Under the new climate-change plan released by the Obama administration, Georgia will be required to reduce carbon emissions from its power plants by 25 percent over the next 15 years, a considerably more modest target than state leaders had feared.
Nonetheless, the reaction has been predictable: Such a reduction can’t be accomplished, or if it can be done, it will come at enormous cost to electricity customers and the economy. As U.S. Sen. David Perdue put it, “The damaging effects of this hostile executive action will drive up energy prices for Georgia families and businesses, while the ripple effect throughout our economy will increase costs of basic necessities for those already struggling to make ends meet.”
Relax. We’ve been through this before. Back in the early to mid-’90s, for example, the federal government classified metro Atlanta as a serious non-attainment area for air pollution, requiring the region to set a strict schedule for air-quality improvement. The reaction was much as you see today.
Georgia Power complained that it would send electricity rates soaring. The new standards were supposed to be the “death knell” of economic development in the region, and the degree of air-quality improvement required was claimed by some to be all but impossible.
Then-Gov. Zell Miller wrote an angry letter of protest to the EPA, warning of “enormous economic and jobs consequences.” For a short period, highway projects were canceled and the region was stripped of federal transportation money until it compiled and committed to an improvement plan. (The state’s auto emissions-inspection program is the most visible outcome of that plan.)
Today, despite the naysayers, the air in metro Atlanta is demonstrably clearer than it was two decades ago. The eye-stinging, throat-burning ozone that routinely accumulated on hot summer days is now a rare occurrence. It’s safer for human beings to play outside, work outside. It is safer to simply breathe. What supposedly couldn’t be done — or couldn’t be done without turning metro Atlanta into a economic wasteland — has in fact been largely accomplished at relatively low cost, although continued improvement is still necessary.
In many ways, complying with the Clean Power Plan should be even easier, because many of the required changes are already underway. Georgia is already getting credit for taking coal-fired generation out of service and replacing it with nuclear power. And just a few years ago, Georgia Power steadfastly dismissed solar power as a possible option in Georgia, saying it was too expensive and the state didn’t get enough sunshine; today it says that “the future of solar is bright in Georgia.”
Judging from his own measured response, Gov. Nathan Deal seems to accept that reality. Rather than grandstand, Deal has instructed state officials to find the best possible way to meet the new standards. As a report last month by researchers at Georgia Tech concluded, a strategy of renewable energy and energy efficiency here in the South would not only bring us into compliance but produce “substantial collateral benefits including lower electricity bills across all customer classes, greater GDP growth, and significant reductions” in air pollution.
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