Cap & Trade
Briefing Continues in ARB case
02/02/17 Filed in: Climate
Change |
High-Speed
Rail
TRANSDEF filed its Opening Brief in its challenge to
ARB’s inclusion of HSR in its 2014 Scoping Plan. It’s
been a long hard slog since we filed the case back in
2014, but things will move more quickly now.
See
this page
for a copy of the brief, for ARB’s Opposition Brief,
and for a description of the case’s complicated
history over the past two years. Here’s the Brief’s
Conclusion: Read
More...
Cap and Trade Guidelines for Transit
02/06/15 Filed in: Climate
Change |
Transportation
Planning
TRANSDEF filed
comments on January 30, 2014 on the draft
Guidelines for the State Transportation
Agency’s distribution of cap and trade
funds to transit and intercity rail. The program,
called the Transit and Intercity Rail Capital
Program, will receive an ongoing 10% of cap and
trade auction revenues. The final
Guidelines were adopted today, and differed
from the draft in the areas highlighted in yellow.
None of the changes responded to our comments.
Our comments addressed the ongoing problem with large transportation projects: they promise too much and deliver too little, at a vastly higher price than initially promised. We wrote up a case study of MTC which we called Politics Trumps Outcomes that identifies the politicization of project selection as the root reason why the Bay Area has lower transit ridership now than it did thirty years ago.
Our comments addressed the ongoing problem with large transportation projects: they promise too much and deliver too little, at a vastly higher price than initially promised. We wrote up a case study of MTC which we called Politics Trumps Outcomes that identifies the politicization of project selection as the root reason why the Bay Area has lower transit ridership now than it did thirty years ago.
Suit Challenges HSR Funding: Says It Worsens Climate Change
06/23/14 Filed in: High-Speed
Rail |
Climate
Change
TRANSDEF, the
Transportation Solutions Defense and Education Fund,
announced that it filed suit
in Fresno County
Superior Court today challenging the Governor's
fallback funding scheme for High-Speed Rail (HSR).
HSR was included in the list of measures to reduce
greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions contained in the
Update to the Scoping Plan recently adopted by the
California Air Resources Board (ARB). The Scoping
Plan is California's master strategy for
responding to climate change.
TRANSDEF’s attorney, Stuart Flashman, commented: “As a former scientist, I was disappointed that ARB ignored the scientific evidence. The huge spike in cement production needed to build all the viaducts and trackways for the Governor’s high-speed rail line will result in greenhouse gas emissions far outstripping any potential benefit from the line. Including high-speed rail in the Scoping Plan runs directly counter to the legislature’s intent in AB 32 and violates the direct mandate of the law." Read More...
TRANSDEF’s attorney, Stuart Flashman, commented: “As a former scientist, I was disappointed that ARB ignored the scientific evidence. The huge spike in cement production needed to build all the viaducts and trackways for the Governor’s high-speed rail line will result in greenhouse gas emissions far outstripping any potential benefit from the line. Including high-speed rail in the Scoping Plan runs directly counter to the legislature’s intent in AB 32 and violates the direct mandate of the law." Read More...
ARB's Scoping Plan Update
04/07/14 Filed in: Climate
Change
The CA Air Resources
Board (ARB) is updating the 2008 Scoping Plan, which
laid out the State’s plan to reduce greenhouse gases
(GHGs) which cause global climate change. TRANSDEF
filed its comments, which stress the need for
clarity as to the contribution of the economic
recession and higher gasoline prices to the
state’s reduced GHG emissions in the past 6 years.
The comments call for ARB to remove HSR as a GHG
emissions reduction measure, given that it is
projected to increase GHGs for decades.
Cap and Trade for HSR: Scientifically Worthless
04/19/14 Filed in: High-Speed
Rail
TRANSDEF released
its analysis today of the CHSRA’s
Contribution of the High-Speed Rail
Program to Reducing California's Greenhouse Gas
Emission Levels (June 2013). In short, the
construction of HSR would generate more greenhouse
gases (GHGs) than it would reduce, for at least 2
decades. Because of this, it would be illegal to
use cap and trade funds, which are intended to
reduce GHGs, to build HSR. Read
More...