Matt Doll, Minnesota Environmental Partnership
This month, the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) is gathering input from Minnesotans on how to roll out the state’s 100% carbon-free electricity law.
Passed last year as the first of the session’s many big steps forward for climate and environment, the 100% law left a number of blanks for the PUC to fill in. Among the most critical: how to define “carbon-free?” Legislators intended for the law to specifically encourage legitimately carbon-free sources of power, like wind and solar. But industry groups are pushing for certain more dubious power technologies to be included despite the intent and letter of the law.
MEP allies CURE, Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy, Minnesota Environmental Justice Table, and Sierra Club North Star Chapter held a press conference today to push back on efforts to water down the law. In a press release, Sierra Club North Star Chapter’s Legislative Director Peter Wagenius said, “The law is unequivocal: carbon-free electricity means electricity that does not emit carbon. Unfortunately, the MPCA and DNR are aligning with polluting industries, and urging the PUC to disregard this clear mandate.”
Rep. Frank Hornstein speaks at a press conference on July 23 in favor of a truly carbon-free clean energy standard
The five commissioners of the PUC will have to carefully consider and debate this and other questions. They’re currently on the second phase of a multi-part series of comment periods on the 100% law, a period that ends at 4:30 tomorrow, July 24th.
We’re encouraging Minnesotans to submit comments referencing docket 23-151 because the PUC’s decisions will have enormous implications for how we build our clean energy future – and the wrong decisions could cause us to take steps backward.
Context: the state of the state’s electricity
For the past several years, more than half of Minnesota’s electricity has come from carbon-free sources. Most of that carbon-free power comes from renewables like wind and solar, which are also now our cheapest available power sources.
Another large portion of our carbon-free power comes from the state’s two nuclear plants, at Monticello and at Prairie Island. Those plants don’t provide us with “clean” energy. MEP member organizations have a variety of views on nuclear power, but our biggest concern is what Xcel Energy does with the waste. Currently, the Prairie Island plant’s radioactive waste is stored in steel casks on land immediately next to the Prairie Island Indian Community, which objects to this long-term storage.
The rest of our energy still mostly comes from coal and natural gas, neither of which are produced anywhere in Minnesota (though North Dakota is more than happy to sell us its dirty power.) Coal is by far our electricity sector’s biggest climate villain, as well as a source of illness-causing pollutants like mercury, nitrogen oxide, and particulates, that end up in our air and make their way into our water. Burning natural gas produces less carbon dioxide and air pollution than coal, but it still does severe harm to our climate in the long term, especially as leaked methane from natural gas infrastructure traps far more heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide.
Minnesota also operates seven trash incinerators around the state, the most controversial of which is the Hennepin Energy Recovery Center (HERC) in a densely populated and diverse part of Minneapolis. For years, environmental justice activists have been fighting to shut down the HERC due to its air pollution impacts. They scored a key victory in the 100% law, which included a provision that the HERC can no longer be regarded as “renewable energy” for legal purposes.
The PUC’s options
Legislators’ intent behind the 100% law was to phase out coal and natural gas, mostly in favor of wind, solar, and geothermal power, along with the storage infrastructure needed to maintain the grid with clean power. But the law left significant wiggle room for utilities and energy companies to push for dirty sources to be included as “carbon-free.”
The clearest example of a technology being falsely labeled “carbon-free” is, as previously mentioned, waste incineration. Burning trash might keep it out of a landfill, but it emits more carbon emissions per unit of electricity it generates, not less. Solving our waste problem is a bigger issue than the 100% law was designed to address, but at the very least, waste incineration, with its public health impacts, should not be treated as carbon free.
Similarly, we’ve seen a push to include woody biomass – from tree removal, lumber production, or other sources – touted as a climate solution as it is “carbon neutral.” Its supporters argue that because the amount of carbon a tree releases when it is burned is close to the amount it previously absorbed from the air, it has no net climate impact. The facts are more complicated, and there are much more productive and climate-friendly – rather than neutral – ways to use waste wood. Burning wood also releases even more toxic pollutants than burning coal. Having a campfire on a calm day is one thing, but Minnesota should not be treating wood burning as a large-scale climate solution.
Some companies are also advocating for hydrogen to be included in the carbon-free framework, pointing to developments like the Heartland Hydrogen Hub in Minnesota and the Dakotas as a step forward. The truth is more complicated: hydrogen itself burns relatively cleanly, producing only water vapor and a small amount of the air pollutant nitrogen oxide, but the production of hydrogen is usually bad for the climate.
The vast majority of industrially used hydrogen is considered “gray” hydrogen, produced using steam and methane, and has a carbon impact of several tons of carbon dioxide for every ton of hydrogen acquired. This hydrogen is considered “blue” hydrogen if those emissions are captured and stored. Only “green hydrogen,” produced using water and electricity, is truly carbon-free, but it’s not necessarily a net benefit to the climate if it uses electricity that could be used for other purposes. Hydrogen could have a place in a green economy, but it shouldn’t be regarded as a clean source of electricity on its own.
Finally, interests including pipeline companies and the ethanol industry are pushing for carbon capture and storage “CCUS” infrastructure, including pipelines, to absorb carbon emissions from industrial and power facilities. Current CCUS methods and pipelines present big problems: they require huge amounts of energy, they threaten nearby communities that could be devastated by toxic carbon dioxide leaks, and the carbon they pump is mostly used to extract more oil. Sequestering carbon in general is good for the climate, but these pipelines are largely a smokescreen to help companies get away with continuing to use dirty fuels. They should not be treated as part of Minnesota’s clean energy makeup.
Next steps to 100%
The Public Utilities Commission is accepting comments on these issues as part of docket 23-151 through 4:30 this Wednesday, July 24th. MEP and allied organizations are submitting comments to the PUC in support of strictly defining “carbon-free” to include only technologies that actually operate without carbon emissions.
We encourage our readers, regardless of your level of energy expertise, to speak up. Whether you live near an urban incinerator, downwind from a coal plant, along the path of a proposed carbon dioxide pipeline, or simply anywhere that will be affected by climate change (everywhere), how this law is implemented will affect you. There’s no time like the present to make your voice heard.
For more information, see this 100% Implementation Toolkit produced by MEP allies.