Speaking Sustainability

The Department of the Treasury published new guidance on securing bonus tax credits within the Inflation Reduction Act (P.L. 117-169; IRA) for offshore wind projects. Before the Virginia legislative session expired, lawmakers passed numerous bipartisan environmental bills. Governor Glenn Younkin (R-VA) must decide on the bills’ fate by April 8, 2024. Finally, the United Nations (U.N.) announced that it plans to finalize stricter greenhouse gas emissions penalties for the international shipping sector by 2027.

On February 20, 2024, European Union (EU) legislators reached a provisional political agreement on a regulatory framework for the certification of carbon dioxide removals (CDR). CDR encompasses a wide range of nature- and technology-based activities that permanently or temporarily remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. While CDR is a part of the EU’s plan to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, it has not yet been incorporated into many of the EU’s climate policy vehicles, such as its Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS). The Carbon Removal Certification Framework (CRCF) paves the way for the EU to incorporate CDR into its climate policies in practice, and to eventually establish a registry allowing a market-based trading of CDR “units.”

The Council on Environmental Quality recently released a notice of proposed rulemaking for Phase II of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) rulemaking process, titled the “Bipartisan Permitting Reform Implementation Rule.” The proposed rule deletes the current regulation’s focus on NEPA as a procedural statute and instead emphasizes the Act’s “action forcing” devices to consider the environmental effects of federal decision-making, to even include global effects as they relate to climate change. If finalized, the proposal also would broaden NEPA’s focus on environmental justice while limiting some aspects of NEPA review to align with NEPA updates authorized in the Fiscal Responsibility Act and BUILDER Act of 2023.