The NYT reports on a potential environmental backlash against proposed greenhouse gas regulations designed to reduce the carbon footprint of buildings in the San Francisco Bay area.
some environmentalists and city planners fear that the new set of guidelines being considered by the region’s air quality regulators could have an unintended consequence, making it more difficult and more expensive for developers to construct buildings within already urbanized areas.That would run counter to the notion that builders should be given incentives to shift future population growth from the car-dependent outer suburbs to places where public services are already available and public transit is a more viable option to get people out of their cars.
juris imprudent says:
Now, now, liberals know there is no such thing as “unintended consequences” – those are merely the residue of the evil doers who refuse to comply for the good of themselves and all of society.
More forceful regulation will make them toe the line!
December 29, 2009, 10:43 pmWes says:
We might need a local Environmental Czar to work out the details.
December 29, 2009, 11:49 pmDavid Sucher says:
I wish the NYT was a bit more blog-like and used links so that one could go back to the original source document.
Obviously there is a problems with the regs. But the way the NYT describes leaves me confused:
“If a new project appears to exceed its allowance, it would trigger an environmental impact report to look for ways to reduce it. Guidelines suggest that a typical condominium development with more than 77 units would go over the threshold, as would a single-family housing project with 56 homes.”
Wouldn’t the determination be more likely to be done on a “carbon output per dwelling” basis? After all, location, siting and design make a huge difference in the carbon-impact of a dwelling. It doesn’t make sense for laws to discriminate by size of project when the goal is to decrease the impact per unit. A huge 1000 dwelling project might be far more carbon-efficient per dwelling than one of 10 dwelling units
Of course the only way to check the reporters (uh…do you think that they don’t really want to encourage that?) is to go back to the source materials to see if they have read it correctly. That’s my real point— I wish the NYT would refer directly back to its sources.
December 30, 2009, 12:02 amWayne Lusvardi says:
Apparently the NYT is not aware of Senate Bill 375 here in California that requires new development to be diverted to cities and not the suburbs to reduce auto pollution from longer commuter trips. The irony of such regulations is that in California groundwater resources are mostly located inland and not toward the dense cities on the coast. So cutting down on air pollution will result in greater dependence on imported water. As per usual, the NYT missed the real story.
December 30, 2009, 1:10 amA. Zarkov says:
Many SF residents seem to hate cars, but these very people own them. SF residents actually have a very high rate of automobile ownership. While the well-heeled in SF extol the virtues of public transportation, they themselves avoid it like the plague and drive. I don’t blame them. A ride on a Muni bus can be an extremely unpleasant experience. My women friends tell me ghastly stories about be groped on the bus. One was brusquely thrown off by a screaming bus driver for eating a single nut. My daughter tells me that the passengers on these buses are downright scary, and she won’t use the Muni at all.
Despite the tremendous personal automobile use by residents, we have fewer roads then we did 20 years ago. After the 1989 earthquake, the Embarcadero Freeway demolished and not rebuilt. Other roads were done away with. So today congestion is much worse. Don’t look for any logic or rationality in the way this place is run– you won’t find it.
December 30, 2009, 4:58 amGov98 says:
On Thanksgiving and Christmas day, Bay Area regulators reached in the homes of every Bay Arean past the fourth amendment and declared fireplace fires to be verboten. Now…talk about a loss of freedom. That offended me (and made me thankful I was just visiting).
December 30, 2009, 8:39 amGlenn Bowen says:
Sharp… damned sharp.
December 30, 2009, 9:14 amDavid Sucher says:
Zarkov.
December 30, 2009, 11:42 amYou say “…we have fewer roads then we did 20 years ago.”
Do you have a source?
Or is that your personal observation?
Howard says:
This is just the beginning of the greenhouse gas folly. Almost every aspect of it will have a negative effect on environmental justice.
Wayne: in regards to groundwater resources, your view is quite myopic. Groundwater resources (coastal and inland) in California are being mined by agribusiness and bedroom communities which greatly reduces the baseflow to the delta and induces seawater intrusion. There is nothing wrong with imported water. The problem is the water storage deficit in all of California.
December 30, 2009, 2:10 pmLarryA says:
Public transportation isn’t for people who vote it in, it’s to keep the peons out of the way so the well-heeled can drive. Why do you think they call it “public” transportation?
December 30, 2009, 2:56 pmTatil says:
I wouldn’t worry about it. As soon as any sizable piece of land in San Francisco opens up, more than enough developers would be there to get build something there. Would it increase the sale price of the building? No, the prices are determined by supply and demand, the latter of which is always high, so the sale price is “as high as it gets” in San Francisco. Additional regulations may increase the cost of construction, but that would only reduce the price of the land, not the end product.
December 30, 2009, 8:27 pmSFBurke says:
@A.Zarkov: There are some san francisco residents w/o cars, but they usually have a dog (dog ownership is very high in san francisco particularly among the greens). A recent study indicate that carbon impact of a medium sized dog is about equal to that of an SUV. I have no idea whether the study is valid or not, but the reaction was interesting. All of the greens defended dog ownership because of the emotional value of dogs etc. Of course, if someone owns a car so they can spend more time with their family and less time commuting, that is dismissed as “convenience”. So to expect any logical coherence on other matters is unrealistic.
December 30, 2009, 9:52 pm