Hi All
The opposition to removal of carbon dioxide probably comes from
vegetable extremists.
I understand that there are a considerable number of intelligent people
in Massachusetts. What will happen to patterns of air movement at the
border if they make geo-engineering compulsory while Rhode island makes
it illegal?
Stephen
Emeritus Professor of Engineering Design. School of Engineering.
University of Edinburgh. Mayfield Road. Edinburgh EH9 3JL. Scotland
[email protected] Tel +44 (0)131 650 5704 Cell 07795 203 195
WWW.see.ed.ac.uk/~shs YouTube Jamie Taylor Power for Change
On 23/03/2015 19:04, Wil Burns wrote:
I don't have any insights into the genesis of this bill, but I suspect
it's not the last one we'll see of this nature. Just as climate
policy/energy policy (think things e.g. state regulation of fracking
or RGGI or AB32) has been effectuated at the sub-national level, so
may climate geoengineering policy. It is possible, however, should
climate geoengineering become a serious policy option in the United
States, that Congress may seek to upend state regulation of this
nature. I think it would have clear authority to do so under the
Preemption Clause of the US Constitution (Article VI, Clause 2).
As for the bill itself, a couple of things jump out:
1. Given the potential threats outlined in the Findings of Fact
portion of the bill, it's really unclear why it seeks to regulate
carbon dioxide removal research at all. I think one could make an
argument that there are some areas of concern in this context that
might be of concern, but they are not set forth in the bill. In fact,
23-23.8-3(3) notes that geoengineering would merely mask the potential
impacts of climate change and not address ocean acidification. That's
assuredly not the case in terms of CDR approaches, so the bill's
drafters appear to be a bit confused, and perhaps a bit overinclusive,
in terms of the scope of potential regulation;
2. I can't see how CDR experiments, or even deployment within state
boundaries, could be deemed to be a violation of Chapter 23 of Title
23 of the Air Pollution Episode Control Act of the state, which would
also make enforcement problematic;
3. I do applaud the bill's proposal to establish a mechanism for
public deliberation on the merits of climate geoengineering, something
woefully lacking in both the major NAS reports released a few weeks
ago. However, the mechanism to effectuate this, public hearings,
doesn't appear to be the optimal approach to accomplish this, in that
it's likely that such venues won't be representative of public
sentiment, nor is there a reflexive process that would help to engage
scientists, citizens and policymakers in a dialogue about the
technical, ethical and political implications of geoengineering. The
state could become a leader in this context by developing a process,
as some states have done in the past in the context of nanotechnology
and GMOs (e.g. North Carolina State University’s National Citizens’
Technology Forum), to facilitate this. This could include the
development of consensus forums, citizen juries and deliberative
mapping exercises. It would behoove our community to reach out to the
drafters to discuss some of these issues.
On Sunday, March 22, 2015 at 4:37:11 PM UTC-7, Hester, Tracy wrote:
We now have possibly the first state proposed legislation in the
United States to control climate engineering efforts. A bill
(H-5480) was recently introduced in the Rhode Island legislature
that would require any climate engineering efforts to undergo an
approval process and two (at least) public hearings. The bill
would impose fines and up to 90 days imprisonment for each day
that the unapproved climate engineering continues. The bill also
gives Rhode Island's environmental agency the ability to enjoin
and halt an unapproved project.
If you’d like to get more details, you can review the bill itself
at
http://webserver.rilin.state.ri.us/BillText/BillText15/HouseText15/H5480.pdf
<http://webserver.rilin.state.ri.us/BillText/BillText15/HouseText15/H5480.pdf>
These local initiatives might pop up in other state legislatures
if climate engineering research gains momentum (especially after
the NAS reports last month). If so, the prospect of overlapping
or conflicting regulations from multiple states will often spur
the federal government to impose its own consolidated regulatory
scheme to preempt the state efforts.
Professor Tracy Hester
University of Houston Law Center
100 Law Center
Houston, Texas 77204
713-743-1152
[email protected] <javascript:>
Web bio: www.law.uh.edu/faculty/thester
<http://www.law.uh.edu/faculty/thester>
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