Column by Tate White

House Bill 537 would require Kentucky to produce four billion gallons of coal-derived-liquids each day. The Kentucky Conservation Committee has shrewdly identified this as financially reckless and, not to mention, environmentally irresponsible. HB 537 is intended to assist in the implementation of Gov. Steve Beshear’s new state energy strategy. Unfortunately, this bill contains fatal flaws that go beyond the fact that it would only increase Kentucky’s already immense carbon footprint.

Section 1 is promising, for those interested in a viable future for Kentucky, in its initial establishment of a Kentucky Renewable and Efficiency Portfolio Standard (REPS), but fails to establish concrete means of achieving what appear to be merely aspirational goals. The biggest danger in these ambiguously defined goals is in what it leaves to still be determined, which very well may end up being neither renewable or efficient. It is Section 3, however, which includes the most outrageous elements of HB 537.

Section 3 establishes a Kentucky Alternative Transportation Fuel Standard (ATFS) with a more substantial commitment rather than a mere aspirational goal to, and I quote, “[d]evelop a coal-to-liquid (CTL) industry that produces four billion (4,000,000,000) gallons of liquid transportation fuel per year.” Not only is this aspect of the ATFS socialist in nature, but it also commits Kentucky to a volatile economic position for the years to come.

If a CTL industry of such a size were to develop in Kentucky, coal would no longer be the cheap fuel that it is today because demand would rise extensively. Utility companies have elaborated upon different variables that would catalyze such a rise in the price of coal, henceforth making electricity exceedingly more expensive for all Kentuckians. One example of such a variable includes the impact of possible carbon regulations — like a federal tax on carbon emissions — which would serve to exacerbate the already increasing price of coal. Potential long-term effects could range from reduced economic activity to major losses of manufacturing and commercial sector jobs in Kentucky. Coal continues to be a destructive force in Kentucky, environmentally and economically.

HB 537 was drawn up completely in-house with no effort to bring in multiple parties or experts to spur more productive discussion. Such an opaque legislative process should strike every citizen as alarmingly undemocratic. It has also repeatedly been underlined that the majority of public comments regarding CTL have opposed it, yet the newly created Energy and Environment Cabinet has failed to take heed of these. That HB 537 was introduced on the last allowable day of the session is telling.

The bill’s tenure in the Senate has resulted in the addition of measures lifting a state moratorium on nuclear power plants and allowing for oil and gas drilling on state-owned lands. Fortunately, the House is not expected to accept these additions and HB 537 may, at last, meet its end. However, I stress every concerned Kentuckian to research HB 537 for themselves and alert their representatives to the many flaws inherent in its composition.

The provision of tax breaks for the continued and intensified creation of dirty fuels is completely counter productive and irresponsible. The immediacy and significance of climate changes needs to be acknowledged and dealt with by our political leaders.