Federal Study: New Climate Law to Cut Carbon Pollution by 40%

Article Author:

Associated Press

Seth Borenstein

Clean Energy Incentives in New Spending Packages Signed This Week by President Joe Biden to 2030 It will reduce U.S. heat-trapping gas emissions by about 1.1 billion tons (1 billion metric tons) by 2020, a new Department of Energy analysis shows.

The first official federal calculation, shared with The Associated Press before Thursday's release, showed that between the just-signed bill and last year's Infrastructure Spending Act, the United States will emit about 1.26 billion tonnes (1.15 billion tonnes) less carbon pollution than without legislation by the end of the decade. This reduction is roughly equivalent to the annual greenhouse gas emissions of each US household.

By 2030, new legislation should bring U.S. greenhouse gas emissions about 40% below 2005 levels, according to a Department of Energy analysis, but this will reduce carbon pollution. We are still short of the US announced target of a reduction of between 50% and 50%. 52% by the end of the decade. However, this 40% reduction is similar to previous calculations by independent research firm Rhodium Group, who calculated the reduction to be between 31% and 44%, and Climate Action Tracker scientists who said the reduction would be between 26% and 42%. I'm here.

A federal analysis shows that most of the projected emissions reductions in the nearly $375 billion spending package will come primarily from solar, wind and electric vehicles. It will promote “clean energy”. More than half of the projected overall reduction in emissions is due to the way the country generates electricity, according to the analysis. About 10% of emissions reductions come from agriculture and land conservation.

New law provisions requiring federal land and water oil and gas leases "could lead to some increase" in carbon pollution, federal analysis says But the other provision spurring cleaner energy is an increase of 35 tons of greenhouse gases for every ton of new pollution from oil and gas drilling.

Outside experts such as Climate Action Tracker's Bill Hare say the new law is a big step for the United States, but the United States is historically the largest producer of carbon dioxide. Given that we are an emitting country, it is still not enough. A source of pollution, it has done little for decades and is lagging behind Europe.

``At this point, anything in that direction counts as a victory, right? And I know how difficult it is politically to move a country in this direction," said Gerald Mir, who was not part of the climate scientist analysis at the National Center for Atmospheric Research. "You could argue that it's not enough, but I think I'm hopeful that when we start to see movement, we can build on that and keep the ball rolling." 56}

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