Regulation

Electric power generation in the U.S. is shifting rapidly away from fossil fuels toward cleaner and lower-carbon sources. State clean energy targets and dramatic declines in the cost of renewable electricity are the most important reasons. But fossil fuel plants still generate 60% of the U.S. electricity supply, producing air, water and land pollutants and greenhouse gases in the process. To reduce these impacts, the Environmental Protection Agency announced a suite of rules on April 25, 2024. They focus mainly on coal plants, the nation’s most-polluting electricity source. As an environmental lawyer who has been in practice since the early 1970s, I believe these curbs on power plant pollution are long overdue. The new rules close loopholes in existing laws that have allowed coal-fired power plants to pollute the nation’s air and water for decades. And they require utilities to drastically slash these plants’ greenhouse gas emissions or close them down. Oppon...

Did you receive a mail-order package this week? Carriers in the U.S. shipped 64 packages for every American in 2022, so it’s quite possible. That commerce reflects the expansion of large-scale retail in recent decades, especially big-box chains like Walmart, Target, Best Buy and Home Depot that sell goods both in stores and online. This has led to the growth of distribution centers that fulfill these orders. While mail-order commerce is convenient, these centers also have harmful impacts, including traffic congestion and air and water pollution. I study environmental history, and I am part of a group of scholars examining the environmental impacts of big-box stores like Walmart, Target, REI and Bass Pro Shops. Sustainability is a hot topic in the retail sector, but my research on the history of Target – the sixth-largest retailer in the U.S. – shows how retail companies have largely escaped the kinds of environmental regulations that affect other sectors such...

The U.S. power grid is the largest and most complex machine ever built. It’s also aging and under increasing stress from climate-driven disasters such as wildfires, hurricanes and heat waves. Over the past decade, power grids have played roles in wildfires in multiple states, including California, Hawaii, Oregon and Minnesota. When wind speeds are high and humidity is low, electrical infrastructure such as aboveground power lines can blow into vegetation or spark against other components, starting a fire that high winds then spread. Under extreme conditions, utilities may opt to shut off power to parts of the grid in their service areas to reduce wildfire risk. These outages, known as public safety power shutoffs, have occurred mainly in California, where wildfires have become larger and more destructive in recent decades. On April 5-6, 2024, Colorado utility Xcel Energy carried out that state’s first public safety power shutoff, cutting power to thousands of custo...

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released strict new emissions limits on March 20, 2024, for cars built from 2027 through 2032. The final rule for Multi-Pollutant Emissions Standards caps a process that started almost a year earlier, when the Biden administration first proposed groundbreaking regulations that would essentially require automakers to make a substantial pivot toward electrification. The original proposal met significant pushback from carmakers and unions, who argued that the industry needed more time to switch from gas-powered cars to EVs. As a result, while the final target that this rule sets is very similar to the one that was initially proposed, the timetable in the final rule – especially in the earlier years – is relatively relaxed. That means more carbon emissions in the short run. Politics is inevitably an important consideration in regulating major industries. The new rule is projected to cut carbon dioxide emissions from passenger ca...

Small-scale solar power, also known as rooftop or distributed solar, has grown considerably in the U.S. over the past decade. It provides electricity without emitting air pollutants or climate-warming greenhouse gases, and it meets local energy demand without requiring costly investments in transmission and distribution systems. However, its expansion is making it harder for electric utilities and power grid managers to design fair and efficient retail electricity rates – the prices that households pay. Under traditional electricity pricing, customers pay one charge per kilowatt-hour of electricity consumption that covers both the energy they use and the fixed costs of maintaining the grid. As more people adopt rooftop solar, they buy less energy from the grid. Fewer customers are left to shoulder utilities’ fixed costs, potentially making power more expensive for everyone. This trend can drive more customers to leave the system and raise prices further – a...