Tis the season for glossy cardboard with lurid red-black-and-white photos of scowling politicos to land in your mailbox, but one face you won’t see (though you’ll hear a lot about him) is Reggie’s — that is, the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, or RGGI.
House Speaker Kirk Cox, R-Colonial Heights, says the northeastern states’ cap-and-trade agreement that Gov. Ralph Northam (who has said state revenues from participating would go to mitigate sea level rise in Hampton Roads) and Democratic legislators want to join will boost Virginians’ electric bills.
In fact, Cox and some GOP colleagues can put a price on it: $144 a year. That’s a couple of pairs of shoes for a working family’s kids, or a co-pay on a elderly Virginian’s medicine, as Mary Margaret Kastelberg, who hopes to win back an Henrico County House district for the GOP, put it during a telephone press conference Thursday.
Cox said he believes language now in the state budget that blocks Virginia from participating in RGGI would go if Democrats take control of the General Assembly.
And yes, Republicans plan to make that point as they campaign, he said.
That $144 number comes from a letter that the State Corporation Commission’s long-time expert on electric utility economics, Bill Stephens, wrote back in January to House Commerce and Labor committee chairman Terry Kilgore, R-Gate City, who was also at the press conference.
But it wasn’t the only number in the letter. In fact, there are plenty floating around for RGGI.
Here are Stephens’: linking to RGGI would boost Dominion Energy Virginia’s costs by $3.3 billion over the decade of the 2020s. The closer connection to RGGI’s cap and trade system from actually joining the program would be $5.9 billion. That translates to a $7 a month increase to a typical residential customer’s bill for the linkage or $12 a month if Virginia opts for the closer ties that come with joining the system.
Twelve dollars a month is $144, which is where that figure comes from.
In a more recent report, the SCC said it couldn’t estimate the cost of RGGI — though it had some other, interesting numbers. The SCC noted that Dominion’s customers could have be in line for rebates of nearly $380 million if the General Assembly hadn’t changed the way the state regulates electric utilities last year, in a bill heavily lobbied by Dominion as a way to finance improvements to its grid and a huge expansion of solar and wind generating facilities. In fact, the investments Dominion told investors the bill facilities would increase typical residential bill by $29.37 per month (that’s $352 a year) or 26% by Dec. 31, 2023, the SCC said.
Dominion, by the way, puts the cost of RGGI at $6.5 billion. Using a ratio derived from Stephens’ letter, Shad Plank makes that a $156 bump to a typical annual power bill.
The state Department of Environmental Quality thinks joining RGGI will bring electric bills down, by encouraging a shift from coal, oil and natural gas, which cost money to buy when firing up a power plant, to solar and wind. They’re free, after wall (though the panels and turbines to capture them are not, of course).
The Natural Resources Defense Council, meanwhile, said electricity costs declined by 6.4% in RGGI member states between 2008 and 2016, while costs in other states rose 6.2%.
Enough numbers? No. This is Shad Plank.
The benefit in terms of reduced carbon emissions is minimal, in the view of GOP House candidate and former Board of Social Services chair D.J. Jordan. Virginia has cut its emissions by 16% since 2000 on its own hook; RGGI emissions are down 17%, he notes.
The NRDC says RGGI has helped cut carbon pollution from power plants by more than half in its member states. Jordan noted that cap and trade markets often just move carbon to areas that aren’t participating.
David T. Stevenson of the Caesar Rodney Institute, a Delaware think tank that advocates free market policies, said RGGI cut greenhouse gas emissions by 40% in member states, versus 20% elsewhere since 2007, but noted that RGGI states, including Delaware, were not big emitters in the first place, which means a modest reduction can look like a big percentage drop.
RGGI states lag the nation in the use of solar and wind, but outpace other states in the percentage of electricity generated at nuclear or gas-fired plants. Utilities in RGGI have seen their total collection of revenue from customers rise 4.6% versus 5.5% for the nation.
Sigh.
Perhaps here’s what the numbers really add up to:
Politics.
“A true fundamental difference between Republicans and Democrats in this cycle is that Republicans support policies that will make sure energy stays affordable, while Democrats support policies that will lead to higher power bills,” Cox said.
Which prompted this from Virginia Democratic spokesman Grant Fox: “His extreme agenda puts access to clean air and water at serious risk for all Virginians, and this is just another example of Virginia Republicans taking a page out of Donald Trump’s anti-environment playbook to throw their constituents under the bus while siding with corporate polluters.”
Shad Plank is the Daily Press blog that tracks Virginia politics. It takes its name from the traditional Shad Planking political get-together, though hopefully it is tastier than the roasted fish featured at that Sussex County event. To contact Dave Ress with tips or questions, call 757-247-4535 or email dress@dailypress.com.
