Days after the U.N.-backed climate-change panel of scientists urged a radical shift toward wind and solar energy to slow accelerating greenhouse-gas pollution, U.S. state attorneys general Wednesday focused on ramped-up production of fossil fuels.
The intensifying oil and gas boom in Colorado and neighboring states is outpacing health and environment rules that the state attorneys must defend. And as elected officials, they’re trying to help capitalize on huge economic opportunities — especially if the latest technology can coax out enough oil and gas for exporting to other countries.
But favoring fossil fuels puts the AGs and their states at odds with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recommendations released Sunday in Europe — which many believe President Barack Obama and the Environmental Protection Agency are embracing.
“Sure they are,” Colorado Attorney General John Suthers, who hosted the industry-sponsored Conference of Western Attorneys General Energy Summit, said in an interview. “It is definitely the agenda of the EPA to discourage coal in power plants and move somewhat to natural gas and primarily to wind and solar.
“But even they understand this is not something we are going to pull off overnight.”
Regardless of the IPCC recommendations, Suthers said, “there’s not enough renewable capacity to deal with energy needs at this point, and we’re going to have to have fossil fuels. We are going to be not only a national exporter of natural gas but an international exporter of natural gas.”
That outlook infused the day=long summit, which drew top state attorneys, and their staffs, from Arkansas, Colorado, Kansas, Michigan, Montana, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Utah and Wyoming.
They shared their experiences with oil and gas issues and heard from panels featuring 18 experts from universities, oil and gas companies, law firms and government regulatory agencies.
Much of the focus was on technical advances designed to maximize extraction of gas and oil from tight shale formations deep underground.
Denver-based lawyers described the “pre-emption doctrine” and “takings” principles they are wielding in court on behalf of the Colorado Oil and Gas Association against local governments trying to control drilling near residential communities. Most of the attorneys see an overriding state interest, established by courts, in developing oil and gas.
Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt was among those emphasizing state primacy in overseeing land and water.
“The attitude out of Washington, D.C., is not just about maintaining a good environment,” Pruitt said in an interview. “They’re trying to pick winners and losers — trying to de-elevate fossil fuels and elevate renewables.”
He referred to the IPCC report that concluded the global rate of greenhouse gas pollution doubled between 2000 and 2010 and recommended bold action in 10 years to shift off fossil fuels to prevent potentially catastrophic global warming.
“How convenient that is,” Pruitt said, adding that India and China are to blame for much of the greenhouse-gas increase. “The opportunity is immense in this country, and we truly can be an exporter as opposed to an importer. We have a tremendous opportunity to seize.”
U.S. middle-class jobs in oil and gas operations are at stake, he said.
“I look with great suspicion at these international bodies speaking with such arrogance, such condescending tones, especially to America,” Pruitt said.
Ken Salazar, a former Colorado attorney general and former U.S. Interior secretary, said cheap energy is spurring big American companies that have moved their manufacturing operations to other countries to consider bringing that work back.
“It’s just a reality,” he said. “The United States of America has become a job magnet for manufacturing. It is really the energy boom that is leading that.”
The summit dealt largely with state-level rules aimed at guiding industry desires to increase production amid growing community opposition.
In his opening remarks, Suthers said some in the industry feel “under siege,” but he also noted an industry tendency “to run roughshod” over community concerns. “There are some very legitimate concerns by folks in residential areas as this industry encroaches.”
Colorado residents are bypassing what they see as an inadequate response by state lawmakers and are pushing statewide ballot initiatives that would increase drilling buffer zones and bolster local power to limit or ban hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, a technique used to free oil and gas from shale.
Drilling’s impact on communities is growing, attorneys general and panels agreed, forcing a rethinking of the extent to which state rules should pre-empt local efforts to shield people and their land, water and air.
The IPCC report summarized seven years of scientific work on climate change. It concluded that greenhouse-gas emissions accelerated largely because of burning fossil fuels such as coal and gasoline.
An EPA report released Tuesday found that U.S. emissions have begun to decrease and that the global increase is driven by economic development abroad.
