure how the export surge was changing the world’s energy mix. Was sending so much gas overseas helping to displace coal, a far more climate-unfriendly fuel, or was it stalling the growth of renewable energy? Was it creating jobs in gas-rich U.S. states, or driving up costs for electricity ratepayers and American companies — or both?
These questions are very difficult to answer, in part because they rely on counterfactual assessments of what would happen if the U.S. didn’t export gas. Even since the pause took effect, a flurry of new research has complicated the picture. On the one hand, a report from the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, an energy think tank, found that gas exports to China aren’t helping to reduce coal usage in the energy-hungry country, undermining a key argument for the industry. On the other hand, an economics paper published in March argued that exports have driven up natural gas prices within the United States and thus encouraged substitutes for the fuel, acting in effect like a carbon tax and aiding the country’s net-zero target as a result.
While the administration tried to answer these questions, it paused its review of a handful of LNG projects that had been awaiting approval. Republicans and industry leaders excoriated that move, saying it jeopardized the nation’s ability to deliver fuel to foreign allies. In truth it only slowed down a few projects that had already received clearance from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, or FERC, a separate independent regulator that has been far friendlier to LNG projects.
The pause also didn’t stop FERC from continuing to kick more projects over to the Department of Energy for approval: Just last week, the commission approved Venture Global’s Calcasieu Pass 2 terminal, or CP2, a massive project that would be able to ship out 24 million metric tons of LNG per year, enough gas to power more than 15 million homes. It was the CP2 project that had galvanized many activists on TikTok and other social media platforms, reportedly drawing the attention of the Biden administration officials who pushed the pause in the first place.
In March, a group of 16 Republican-led states sued the administration over the DOE’s regulatory pause, and they found a sympathetic audience in a Louisiana court. The judge, Trump appointee James Cain, ruled that the Department didn’t have the authority to stop reviewing LNG export terminals, finding that the decision had led to “the loss of revenues, market share, and deprivation of a procedural right” for states such as Louisiana and West Virginia.
For Roishetta Ozane, an activist in Lake Charles, Louisiana, who has led the charge against the LNG industry for more than three years, the decision was demoralizing.
“It’s insane,” she told Grist. “I’m sad, I’m frustrated. I feel like I’m fighting against a state that I love and am trying to protect.”
The ruling doesn’t prevent the Biden administration from pursuing a larger review of how it regulates LNG projects, one that could lead to more comprehensive restrictions on the industry. However, given that this review would require the department to push through a new definition of whether exports are in the “public interest” under the decades-old Natural Gas Act, it would likely be subject to legal challenges now that the Supreme Court has scrapped the so-called Chevron deference precedent that gave federal agencies the flexibility to craft such policies under their interpretations of federal law.
Even so, in the aftermath of the ruling, environmental and climate advocates urged the administration to continue pushing forward with that bigger shift.
“It’s no surprise that a Trump judge would bend the law to hand the oil industry a win,” said Craig Segall, the vice president of the climate-oriented political group Evergreen Action, in a statement. “Luckily, today’s deeply misguided ruling from the Western District of Louisiana should have no impact on the Department of Energy’s statutory authority over what must be included in a public interest determination.”
But that long-term review of LNG exports will only continue if Biden wins reelection, and it’s unclear whether the attempted pause has helped or hurt his election chances. The January move represented an attempt to shore up support among young environmentalists, but some Democratic politicians in gas-rich states such as Pennsylvania — a must-win state for the president — have said that it hurt his standing locally.
It may also have damaged Biden’s fragile and largely unspoken truce with large oil and gas companies, which had been supportive of carbon capture and hydrogen provisions in the landmark Inflation Reduction Act that the president signed in 2022. During a March dinner at the Mar-a-Lago resort, former President Trump asked a group of oil and gas executives to donate around $1 billion to his campaign in exchange for favorable policies, including an end to the natural gas export pause.
“The damage has been done, in my view,” said Mary Landrieu, a former Democratic senator from Louisiana who now helps lead a coalition of gas industry stakeholders. “The decision was made so abruptly and so poorly that it doesn’t give people confidence that the president has a consistent and well-thought-through policy on the energy transition. I don’t think there was any upside to it, and I believe that the downside was really damaging the trust relationship that was building [with the oil industry] to some degree.”
https://grist.org/energy/biden-liquefied-natural-gas-export-pause-court-ruling/ .
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Used Engines Among Quebec’s Total Ban on Gas Vehicles by 2035
The government of Quebec is proposing regulations to ban the sale of all gasoline-powered vehicles, as well as the sale of used gas engines, by 2035.
The draft regulation for Bill 50, which was printed in the July 10 edition of La Gazette Officielle du Québec, says the ban would take effect on Jan. 1, 2035.
Specifically mentioned are the sale or lease of “motor vehicles that are not propelled solely by an electric motor,” including vehicles with “a hydrogen fuel cell or another means of propulsion that emits no pollutant.”
Bill 50, which is described as an act “respecting civil protection to promote disaster resilience and to amend various provisions relating in particular to emergency communication centres and to forest fire protection,” estimates that switching to electric vehicles will save consumers $2.1 million per year in energy costs. It will cost businesses in the petroleum sector approximately $434,000 per year in reduced fuel sales.
The regulation is aimed at increasing “the number of zero-emission motor vehicles in Québec in order to reduce greenhouse gas and other pollutant emissions,” it reads.
After 2035, only electric vehicles will be permitted to be sold in the province, according to the regulation, which will also ban the sale of used gasoline-powered engines. An exemption is provided for replacement engines for vehicles of model year 2034 or earlier.
Anyone wishing to comment on the draft regulation must submit written comments within 45 days of the July 10 publication.
The federal government announced its own regulations in December 2023 to be phased in over 12 years, although unlike Quebec’s plan they don’t include engines—new or old. At that time, Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault said the government would be pushing for 20 percent of all new vehicle sales to be electric by 2026, with that number increasing to three-fifths by 2030 and 100 percent by 2035.
Mr. Guilbeault said the move would tackle one of the reasons that Canadians haven’t been switching to EVs, which is a long wait time for a low supply.
Vehicle manufacturers will be entitled to credits issued by the Canadian Environmental Protection Act and which they can use, bank, or sell to companies that don’t earn enough credits.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently announced its regulations on gas vehicles, requiring one-third of new car sales to be electric by 2027, with that number jumping to over two-thirds by 2032.
Europe has also introduced legislation that would also see all petrol and diesel-powered vehicles banned by 2035.
The decision means that manufacturers need to cut 100 percent in carbon emissions by 2035 for new cars sold. It also set a 55 percent reduction in emissions for vehicles sold from 2030.
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My other blogs. Main ones below
http://jonjayray.com/covidwatch.html (COVID WATCH)
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM )
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs
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Jim Hansen and his twin
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