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Interior appointee faces major energy and mining questions
Dick Kamp / Wick Communications Environmental Liaison
On April 7, Ned Farquhar was named deputy assistant secretary of the Land and Minerals Management for the Department of the Interior (DOI). Farquhar has spent much of the past decade in New Mexico working on southwestern energy initiatives for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and previously as principal environmental aide to Governor Bill Richardson, where he worked on details of the US-Canada Western Climate Change carbon reduction initiative.
Farquhar will be assisting Secretary Ken Salazar, according to a DOI release, in "providing oversight to the Bureau of Land Management, Minerals Management Service, and the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement. The office oversees management of public lands and resources, including production of federal energy and mineral resources."
With legislation introduced to establish comprehensive climate change policies, with the Obama Administration developing its own climate change policies, and with bills in committees of the House and Senate to reform the 1872 Mining Act, Farquhar will have a full agenda. Upon his appointment he said, "It's exciting for me to come out of the environmental community and now be pushing for change as part of this Administration."
Ned Farquhar's priorities:
Renewable Energy: "When we talk about establishing sustainable energy priorities, this is not just renewable generation sources but upgrades in efficiency, ensuring better transmission of energy, and addressing a whole lot of questions on climate and energy security. All of these issues I see within the context of my second biggest priority which is protecting treasured landscapes and conserving these lands for future generations
It is personally important to me to see more of an emphasis on 'distributed generation', (where energy is transmitted to a surrounding region and does not require a lot of available transmission lines) that utilizes local solutions. We need a recognition of these approaches combined with an emphasis on energy efficiency, versus the other context of more distant approaches and long range energy transmission. We do not have excess transmission capacity and we have to develop locally first.
"California is setting the pace for this country in many ways in spite of all of its consumers and energy demand. They've had flat consumption for 20-25 years while the rest of the nation increased consumption by 60%. They keep pushing greater energy efficiency while remaining the capital of energy consuming computers. They seek renewable energy transmission initiatives while saying 'we treasure our land and our state parks.' The state is winnowing down to what they feel they really need-retiring gas plants on their coasts and banning coal plants and seeking to have a 32% renewable energy portfolio. The state is the most aggressive on using rooftop photovoltaic panels and the Google campus is a model experiment that uses rechargeable electric cars that charge up at off-peak hours and then operate .during the day. It's a state that doesn't say, 'nobody tried it before' and the rest of the country could follow their lead.
"But even with all that, the amount of renewable energy planned for California is miniscule compared to what we could develop judiciously on public lands. (Salazar proposed in March that the entire country could be powered by renewable energy sources on Federal public land.)
"We used to say that the southeastern U.S. has little renewable energy potential but there has proven to be large scale wind available even though we need to develop reliable storage. The offshore wind potential is huge.
"We could be using biogas instead of oil or gas for heating in the Northeast and ultimately renewable electricity. If you put together energy efficiency and renewable options and revenues from carbon cap and trading systems, I would argue that in 30 years during the winter, New England could be warm and comfortable and saving money from price breaks
"The most encouraging thing I think right now is the interagency approach to working together for the first time to address renewable energy and climate change. We never thought we would see joint memoranda of understanding between DOI and FERC (Federal Energy Regulatory Commission that approves power generation and transmission) on offshore renewable energy sources."
Mining and Energy: (The Department of Energy and US EPA have been exploring utilizing abandoned mines from New Mexico to Pennsylvania that need reclamation and cleanup as potential locations and transmission corridors for renewable electricity. Most already have large transmission pylons and legal rights of way for transmission lines. Salazar said in March that DOI could be exploring zoning some of these sites for energy generation.) "Its very logical to use old mining sites to generate wind and solar electricity. They have available transmission lines and hopefully, as there is less coal and natural gas transmission they can reduce a deficiency of both generation and transmission. Beyond hardrock mining, there are old coal mines like Black Mesa in the 4-corners area where power generation was consumed and now there is potentially transmission capacity going out.
The success of such initiatives may depend on whether the market prefers those sites over others for renewable generation and transmission. Could we potentially guide the market?"
Mining: Mining reform is in front of DOI who oversees all Federal mining. Two widely differing bills are in the hopper that have passed the House and have been introduced in the Senate. The House version has protection against groundwater overpumping, places time limits on mining claims and has a greater percentage of profits to be placed in a fund for reclamation and cleanup and both claim to create jobs from mining cleanup than the Senate version. The mining industry has not been required to contribute revenues under the 1872 Mining Act and the EPA estimates that abandoned mine cleanup will cost at least $50 million. "To be honest, I have to absorb the text of both Congressional bills. DOI recognizes the perennial need for 1872 Mining Act reform, and I need to better understand how resources such as water are protected at the state level. I just started and I'm not up to speed on mining issues."
On April 7, Ned Farquhar was named deputy assistant secretary of the Land and Minerals Management for the Department of the Interior (DOI). Farquhar has spent much of the past decade in New Mexico working on southwestern energy initiatives for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and previously as principal environmental aide to Governor Bill Richardson, where he worked on details of the US-Canada Western Climate Change carbon reduction initiative.
Farquhar will be assisting Secretary Ken Salazar, according to a DOI release, in "providing oversight to the Bureau of Land Management, Minerals Management Service, and the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement. The office oversees management of public lands and resources, including production of federal energy and mineral resources."
With legislation introduced to establish comprehensive climate change policies, with the Obama Administration developing its own climate change policies, and with bills in committees of the House and Senate to reform the 1872 Mining Act, Farquhar will have a full agenda. Upon his appointment he said, "It's exciting for me to come out of the environmental community and now be pushing for change as part of this Administration."
Ned Farquhar's priorities:
Renewable Energy: "When we talk about establishing sustainable energy priorities, this is not just renewable generation sources but upgrades in efficiency, ensuring better transmission of energy, and addressing a whole lot of questions on climate and energy security. All of these issues I see within the context of my second biggest priority which is protecting treasured landscapes and conserving these lands for future generations
It is personally important to me to see more of an emphasis on 'distributed generation', (where energy is transmitted to a surrounding region and does not require a lot of available transmission lines) that utilizes local solutions. We need a recognition of these approaches combined with an emphasis on energy efficiency, versus the other context of more distant approaches and long range energy transmission. We do not have excess transmission capacity and we have to develop locally first.
"California is setting the pace for this country in many ways in spite of all of its consumers and energy demand. They've had flat consumption for 20-25 years while the rest of the nation increased consumption by 60%. They keep pushing greater energy efficiency while remaining the capital of energy consuming computers. They seek renewable energy transmission initiatives while saying 'we treasure our land and our state parks.' The state is winnowing down to what they feel they really need-retiring gas plants on their coasts and banning coal plants and seeking to have a 32% renewable energy portfolio. The state is the most aggressive on using rooftop photovoltaic panels and the Google campus is a model experiment that uses rechargeable electric cars that charge up at off-peak hours and then operate .during the day. It's a state that doesn't say, 'nobody tried it before' and the rest of the country could follow their lead.
"But even with all that, the amount of renewable energy planned for California is miniscule compared to what we could develop judiciously on public lands. (Salazar proposed in March that the entire country could be powered by renewable energy sources on Federal public land.)
"We used to say that the southeastern U.S. has little renewable energy potential but there has proven to be large scale wind available even though we need to develop reliable storage. The offshore wind potential is huge.
"We could be using biogas instead of oil or gas for heating in the Northeast and ultimately renewable electricity. If you put together energy efficiency and renewable options and revenues from carbon cap and trading systems, I would argue that in 30 years during the winter, New England could be warm and comfortable and saving money from price breaks
"The most encouraging thing I think right now is the interagency approach to working together for the first time to address renewable energy and climate change. We never thought we would see joint memoranda of understanding between DOI and FERC (Federal Energy Regulatory Commission that approves power generation and transmission) on offshore renewable energy sources."
Mining and Energy: (The Department of Energy and US EPA have been exploring utilizing abandoned mines from New Mexico to Pennsylvania that need reclamation and cleanup as potential locations and transmission corridors for renewable electricity. Most already have large transmission pylons and legal rights of way for transmission lines. Salazar said in March that DOI could be exploring zoning some of these sites for energy generation.) "Its very logical to use old mining sites to generate wind and solar electricity. They have available transmission lines and hopefully, as there is less coal and natural gas transmission they can reduce a deficiency of both generation and transmission. Beyond hardrock mining, there are old coal mines like Black Mesa in the 4-corners area where power generation was consumed and now there is potentially transmission capacity going out.
The success of such initiatives may depend on whether the market prefers those sites over others for renewable generation and transmission. Could we potentially guide the market?"
Mining: Mining reform is in front of DOI who oversees all Federal mining. Two widely differing bills are in the hopper that have passed the House and have been introduced in the Senate. The House version has protection against groundwater overpumping, places time limits on mining claims and has a greater percentage of profits to be placed in a fund for reclamation and cleanup and both claim to create jobs from mining cleanup than the Senate version. The mining industry has not been required to contribute revenues under the 1872 Mining Act and the EPA estimates that abandoned mine cleanup will cost at least $50 million. "To be honest, I have to absorb the text of both Congressional bills. DOI recognizes the perennial need for 1872 Mining Act reform, and I need to better understand how resources such as water are protected at the state level. I just started and I'm not up to speed on mining issues."
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