MAE 124/ESYS 103:  Week 9 Assignment

 Power for America:  Analyzing provisions in the Kerry-Lieberman climate bill


The week 9 assignment addresses the American Power Act proposed by Senators John Kerry and Joe Lieberman.  The proposed measure would substantially reduce greenhouse gas emissions (by over 80% by 2050.)  Please read the assignment pdf file carefully and write a brief (250 words or less) statement in response to the questions posed in the pdf.

24 May update: One student e-mailed asking for clarification about the meaning of "components of the power industry" and about the interpretation of "historic usage". Perhaps the assignment should have said "which sectors of the electric power industry"? Examples could be nuclear, wind, natural gas, solar, etc. Historic usage refers to the emissions history of a particular power plant (or perhaps particular energy company, so SDG&E for San Diego, for example, with the current mix of energy sources). Of course if you read all of the nearly 1000 pages of the bill, you'll find clear definitions, but keep in mind that the bill is newly proposed, so some of the details will be probably be revised extensive before Congress votes (if indeed they ever vote) on the measure.



The bill has a range of provisions beyond those discussed in the assignment handout.  For discussion section you might want to consider the relative merits of the numerous provisions.  Which of the provisions do you think are most important for achieving the desired 80+% greenhouse gas emission reductions?  Among the provisions:
Here are links to a number of articles that have attempted to summarize the contents of the bill and analyze the likely impact:
I especially like Andrew Revkin's blog comments.  He wrote, "Will it succeed? That depends on your definition of success, of course. The text and summaries circulating on the Web show that the bill contains plenty of mechanisms — some dubious — aimed at easing the path toward achieving the 2020 target of a 17-percent reduction in emissions from 2005 levels." 

Of course there are numerous other commentaries.  We encourage you to keep reading.