MONTPELIER — As Vermont quickly approaches a 2025 deadline to reduce climate emissions, state agencies and data experts engaged in a tense discussion this week about whether the state is on track to meet the legally binding benchmark.
The Global Warming Solutions Act, passed by lawmakers in 2020, requires Vermont to reduce emissions by specific amounts by 2025, 2030 and 2050. The law commits the state government to lowering the pollution that contributes to climate change to 26% below 2005 levels by 2025.
Leaders of various state agencies and data experts testified before the Senate Committee on Natural Resources and Energy on Wednesday about what kind of progress has been made so far toward reaching that goal.
Their testimony revealed questions about the appropriateness of the data the state cited to the committee in quantifying its progress.
The stakes of the disagreement are high due to the conditions of the law. If Vermont is not on track to meet 2025 emissions, the Global Warming Solutions Act allows a court to force the Agency of Natural Resources to begin a rulemaking process — and potentially introduce new regulations — to further reduce Vermont emissions.
Julie Moore, secretary of the state’s Agency of Natural Resources, testified first, telling lawmakers that “the Climate Office now projects that Vermont is on track to meet the 2025 climate pollution reduction requirements” of the Global Warming Solutions Act.
That positive report represented a departure from what the agency and data experts had previously reported about Vermont’s climate progress: that the state was not on track to meet its emissions reduction target in accordance with the law.
In explaining the new forecast, Moore cited new information from a recent report by the Energy Futures Group, a consulting firm based in Hinesburg working with the state to understand the economic impact of a clean heat standard. That report attributes a lower emissions forecast to a slew of federal funding that has helped Vermont move forward with projects that are expected to lower emissions over time.
But that report followed a different methodology for calculating emissions — one which projects into the future — than Vermont’s Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventory and Forecast, an official state document that uses recent data from state agencies to calculate actual emissions. The inventory follows guidelines from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the Environmental Protection Agency.
Jared Duval, the executive director of the Energy Action Network who testified in his capacity as a member of the Vermont Climate Council, characterized the Energy Futures Group report as overly optimistic.
The modeled data used in the report made the state appear as though it had emitted almost 1 million metric tons of climate emissions less in 2020 than it actually had, Duval said, citing the greenhouse gas inventory. That figure amounts to more than 12% of the roughly 8 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions that activities in the state emitted that year.
In fact, Duval testified, the modeled data has been lower than Vermont’s actual emissions since 2015.
Duval said he used fossil fuel sales data from the Joint Fiscal Office and the Vermont Department of Taxes to check the accuracy of the report’s modeled data for the years 2021 and 2022, for which the state has not yet published its official emissions inventory.
Historically, those data are good predictors of actual reported emissions in Vermont, Duval said. The report’s modeled emissions are lower than what the available data shows they should be, in some cases by as much as 15%, Duval said.
Using modeled data also lowers the state’s projection of climate emissions for future years. Calculating emissions based on modeled projections instead of the actual data is like a scale “that reads -25 before you step on it,” Duval told lawmakers.
To Duval, all of this means that the agency has not proved that Vermont is on track to meet its 2025 deadline.
“I believe that the Agency of Natural Resources has a legal responsibility to initiate rulemaking as required by the (Global Warming Solutions Act) to ensure that we meet the first and also subsequent science-based targets that represent Vermont doing our part to reduce climate pollution,” Duval said.
David Hill, a consultant with the Energy Futures Group who worked on the report, testified immediately after Duval. He said Duval’s testimony raised “important and valuable points,” acknowledging that the model is “not an appropriate measurement and verification of what’s actually happening on the ground.”
“I think that a scenario planning model, or a study that is looking at this, doesn’t replace, nor was it intended to be the means by which you validate the state meeting the Global Warming Solutions requirement reductions,” Hill said.
Moore, who had another obligation, had left the committee discussion before Duval’s testimony. In an interview with VTDigger, she said she was surprised at his assessment, and “disappointed” that, as someone charged with reviewing the report, Duval hadn’t brought up his concerns earlier.
Duval said that while he had previously reviewed the report, he didn’t know it was based on modeled projections instead of the state’s emissions data until earlier this week, as he was preparing for his testimony.
Asked on Thursday whether the data could still be used to determine that the state is on track for the 2025 deadline, Moore said she isn’t sure.
“I think that’s an open question following the discussion yesterday,” she said.
She said she imagines there are reasons why the Energy Futures Group used the model and data that it did, and that she wants to understand both the strengths and weaknesses of the approach.
Moore said she has her eye on the broader picture of meeting the requirements of the law and reducing emissions. She noted that, using either data set, “the investments we’ve made over the last three or four years have really fundamentally changed the trajectory we are on as a state, in terms of greenhouse gas emissions.”
Moore said it will be important to turn to the 2030 deadline “where I don’t see that there’s any disagreement that we currently don’t have programs, policies, rules in place that are sufficient to meet the reduction requirements of the Global Warming Solutions Act,” she said.
