EDF Touts Market-Based Solutions to Carbon Capture Sequestration Risk Management

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact:
Scott Anderson, Environmental Defense Fund, 512.691.3410-w or 512.699.1077-c
Media Contact: Chris Smith, Environmental Defense Fund, 512.691.3451-w or 512.659.9264-c or csmith@edf.org

(WASHINGTON D.C. – May 14, 2009) – Praising the initiative that a pending Senate bill provides on carbon capture and sequestration risk management and the development of corresponding market-based solutions, Senior Policy Advisor Scott Anderson with Environmental Defense Fund testified today before the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources in support of S. 1013.

“We are pleased that this bill helps explain the difference between two geologic sequestration issues that are often confused,” Anderson said. The two issues are 1) the need for long-term site maintenance after sequestration sites are successfully closed; and 2) the need for project developers to manage the risk of liability for damages resulting from their activities.

Anderson was invited to testify on Senate Bill 1013, the Department of Energy Carbon Capture and Sequestration Program Amendments Act of 2009, and stated that EDF believes the bill offers a “measured response” to barriers faced by some early project movers at a time when private sector insurance options are not fully developed.

“In the long run, we believe a market-based solution for risk management should be our goal,” Anderson said. “This model is healthier for taxpayers, parties who may suffer damages, and the industry itself than would be a system where firms routinely depend on the government to absolve them of the consequences of their actions.”

While EDF supports CCS development, Anderson also testified, “We aren’t champions of coal, but we are realists. Since the transition away from fossil fuels is likely to take a very long time, we foresee a long-term need to deal with coal-based emissions.”

EDF considers CCS to be an important part of reducing the climate impact of coal, the world’s most abundant but most carbon-intensive fossil fuel, and accommodating it to a carbon-constrained future.

Full testimony by Scott Anderson is available in PDF format at: http://www.edf.org/sites/default/files/9741_ccs-anderson-senate-testimony-2009-may-12.pdf