The program, aimed at controlling greenhouse gas emissions by setting carbon allowances for energy-intensive companies including refineries, raised billions of dollars after it was started in 2012 but demand has shrunk in recent years amid legal challenges.
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A news release from Garcia says the legislation also requires the California Air Resources Board (CARB) to prioritize direct emission reductions and consider potential impacts when adopting regulations to reduce GHG emissions. Brown’s office said the state is on track to reach that mark, and that the new law will help California reach its goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent from 1990 levels by 2050.
The new legislation will “impose very severe caps on the emission of greenhouse gases in California, without requiring the regulatory agencies to give any consideration to the impacts on our economy, disruptions in everyone’s daily lives or the fact that California’s population will grow nearly 50 percent between 1990 and 2030”, the California Chamber of Commerce said in a statement. The successful effort behind these two bills is the latest sign of a growing consensus that protecting the environment and improving public health are inextricably linked and that maintaining that link is key to advancing future environmental actions..
Brown, at the event, chided Republicans in the U.S. Congress who have opposed measures to control climate change, and he said California lawmakers, for their part, were moving forward.
The legislation is a priority for Brown.
The new law goes further, aiming to reduce emissions 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2030, which the governor called the most aggressive target enacted by any government in North America. Jerry Brown extended the nation’s most ambitious climate change law by another 10 years.
California Gov. Jerry Brown is set to extend the nation’s most ambitious climate change law by another 10 years, charting a new goal to reduce carbon pollution. “Lawmakers should get back to work immediately to ensure that we can achieve the SB 32 goal while protecting California jobs and the economy”. “California is doing something that no other state has done”.
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Johannes Escudero, executive director of the RNG Coalition, said, “LCFS will stay and renewable natural gas will continue as a major success story”. He said that bills like SB 32 and AB 197 are extensive moves that have been keeping California on its path of huge innovation and environmental flexibility. That’s why extending our emission- reductions goals is so critical. He didn’t give a lot of details as to how that was supposed to happen-but legislators responded by passing laws, including one that implemented a cap-and-trade system.
