THE NET-ZERO BLOG
Climate policy analysis and updates from Sacramento
The challenges of carbon capture and storage in California: Commercial frameworks
California has significant ambitions for carbon capture and storage, with a goal for this technology to make-up 25% of the state’s net-zero portfolio. However, there are currently no operating CCS projects in California. In a previous post, we highlighted how an immature regulatory framework is a key reason for this and identified opportunities to address this barrier. Here we examine a second key barrier, which is the lack of a commercial framework to attract the substantial and diverse CCS investments required to help fully decarbonize California’s economy in only 22-years.
California’s transmission permitting: Slowest in the West?
Blog announcement: Clean Air Task Force’s Nelson Falkenburg and CSG’s Sam Uden explore one of the main drivers behind California’s decade-long lead times to transmission development, which is a key permitting application at the California Public Utilities Commission known as the Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity. Nelson and Sam compare these requirements to other Western States, highlighting California’s highly challenging permitting regime.
The challenges of carbon capture and storage in California: Regulatory issues
The 2022 Scoping Plan identified the need for 100 million tons of carbon capture and storage (CCS) to achieve net-zero emissions by 2045. This is a significant share – equal to about 25% of the total solution. However, there are currently no operating CCS projects in the state. Can California reliably deploy this technology and infrastructure in the timeframe required by the Scoping Plan, and if so, how can we get from here to there? In this technical blog post – the first of a two-part series – we analyze the first main barrier: lack of a regulatory framework.
Study finds public financing of transmission could save ratepayers billions
A rapid and significant expansion in transmission infrastructure this decade is key for California to meet its ambitious climate goals. However, this build-out will be expensive – with the potential to overburden ratepayers and undermine the state’s clean energy transition. In this blog post, we highlight an analysis by the Public Advocates Office which explores strategies to minimize the cost of transmission.
Governor’s proposed Clean Energy Central Procurement mechanism could be the most consequential climate policy this decade
The pace of clean energy deployment in California is currently too slow to achieve the state’s ambitious climate targets. The Governor’s proposed Clean Energy Central Procurement mechanism in the 2023-24 energy trailer bill is a powerful policy concept that has the potential to correct this trajectory. In this blog post, we highlight how strategic public procurement of clean energy assets can address critical obstacles to a rapid energy transition in California.
State and federal agencies release first-of-its-kind biomass utilization strategy
Biomass management has been a neglected climate problem in California. That is, until recently – when the 2022 Scoping Plan identified both the significant scale of the biomass challenge and importance of mobilizing organic waste to provide clean fuels and carbon dioxide removal in a net-zero economy. In this blog post we briefly recap California’s biomass challenge before summarizing the top-five recommendations from the state’s newest draft wood utilization strategy from the Governor’s Wildfire and Forest Resilience Task Force.