HARRISBURG — Josh Shapiro, the Democratic candidate for governor, is breaking with Gov. Tom Wolf on the centerpiece of Wolf’s plan to fight climate change amid the strong and sustained pushback it has received from building trades unions that have long backed the party’s candidates for governor.
Wolf — a fellow Democrat who has endorsed Shapiro, the state’s two-term attorney general — has worked for two years to finalize regulations to make Pennsylvania the first major fossil fuel state to adopt a carbon pricing policy by imposing a price on carbon dioxide emissions from power plants.
Wolf has called it a “historic, proactive and progressive approach that will have significant positive environmental, public health and economic impacts.”
Meanwhile, the Republican-controlled Senate voted Wednesday to disapprove of Pennsylvania joining RGGI.
Shapiro, in a statement from his 2-week-old campaign, suggested that Wolf’s plan — which involves joining the multistate consortium, the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, or RGGI — does not satisfy criticism that it will hurt the state’s energy industry, drive up electric prices and do little to curtail greenhouse gases.
“We need to take real action to address climate change, protect and create energy jobs and ensure Pennsylvania has reliable, affordable and clean power for the long term,” Shapiro said in the statement. “As governor, I will implement an energy strategy which passes that test, and it’s not clear to me that RGGI does.”
That, he said, “is a determination I will make as governor, in close consultation with workers and affected communities.”
Even if he wins next year’s election, Shapiro — as state attorney general — could before then be in the position of rendering legal judgement on Wolf’s carbon-pricing regulation.
Shapiro’s statement came just before he spoke Wednesday to a conference of union leaders from the pipeline trades. They are among the labor unions whose members work on power plants, gas pipelines and refineries.
Wolf said Tuesday that he still expects his plan to take effect next year. For now, Wolf’s plan faces solid opposition from Republicans in the Legislature and in the double-digit-deep GOP field running for governor in next year’s election.
Republicans can halt Wolf’s carbon-pricing regulation if they win over enough Democrats to muster veto-proof majorities in both the House and Senate.
Sen. Cris Dush, R-Brookville, after Wednesday’s vote rejecting RGGI, said he and his Republican colleagues have stressed. its carbon pricing measures are a tax, which would violate the state Constitution that grants exclusive power to the Assembly to levy taxes. Dush said carbon taxes would also result in the closure of Pennsylvania’s coal-fired power plants, the loss of family-sustaining jobs and negative impacts on the state’s economy.
Dush added that spending of carbon tax revenue by RGGI states on energy efficiency, wind power, solar power and low-income fuel assistance was found to have minimal positive impact in those states, while RGGI increased electric bills in the coalition states.
The Senate resolution rejecting RGGI now goes to the GOP-controlled House. If Wolf vetoes the resolution, Dush said it will return to the Senate, which may consider overriding the veto. Two-thirds of the Senate must support the resolution to override the veto. Should the Senate override the veto, the measure would then go to the House where the same two-thirds vote is required.
Wolf’s regulation also faces litigation from opponents who question its legality, and Shapiro’s office could be tasked with defending the regulation in court.
Heavily populated and fossil fuel-rich Pennsylvania has long been one of the nation’s biggest polluters and power producers, and the jury is out on whether a carbon-pricing program on power plants would significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Its effectiveness could depend on where emissions caps are set and whether money from the emissions credits are wisely spent on clean energy and energy efficiency programs.
Wolf’s carbon-pricing regulation has broad support from environmental advocacy groups and, in theory, electricity from solar, wind and nuclear power generators would become more cost competitive in electricity markets.
In some cases, Wolf’s plan received support from backers of higher-efficiency natural gas plants and labor unions involved in renewable energy projects. It also motivated the Ohio-based owner of nuclear-powered Beaver Valley Power Station to put off plans to close the plant.
Coal advocates say the plan will prematurely shut down coal mines and coal-fired power plants in Pennsylvania, while many in the natural gas industry have opposed it.
