Cumulative Impacts Basic Primer
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Mandatory Emissions Reductions (MER) for Climate Mitigation in the Power Sector
Executive Summary
Across the United States, fossil fuel infrastructure emits toxic air pollution and planet-warming greenhouse gases that drive climate change. Environmental justice (EJ) communities bear the brunt of both, living on the front lines of impacts from climate change while also suffering the localized environmental health harms caused by fossil fuel facilities in their vicinity. Despite these disproportionate impacts, climate mitigation policies remain focused on reducing carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions without attention to the health-harming co-pollutants from the power sector. A just and equitable climate mitigation policy, however, makes the elimination of the sector’s outsize and inequitable impact on low-income communities and communities of color an explicit goal. From an environmental justice perspective, climate change mitigation measures, whether they use a technology-based standard, a greenhouse gas (GHG) target, or a market-based or other mechanism, should explicitly incorporate mandatory emissions reductions (MER) of health-harming co-pollutants in EJ communities.
This report lays out the justification and framework for an MER policy in the U.S. power sector. The essential steps of our framework are to identify power plants located in EJ communities, decide on the specific type of MER policy to apply, and finally, examine additional factors—such as measures of cumulative burden or vulnerability—that can inform which power plants should be prioritized for MER soonest or to the greatest extent. We offer several variants of an MER policy, with the ideal option being the closure of fossil fuel–fired power plants in EJ communities and a concomitant transition to renewable energy to maintain safe and reliable electricity generation.
To understand how the selection and prioritization of plants for MER might work in practice, we applied our framework to three states, New Jersey, Delaware, and Minnesota. We adopted a definition of “environmental justice community” based on quantitative thresholds for People of Color, those with limited English proficiency, and low-income populations, in line with recommendations of EJ advocates and the classification used in New Jersey’s 2020 landmark environmental justice law (A2212/S232). Once plants in EJ communities were identified, additional factors that reflect environmental burden, such as cancer risk and respiratory hazard related to toxic air pollution, as well as the emissions profiles of the plants, were incorporated as an illustrative, second layer of analysis for prioritizing plants and the most impacted EJ areas.
Throughout the development and application of our framework, the research team relied on the input and collaboration of key stakeholders representing EJ communities in the three case study states. These EJ partners played a crucial role in ground-truthing the set of plants that were identified and prioritized for an MER policy, which was important given the occasional gaps in data and the inherent limitations of relying on strict quantitative thresholds for definitional purposes.
Overall, the New Jersey, Delaware, and Minnesota case studies underscore the disproportionate siting of power plants in environmental justice communities. In all three states, there is an inequitable overrepresentation of People of Color in the fence-line populations residing near power plants, emphasizing the importance of considering race when developing strategies for the sector. As more attention, policy, and investment are directed toward a just energy transition, this work aims to highlight the need for, and to advance a path forward for, mandatory emissions reductions in power sector climate mitigation efforts.
To read the full report, download “Mandatory Emissions Reductions for Climate Mitigation in the Power Sector” below.
The Freight System: A Growing Threat to Our Communities
Our Comments to NJDEP: No Toxic Hydrogen Hubs in Overburdened Communities
Comments on: New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection’s Strategic Climate Action Plan
Submitted by the New Jersey Environmental Justice Alliance to the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection
October 19, 2023
Introduction
The New Jersey Environmental Justice Alliance (NJEJA) is a statewide organization mobilizing other environmental justice (EJ) organizations and individuals in order to increase the quality of life and upward mobility opportunities for EJ communities (low-income communities and communities Of Color), many of whom experience additional burdens resulting from histories of systemic racism. Our work covers a wide range of areas including plastics and incineration, air pollution reduction and cumulative impacts, ports and transportation, and clean energy policy. The principles and values of environmental justice practices are at the center of all we do, and we believe that the community’s vision of improvement will always be the most effective and important part of strategic development.
As such, we respectfully submit these comments today in an effort to support the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) in their “continuing commitment to furthering the promise of environmental justice through actions that advance climate justice” (Section 2). Our range of work, state-wide reach, and diversity of membership gives us a unique perspective on environmental protection and allows us to bring the concerns of overburdened, environmental justice communities to the forefront of the conversation.
Air Pollution, Co-Pollutants and Emissions Reduction
When identifying and implementing the best practices for addressing air pollution in the state of New Jersey, the DEP must ensure that all efforts to lower greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions work equally as hard to lower co-pollutants emissions. As the Strategic Climate Action Plan (the Plan)
draft clearly states:
Section 2
“Climate impacts are likely to have even greater effects in communities already overburdened by pollution. That includes threats from co-pollutants, emitted alongside greenhouse gases, which have localized health effects.”
The harmful effects of co-pollutants disproportionately impact already overburdened EJ communities. These aforementioned localized health risks, such as the effects of Particulate Matter (PM) 2.5, include premature death, cardiovascular disease, lung cancer, and pulmonary disease. Additionally, it must be acknowledged that fine PM has no lower threshold for health benefits. Driving down concentrations of fine PM and other co-pollutants in tandem with GHG emissions has immediate relevancy and benefit to EJ communities.
To this end, NJEJA is concerned both about the lack of specific accountability mechanisms and discussion of co-pollutants throughout the report. Within the report, reduction in co-pollutants is seen as a secondary benefit brought on by a reduction in GHG emissions. It must be recognized that a climate change mitigation policy that does not address co-pollutants directly, but instead treats them as secondary benefits is an ineffective policy. This can be seen in Section 4.2.6.1 when the Plan states that “anticipated outcomes could include reduced co-pollutant emissions.” Similarly, Section 7.2.2 states that “reducing greenhouse gas emissions will also have co-benefits of reducing co-pollutants.”
By not addressing co-pollutants in air pollution policy directly, we risk failing to improve air quality even if we are successful in our GHG policies. Climate change mitigation policy must address co-pollutants in order to ensure that we protect overburdened EJ communities. The DEP has the opportunity to drive down concentrations of co-pollutants in tandem with GHG emissions while advancing the States’ clean energy and climate-related priorities; this can only be achieved by treating greenhouse gases and co-pollutants as equally important and as equally devastating to our communities’ health, safety, and stability. To this end, we recommend that any policies which target greenhouse gas emissions include mechanisms to monitor and reduce co-pollutants as well. Such examples could include: factoring in co-pollutants to the Social Cost of Carbon (SCC) calculations (Section 4.2.2); including co-pollutants in the proposed annual Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Inventory Report (Section 4.2.2); developing a co-pollutant inventory for Department facilities as supplemental to the development of its greenhouse gas inventory (Section 4.2.3.1); increasing transparency and specificity to address co-pollutants while examining “avenues to reduce pollution in overburdened communities” (Section 7.1).
Hydrogen Hubs
Throughout the Plan, the DEP highlights their intention to support the development of a regional hydrogen hub (Section 4.2.5 and Section 4.2.6.1). We are deeply concerned that these plans will be advanced without consideration of community input, potential risks, and sufficient conversation with EJ communities who will bear the brunt of negative consequences from these facilities. The only way to produce hydrogen without worsening air pollution or further damaging the climate is to create “green hydrogen” which – as of April 2021 – represents less than 1% of the hydrogen produced. Hydrogen Hubs cannot be treated as the singular solution and any exploration of using hydrogen should be treated with extreme caution. EJ communities must be engaged and given accurate information regarding the impacts of these hubs to their communities. Furthermore, the DEP must sufficiently address the public and environmental risks of the hydrogen hubs program to New Jersey communities with robust discussion, full transparency, and meaningful engagement.
Lastly, the DEP should be clear in its understanding and interpretation of clean energy specifically as it relates to the development of renewable energy powered and/or hydrogen-powered fuel cells. The DEP must define “clean firm” and be precise about both the benefits and risks of these technologies. Clean technology cannot become a greenwashed term, and must represent truly clean technologies. Language regarding clean energy and clean technologies must ensure that environmental communities see real, tangible protection and that just transition practices are employed in every proposal and plan.
Sustainable Waste Management
The issue of sustainable waste management is a unique challenge in that it requires both highly specific community engagement and localized plans as well as a broad state-wide plan to handle the state’s waste. NJEJA firmly supports a prioritization of EPR as an effective tool to drastically reduce the amount of plastic waste, particularly plastic packaging waste, from entering the waste stream. When we reduce plastic production we send less waste to incinerators, which alleviates air pollution and other toxic-exposure health concerns in overburdened communities. We urge the DEP to continue developing EPR policies and infrastructure, in order to address waste issues in a manner that reduces the pressure on the individual, and instead handles these waste challenges at an infrastructural level targeting plastic reduction policies at the source of their production. Additionally, the DEP must be clear about their definitions of recycling and their development of facilities to handle sustainable waste management. First, the definition of recycling should prohibit chemical recycling, plastic to fuel, advanced recycling, pyrolysis, solvolysis, gasification, or any synonymous technology from being included as viable recycling techniques. These technologies have not been proven to be credible or safe techniques and expose communities, particularly already overburdened communities, to air pollutants and risk of fires, gas and chemical leaks, and costly clean-ups. Secondly, we recommend that the DEP define and explain their intention for similar terms including food waste recycling facilities and organic waste recycling.
Finally, the DEP must ensure that all evaluation of emerging technologies, educational programming, engagement opportunities, and strategic planning includes communities who will be primarily affected by these facilities. These communities must be prioritized in the stakeholder engagement process in order to address their concerns, ensure safety and stability in the development process, and sufficiently address environmental risks.
Climate Equity: Stakeholder Engagement and Community Input
Finally, climate equity work must include and center EJ communities. As the Plan acknowledges:
“Low-income communities and communities of color in New Jersey – and across the United States – are burdened with disproportionately high pollution, increased flood risk, and more intense heat waves as compared to wealthy, White communities due to decades of redlining and community disinvestment.”
Section 7
These communities have consistently been forced to navigate climate change dangers, environmental degradation, adverse health risks due to worsening air pollution, and other community risks. In order to ensure that past wrongs are not replicated in current plans, EJ communities must be included and recognized as leaders in the strategic planning process. The DEP must underscore the importance of community engagement in every action, plan, and regulatory development. We are supportive of the opportunities for stakeholder engagement listed within the Plan, and we encourage the DEP to ensure that these engagements are inclusive of all stakeholders including community-based and local non-profit organizations. Prioritizing direct engagement with communities not only builds trust between governmental bodies and the local communities, but often leads to increased support for projects by recognizing the value and knowledge of communities in leading the planning and development processes. This support serves to expedite the planning process, ensure that communities are enthusiastic about plans to build climate resilience across New Jersey, and create a cohesive, cross-sector coalition dedicated to helping the State reach its climate goals. All areas of the Plan would benefit from increasing community engagement, but areas that address the layout and specific conditions of a community can see increased benefit from direct community conversation. Such areas include the DEP’s work on sustainable waste management (Section 9.2.1), resilience funding (Section 5.2.2.1 and Section 5.2.2.2), and the Community Solar Energy Program (Section 4.2.5.1). Furthermore, the DEP should increase transparency and specificity regarding tools, tactics, and strategies to support overburdened communities; there must be prioritized, direct, and protective actions to reduce risk and strengthen the overall health and wellbeing of the community.
Conclusion
When the communities across the state that are most consistently facing climate risk are protected, we will see a trickle-up effect where every individual is protected. NJEJA reaffirms every community’s inherent right to a healthy, safe community. These comments have been submitted to address our concerns regarding air pollution, hydrogen technologies, truly clean energy, sustainable waste management, and robust stakeholder engagement. We offer our support in building a cleaner, more resilient New Jersey and are supportive of ongoing conversation with the NJDEP concerning our thoughts in these comments.
Prepared by:
Brooke Helmick, M.A.
Law and Policy Manager, New Jersey Environmental Justice Alliance
Press Release: EPA’s Proposed New Carbon Pollution Standards for Fossil Fuel-Fired Power Plants Will Fail to Protect EJ Communities
Press Release: EPA’s Proposed New Carbon Pollution Standards for Fossil Fuel-Fired Power Plants Will Fail to Protect EJ Communities
WASHINGTON (August 8, 2023) –The Tishman Environment and Design Center at The New School, the Center for the Urban Environment of the John S. Watson Institute for Urban Policy and Research at Kean University, the New Jersey Environmental Justice Alliance (NJEJA), and the Center for Earth, Energy and Democracy, along with 18 environmental justice and 9 allied organizations are submitting public comments today on the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)’s proposed carbon pollution standards for coal and new natural gas fired power plants.
Environmental justice (EJ) communities are on the frontlines of the adverse impacts of climate change and are disproportionately exposed to a wide range of polluting industries, including fossil fuel infrastructure like coal plants, natural gas plants, and pipelines. The use of carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) mechanisms and hydrogen co-firing in the power sector will further harm EJ communities that are already overburdened. The only real solution to climate change is the rapid and complete transition of the power sector away from all types of fossil fuels to energy efficiency and renewable energy in the form of wind and solar power. We call attention to critical EJ concerns related to the proposed rule that would hinder a reliable, just, and truly clean power section transition.
The EPA will finalize the standards in the coming months.
The following is a comment from Dr. Ana Baptista, The Tishman Environment and Design Center at The New School
“Addressing climate change and decades of toxic exposure experienced by environmental justice communities means moving away from a dependence on fossil fuels and investing instead in renewable energy sources and infrastructure in communities. Supporting carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) and hydrogen co-firing in the power sector through massive amounts of public funding and policies like EPA’s proposed rule will perpetuate the fossil fuel industry, to the continued detriment of EJ communities. These same overburdened communities have time and again been sacrifice zones to unjust policies and infrastructure that place them on the frontlines of fossil fuel polluting structures. Environmental justice should be a priority for the EPA’s power sector rule rather than an afterthought . We urge the EPA to take seriously the environmental justice implications of this rule and consider cumulative impacts in decision-making processes related to the rule.”
The following is a comment from Dr. Nicky Sheats, John S. Watson Institute for Urban Policy and Research at Kean University
“Too many low-income communities and Communities of Color around the country are exposed to the harms of all types of polluting infrastructure and have disproportionately borne these cumulative burdens for too long. It’s time to right these wrongs. EPA’s proposed rule all but recognizes that CCS and hydrogen co-firing will add to toxic air pollution in communities living near power plants, and this is unacceptable when such communities already live with an unfair share of cumulative impacts from pollution. The EPA’s proposed carbon pollution standards must adopt a more affirmative approach toward environmental justice to address cumulative impacts. ”
The following is a comment from Melissa Miles, New Jersey Environmental Justice Alliance
“A rapid, clean energy transition is indispensable to ensure that current and future generations have healthy and safe communities to live, work, play, learn, and worship in. We need policies that mandate emissions reductions in EJ communities and ensure the closure of fossil fuel powered plants first and foremost in EJ communities. The EPA’s proposed carbon pollution standards are an opportunity for the EPA to create equitable policies that truly center communities on the frontlines and bring us to a clean energy transition and just future for all.”
The following is a comment from Bill Gallegos, Center for Earth Energy & Democracy
“We know that overwhelmingly the burden of pollution from fossil fuel powered power plants is borne by low income communities, communities of color and indigenous communities. We also know that the impacts of rising intensive heat cycles, extreme temperatures and the resulting power outages are experienced most acutely by environmental justice communities. We are at a critical juncture in our nation’s history. We must meet the challenge of climate change like never before – in ways that center environmental justice communities. We urge the EPA to uphold its commitment to environmental justice and create policies that reduce carbon pollution from the power sector in ways that create benefits for environmental justice communities.”
Environmental Justice Ordinance
Comments on: National Environmental Policy Act Implementing Regulations Revisions
Comments on: National Environmental Policy Act Implementing Regulations Revisions
The New Jersey Environmental Justice Alliance (NJEJA) would like to submit the following comments to the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) concerning its recently released National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) Implementing Regulations Revisions. In March of 2020 NJEJA submitted comments on CEQ’s proposed changes to the regulations that implement procedural provisions of the National Environmental Policy Act (Docket ID No. CEQ-2019-0003, Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, 40 CFR Parts 1500, 1501, 1502, 1503, 1504, 1505, 1506, 1507, and 1508). Those comments focused on, and strongly disagreed with, CEQ’s proposal to remove the requirement to perform cumulative impacts analyses in environmental review documents created pursuant to NEPA. Because it is such an important issue to environmental justice (EJ) residential communities and to the EJ advocacy community these comments similarly focus on whether cumulative impacts analyses should be a required part of NEPA reviews. NJEJA believes they should be.
Comments on BPU Charging Infrastructure Straw
Comments on: In The Matter Of Medium And Heavy Duty Electric Vehicle Charging Ecosystem, New Jersey Electric Vehicles Infrastructure Ecosystem 2021 – Medium And heavy Duty Straw Proposal
One of the most important policy recommendations that has been supported by a significant segment of the environmental justice (EJ) advocacy community is that climate change mitigation policy, in addition to fighting climate change, should be used to reduce the disproportionate amount of pollution often found in EJ communities.
In the power generation sector the EJ advocacy community has indicated this means, at least partly, that electricity generating plants located in EJ residential communities should be required to reduce emissions, no matter what type of climate change mitigation program applies to the plants. This policy would guarantee that climate change mitigation policy would deliver critical reductions in locally harmful greenhouse gas co-pollutants to vulnerable and overburdened EJ communities. These reductions would improve the health of residents living in communities affected by plant emissions. The New Jersey EJ Alliance (NJEJA), has called this policy “mandatory emissions reductions for EJ communities through climate change mitigation policy”.
NJEJA is a statewide organization that focuses solely on EJ issues and advocates for policies that will improve the quality of life of low-income communities and communities Of Color, i.e. EJ communities, in New Jersey and across the nation. It is important to note that NJEJA has strongly advocated for the adoption of the mandatory emissions reductions for EJ communities through climate change mitigation policy and opposed New Jersey’s entrance into the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative and Transportation and Climate Initiative, in part because they do not guarantee such reductions. A comparable type of mandatory emissions reductions policy that directly and unequivocally improves the health of EJ communities is needed for the transportation sector. The New Jersey Board of Public Utilities’ (NJBPU) Notice, In The Matter Of Medium And Heavy Duty Electric Vehicle Charging Ecosystem, New Jersey Electric Vehicles Infrastructure Ecosystem 2021 – Medium And heavy Duty Straw Proposal (hereinafter referred to as Straw Proposal), provides New Jersey with an opportunity to discuss and make progress on this type of important policy. NJEJA is submitting the following comments in an effort to further that discussion.
Newark EJ Ordinance: Environmental Review Checklist
Chapter 41:20A
EXHIBIT A: ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW CHECKLIST
§ 41:20A-1. Environmental Review Checklist.
Cover Sheet:
Name of applicant entity.
Contact information (name, email, phone, address).
Location of Proposed Project (address and block and lot).
Summary description of proposed project (one paragraph only) including proposed dimensions of any buildings and total project cost.
Existing land use at project site and existing land use zoning designation.
Requested variance, if any.
Permits:
List of all permits and approvals needed.
Copy of any permits already obtained from the United States Environmental Protection Agency, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, or evidence of inclusion in the Essex County Solid Waste Management Plan after advice of the Essex County Solid Waste Advisory Council.
Basic Form – For Covered Applicants with a Commercial or Light Manufacturing Use, including those uses within an MX-1 or MX-2 Zone…