Comment Log Display

Can you provide the public with the data supporting how these
proposals provide a cleaner and more affordable world for the lower
class?  Can you also address how will help the children and women
who are mining for your ZEV batteries in South America and other
places.  Can you also provide data on how much carbon is emitted
when mining the critical elements for your ZEV batteries?  And
finally, how much carbon will be emitted when setting up the
infrastructure to make these charging stations for all the ZEVs you
are proposing, please include this estimate based on your long term
target for number of total ZEV's on the road in CA by 2050.  

The letter released to our government, mentions that hydrogen
(which you claim to be a big source moving forward to power ZEV)
emits at least twice the carbon as gas.  (see below) 

Here is the letter, please read in detail and submit to your board
for consideration. 

February 23, 2023
The Honorable Lily L. Batchelder
Assistant Secretary for Tax Policy
Department of the Treasury
Mr. Seth Hanlon
Deputy Assistant Secretary for Tax and Climate Policy
Department of the Treasury
Mr. William M. Paul
Principal Deputy Chief Counsel and Deputy Chief Counsel
(Technical)
Internal Revenue Service
Mr. John Podesta
Senior Advisor to the President for Clean Energy Innovation and
Implementation
White House
Mr. Ali Zaidi
Assistant to the President and National Climate Advisor
White House
The Honorable Jennifer Granholm
Secretary
U.S. Department of Energy
Re: Implementation of the IRA 45V clean hydrogen tax credits as it
relates to guidelines for emissions accounting
of grid-connected electrolyzers
Dear Assistant Secretary Batchelder, Mr. Hanlon, Mr. Paul, Mr.
Podesta, Mr. Zaidi, and Secretary Granholm:
We write to urge Treasury, the Department of Energy (DOE), and the
White House to adopt thoughtful and climatealigned implementation
of the 45V clean hydrogen production tax credit (PTC). Our
coalition is composed of
organizations, companies, and institutions spanning sectors,
business models, and interests united by a common concern
for the climate and agreement on principles to underpin
qualification for the 45V clean hydrogen PTC.
Weak guidelines for grid-connected systems risk driving up
emissions, in direct conflict with the IRA's requirements
We applaud the 45V tax credit for its potential to support the
transition to a clean economy. However, we are concerned
that Treasury may adopt insufficiently rigorous guidance concerning
the credit's implementation--especially as it relates
to grid-connected electrolyzers. Using fossil-generated electricity
or siphoning off renewables subsequently back-filled by
fossil power to operate electrolyzers--which would occur under
loose guidance--generates at least twice the carbon
emissions that status-quo gas-derived hydrogen emits. Weak guidance
could therefore force Treasury to spend more than
$100 billion dollars in subsidies for hydrogen projects that result
in increased net emissions, in direct conflict with
statutory requirements and tarnishing the reputation of the nascent
"clean" hydrogen industry.
Additionality, deliverability, and hourly matching are necessary to
guard against negative consequences
To prevent those negative outcomes in contradiction to the IRA's
requirements, we support Treasury's implementation of
a strong emissions accounting system for grid-connected
electrolysis that espouses three pillars: additionality,
deliverability, and hourly matching. A robust body of research
consistently identifies all three principles as necessary
to guard against substantial emissions increases and drive the
deployment of truly low or zero emitting hydrogen
projects.
1,2
In fact, the recent EU rules European Union's proposed rules in its
Hydrogen Delegated Act firmly upheld all
three pillars as necessary to demonstrate that hydrogen is
"renewable" and has zero-carbon emissions.
Treasury has broad regulatory authority to implement the
three-pillar system, and the system is administrable
The IRA requires Treasury to only provide subsidies to projects
that reduce "effective GHG emissions," meaning that for
electrolysis projects, system-wide grid emissions must be accounted
for, and guidance for 45V implementation must be
designed to reduce overall emissions. The three-pillar system is
necessary to ensure this outcome. Furthermore,
Treasury has statutory authority to implement the three-pillar
system. The statute provides broad regulatory authority
for Treasury to "issue regulations or other guidance to carry out
the purposes of this section."3
A lifecycle analysis must embed all three pillars in order to meet
the purposes of this provision. Furthermore, and to
the extent that it is needed, Treasury has specific authority to
adopt a "successor model" to the GREET model which can
and should include these pillars.4
Importantly, each of the three pillars is administrable: signatory
companies are either
already implementing them or confident that they can successfully
do so, and the necessary tools and market structures for
compliance with the pillars are widely available. We continue to
explore how to leverage existing information already
collected by taxpayers and/or reported to federal regulators to
adopt and operationalize these three pillars, and we look
forward to working with the White House, Treasury and DOE on this
topic.
Hydrogen projects that satisfy the three pillars can be extremely
competitive from the outset
Renewable energy and hydrogen developers--including a subset of
companies who have signed onto this letter--are
already developing profitable projects that satisfy additionality,
deliverability, and hourly matching. This provides
robust evidence that the system is technically and economically
feasible. Developers can successfully manage operations
by contracting for diverse clean resources, storing hydrogen, and
ramping the electrolyzer load to match clean power
availability; in fact, electrolyzer technologies are already
capable of efficiently ramping to match variable generation
profiles with major ancillary benefits for grid reliability.
Further, ongoing financial modeling is robustly concluding that
projects that satisfy the three pillars can be extremely
competitive from the outset; claims that the three pillars would
result in an industry that is "dead on arrival" are therefore
demonstrably false. We look forward to further
engagement on this topic.
Hourly matching can be widespread in time for large-scale hydrogen
development
The tools necessary to accomplish hourly matching are proven,
available, and already support existing renewable
energy credit (REC) markets. M-RETS--a non-profit and the largest
North American credit tracking system--has over
100 million hourly RECs in its system and is already ready to
provide hourly certificates nationwide, including all
markets and U.S. regions. EnergyTag--a global entity building a
market for hourly clean energy certificates--supports
over a dozen hourly matching projects worldwide. Both are
signatories to this letter. Furthermore, third-party grid data
providers such as Electricity Maps and software providers such as
FlexiDAO - both signatories to this letter -- already
provide both the necessary data and a framework for robust hourly
tracking to customers and can do so for hydrogen
today.
Otherwise, any regional or national registry who would like to can
implement hourly matching tools at scale in less than
12 to 18 months, compared to the no less than 24 months scaling
timelines for large-scale electrolyzer deployment. In
1 Ricks, Wilson, Xu, Qingyu, & Jenkins, Jesse D. (2023). Minimizing
emissions from grid-based hydrogen production in the United
States. Environmental Research Letters.
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/acacb5/meta
2 Zeyen, Elisabeth, Riepin, Iegor, & Brown, Tom. (2022). Hourly
versus annually matched renewable supply for electrolytic hydrogen
(0.1). Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7457441
3 See 26 U.S.C. § 45V (f)
4
Id. Sec 45V(c)(1)(B)
fact, PJM will now provide hourly, time-stamped certificates-- an
offering which scaled in a short period of time.
5 PJM
developed those tools largely in response to growing demand from
large customers, demonstrating that hourly matching
is moving forward independently of the hydrogen market such that
Treasury guidelines that require less granularity
would be contrary to market direction and introduce additional risk
to developers. As we note above, M-RETS is already
ready to offer hourly matching nationwide as well as offer regional
registries technical assistance and the use of its
platform as Western Electricity Coordinating Committee states did
when their tracking system WREGIS adopted
the M-RETS platform.6
Furthermore, increased global demand and policy signals continue to
drive the scaling of hourly matching infrastructure.7
For example, the U.K. hydrogen standard requires hourly matching,
Germany's recently launched tender for green
ammonia imports starting in 2024 requires hourly matching and more
importantly, the European Union's approved rules
in its Hydrogen Delegated Act require all hydrogen projects to
prove hourly matching in 2030 onwards, including for
hydrogen imports, as the way to prove that the electricity feeding
electrolyzers is fully renewable and therefore zero
carbon. All these developments should drive a significant
acceleration in the roll-out of hourly energy tracking
infrastructure in Europe and globally, and the US should not fall
behind to guarantee a coherent approach in the clean
hydrogen global trade.8
Hourly matching is firmly not a complex endeavor that would prevent
industry scale and is well understood by
customers. For example, companies such as Google and Microsoft
already employ the range of those tools and execute
contracts based on hourly matching in several U.S. states, and the
U.S. government recently signed an MOU with Entergy
Arkansas to supply federal agencies with carbon free energy,
including 50% on an hourly basis. 9,10, 11
We are therefore confident that hourly matching options will be
widely available in time for large-scale hydrogen
development.
5 PJM, PJM EIS To Produce Energy Certificates Hourly, February 13,
2023,
https://insidelines.pjm.com/pjm-eis-to-produce-energycertificateshourly/#:~:text=PJM%20Environmental%20Information%20Services%2C%20Inc,free%20energy%20around%20the%20clock;
Emma Penrod, "PJM to offer time-matched renewable energy
certificates as demand for 24/7 coverage grows," UtilityDive,
February
2023,
https://www.utilitydive.com/news/pjm-to-offer-time-matched-renewable-energy-certificates-as-demand-for247/643135/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Issue:%202023-02-
21%20Utility%20Dive%20Newsletter%20%5Bissue:48206%5D&utm_term=Utility%20Dive
6 M-RETS, WECC Signs Multi-Year Agreement with M-RETS for Software
Services,
https://www.mrets.org/wecc-signs-multi-yearagreement-with-m-rets-for-software-services/
7 Running list of policies, proposals and regulations requiring
hourly (or sub-hourly) matching:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1nRSKHoTl61SjSsl5hYCgTcZQ79kyXLLrwCNiybFc1Po/edit?usp=sharing
8 Baker McKenzie, International: H2Global enables imports of
sustainable hydrogen products into Germany and incentivizes
investment in green hydrogen outside of the European Union,
https://insightplus.bakermckenzie.com/bm/projects/internationalh2global-enables-imports-of-sustainable-hydrogen-products-into-germany-and-incentivizes-investment-in-green-hydrogen-outside-ofthe-european-union/;
European Commission sets out rules for renewable hydrogen
9 Google Cloud Blog, Timely Progress Towards Around-the-Clock
Carbon-free Energy, March 15, 2022:
https://cloud.google.com/blog/topics/sustainability/t-eacs-help-drive-around-the-clock-carbon-free-energy
10 PR Newswire, AES Announces First-of-Its-Kind Agreement to Supply
24/7 Carbon-free Energy for Google Data Centers in
Virginia, May 04, 2021.
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/aes-announces-first-of-its-kind-agreement-to-supply-247-
carbon-free-energy-for-google-data-centers-in-virginia-301282750.html
 2. "Microsoft and AES Partner to Bring Around-the-Clock Renewable
Energy to Data Centers," November 2, 2021.
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/microsoft-and-aes-partner-to-bring-around-the-clock-renewable-energy-to-data-centers301414877.html
 3. Silicon Valley Clean Energy, Silicon Valley Clean Energy and
Google Announce Comprehensive 24/7 Carbon-free Energy
Agreement, June 15, 2022.
https://svcleanenergy.org/news/silicon-valley-clean-energy-and-google-announce-comprehensive-24-7-
carbon-free-energy-agreement/
 4. Canary Media, 24/7 Carbon-free Energy is About to Become a
Reality in California, January 18, 2023.
https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/clean-energy/24-7-carbon-free-energy-is-about-to-become-a-reality-in-california
11 Entergy News Room, Entergy Arkansas, U.S. government sign first
MOU to work toward 24/7 carbon-free electricity, November
15, 2022.
https://www.entergynewsroom.com/news/entergy-arkansas-u-s-government-sign-first-mou-work-toward-24-7-carbonpollution-free-electric/
The 45V credits will have far-reaching consequences beyond the
hydrogen industry; thoughtful implementation is
imperative
The magnitude of the 45V credit will have ripple effects well
beyond the hydrogen economy. While secondary to
satisfying the IRA's legal emissions requirements, implementation
guidance will impact grid congestion; electricity
prices; water supplies; long-term hydrogen, renewable energy, and
storage infrastructure; electrolyzer technology
development; and energy resource siting.
Treasury should work with DOE and the White House to implement a
strong system embedding the three pillars
We urge Treasury to work closely with DOE and the White House to
design rigorous guidelines for grid-connected
electrolyzers that embed additionality, deliverability, and hourly
matching. The breadth of this letter's signatories should
demonstrate significant confidence in this system's technical and
economic feasibility, administrability, and necessity
to comply with the IRA's emission requirements and safeguard the
climate integrity of the 45V tax credits.
We have the solutions to get this right. The signatories stand
ready to work with Treasury, DOE, and the White House to
design a strong and legally durable system. Please do not hesitate
to reach out to us should you have questions about the
items we have put forward.
Sincerely,
Clean Air Task Force
EDP Renewables
Electric Hydrogen
Electricity Maps
Energy Innovation
EnergyTag
Environmental Defense Fund
Evergreen Action
FlexiDAO
Galvanize Climate Solutions
Intersect Power
M-RETS
Natural Resources Defense Council
Nordex USA, Inc
Rondo
Singularity Energy
Synergetic LLC
Union of Concerned Scientists