nuclear power and conflicts of interest

Just scanned a new article by Kristin Shrader-Frechette in Science and Engineering Ethics. She provides evidence from 30 nuclear power cost estimates and shows that the industry consistently ignores certain costs, trims others and generally makes estimates of other parameters which make the final result appear favorable to the nuclear industry.

She attributes the underestimates of cost that result from these studies are most likely due to the obvious conflict of interest that industry-funded studies encounter. Further, most of the data are provided by the industry themselves, and many are shielded under proprietary privilege.

In any case, a very nice piece of work with interesting parallels for others in the energy sector.

Shrader-Frechette, K. (2011). "Climate Change, Nuclear Economics, and Conflicts of Interest." Science and Engineering Ethics 17(1): 75-107.

A letter to Governor Brown re: California Transportation Commission appointments

I just sent in this letter to Governor Brown via this link.

Dear Gov. Brown,

The current membership of the California Transportation Commission (CTC) is troubling. Not a single civil engineer or urban planner sits on the body charged with approving the State Transportation Improvement Plan - the key document outlining the state's vision for transportation as embodied in the projects listed within it. Instead, the commission is overwhelmingly populated by real estate developers. While their voice is surely important, it ought not dominate the discussion. Pursuit of the objectives of developers is often not the best course for the state as a whole.

As you consider new appointees to the CTC, I urge you to choose individuals who have demonstrated an ability to think critically about the state's transportation policies and priorities. California has a substantial amount of transportation research talent housed within the Institute of Transportation Studies spread across several University of California campuses (Davis, Irvine, Los Angeles, and Berkeley). Professors and researchers at these institutions have been on the leading edge of transportation and land use planning research for decades. Many of them would make excellent candidates capable of providing the well-reasoned input necessary to place California on a path to meet its ambitious 2050 greenhouse gas emissions reductions goals as required by AB32 and to improve land use planning as required by SB375.

With kind regards.

ab32 lawsuit

Looks like a devastating result for EJ advocates. I don't see how finding the alternatives analysis of CEQA to be in violation is going to lead to an improvement in EJ outcomes. The CARB will simply prepare an updated alternatives analysis that will still lead to cap and trade as the preferred alternative. California agencies have never (or, perhaps, rarely) seen an alternatives analysis as an occasion to change a preferred policy.

Quick:

AB32

• "Arbitrary and capricious" is the relevant standard against which the court will judge the ARB.
  
• ARB's interpretation of the 2020 target as a floor on reductions is fine.
• Costs are properly evaluated for the plan as a whole - not individual measures.
• Exclusion of agriculture also okay.
• "The statute does not support the argument that ARB must demonstrate that cap and trade will result in the same reductions as any direct regulation."
• CARB justified in choosing cap and trade
• "In the analysis of voluntary and incentivized measures for the agricultural sector, the record does not demonstrate that ARB used the best available models as required by AB 32."
• AB 32 does not specify that analyses have to be quantitative (?)
• Public health analysis fine (but no mention of the question of co-benefits)
• No AB 32 revisions necessary - CARB gets wide latitude as a quasi-legislative agency

CEQA

• This is a program- as opposed to project-level EIR. They are assessed on different merits.
• Location of biofuel plants was speculated upon in the SP, but CARB was justified in only giving a vague description of possible impacts. The case cited here (Rio Vista) refers to a county that generated a hazardous waste landfill plan, but did not specify particular locations, so it seems to be a little different.
• The impacts portions of the FED are complete.
• The "programmatic" label cannot be used to justify an analysis which is inadequate for informed public review and informed decision making by the ARB. Respondent has argued that more detailed analysis of alternative may come later during the implementation process. This claim has no credibility because the ARB has already proceeded, prematurely, with the implementation process.
  

funny passage from conference report on performance measures

For example, a transit project is sold or marketed to a decision-making group. The proponents say, "We have great fare box recovery ratio, unlinked passengers, etc." After the transit advocate goes out, the highway advocate comes in and says, "My VC ratio is going to go from .95 to .85, and my average speed is going to go from 35 to 37." That person leaves the room, and the decision makers sit together and say, "We don’t understand what these guys are talking about. It is very difficult to compare these two. So we are going to go with whomever we feel lobbied harder and seemed more sincere."

environmental justice and public participation

There's a new issue of Environmental Justice out that focuses on public participation. In it, there's an article by Neenah Estrella-Luna that analyzes the law structuring public participation in environmental review in Massachusetts. It's a nice piece, but doesn't go far enough (although the articles in this journal are quite short, so don't really allow the type of incisive, nuanced analysis required [IMO] for EJ work).

The article focuses on public participation in environmental permitting. The permitting decision is usually binary - either the facility gets permitted or it does not. She's specifically interested in the tradeoff between the interests of the permit applicant (or proponent) and the public-at-large. Who is more influential on the final decision?

But what is the appropriate way to measure influence when something either happens or it does not? It seems like the discussion of public participation in EJ misses this point - what would we judge as good public participation? How do we operationalize influence when a decision is binary? How many facilities should be permitted, and how many not for it to be considered just? Where does the facility go if not in the EJ community? Will it simply go to a rich neighborhood? to China? is either just?

Rather than arguing about individual permitting decisions, EJ should embrace its criticism of consumer capitalism and take it to its logical conclusions (a la Bedford). Seen in this light, the idea that harmful facilities should be placed in any community is unjust and we begin to see the nature of production and consumption as problematic. Environmental injustice is a symptom, the cure is not amelioration but something much more radical.

strange word choice

A massive FHWA report released in April suggests strategies for reducing transportation-related GHG emissions along with a technical appendix. One of the options is titled "reduce carbon-intensive travel activity." Why only "carbon-intensive" travel activity. Why not just travel activity? The methods that they list yield substantial benefits regardless of the carbon intensity of the mode ("reducing the need for travel [and] increasing vehicle occupancies"). It's just a framing question then, I suppose: thinking about reducing travel demand as only or mostly applying to high carbon modes makes us feel good that we don't need to actually change our behavior. It's almost like painting over VMT reductions with a technology brush.

environmental impact assessments

Nice article by Anne Steinemann on how alternatives get selected and analyzed in environmental impact assessments under NEPA.

I was just thinking about related issues - why do we have so much resistance to innovative transportation planning? Could the problem lie with environmental assessment?

Steinemann confirms (somewhat anecdotally) that alternative projects are often boxed out by the project objectives as stated by the agency, or are eliminated later as not being "cost effective" where the costs are defined narrowly (in terms of agency or construction costs - benefits don't seem to be a factor).

Other problems involve difficulties integrating agencies. I chuckled when I read this: As a federal highway agency official said, "Why would we want to pursue transit alternatives, and give some of our money to them?"

Right, so FHWA/FTA are competing for the same funds, FHWA is the lead agency, why would they want money to go towards a transit project?

This type of initial foreclosure is even happening with the bit of innovative planning that's going on in California in response to SB 375. It's even a little more insidious. SACOG is conducting a series of workshops presenting the pubic with (four?) alternative futures for transportation. Two are extreme and one is status quo. The other is a reasonable middle ground. Obviously folks are choosing that one. What good is a public process if the outcomes are determined in advance?

A related article by Michael Smith reviews appellate court decisions involving NEPA alternatives analysis. He finds that the "purpose and need" statement can be circumscribed by an agency who is conducting an environmental assessment in response to an application by a private party. So, if I want to build an oil pipeline through a wetland, I need only apply to the relevant agency who can then compare the project to a "no-build" scenario. No other alternatives need be assessed so long as the agency provides some justification. This is the primary lesson from the paper - that if an agency gives some justification for the exclusion of an alternative, it will likely be successful in court should the environmental review be challenged.

Smith's article leaves me feeling a little more pessimistic than Steinemann's. His conclusion that

if federal agencies construct a solid and legitimate statement of purpose and need, analyze [a] reasonable range of alternatives in detail that stems directly from that purpose and need, and explain clearly and with rational reasoning [?] why they are dismissing other alternatives to their project that may appear reasonable, they will nearly always be successful if they face future litigation...

So, he's basically laid out a roadmap for agencies to follow if they want to avoid being defeated in litigation whereas Steinemann has an eye toward improving the process (conducting assessments earlier, involving the public in deciding alternatives). Clearly the extant alternatives assessment is broken. Why would we keep it as is?