On the Issues: Housing Policy, Dam Removals, and More

Matt Fleck, Hans Hirwa, and Elizabeth Wason

Twice a month, we’re compiling the most relevant news stories from diverse sources online, connecting the latest environmental and energy economics research to global current events, real-time public discourse, and policy decisions. Keep reading, and feel free to send us your feedback.

Here are some questions we’re asking and addressing with our research chops this week:

What proactive steps can help protect housing and built infrastructure against the effects of climate change?

Heavy rainstorms have struck California for the second time this month. Both sets of storms are the product of atmospheric rivers, which are “rivers in the sky” that carry large amounts of moisture through the atmosphere from tropical regions to other areas of the world, like the western United States. These types of storms are expected to intensify as the planet warms. Proactive measures can help mitigate damage to households when extreme weather strikes, says Carlos Martín, a university fellow at Resources for the Future (RFF). In a new episode of the Resources Radio podcast, Martín discusses steps that governments can take to help households prepare for climate change, argues that housing is central to climate policy, and expounds on two recent reports about climate change and the built environment. “There’s a housing crisis that’s afoot, and that housing crisis is going to play out in our climate and environmental policy,” says Martín.

How has New York State used housing policy to improve community resilience to climate change and keep residents out of harm’s way?

New York State is projected to experience more coastal flooding, heavier rainstorms, and rapid sea level rise due to climate change, according to a new report. Sea levels surrounding Manhattan could rise 19 inches by midcentury and 50 inches by 2100; flooding in coastal communities is expected to become more frequent and intense, as well. A program that the state instituted in the wake of Hurricane Sandy may offer an example for policymakers who want to mitigate the damages from these effects, says RFF Fellow Yanjun (Penny) Liao. The state bought properties that were impacted by Hurricane Sandy, with the aim of boosting local resilience against future storms. Liao discusses the effects of the program in a Q&A on the Common Resources blog. “This program serves the dual purposes of helping households and communities recover from storms while incentivizing relocation out of harm’s way and enhancing community resilience against future storms,” says Liao.

What is the history of dams and reservoirs on Native American reservations, and how can the repair or removal of dams benefit Native nations today?

A group of Native nations and farmers in the Pacific Northwest have signed an agreement with the federal government to facilitate the ecological restoration of the area surrounding the Klamath River and improvements to nearby agricultural infrastructure. The river, which runs from Oregon through California to the Pacific Ocean, is receiving another ecological boost from the removal of four dams. Many Native leaders have applauded the removals, which are expected to support the health of fish populations that are significant for some Native nations in the region. Heather Randell, an assistant professor at the University of Minnesota, joined the latest episode of the Resources Radio podcast to discuss the effects of dams on Tribal lands. “Dam removal can be a way to restore Tribal sovereignty over their ancestral land and enable Tribes to really rehabilitate the land and water ecosystems that supported their livelihoods for thousands of years and were damaged by dam construction,” she says.

Expert Perspectives

New Satellite System Will Track Emissions of Potent Greenhouse Gas

In March, a coalition of researchers will send a new satellite into Earth’s orbit to monitor emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas that has a large effect on short-term global warming. Researchers will use the satellite, called MethaneSAT, to develop a global map of methane emissions and leaks.

“Methane emissions are notoriously hard to measure,” says RFF Fellow Brian C. Prest. “The Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program, which is administered by the US Environmental Protection Agency, drastically undercounts actual methane emissions from the US oil and gas industry—perhaps by a factor of four. While time will tell how the federal government will use data from MethaneSAT to enforce regulations on methane emissions, this new data source seems like it could become a valuable resource for governments and firms that are looking to pinpoint and eliminate methane leaks.”

Resources Roundup

Federal Justice40 Initiative: Priorities and Implementation

Through its Justice40 Initiative, the federal government under the Biden administration has set the goal of at least 40 percent of the benefits from federal climate investments to flow to disadvantaged communities. The goal is poised to fundamentally change how federal agencies develop policies, implement those policies, and allocate funding. On Wednesday, March 6, RFF will host a panel of experts to take stock of how the Justice40 Initiative has been implemented to date across federal programs. The event will feature a summary of RFF’s work on measuring the impact of Justice40 so far. RSVP to attend the event in person or online.

Modeling Decarbonization in Industrial Sectors

Greenhouse gas emissions from the industrial sector—including the subsectors of steelmaking, cement, aluminum, and chemicals—are particularly difficult to mitigate. The complexities of decarbonizing the industrial sector pose a challenge for researchers and modelers in their efforts to predict which of the various potential policies and technologies may be most effective at reducing emissions. In a new blog post, RFF scholars Marc Hafstead and Lillian Anderson discuss that collaboration between industrial-sector modelers, and between modelers and policymakers, can help inform smarter policymaking on industrial decarbonization. “Modeling teams can help policymakers and stakeholders understand the outcomes of different policy choices in terms of emissions, costs, impacts on various demographic groups, and equity among communities,” they say.

Scaling Up Carbon Dioxide Removal in the United States

Carbon dioxide must be removed from the atmosphere to mitigate the effects of climate change, even if nations rapidly reduce their greenhouse gas emissions in the coming decades. However, large-scale carbon dioxide removal will be expensive and poses social and environmental challenges, including effects on communities, changes in land use, and increased electricity consumption. In a new report, RFF scholars James Boyd, Emily Joiner, Alan Krupnick, and Michael A. Toman explore potential policies and technologies that may help scale up carbon dioxide removal in the United States. “To aggressively ramp up carbon dioxide removal, immediate measures—with commensurately large investments—are needed to overcome gaps and weaknesses in current carbon dioxide removal policies,” they say.

Assessing China’s National Emissions Trading System

China recently launched an emissions trading system for carbon dioxide. In the new system, which is known as a tradable performance standard, the Chinese government will limit the ratio of carbon dioxide emissions to output, such as electricity or steel produced; in other words, facilities will be required to produce more of a good while emitting less. In contrast, emissions trading systems in the United States and Europe place a cap on total emissions. In a new working paper, RFF University Fellow Lawrence H. Goulder and coauthors examine the potential effects and costs of the new system on China’s emissions and economy. “The … environmental benefits [of the system] are well above its economic costs,” the authors say. “Our central estimate is that the benefits exceed costs by a factor of more than five when only the climate benefits are considered—and by a much higher factor when the health benefits from reduced emissions of local pollutants are also considered.”

Examining the Effects of Gasoline Prices on Public Support for Climate Policies

Public support for climate policies is crucial for the successful implementation of these policies, and balancing ambition with public support is a challenge in the clean energy transition. In a new journal article in Nature Energy, Ireri Hernandez Carballo and Matthew Ryan Sisco, scholars at the RFF-CMCC European Institute on Economics and the Environment, investigate how the price of gas for personal vehicles affects support for climate policies. “Although individuals worry more about the economy and energy security as gasoline prices rise, their worry about the environment is not associated with gasoline prices,” they say.

#ChartOfTheWeek

Data and Chart: International Energy Agency.

Historically, the consumption of fossil fuels has driven economic growth. Technologies that burned coal for power helped initiate the industrial revolution in the nineteenth century, and a plentiful supply of coal and oil enabled the transportation, power, and industrial sectors to boom in industrialized nations in the twentieth century. However, the achievement of global climate goals depends on nations breaking this link between fossil fuel consumption and economic growth. Nations in several regions already have decoupled economic growth (measured as GDP) from emissions (top row in the figure above, with GDP continuing to grow even as emissions are declining), while emissions and GDP are losing their strong positive correlation in South Asia, Africa, and Latin America (middle row).

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