This week, the California Public Utilities Comm'n rejected an unprecedented money-grab from SoCalGas. SoCalGas tried to force its residential and small business customers to fund development of a hydrogen pipeline system that those customers would never use. I represented Sierra Club in this case.

Friday, the California PUC proposed rejecting SoCalGas’ request to charge its gas customers $266 million to design a hydrogen pipeline that won't directly benefit them. If the PUC adopts the proposed decision, it will be a much-needed win for affordability in CA. docs.cpuc.ca.gov/PublishedDoc...

Come work with me! Earthjustice is the best place to be a public interest environmental lawyer and our clean energy team is hiring! earthjustice.org/job/senior-a...

To fast-track recovery after wildfires ravaged Los Angeles County in January, Mayor Karen Bass issued an executive order exempting replacement structures from the city's all-electric building requirement. A new report argues that’s the wrong approach:

Explainer: Using ISRs to fight air pollution from mega facilities This new report by Brennon Mendez and Cara Horowitz in the Pritzker Brief series from @law.ucla.edu focuses on how to use Indirect Source Rules to fight pollution from mega facilities.

Berkeley continues to innovate with first-in-nation time of sale ordinance to cut pollution from existing buildings. Still lots cities can do to end reliance on fossil fuels! www.kqed.org/news/1203655...

This Washington Post video touches on a lot of profound problems with California's Low Carbon Fuel Standard, but it oversimplifies one key thing. The cow gas is not delivered to CA. It does nothing to reduce the climate impact of the fuels we use here. 1/2 www.youtube.com/shorts/j5kms...

Demand for these manure gas credits is about to skyrocket because of bad federal policy. The federal government is allowing the fossil fuel industry to reap big tax subsidies for producing hydrogen, provided they buy these paper credits to recharacterize their fossil fuels as "renewables."

I replaced my gas water heater with a heat pump model at the beginning of March and now have about a month of data on my home's fossil fuel usage after the water heater upgrade. Now, my SoCal home is zero-emissions most days, unless we're burning gas to dry laundry. 🏘️⚡🔌💧

This is an important case. Big ups to Earthjustice colleagues (@candyoungblood.bsky.social), @sierraclub.org, @industriouslabs.bsky.social ( @evangillespie.bsky.social ), and Peoples Collective 4 EJ. The zero-emissions shift is happening and we will go to court to defend our right to clean air.

Thank you @benallenca.bsky.social & Sen Stern for asking @californiapuc.bsky.social for answers on costs of building back with gas, ways it can facilitate all-electric construction, and role of gas line fires in complicating firefighting. We need a proactive PUC to enable thoughtful rebuilding.

Why are Karen Bass & Gavin Newsom rushing to rethink clean energy rules in the wake of the L.A. fires? Rebuilding homes with gas furnaces won't be any cheaper or faster. If anything, all-electric homes are the best thing for everyone. My @latimes.com column: www.latimes.com/environment/...

Today, Sierra Club and @ceja.org protested SoCalGas’ request to charge customers $266 million to design a hydrogen pipeline system. The CPUC has told SoCalGas multiple times recently it can’t make customers pay for Sempra’s new lines of business that don’t directly benefit us. But here we go again!

Earthjustice President Abbie Dillen said it best: People want policies that safeguard clean air and clean water and protect them from climate-fueled extreme weather. The President's job is to protect the people, not corporate interests.

Right now, we need states to lead on climate. Sadly, New Mexico's draft Clean Transportation Fuel Standard won't truly deliver the emissions reductions required by law because shabby carbon accounting rewards biofuels for reductions that only exist on paper. We filed comments on how to fix it!

Good article on the new rules for the federal hydrogen tax credits. My one quibble is with the suggestion that manure methane has "long been treated as 'carbon negative.'" The LCFS has only treated manure gas as a magical "carbon negative" fuel since 2018.

It looks like the new rules for the "clean" hydrogen tax credit will apply strong rules to some hydrogen producers, but gives industry in California and Washington a pass from meeting statutory emissions requirements. Bad news for the climate and energy bills, when folks are already struggling.

BIG NEWS in California climate world: On New Year's Eve, EPA issues first ever injection permit for carbon capture and sequestration in California. It's going to California Resources Corporation, the state's largest oil driller.

BREAKING: SoCalGas asks to charge its captive methane customers $266 million for costs to develop a hydrogen pipeline. Presumably buried before the holidays because SoCalGas knows customers don't want to pay for stuff that has nothing to do with their gas service. www.socalgas.com/regulatory/a...

A big win for customers across SoCal! earthjustice.org/press/2024/l...

BREAKING: California PUC votes out SoCalGas rate case decision 4-0. Big improvement from last rate case. Assigned Comm'r Houck deserves credit for holding utility to burden of proof, cutting frivolous costs and requiring new reporting to identify misuse of customer $$ for lobbying. Some highlights:

Communities on the fence lines of factory farms sue because CARB's review of the LCFS refuses to recognize the obvious: When you pay big ag an enormous amount of money for a commodity (methane), they will make more of it. And farms produce biomethane by managing manure in the grossest ways.

We begged the California Air Resources Board to reform the LCFS to not subsidize biofuels with fake climate benefits and real pollution. Sad that they appeased the refineries and big ag, ignoring the recs of their own environmental justice advisory council and making this lawsuit necessary.

Revisions out on proposed decision in SoCalGas rate case with vote likely Thursday. A lot to like - rejection of outside legal/lobbying costs + new reporting to spot continued abuses, denial of slew of hydrogen projects, and savings from elimination of subsidies for gas lines to new homes🧵

With demand for fossil gas going down, SoCalGas is looking for new lines of business and wants its captive methane customers to foot the bill. In proposed decision, the California Public Utilities Commission is ready to say "nope." Here are some examples...

idk if I worked in Toyota's government affairs department, I'd probably keep quiet, hope Trump rolls with his worst economy-destabilizing impulses, and not highlight that rolling back Biden's EV policies is a great way to give a competitive edge to foreign companies.

On heels of squandering opp to redirect billions in LCFS revenue to EVs instead of polluting biofuels, Newsom talking big about keeping EVs funded despite lack of budget surplus and limited cap-and-trade $$ needed for decarbonizing buildings and other sectors. smh www.nytimes.com/2024/11/25/c...

Niche rant: Hydrogen is almost never an "alternative to fossil fuels." Today, hydrogen *is* a fossil fuel. >98% of h2 used today is cracked off hydrocarbons in fossil fuels. Fossil hydrogen is a fossil fuel that's more expensive than gas due to its energy-intense (and polluting) production processes

This 2-part podcast is a good resource on the accounting gimmicks and bad assumptions the hydrogen industry uses to make its buses look competitive with electric. The hosts rip apart one Canadian report, but I bet the issues they spot are relevant for any fleet. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/r...

At best, the CPUC's proposed decision on closing the Aliso Canyon facility has "concepts of a plan." The Commission acknowledges that deep cuts in gas demand would enable closure of a dangerous facility but doesn't bother cutting gas demand near Aliso with new clean resources.

Just submitted my claim for the 2015 gas price manipulation settlement. So rare that you get to claw money back from the fossil fuel industry’s ill-gotten profits. Thanks Rob Bonta!

The impending oversupply of green hydrogen makes it all the more infuriating that California’s low carbon fuel standard program allows fossil hydrogen sellers to greenwash their fossil fuels as “renewable” carbon negative fuel by buying bogus offsets.

The Low Carbon Fuel Standard is flooding the CA market with soy diesel -- a threat to the climate, global hunger, deforestation, and more. A cap on veg oil biofuels can stop the madness. blog.ucsusa.org/jeremy-marti...

This is why enviro and public health advocates are alarmed at using hydrogen in power plants 👇‼️ A company just got a permit in Indiana for a new power plant that could emit more than 3x as much NOx when burning a high-H2 blend.

"We can’t afford to squander tens of billions of federal climate funding on projects with questionable environmental effects." 🎯 www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

The LA Times exposes the public health harms of CA's current strategy for dealing with methane from cattle manure: paying factory farms for methane + ignoring ammonia emissions, instead of regulating pollution. www.latimes.com/environment/...

The Biden administration must stay strong against the tsunami of lobbying from the hydrogen industry, which feels entitled to tax $$$$$ for producing hydrogen in ways that are so polluting it would worsen the climate crisis. 💪🌊 www.hydrogeninsight.com/policy/leake...

For over a year, we've been begging CA leaders to reform the low-carbon fuel standard because its outlandish subsidies for biogas kneecap the market for truly green hydrogen. This article provides one more example of why reform is needed. www.utilitydive.com/news/h2b2-gr...

In my experience, policymakers who use the “don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good” line are rarely doing good, and almost never are when they won’t even tell you what they are actually doing — as is the case here, where project information is confidential.

ARCHES insults our intelligence by saying that reserving public investment for non-polluting hydrogen would let the "perfect be the enemy of the good." Hydrogen production that spikes GHGs, health-harming pollution and electric rates is neither perfect nor "good." www.latimes.com/environment/...

One reason I'm not celebrating CA's hydrogen hub: we don't know if its "commitment" to use renewables means anything. The hub plans to use the fed tax credit methodology to judge whether electricity is renewable + the CA hub is lobbying the IRS to use a crap methodology.

“The IRA’s section 45V production tax credit is the most generous clean hydrogen subsidy in the world...But without proper implementation, 45V could backfire...causing a significant increase in domestic emissions that imperil U.S. climate goals.” www.cnbc.com/2023/10/13/w...

Great write-up on reforms to the Low Carbon Fuel Standard that a broad coalition of environmental justice and green groups are supporting: End inflated subsidies for livestock biomethane immediately and cap the volume of lipid biofuels in the program. www.randomlengthsnews.com/archives/202...