Climate Money Watchdog

For years, activists, scientists and politicians have fought to get enough federal funding to make a start to slow climate change and stop the incessant temperature climb of the planet. Although the job of getting money is far from done, the first large tranche of appropriated money from the infrastructure law is starting to be spent. This important money will only be effective if it is spent well and scandals and waste could affect the success of climate goals and deter future and follow-on appropriations. To do this correctly, there has to be strong and workable oversight structure either built into the legislation or established by the Executive Branch.
For this week's podcast episode, we are lucky to have Scott Amey from the Project on Government Oversight (POGO). He is one of the best people in Washington DC on how to build effective oversight into government and what has worked or not worked over his decades of experience. Every climate activist and the politicians who support climate change legislation should listen to Scott so that the federal government can be pushed to do it s job and make sure the money is well spent on realistic and effective projects. The whole system that is spending this money, clear down to state and local governments, has to be pushed from the inside and outside the federal government to make it work the first time. Scott has seen it all and he talks frankly about his concerns of what can happen when well intended money is spent badly. (full disclosure: Dina Rasor is the founder and was the first director of POGO and serves on its board of directors and Greg Williams worked as an investigator at POGO)
Scott Amey is POGO’s general counsel and executive editorial director. In addition to organizational legal demands, he oversees the investigations, research and policy teams, the Center for Defense Information (CDI), and The Constitution Project (TCP). Scott also participates in contract oversight investigations, including reviews of federal spending on products and services, the responsibility of federal contractors, and conflicts-of-interest and ethics concerns. Scott is an attorney and can practice law in Maryland.
In October of 2021, Scott was asked to testify before the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology’s Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight and Subcommittee on Energy on best practices for federal spending. This podcast provides reflection on that testimony, and his decades of experience.
Scott's October 21, 2021 before the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology

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Doug founded Earth Track to more effectively integrate information on energy subsidies. For the past three decades, he has written extensively on natural resource subsidies for organizations such as the International Institute for Sustainable Development, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Sierra Club, the Natural Resources Defense Council, and the Stockholm Environment Institute. He has analyzed scores of government programs and made important developments in subsidy valuation techniques. He has provided input on subsidy reform legislation, served as a peer reviewer on subsidy papers from all over the world, and has published his own work in major journals and as book chapters. In recent years, his work has focused on subsidies to fossil fuels, nuclear power, and the impact of multi-sector natural resource subsidies on biodiversity and critical habitats.

Working collaboratively with other organizations, Earth Track focuses on ways to more effectively align the incentives of key stakeholder groups and to leverage market forces to help address complex environmental challenges.

He holds an MBA from the Harvard Business School and a BA in economics from Wesleyan University.

Topics Discussed Include:

• Government subsidies - why they are important to think about as we try to decarbonize our economy.
• How oil and gas subsides work in general and why they are outdated and harmful to climate goals.
• How taxpayers’ subsidies distort the market for oil and gas produced in Permian Basin.
• The role of different levels of government in supporting oil and gas and whether there are specific challenges trying to reform state-level policies.
• How some subsides were passed in the 1920s when oil extraction was a new industry and haven’t been changed to match the times.
• How three quarters of the subsides support exploration and production, potentially creating a disincentive to phasing out fossil fuel energy.
• How transparency of information on costs and how is paid is often lacking
• Particularly egregious subsidies in the federal realm, in Texas, and New Mexico.
• Examples of federal and state regulations and environmental exemptions that allow the fossil fuel production pollution to walk away from their production pollution and how that is affecting the Permian Basin’s environment for the people.

Further Reading:

· The High Cost Well subsidy

· The Good Jobs First organization

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Matt Renner serves as Vice President of Seneca Environmental, a tribally owned and controlled Earth-healing solutions company focused on helping commercial customers achieve ambitious climate goals while supporting the long-term well-being of the Seneca Nation and other Indigenous people. His work focuses on partnership development and customer acquisition to create unprecedented collaboration and profitably accelerate climate action.

Matt has worked as a nonprofit executive in clean energy, climate policy, and journalism for over a decade, focusing on the near-term social and economic impacts of climate change. He was the head of Climate Mobilization and now serves on their board of directors. He began his career as an investigative reporter and later became the Executive Director of the World Business Academy to focus on the transition to a climate-constrained economic paradigm.

Matt has a BA degree in Political Science and Government from the University of California, Berkeley.

Topics Discussed Include:

· How Seneca Environmental is set up and its main goals.

· Why the Seneca Nation set up a specific section to invest in clean climate change solutions.

· How Seneca Environmental made the 2023 Time100 List and what Matt has done to make Seneca Environmental unique.

· An outline of the work Renner has done for the Native American community and for corporate businesses on producing clean energy.

· Why Seneca Environmental’s business model is working for both the Native American community and corporate businesses.

· How Seneca Environmental’s model and efforts can be replicated with other tribes and businesses to help the clean energy movement going forward.

Further Reading:

· The Seneca Environmental web site

· Video overview of the Seneca Nation

· Federal Tax Credits for Businesses

· Department of Energy Loan Programs

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Our guest tonight is Paul Blackburn of Pipeline Fighters’ Hub. Paul provides legal services on pipeline and renewable energy matters. He has worked on crude oil pipeline issues since 2008, and has experience in renewable energy policy and development. Paul represented nonprofit clients in the South Dakota Public Utilities Commission hearing on the Keystone XL Pipeline, and in the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission hearing on expansion of Line 67, another Enbridge pipeline. He has provided policy analysis and strategic advice on a variety of pipeline matters and authored reports on pipeline safety and oil spill response.

Paul started his legal career in Washington, DC, at the law firm of Van Ness Feldman, where he assisted clients in renewable energy and coal-fired power plant development, a variety of regulatory, legislative, and litigation matters, and Native American commercial law. After leaving private practice, he began a career in the nonprofit sector, including employment by the Sierra Club, the National Environmental Trust, and Oceana in organizing and media. He also has experience in community wind and solar energy development. Paul holds a B.A. in Biology from Macalester College and a J.D. from Boston College Law School.

In this episode we discuss topics including:

· An overview of the Q45 Carbon sequestration tax credit program

· Who benefits from the Q45 Tax Credit Program?

· How Fossil Fuel companies take advantage of the Q45 program and use it to continue to justify producing more fossil fuel

· Problems with the reporting system for 45Q to the EPA and IRS

For more information, see:

· The Pipeline Fighters Hub web site

· The Congressional Research Service’s page on the Q45 program

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Our guest this episode is Erandi Trevino of Public Citizen, Houston. Erandi grew up in Houston and has been concerned about the pollution in her neighborhood since she was a young child.

Before joining Public Citizen in Houston as a Climate Policy and Outreach Specialist, she was an Advocacy Fellow with the Fulbright Association in Washington, DC, where she worked on education policy, nutrition, and financial regulations. During her time in DC, Erandi also volunteered for the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute.

Earlier in her career, Erandi assisted the Permanent Representative of Mexico to the United Nations in New York. She has a law degree from Fordham University and degrees in International Relations and Latin American studies from Seton Hall University. Following her graduation there, she received a Fulbright Grant to teach English in Belo Horizonte, Brazil where she became fluent in Portuguese.

In this episode we discuss the following topics:

• The coalition of companies and other institutions that are partners with this new project called the HyVelocity Hub and their claims to be able to build an “ecosystem” from the existing hydrogen and pipeline industry in Houston to make clean hydrogen.
• HyVelocity Hub claims that they will be able use carbon capture to make “clean” hydrogen (called blue hydrogen) using existing hydrogen production plants.
• How credible is Houston’s Clean Hydrogen Roadmap in general?
• Is HyVelocity’s goal of achieving 2kg CO2 / kg of H2 is realistic?
• RMI currently estimates 20 kg CO2 / kg H2 with Texas’s current fossil-heavy power grid.
• How credible is HyVelocity’s vision “to serve disadvantaged communities by providing jobs and higher labor standards, reducing local pollution, and supporting and complying with the Justice40 initiative?
• Who are the powerful investors in this endeavor and how are they affecting the plans for these plants? Are they listening to local concerns or just greenwashing their environmental challenges?
• What is Public Citizen doing as a local activist to get some oversight on this HyVelocity Hub project?

Resources:

Center for Houston's Future

Houston Healthy Port Communities Coalition

Environmental Defense Fund - Better Hubs - Expring Decarbonizing Industry

Greater Houston Port Bureau's Project 11

On Breath Partnership's "What is Port Houston's Project 11?"

Erandi's Contact Information

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