Governors sign low-carbon accord

The governors of 11 states in the Northeast said Wednesday they would work to develop a low-carbon fuel standard to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from cars and trucks despite objections from the oil industry.

The memorandum of understanding sets an early 2011 deadline for a proposed framework to be completed, and piggybacks on California's controversial effort to reduce the carbon footprint of transportation fuels. The governors of Connecticut, Maine, Delaware, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Vermont signed the MOU.

Ten of those states (the exception being Pennsylvania) are members of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, an effort to cut carbon dioxide emissions from power plants in response to global warming.

In a statement, the governors who signed the MOU repeated the arguments supporters of national climate legislation in Congress often use: It would help combat the threat of climate change, reduce dependence on foreign oil and create hundreds of new “green jobs.”

The oil industry is fighting the proposal.

In written comments, the American Petroleum Institute said the low-carbon fuel standard would “lead to higher costs and greater bureaucracy without achieving any progress in cutting national greenhouse gas emissions.”

ConocoPhillips, the third largest oil refiner in the U.S., said there are only a “limited number” of fuels that could meet a low-carbon standard. Those fuels would likely be directed to the states that adopt the standard, leading to fuel shuffling that does not lower greenhouse gases on a national level.

The ethanol industry was a bit more positive in its comments, but also expressed worry that the Northeastern states were using a low-carbon fuel standard developed by California regulators as a starting point. Ethanol producers say the California rule hurts them by calculating indirect land use changes as part of ethanol’s carbon footprint.

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