POWER June 2014 - 6

SPEAKING OF POWER
Who's Talking About
Climate Change?
E
veryone, it seems. From Bloomberg
Businessweek to Rolling Stone, from
ELECTRIC POWER (EP) to Platts Global
Power Markets conferences, this spring everyone
was talking about climate change.
The topic is no longer taboo, even among
executives of power companies.
More than a dozen years ago, former
BP CEO John Browne may have been
among the first in the energy industry to
talk publicly about the threat of climate
change and industry's responsibility to
participate in addressing that threat, but
these days, there are few climate change
deniers among industry leaders. Even when
they disagree about the degree to which
human activity causes climate change
or express legitimate concern about the
costs of reducing emissions of greenhouse
gases (GHGs), those responsible for both
quarterly earnings and long-term business
sustainability (both economic and environmental)
are learning first-hand why
they need to both talk about and act in
response to climate change.
Recent media and event coverage of
the matter has had as much to do with
responses to climate change effects as
with national and international climate
reports or anticipated U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) GHG rules. While
regulatory entities develop GHG-reduction
policies aimed at limiting climate change,
countries, utilities, and enterprising companies
are already making adaptive changes
in response to current climate change
consequences. Some may profit; others
will pay.
Talking Winners and Losers
" The world's failure to take meaningful action
on climate change may one day be
seen as the gravest mistake of our time, "
began an unsigned editorial in the Apr. 14
Bloomberg Businessweek. Three weeks later,
the same magazine ran an article about how
Greenland hopes to profit from easier access
to minerals, thanks to its swiftly melting
ice sheet. Aleqa Hammond, the country's
first female prime minister, is spearheading
efforts to mine everything from gold, plati6
num,
diamonds, and rubies to zinc, iron,
uranium, and rare earth minerals.
Though Greenland may become a " net
winner " -many of its 56,000 residents
will have to move from proposed mining
locations sooner, and from coastal areas a
bit later-many more nations and people
face myriad challenging consequences,
which is why utility executives are talking
openly about responding to climate
change (see " Lessons in Resiliency and
Risk " in this issue).
Acting to Limit Climate Change
For the U.S. power industry, June is expected
to be the month when the EPA releases
its final rule on GHGs emitted by
existing fossil-fueled power plants, and
Administrator Gina McCarthy has been
point person for that effort. As Rolling
Stone magazine described her in its May
8 article, " Obama's Last Shot, " she " has
a kind of gruff charm that suggests she's
anything but a tree-hugging elitist. "
With her blue collar Boston background,
McCarthy has more in common with coal
miners and coal plant workers than with
the well-heeled lobbyists on both sides
of climate change politics, so I take her
seriously when she says (and as many in
this industry have confirmed) that the EPA
has listened carefully to concerns that the
GHG regulations for existing plants need to
be flexible-both to ensure grid reliability
and to minimize economic impacts. (This
issue went to press before release of the
final rule, but we'll be examining its implications,
and legal twists and turns, over
the coming months in print and online.)
Threats to Generation
Climate change isn't just a threat to coalfueled
power plants because of recent and
anticipated regulations. It's also a threat
in many less-predictable ways, from constrained
water availability to extreme
weather events that may damage a plant
itself or make fuel delivery impossible.
Utilities like Louisiana-based Entergy
and New Jersey's Public Service Electric
& Gas (PSE&G) that have recently had to
www.powermag.com
cope with unusually severe hurricanes are
learning to adopt new prevention, mitigation,
and recovery strategies. PSE&G
Chairman, President, and CEO Ralph Izzo
has been quoted as saying, " Climate
change is the preeminent issue of our
time, with the power to transform both
our company and our industry. " PSE&G has
a multipronged carbon-reduction strategy
but also planned to spend $2.6 billion to
harden its infrastructure (the Board of
Public Utilities approved much less, closer
to $1 billion, in early May). And in February,
New York regulators required ConEd
to factor climate risks into all its forward
planning and implement state-of-the-art
measures to protect its system from those
risks. Over the next four years, ConEd
plans to spend $1 billion on storm hardening
and resiliency measures.
Meanwhile, the vendor community is introducing
new tools to help address intensifying
challenges. Just two examples are
Schneider Electric and Space-Time Insight.
Schneider Electric provides independent,
location-specific weather forecasting
services that range from load prediction
to determining safe times to erect and
perform maintenance on wind turbines.
Among the technology products provided
by Space-Time Insight is one that helps
utilities predict where their grid might fail
during severe weather and identify where
repairs are needed after such events.
Climate change-intensified severe
weather can wreak as much havoc on renewable
power generation as on fossil or
nuclear generation. Stepping up to develop
and deploy cost-effective and technically
viable solutions to reducing GHG emissions
(especially those that don't incur a water
use penalty) while also hardening infrastructure
and preparing for post-event restoration
are the responsibilities of those
involved in all forms of electricity generation,
because climate change doesn't care
what your politics or beliefs are, nor what
technology provides the electrons that
power your computer and refrigerator. ■
-Gail Reitenbach, PhD is POWER's
editor (@GailReit, @POWERmagazine).
POWER | June 2014
http://www.powermag.com
POWER June 2014

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