Tag Archives: New York State

New York State Sea Level Rise:  Fantasy as Law

From Watts Up With That?

Opinion by Kip Hansen — 28 February 2024

In the United States, both Federal and State agencies make pseudo-laws by formalizing “rules” which have the effect of law but are not written by or voted on by the legislators which have the responsibility to make law.

We see this in the fight over CO2 and PM2.5 rules from U.S. Federal agencies like the EPA.  At the Federal level, the rule making process takes more than a year, usually two or more and includes Public Comment periods.  Rules are difficult to undo – and require the same lengthy process to make a new rule to override the old. 

New York State, currently big on the Climate Crisis, has just proposed a new rule as follows:

Proposed Action: Amendment of Part 490 of Title 6 NYCRR.

Statutory authority: Environmental Conservation Law, section 3-0319

Subject: Science-based State sea level rise projections. — Purpose: To establish a common source of sea-level rise projections for consideration in relevant programs and decision-making.

In plain English, the NY State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYS DEC) proposes a common source of Sea Level Rise Projections to be used statewide for program planning and decisions making.  This sounds good, right?  Can’t have all these different government programs and politicians using different data – that would be a mess.

Let’s see what they are mandating through this rule:

490.1 Purpose: This Part establishes science-based projections of [sea-level rise] sea level rise for New York State’s tidal coast, including the marine coasts of Nassau, Suffolk and Westchester counties and the five boroughs of New York City, and the main stem of the Hudson River, north from New York City to the federal dam at Troy.

Readers unfamiliar with New York State geography can look at this map of NY State – the above paragraph covers all the coastal sections of Long Island, Atlantic and Long Island Sound, and the Hudson River, which is tidal, all the way to Troy, which is north of Albany:

So, we see that besides the usual coastal areas, where we would expect tides, the Hudson River itself is tidal all the way north to “the federal dam at Troy”, which is 160 miles north of The Battery which sits at the southern tip of Manhattan Island (see inset lower right).   

The geography dictates that all of the tides up the Hudson River are determined by the tides at the Battery.

So, if we want to know how much sea level rise there has been in the past for Manhattan and all points north on the Hudson River, we must look to the tide gauge at The Battery.  We would be in luck, as that is one of the longest continuous tide gauge records in the United States and is coupled to a continuously operating GPS stations, which allows correction of the tide gauge record for the  vertical land movement (VLM) of the rock to which the tide gauge is attached.  Subtracting the VLM from the Relative Sea Level Rise (RSLR) apparent in the Tide Gauge Record,  we can determine eactly how much the sea surface itself has risen.

According to NOAA’s tide gauge record, The Battery has a long-term, nearly-perfectly linear record of Relative Sea Level Rise over 167 years of 2.92 mm/yr.  It can be highly variable month-to-month.  We can safely just say 3 mm per year and be close enough.

How much of that is subsidence of the structure on which the tide gauge is mounted?  According to the latest study [Wu, P.-C., Wei, M. (M. ), & D’Hondt, S. (2022). “Subsidence in coastal cities throughout the world observed by InSAR”. Geophysical Research Letters ] NY City’s The Battery sees VLM of -1.21 mm/yr.  That is subsidence, downward land movement, of over 40% of the recorded Relative Sea Level Rise, leaving  1.69 mm/yr of upward movement of the actual surface of the sea per year.  That 1.69 is very close to the standardly cited Global Sea Level Rise figure for the 20th Century of 1.7 or 1.8 mm/yr.  (opinions vary – see NOAA here.)

Note that this latest VLM finding is very close to that found in the seminal paper by Snay et al. in 2007 of -1.35 mm/yr for The Battery.

The subsidence at The Battery will not necessarily be reflected in the tidal values up the Hudson River, as coastal New York is thought to be subsiding at a faster rate than areas inland, and the “hinge point” for crustal rebound on the Hudson River is around Kingston, NY, which is about 95 miles north of The Battery, north of which the land begins to rise instead of subside.  

Nonetheless, for our purposes today, when talking about potential Sea Level Rise in the upriver reaches of the Hudson River, we can use 3 mm/yr as the upper bound and 1.7 mm/yr as the lower bound for Sea Level Rise on the tidal Hudson based on historical records corrected for VLM.

The proposed NY State rule calls for replacing the previously used  ClimAID projections, which had been updated in 2014, in this report:

which can be downloaded here.

Let‘s see what the updated projections are as of 2014.

The new rule calls for replacing the projections from the ClimAID 2004 report as updated in 2014.  This newer report updated the base period, changing the base period from 2000-2004  to the twenty years between 1995-2014, but gives no numerical metric – it doesn’t state what they were to use for the average sea level for that time period.    There are so many different methods of determining that base period metric that I will simply fallback on referring to the tide gauge record at The Battery. 

Using the long-term tide gauge record, we see an unchanging trend of 2.9 mm/yr.  The trend for the base period appears to be the same when looking at the whole record. (Technically, using the recorded monthly values, from Jan 1995 through Dec 2014, the linear trend is down…which is what happens when selecting just a small portion of a long-term record).  The previous sentence is an error – depending on and sensitive to the exact starting and ending dates for the base period (Jan or Dec 1995 and Jan or Dec 2014) the trend is either close to 2.9 mm/yr or decidedly flatter.

All of that adds up to this:  The least-wrong projection of future sea level rise for The Battery would be “more of the same” – about 3 mm/yr. – and, if one was overcome by a sudden attack of over-cautiousness, “maybe a little more.”

If we wish to include global warming/climate change in our forecast, then we must do so from one of the following IPCC dates for the start of Climate Change:   1890,  1950 (mid-20th century) or 1979 [IPCC AR6].  It is obvious from the NOAA Tide Gauge Record of The Battery that the sea level rise rate did not change at any of those dates but has rather remained stubbornly steady at the stated about 3 mm/yr or 30 mm per decade or 300 mm (about 12 inches) per century.

What does the new rule say planners in NY State must consider?  For all of these projections which are from the base period 1995-2014, the date of the report?

The previous version, supposed to be based on the updated NYSERDA report, had these:

The first chart above is from the NY State Register version of the new rule, however, despite claiming that the projections are from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) 2014, they are not the same.  The second chart is the equivalent chart from NYSERDA (2014).  Note that the dates are different and that even for the Low Projection, the new rule adds 10 extra inches (from 15 to 25) to projected SLR in NYC by 2100 without any explanation for the differences from the NYSERDA report.

It has taken a very deep dig to discover that the SLR projections in the new rule are derived from an Interim Version of a report that is to be cited as : Stevens, A., & Lamie, C., Eds. (2024). New York State Climate Impacts Assessment: Understanding and preparing for our changing climate.  (All the available .pdf files are watermarked INTERIM PUBLICATION.)

I’ll come back to how these projections came to be so exceptionally high.

If we just stick to SLR trends, so how much SLR do we need to experience at The Battery to see 6 inches of SLR between 2014 and 2039?  That’s 25 years to see 152 millimeters of SLR; just about exactly 6 mm/yr. 

Low Projection:   Even for the low projection, we would have had to seen twice the rate of SLR, every year since 2014 and every year up to 2039,  as we have actually experienced.  In the 9 years since 2014, we have only had 27-30 mm of SLR leaving 122 mm to be achieved in the next 15 years which would be a rate of a little over 8 mm/yr, nearly triple the current rate.  Likewise, for the 2100 low projection, a rate of about 8 mm/yr for the rest of the century would be required. 

High Projection:  The projection calls for 13 inches or 330 mm between the years 2014 and 2039 – which would require a rate of SLR of 13 mm/yr.  Since it is now 2024, we have only about 15 years left to see the remaining 300 mm (we have already seen 30) which requires 20 mm per year or 8/10th of an inch, each year, for the next 15 years.

They are just making this rule now, today, this week. 

I would think that those proposing this rule would realize that if they have not seen any increase in SLR rate in the last decade, 2014 to 2024, that it would require something truly extraordinary to see the rate of SLR double or triple over the next 15 years.  And these multiples are just for the Low Projection.

When considering the High Projections to 2100, we find that the projected rate of SLR used in the new rule are the same 20 mm/yr for the 85 years from 2014-2100.  But again, that would have required 20 mm/yr for the last decade as well, which we have not seen.

In short, something is seriously wrong with the projections of Sea Level Rise in this new rule.  They are not based on the 2014 NYSERDA report, but on the new, apparently not yet finalized, New York State Climate Impacts Assessment (2024).  I’ll give you a peek at the full projection from this report for The Battery (click on it for a single page .pdf download):

NYS-Climate-Impacts-Assessment-Projections-SLT-Rev-2023-The-BatteryHerunterladen

From the chart above, the Climate Assessment makes this claim:

“Projections for the future: Sea level is projected to rise along the state’s coastline and in the tidal Hudson by about 2 to 3 feet by the end of the century. However, there is a chance of a more dramatic change if part of the Antarctic ice sheet collapses, for example. Such a change is impossible to predict with any certainty, and scientists consider it a “low probability but high impact” event. If it happens, New York could experience sea level rise of about 7 to 10 feet by the end of the century.”

How in the world do they arrive at such hysterical conclusions?  Here’s the text from the new proposed rule:  “To provide for consideration of a range of possible futures, including potential for low-confidence, high-consequence sea level rise scenarios associated with rapid melt of land-based ice, the Department proposes adoption of projections based on a blending of projections associated with three illustrative scenarios: SSP2-4.5, SSP5-8.5 medium-confidence and SSP5-8.5 low-confidence.”

As with almost every other catastrophic climate change scenario and projection, the Climate Assessment team has used SSP5-8.5 – not just once,  but two versions of SSP5-8.5 “blended” with more sensible projections produced by SSP2-4.5. 

I’m sure that there is a procedure explaining somewhere how one scientifically “blends” projections, particularly if two of the three are considered improbable, implausible and/or outright impossible.   If you can find it, please let me know.

Normally, I would shake my head in amusement and forget it.  But in this case, everyone in New York with interests in tidal areas, including my friends and neighbors, or who pays State taxes of any sort, will be paying the price for these wildly exaggerated projections of sea level rise.

Bottom Lines:

1.  The report prepared for the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) and its projections of Sea Level Rise in NY State were touted as “Science-based State sea level rise projections”.  However, the even the projections in the updated version are poor science and do not even take into account the actual SLR seen over the last two decades, during which the SLR rate has stubbornly remained at 3 mm/yr. 

2.  The  updated NYSERDA 2014 report did not use standard procedures for its sea level rise projections, but a homespun mixture  “using  an innovative component-by-component analysis (Table 2)  that blends climate model outputs and expert judgment for  variables like ice sheet dynamics that climate models are unable to simulate.”    

3.  Worse yet, the new proposed rule under consideration,  as contained in the NY State Register, does not use the projections from the NYSERDA 2014, but instead uses the interim projections, claimed to be based on the IPCC’s AR6, in the New York State Climate Assessment.

4.  All of the projections, in the new rule,  in the NYSERDA 2014 report and in the NYS Climate Assessment require doubling and tripling of long-term SLR rates as seen at The Battery.  Such increases have not been seen in the decade since the 2014 update report and, based on the historical record,  are extremely unlikely to be seen in the near future.

5.  RCP8.5, or the newer version called  SSP2-8.5. A reasonable approach to projecting SLR in NY State, using the IPCC’s SSP2-4.5, has been polluted by “blending” in two projection sets based on the implausible, maybe impossible,  SSP5-8.5 resulting in projections that appear as fantasies.

5.  There must have been a real stickler on the NYS Climate Assessment team to force them to include the following caveat at the bottom of their SLR projections:

“Like all projections, these climate projections have uncertainty embedded within them. Sources of uncertainty include data and modeling constraints, the random nature of some parts of the climate system, and limited understanding of some physical processes. Levels of uncertainty are characterized using state-of-the-art climate models, multiple scenarios of future greenhouse gas concentrations, and recent peer-reviewed literature. Even so, the projections are not true probabilities, so the specific numbers should not be emphasized, and the potential for error should be acknowledged.”

6. Laughably, the Register entry, makes the following claim:

“4. Costs   Part 490 will not impose any costs on any entity because the regulation consists only of sea level rise projections and does not impose any standards or compliance obligations.”   

The new rule, however, literally “raises the bar”, to ridiculous heights, required for compliance with an untold number of other existing rules and regulations that mandate actions based on what will be these new official projections of Sea Level Rise, if the rule is enacted.

# # # # #

Author’s Comment:

My usual Sea Level Caveats apply:  The surface of the sea is rising, it has been rising for several hundred years, slowly and inexorably. It will continue to do so until the Earth enters into yet another cool period.  Human developments on low-lying coastal land (and foolishly-built infrastructure on barrier islands) are already at risk and should undertake adaption and mitigation efforts.

The very hard-working and knowledgeable Roger Caiazza, the Pragmatic Environmentalist of New York, brought this matter to my attention — and I hope that those of you with interests in New York State will take advantage of the Comment Period to object to this new rule.

You may participate in the Public Comment process as follows:

“Written comments on the proposed rule may be submitted until 5 p.m. on April 29, 2024. Comments and requests for further information can be sent by mail to Mark Lowery, NYS DEC Office of Climate Change, 625 Broadway, Albany, NY 12233-1030 or emailed to climate.regs@dec.ny.gov.  Include “Comments on Part 490” in the subject line of the email.”

Here is the link to read the full rule proposal in the NY State Register.   The Part 490 proposal begins on Page 8.

Thanks for reading.

Note: As usual, several obvious typos and grammatical errors have been corrected on my first reading after initial publication. There were quite a few — injected by nasty little internet pixies while I distracted. kh

New York State Advanced Clean Cars

Power supply connect to electric vehicle for charge to the battery. Charging technology industry transport which are the futuristic of the Automobile. EV fuel Plug in hybrid car.

Watts Up With That?

From the Pragmatic Environmentalist of New York

By Roger Caiazza

I believe that the majority of New Yorkers are unaware of the ramifications of regulations implementing control programs for the Climate Leadership & Community Protection Act (Climate Act) emission reduction mandates.  This post describes one regulation that will affect most New Yorkers but has not received as much attention as I would have thought.  The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) recently adopted amendments to 6 NYCRR Section 200.9 and 6 NYCRR Part 218 will incorporate California’s Advanced Clean Cars II (ACC II) regulation that require increasing annual zero emission vehicle (ZEV) sales requirements starting at 35% in model year 2026 and increasing to 100% by model year 2035.

I have been following the Climate Act since it was first proposed, submitted comments on the Climate Act implementation plan, and have written over 300 articles about New York’s net-zero transition.  I have devoted a lot of time to the Climate Act because I believe the ambitions for a zero-emissions economy embodied in the Climate Act outstrip available renewable technology such that the net-zero transition will do more harm than good.  The opinions expressed in this post do not reflect the position of any of my previous employers or any other company I have been associated with, these comments are mine alone.

Climate Act Background

The Climate Act established a New York “Net Zero” target (85% reduction and 15% offset of emissions) by 2050 and an interim 2030 reduction target of a 40% reduction by 2030. The Climate Action Council is responsible for preparing the Scoping Plan that outlines how to “achieve the State’s bold clean energy and climate agenda.”  In brief, that plan is to electrify everything possible and power the electric grid with zero-emissions generating resources.  The Integration Analysis prepared by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) and its consultants quantifies the impact of the electrification strategies.  That material was used to write a Draft Scoping Plan.  After a year-long review the Scoping Plan recommendations were finalized at the end of 2022.  In 2023 the Scoping Plan recommendations are supposed to be implemented through regulation and legislation.  This regulation is an example: “The amendments are also consistent with the requirements of the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, Chapter 106 of the Laws of 2019, as well as legislative requirement for all new, light-duty vehicle sales to 100% ZEV by 2035, Chapter 423 of the Laws of 2021, to further reduce greenhouse emissions in New York State.”

Advanced Clean Cars Regulation

One problem for the public as regulations and legislation are proposed and enacted is that the regulatory action language is dense and unclear.  The  DEC description of this rulemaking is a good example:

Part 218 Advanced Clean Cars II (ACC II) (PDF) – Effective July 6, 2023

This notice is continuation of the Proposed/Emergency Rulemaking of the same title that was adopted and effective on December 13, 2022 and published in the State Register on December 28, 2022. Emergency Rulemaking – Parts 200, General Provisions, and 218, Emissions Standards for Motor Vehicles and Motor Vehicle Engines. The emergency rulemaking will incorporate the State of California’s Advanced Clean Cars II (ACC II) regulation. The proposed amendments establish new zero emission vehicle (ZEV) and low emission vehicle (LEV IV) standards intended to reduce GHG (greenhouse gas) and NMOG + NOx (non-methane organic gas + oxides of nitrogen) emissions from light- and medium-duty on-road vehicles.

The ZEV amendments include an annual ZEV sales requirement for original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), minimum technical requirements, ZEV assurance measures, regulatory flexibilities, and simplified credit accounting. The proposed ZEV amendments will apply to 2026 and subsequent model year light-duty passenger cars (PC), light-duty trucks (LDT), and medium-duty passenger vehicles (MDPV). Starting with model year 2026, OEMs, will be required to deliver an increasing annual percentage of their sales that are ZEVs or PHEVs. This percentage requirement will start at 35% in model year 2026 and increase to 100% of sales for 2035 and subsequent model years. The proposed LEV IV amendments will apply to 2026 and subsequent model year PC, LDT, and medium-duty vehicles (MDV).

The Notice of Emergency Rulemaking is effective as of July 6, 2023, and will be available in the July 26, 2023 issues of the State Register and the Environmental Notice Bulletin.

Advanced Clean Cars for the Public

I think that the biggest unappreciated impact to the public will be the sales percentage mandates for zero-emission vehicles (ZEV) and plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEV).  Buried in the regulatory documents there is a pretty straigh-forward explanation. On page 4 of the July 26, 2023 State Register (page 14 of the pdf file) the sales mandates are described:

Starting with model year 2026, OEMs, will be required to deliver an increasing annual percentage of their sales that are ZEVs or PHEVs. This percentage requirement will start at 35% in model year 2026 and increase to 100% of sales for 2035 and subsequent model years.

PHEVs may be used to meet up to 20% of the annual ZEV requirement and they must meet minimum technical requirements. The use of PHEVs to meet part of the annual ZEV requirement will sunset following the 2035 model year.

ZEVs and PHEVs will be required to meet minimum technical requirements to earn ZEV values under ACC II. ZEVs must have a minimum all electric range (AER) of at least 150 miles and PHEVs must have a minimum AER of 50 miles and be capable of doing at least 40 miles on an aggressive drive cycle. ZEVs and PHEVs must also meet the ZEV assurance measures to be eligible to earn ZEV values. PHEVs must also be certified to super ultra-low emission vehicle (SULEV) standards and be covered by a 15 year or 150,000 mile warranty

The proposed ACC II ZEV amendments include ZEV assurance measures consisting of durability, warranty, service information/ standardized data parameters, and battery label requirements. The ZEV assurance measures will ensure that ZEVs retain functionality and reliability as internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEVs) are transitioned out of the on-road fleet.

Reactions to Advanced Clean Cars

The Big Green NGOs support this program to mitigate climate change.  The NRDC claims “Transitioning to a zero-emission transportation system, therefore, is one of the most effective ways to mitigate climate change, improve air quality and health almost everywhere, and make the total cost of car ownership lower and more predictable.”  The Sierra Club says “One policy that has pushed EVs to become more affordable and easier to purchase is the Advanced Clean Cars II (ACC2) Rule, also known as the Zero Emission Vehicle (ZEV) Standard.” 

While I am sure that there are people who agree with these organizations, I believe that the majority do not.  According to the NYSERDA Electric Vehicle Registration Map there were 155,988 electric vehicles on the road in New York as of July 2, 2023.  There are on the order of 11.5 million vehicles registered in New York so electric vehicles account for about 1.5% of the vehicles in the state.  The following table lists the number of new EV registrations per year.  EV proponents point to the increasing sales but, given the tremendous marketing effort for EVs I do not these numbers represent an endorsement for electric vehicles where it counts.

The reality is that there are issues with EVs.  I have set up a background page that provides links to articles describing some of those issues.  I am going to describe a couple of recent articles here that list some of my concerns.

Both articles address the obvious issue.  What if people like me don’t want to buy a battery electric vehicle because of range limitations, home infrastructure concerns, and worries about the morality of the supply chain of rare earth metals.  The first article notes that Unsold Electric Cars May Be Signaling A Death Spiral For The Auto Industry.  Ronald Stein lists reasons why people are not purchasing EVs and points out that EV inventories are rising.  He also points out that the used car market is important but that the EV used car market is non-existent.  Anecdotally, a friend of mine in the car business says that used Evs are not selling because of lemon laws and worries about battery replacement.

The other article by Terry Etam, The Potential Looming Auto Industry Fiasco, takes a big picture look at what lies ahead for the auto industry.  He notes that:

In the second quarter of 2023, Ford lost $72,000 on every EV sold. While the latter is ‘sort of’ normal for new car platforms – and Evs are nothing if not new platforms – what isn’t normal is for highly-touted/media-frenzy revolutionary new autos like the Ford Mustang Mach E EV to be selling under 3,000 units per month in the US as it is in 2023, two years after introduction (US sales peaked over 5,000 units per month shortly after introduction). In the second quarter of 2023, Ford sold 14,843 Evs (out of 513,662 vehicles sold by the company overall), a fairly meagre total considering the capital invested and the marketing campaigns. In the minds of most consumers, it seems an EV means a Tesla, and there is scant interest in anything else no matter the marketing hyperbole.

Etam brings up another point that is a concern of mine.  Evs are so expensive that the low- and middle- income residents of disadvantaged communities will have a tough time buying one.  He explains:

In case anyone cares, and it doesn’t seem that they do when energy transitions are discussed, this will all work out the absolute worst for lower income people. Ordinarily, the auto market provides options for lower economic classes with vehicles that are no longer in favour. For example, in periods of high gasoline prices, consumers that can afford to switch up will tend to go for more fuel efficient vehicles, and the market can get flooded with inefficient ones – which has the effect of pushing down prices of these out of favour beasts, putting them within reach of poorer people. The fuel costs may be higher, but at least they can buy wheels.

That likely won’t happen this time around, if we see people buy ICE vehicles and then hoard them for as long as they can. In fact, things are terrible already for lower income people looking to buy older used cars – prices have skyrocketed for those as well. 

Used cars are expensive, new cars are hideously more so, and Evs are, thus far, mostly toys of the wealthy with multi-car garages, or well paid urbanites that can afford to use them where they really shine. Again, we can see where China is twelve steps ahead; many popular Evs in China are tiny, cheap EV runabouts that don’t have massive range, but get the job done. No such option is available here in North America, few in Europe, and if they do show up on these shores, it is a safe bet they will be of Chinese origin, because they’re the only ones that can make money at it.

New York Reality

I took a quick look at the numbers to see if the Advanced Clean Car regulations in New York that require a certain percentage of new vehicle sales that are ZEVs or PHEVs have realistic targets.  The requirements are:

This percentage requirement will start at 35% in model year 2026 and increase to 100% of sales for 2035 and subsequent model years.  PHEVs may be used to meet up to 20% of the annual ZEV requirement and they must meet minimum technical requirements. The use of PHEVs to meet part of the annual ZEV requirement will sunset following the 2035 model year.

Where is the state now relative to these mandates?  At one time it would have been relatively easy to get the necessary data to determine the status.  However, the NY Department of Motor Vehicles no longer provides historical registration and new vehicle registration summary information.  Instead the primary New York registration information through Data.NY.Gov is a data dump of 12.5 million rows of registrations.  Completely worthless without a lot of processing and I don’t think it includes any historical information.  There is Data.NY.Gov source of summary registration by fuel type and county data.

In order to estimate the EV percentage of new car sales I needed the number of vehicles sold in New York.  I could not find that data but did find data for the United States.  I assumed that the percentage of new car sales in New York would be the same as the percentage of the country.  I found a source for United State motor vehicle registrations that included state data.  The following table lists country-wide and New York registrations by vehicle type.  I lumped all the registrations together for this analysis.

For new car sales I found data for the country.  I estimated the New York new car sales as the same percentage of new sales to total registrations for the country.  The following table lists those results.  Because I did not have registration data after 2019, I assumed the New York sales would equal the 5-year average for 2019 and subsequent years (highlighted in yellow).

I previously listed the EV registration data for New York. The following table includes a projection of sales needed for model year 2026. These assumptions show that the idea that New York will be able to meet the Advanced Clean Car rule 2026 mandate is preposterous. In 2023 I estimate that 8.6% of the vehicle sold will be EVs. Note that PHEVs made up around 50% of the sales in 2022 but that starting in 2026 that percentage needs to be lowered to 20%. I interpolated where we are in 2023 to 2026 and the increase in sales of EVs is not likely. To think that in 2025 that EV sales will be larger than the number of EVs currently on the road is nothing but wishful thinking.

The State Register notice describes the public comments:

Most of the more than 4,400 commenters including vehicle manufacturers, environmental groups, and non-governmental organizations supported the Department’s ACC II adoption. The remaining six commenters, including a large manufacturer of diesel engines and a petroleum industry trade group, were opposed to the regulation.

Typically, DEC will point to this overwhelming support in favor of the regulation as “proof” that it is appropriate.  If the comments were representative of general public opinion, then the percentage of EVs on the road in New York and the sales totals would be much higher.  As a result, the argument that the comments supporting the program are representative of general public opinion fails.  The overwhelming numbers do show that the environmental movement is extremely good at playing the game.

Used Vehicles

I believe that the regulation only applies to new cars.  This explanation states: “This law doesn’t affect gas cars already on the road, the sale of used gas cars or new registrations of gas cars.”  I suspect what we will see will be similar to what happened in Cuba.  Etam notes that:

Cuba has not had access to modern automotive technology since the 1960s. As a result, streets still are full of ancient American cars, held together forever.

There is no reason to think that won’t happen in the US, Canada and western Europe when the new-ICE ban comes into effect. Some segments of the population will go with the regulatory-mandated flow, while a great many will hold onto what they know, trust, and love. Short of a miracle battery breakthrough, many will simply not trust EVs in cold weather and/or instances where battery power doesn’t cut it.

As note previously, the lack of used EVs will impact the low income and disadvantage communities the most.  The regulation tries to address this problem but I don’t think the plan is very useful:

The proposed voluntary ACC II EJ flexibility is intended to award extra ZEV values to OEMs that undertake programs to expand ZEV availability to low income and disadvantaged communities. Optional programs include discounted ZEVs and PHEVs placed in community-based clean mobility programs, used ZEVs and PHEVs remaining in New York following the expiration of their lease term, and making low-cost ZEVs available to low income and disadvantaged communities. EJ values will be capped at 5% per year and will sunset following model year 2031.

Conclusion

From a practical standpoint I do not see how the new car sales mandates are going to convince those members of the public that EVs have more problems than benefits to buy one.  I bet that enterprising car salesmen will figure out ways around the regulation for those people who want a new internal combustion engine or even a PHEV for that matter.  If I but one out of state and come in toe DMV to register it are they going to say you cannot do that?  Will there be a market for sales out-of-state to middle men who buy a specific new car then turn around and sell it “used”.  The ultimate fall back is to simply keep the existing cars running as long a possible.

When I tell someone that there is a regulation in place that will eventually force them to buy an electric vehicle, the usual response is to say they cannot do that and I won’t buy one.  Unfortunately, the law is in place and eventually there will not be any other options for new vehicles.  The only alternative is to vote out the pandering politicians who respond to the marketing efforts of the Big Green lobbyists that got us into this mess.  I think that will eventually happen and I can’t wait.

For more on electric vehicles, go to our ClimateTV EV topic

New York Gas Stove Ban – Beginning of the End or End of the Beginning?

From Watts Up With That?

By Roger Caiazza

New York State recently banned the use of natural gas from most new buildings that was described as: “a major win for climate advocates, but a move that could spark pushback from fossil fuel interests”.   I have been following New York’s net-zero transition plan for years and there are some interesting aspects associated with the “major win for climate advocates”.

Climate Act Background

The Climate Leadership & Community Protection Act (Climate Act) established a New York “Net Zero” target (85% reduction and 15% offset of emissions) by 2050 and an interim 2030 target of a 40% reduction by 2030. The Climate Action Council is responsible for preparing the Scoping Plan that outlines how to “achieve the State’s bold clean energy and climate agenda.”  In brief, that plan is to electrify everything possible and power the electric gride with zero-emissions generating resources by 2040.  The Integration Analysis prepared by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) and its consultants quantifies the impact of the electrification strategies.  That material was used to write a Draft Scoping Plan.  After a year-long review the Scoping Plan recommendations were finalized at the end of 2022.  In 2023 the Scoping Plan recommendations are supposed to be implemented through regulation and legislation

New York’s official website for the Climate Act promotes the strategies in the Scoping Plan including a fact sheet describing the plans to decarbonize New York’s buildings.  It includes the following:

Adopt Zero-Emission Codes and Standards: More efficient, zero-emissions equipment for heating and cooking is increasingly available. That makes replacing existing equipment and appliances with cleaner and healthier alternatives an easy choice for New Yorkers. New construction projects will be required to install zero-emissions equipment in 2025 for single-family and low-rise buildings and in 2028 for high-rise and commercial buildings.

The Scoping Plan includes specific recommended strategies for the buildings sector.  The relevant theme, “Adopt Zero-Emission Codes and Standards and Require Energy Benchmarking for Buildings”, included three strategies:

B1. Adopt Advanced Codes for Highly Efficient, Zero-Emission, and Resilient New Construction

B2. Adopt Standards for Zero-Emission Equipment and the Energy Performance of Existing Buildings

B3. Require Energy Benchmarking and Disclosure

The text states:

In existing buildings, the best opportunity for energy improvements is during routine home and capital improvements and when HVAC equipment is retired from service. Since the useful life of HVAC equipment ranges from 15 to 30 years, seizing the opportunities to electrify

buildings by 2050 requires near-term action.

Electrification and efficiency improvements in existing buildings present a larger challenge of sheer scale.  The New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA), DEC, and New York State Department of State (DOS) should work together to adopt regulatory requirements that will bring about the end of fossil fuel combustion in buildings by prohibiting replacement of fossil fuel equipment at end of useful life, coordinated with action taken by the PSC and New York State Department of Public Service (DPS) to regulate gas utilities and with New York State Department of Labor (DOL) and the Office of Just Transition to promote workforce development. Building performance standards also will compel efficient operation of buildings and capital investments in high-performance building envelopes and efficient HVAC systems.

New York Legislation

As noted previously the plan for 2023 is to promulgate new regulations and pass new legislation to implement the Scoping Plan recommendations.  New York’s strange political process includes an annual legislative self-made crisis in which legislation is held hostage to the annual budget.  On May 2, over a month past the April 1 due date, the Legislature and Administration finally passed the budget bill that included the gas stove ban that got so much attention.  The point of this article is that there were interesting aspects of the budget discussions this year that have bigger implications than the passage of the ban.

In my opinion, and certainly the belief of the climate activists, the Scoping Plan is pretty clear that fossil-fueled equipment is to be banned outright.  Indeed, the legislation prohibits installation of “fossil-fuel equipment and building systems” in newly constructed buildings seven stories or less, except new commercial or industrial buildings over 100,000 ft2 on or after 12/31/25, and for all other buildings on or after 12/31/28”.  However, the prohibition does not apply to     

  • The repair, alteration, addition, relocation, or other changes to pre-existing buildings
  • The fossil-fuel prohibition shall exempt equipment and systems used for emergency back-up power and standby power; manufactured homes, and building used as a manufacturing facility, commercial food establishment, laboratory, car wash, laundromat, hospital, other medical facility,  critical  infrastructure, agricultural building, fuel cell system, or crematorium.
  • To the “fullest extent feasible”, fossil-fuel equipment and building systems in such buildings are to be limited to areas where a prohibition is infeasible, and such areas must be “electrification ready”, except for those serving manufacturing or industrial processes.  Emissions from allowed use must be minimized.  “Financial considerations shall not be sufficient basis to determine physical or technical infeasibility.”
  • The Energy Code shall exempt new building construction that requires new or expanded electric service, pursuant to §31.1 of the Public Service Law, when electric service cannot be reasonably provided by the grid.

When the ban on natural gas in new construction was first announced there was intense pushback.  Apologists and the Governor were quick to point out that the ban only affected new construction and that nobody was coming to take away existing natural gas appliances.  However, the Scoping Plan recommendations make it clear that the plan is to eventually ban the replacement of most existing fossil-fired infrastructure. Furthermore, the original language did not include all the caveats that ended up in the final bill described above.  I interpret that to mean that the reality is that accommodations have to be made to pass Climate Act implementing legislation.

Emissions Accounting

The New York political theater starts with the Governor’s State of the State address in early January that outlines her legislative agenda for the year.  This is followed by specific legislative proposals from the Administration, Senate, and Assembly.  This year the initial budget bills from the Governor, Senate and Assembly included significant policy aspects related to the Climate Act that did not get included in the final budget bill but the debates are instructive.

For example, sometime during this process there was a revelation that prompted a specific legislative proposal to modify the emissions accounting because of excessive costs.  Climate Action Council co-chairs Doreen Harris and Basil Seggos explained that::

“First and foremost, the governor is trying to maintain New York’s leadership on climate. It’s a core principle that she brought into office and we have been carrying that out for several years,” said Seggos.

But Gov. Hochul instructed both the DEC and NYSERDA to look at the affordability of Cap & Invest.

“We began running the numbers on that, based on some of the metrics being used by Washington state and some of our own, and revealed some…potentially extraordinary costs affiliated with the program,” Seggos explained. “So that’s really what this is.  It isn’t a focus necessarily on methane itself, or any particular pollutant. It is how do we implement the CLCPA in a way that doesn’t put extraordinary costs on the pockets of New Yorkers.”

It seems astounding to me but it does appear that someone in the Administration finally started really looking at the potential costs of the Climate Act.  When the first auction of allowances for the Washington state program produced costs higher than expected, DEC and NYSERDA ran the numbers and the results were a reality slap to the Administration.  The response was to propose a change to the unique emissions accounting scheme used in the Climate Act.

In order to maximize the purported harm of natural gas use the Climate Act specified the use of global warming potential over 20 years rather than over 100 years as used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the United States government, and every other jurisdiction (since its implementation the state of Maryland has also begun to specify GWP-20).  The result is that the number of tons of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions are increased and when that emission total was  multiplied by the closing price of the Washington state auction the result was “extraordinary costs”.

In one word the response by climate activists to this legislation was  “meltdown”.  For example, NY Renews, a coalition of over 300 environmental, justice, faith, labor, and community groups that bills itself as the “force behind the nation’s most progressive climate law” had this to say:

S6030/A6039 is part of a larger pattern of attacks by the fossil fuel industry that threaten to sabotage New York’s nation-leading climate law, the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, and roll back hard-won standards for accurately accounting for the impacts of greenhouse gas emissions, particularly methane. If passed, the bill would change how the state measures methane and carbon dioxide emissions, pave the way for polluting corporations to emit without consequence, and harm the health and well-being of frontline community members who live, work, play, and pray in neighborhoods across NYS. 

NY Renews unequivocally opposes the inclusion of this bill in the state budget and any deal that would include it. We’re calling on the state legislature to uphold the Climate Act as written into law and reject amendments that would threaten its power to protect and prepare New Yorkers facing the worst effects of the climate crisis.

In response to the outcry the Administration backed down from the proposal.  They claimed that it distracted from the importance of passing the budget bill.  Nonetheless, Seggos said “The fundamental takeaway is it’s full steam ahead for cap and invest with the climate action rebate and any other elements we’ll take up as soon as we can.”

Discussion

The reason that I am encouraged rather than discouraged by the enacted gas appliance ban on new construction is that a couple of issues came up that will have to be addressed.  The political approach to punt difficult problems down the road can only work so long.

The initial blowback to the gas stove ban prompted the Administration to propose legislation that gradually eliminates fossil fuel-burning heating equipment from nearly all New York buildings, consistent with the Climate Action Council plan, but takes less aggressive steps to reduce the use of gas stoves.  The proposed changes:

  • Dec. 31, 2025: Prohibit all equipment (including stoves) that burn fossil fuels in new construction of single-family homes or apartment buildings of three stories or less.
  • Dec. 31, 2028: Prohibit all fossil fuel-burning equipment (including stoves) in new construction of commercial buildings and multifamily structures of four stories or more.
  • Jan. 1, 2030: Prohibit installation of heating or hot water equipment (but not stoves) in any single-family home or apartment building of three stories or less.
  • Jan. 1, 2035: Prohibit installation of fossil fuel heating or hot water systems (but not stoves) in any commercial building or larger multifamily structure.

The final legislation only addressed the first two components.  The Administration apparently hopes that the Scoping Plan recommendation to mandate electrification when existing fossil-fired appliances reach their end of life can be made palatable if gas stoves are exempted.  I think that is naïve because so many people appreciate the resiliency and capabilities of fossil-fueled furnaces and hot water heaters too.  When the legislation to implement a prohibit in-kind replacement of existing appliances comes up, I believe there will be intense blowback.

The final budget bill also included legislation for distribution of the proceeds from a cap and invest auction.  I don’t see an easy path for the Administration to walk back their statements that the auction will result in extraordinary costs.  They are on record saying the costs are unacceptable so how do they reconcile that?

Conclusion

At the start of the year the idea that the government is coming for your gas stove was dismissed as a right wing conspiracy:

  • NYT: “No One Is Coming for Your Gas Stove Anytime Soon” 
  • Time: “How Gas Stoves Became the Latest Right-Wing Cause in the Culture Wars”
  • Salon: “Rumors of a gas stove ban ignite a right-wing culture war”
  • MSNBC: “No, the woke mob is not coming for your gas stove.”
  • AP News: “FACT FOCUS: Biden administration isn’t banning gas stoves”
  • The Washington Post: ​​“GOP thrusts gas stoves, Biden’s green agenda into the culture wars”

However, New York’s Climate Act implementation demonstrates that a net-zero transition requires such a ban.  It is not going to be possible to put off a debate about personal choice options and the advantages of fossil fuel for residential use because the New Yorkers who are blissfully unaware of this aspect of the Climate Act will demand to be heard.

The other aspect of this relates to the cap and invest program and the costs of the program.  The Hochul Administration narrative is that the costs of inaction for the net zero Climate Act transition outweigh the costs of action but that statement is misleading unless they issue a caveat that the costs in the Scoping Plan do not include the costs of “already implemented” programs. My analyses of costs have found that there are other  significant “already implemented” program costs (for example the costs of transportation electrification) and that means that the Administration claim does not include all the costs to transition to net-zero.  It gets worse because as far as I can tell the Integration Analysis does include the benefits of already implemented programs while it excludes the costs.  In order to get the desired result, the State analyses have a thumb pressing down on one side of the scale and the other thumb is pushing up the other side of the scale.  I don’t see how the Administration can avoid a meaningful discussion of the costs that they admit are extraordinary.

CNN described the New York State ban on the use of natural gas from most new buildings as “a major win for climate advocates, but a move that could spark pushback from fossil fuel interests”.   Advocates refuse to acknowledge the possibility that fossil fuel interests could align with the interests of the majority of New Yorkers who appreciate and value the resiliency and affordability of our existing fossil-fueled infrastructure.  The proposed wholesale shift to unwanted technology without proper accounting of costs will be under intense scrutiny this year.  I do not see how the Hochul Administration can avoid an open debate about the implications of the Climate Act for all New Yorkers.

—————————————————————————————————————————————

Roger Caiazza blogs on New York energy and environmental issues at Pragmatic Environmentalist of New York.  More details on the Climate Leadership & Community Protection Act are available here. He has written over 300 articles about New York’s net-zero transition because he believes the ambitions for a zero-emissions economy embodied in the Climate Act outstrip available renewable technology such that the net-zero transition will do more harm than good. This represents his opinion and not the opinion of any of his previous employers or any other company with which he has been associated.

New York Goes Full Central Planning for The Electricity Sector

From MANHATTAN CONTRARIAN

by Francis Menton

Here in New York State, we have an electricity system that, as of this moment, is functioning just fine. Granted, we pay more for the electricity than we should — probably in the range of 50% or more extra — mainly because we have banned the exploitation of our own abundant natural gas resources from the Marcellus and Utica shale formations in the upstate areas. And granted also that we just in 2020 and 2021 closed the two big nuclear reactors at Indian Point, about 40 miles north of New York City, which had supplied more than 25% of the City’s power.

(We immediately replaced those nuclear plants with two brand new natural gas power plants of almost equivalent capacity, and with those additions the current system continues to work with a high degree of reliability. Building those new gas plants was our last rational act before peak environmental insanity kicked in.)

It is not news that our existing, functional electricity system grievously offends the sensibilities of environmental activists, particularly due to its high reliance on natural gas to generate the power. By our Climate Change and Community Protection Act of 2019 (Climate Act), the legislature has decreed that we are to have a rapid transition to “net zero” carbon emissions, first in the electricity sector, and then for the entire economy. No feasibility study or demonstration project for us! The only option is Full Speed Ahead, without a clue as to whether this will work or not.

The free markets have figured out that natural gas is the current low-cost way to make incremental electricity; thus, the energy transition does not budge without government command and massive subsidies. That will not stop us. Forget what the markets are clearly telling us. It’s time for the markets to take their orders from the politicians and the bureaucrats. We will go Full Central Planning. Has that ever proved to be a problem anywhere in the past? Not that anyone here seems to recognize.

As previously discussed in this post of December 29, 2021, the Climate Act ordered up a Climate Action Council, and directed said Council to produce a Scoping Plan to show us the path forward to net zero utopia. The Council was stacked with environmental activists and sorely lacking in anyone with expertise in how the energy system actually works. A Scoping Plan was duly produced— more than 300 pages of text and another 400+ of appendices. In that December 2021 post I characterized the Scoping Plan (then in near-final draft form) as “preposterous” and “amateurish,” essentially taking the approach of ordering up the end result and directing the little people to figure out the engineering details. Sample quote: “The authors are like a parody version of King Canute, who actually believe that when they order the tide to stop rising, it will obey.”

More recently, it has been brought to my attention that other documents exist supposedly giving more detail as to how New York is going to accomplish the net zero transition. First, daughter (and MC contributor) Jane participated in a conference call among board members of Queens co-ops, attended by Donovan Richards, the Queens Borough President. The purpose of the call was to present concerns about whether the grid would be adequate to support the change to electric heat that is being forced on the co-ops by a New York City statute. According to Jane, Richards and his staff pooh-poohed the idea that grid adequacy might pose any problem. To allay any concerns, they referred Jane and her co-board members to a January 2022 Report issued by the electric utility Con Edison, with the title “An Integrated View of Our Energy System through 2050.”

Separately, reader Bill Ponton refers me to another Report, this one put out in January 2021 by the New York Public Service Commission and the NYS Energy Research and Development Authority, with the title “Initial Report on the Power Grid Study.” (At that link there is a further link where you can download a pdf of the full Report.)

Let me start with a few thoughts on the Con Edison Report. It is lots of verbiage and plenty of charts and graphs. And it is more or less exactly what you would expect if you think for say, one minute, about what position Con Edison might take. As a deeply regulated entity, they are completely required to affirm the directives and applaud the wisdom of their government overlords. But more than that, they are clearly salivating over the prospect of getting to make billions of dollars of new investments, all of which will earn a guaranteed, regulated rate of return for their investors — and if we are really, really lucky, the end result will be that we get the exact same electricity for much higher cost. If we aren’t so lucky, we will get much less reliable electricity for the much higher cost. The cost factor is played down throughout the Report, and we never get any meaningful quantification.

But all the verbiage and charts and graphs mainly have the purpose of obscuring the fact that Con Ed does not take responsibility for making sure that there is enough electricity availability to supply customer demand on the grid. That’s somebody else’s job.

To set the tone, here is a quote from page 1:

[W]e are committed to being the next-generation, clean energy company that our customers deserve and expect. We will play a critical role in delivering on the ambitious climate and clean energy goals set by New York State and New York City, including reaching net-zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2050. In addition, the need for safe, reliable, and secure energy infrastructure remains paramount.

OK, where in there did you say that you take responsibility for there being enough electricity to meet demand?

Cost barely gets mentioned in the introductory section. It finally turns up in the last paragraph. Here’s how they spin it:

We recognize this transition to a net-zero GHG emissions energy system will require significant investment. We seek to make investments that achieve the goals of this transition as cost- effectively as possible, which necessitates growing our electric system while maintaining our gas and steam systems to achieve clean energy goals.

In other words, whoo-boy is there a lot of money for us to make here!

But how about the question of who is going to supply the electricity? Buried in a section on “Our History” (page 9), we find this:

We primarily own transmission and distribution assets and no generation aside from our steam co-generation.

Oh, right, Con Ed got out of the generation business over the course of the past several decades. Somebody else will be building all of those new wind turbines and solar panels. Or maybe they won’t. Not our business. On page 3 we get a table of all of the fantastic new renewable generation to come:

  • Up to 41 GW of utility scale solar generation from across New York State
  • Up to 19.4 GW of offshore wind from the Atlantic Ocean
  • Up to 13.8 GW of onshore wind from upstate New York
  • 3.5 GW of renewable hydropower from Canada

And how much of that do you take responsibility for?

We have developed plans to build the necessary electric transmission and distribution infrastructure by 2050 to . . . [I]nterconnect and balance new renewable generation from [these new renewable generators].

In other words, it’s not our job to actually build the things, let alone decide how many of them to build or where. Our job is “interconnection” and “balance.” Providing the actual generation capacity is the job of the Central Planners — people with no profit motive and whose jobs are not on the line if the whole thing turns out not to work. Are they doing the job? No comment.

And how about the trillions of dollars worth of energy storage that will be needed when the sun doesn’t shine and the wind doesn’t blow? See if you can decode this word salad:

We have developed plans to build the necessary electric transmission and distribution infrastructure by 2050 to . . . [d]evelop and facilitate up to 12.6 GW of energy storage through direct utility investments and customer programs at customer and utility scales.

Where even to start? “12.6 GW” of storage? They don’t even know the correct units to discuss this issue. If these are four-hour duration lithium ion batteries (unspecified, but what else could they be talking about?), that will give you 50.4 GWh of storage — enough to cover New York State for a couple of hours at most of low sun and wind. Competent calculations indicate a storage requirement of more like 20 to 30 days of storage to deal with the seasonality of the sun and wind. So this is at best a small fraction of one percent of what will be needed to back up the solar/wind grid of the future.

But what does Con Ed care? They’re not actually saying here that they are taking responsibility for making the new system work, let alone even providing the batteries themselves. They’re only saying that they have “developed plans” to “facilitate” the storage, which could occur either through “utility investments” or “customer programs.” In other words, I guess, hey sucker, use your electric car battery to power the house when the grid goes down.

Yes, this is what the Borough President of Queens is offering up to reassure his constituents that they have nothing to worry about as our government simultaneously shuts down all electricity generation that works and compels them to go all electric to heat their homes.

In the next post I’ll offer some observations from Bill Ponton on the NYSERDA grid study.