On Wednesday, I posted a blog questioning the commitment of Gov. Timothy M. Kaine to a “green” agenda in areas where it comes into hard conflict with the backers of Business As Usual. (See “The Greenwashing of the Kaine Administration.”) I wasn’t entirely fair. I need to set the record straight, at least regarding the issue of conservation and electricity re-regulation.
I noted that Kaine had signed a re-regulation bill that was highly favorable to the electric utilities. I asked, “Will he accede to a Big Grid electric power infrastructure, or will he back meaningful efforts to evolve Virginia’s power grid into a more decentralized system with small-scale and renewable power producers?”
Well, the fact is — and I should have remembered because I covered it in this blog — the conservation and renewable-energy elements contained in the bill, modest though they may be, were inserted at Kaine’s behest. As we are reminded in an article, “Virginia’s Energy Policy,” published under the governor’s name in Virginia Tech’s “Issues & Answers,” Kaine added the following amendments to the re-regulation bill:
• Place a greater emphasis on electric-generating plant performance, customer service, and utility operating efficiency when calculating allowable return on equity for utilities.
• Provide a greater incentive for nuclear, carbon capture-compatible clean coal, and renewable energy plants (lower-carbon technologies).
• Increase the energy efficiency goal to 10 percent from 5 percent.
• Strengthen requirements for use of renewable sources in electricity generation.
Kaine also issued Executive Order 48, which contained a number of conservation initiatives in state government, and he signed a four-day tax holiday for Energy Star appliances.
I still stand by my other observations in the post, but I was unfair to suggest that Gov. Kaine was less than dedicated to the cause of energy conservation. My apologies.