Climate COP kicks off

Presented by

With help from Zack Colman and Alex Guillén

Editor’s Note: Morning Energy is a free version of POLITICO Pro Energy’s morning newsletter, which is delivered to our subscribers each morning at 6 a.m. The POLITICO Pro platform combines the news you need with tools you can use to take action on the day’s biggest stories. Act on the news with POLITICO Pro.

Quick Fix

— World leaders have gathered in Glasgow for the crucial COP26 climate summit, where they have their work cut out for them to make meaningful progress on curbing temperature rise and preparing for the changing climate.

— The Supreme Court said it will take up lawsuits from red states and coal companies seeking to stop the Biden administration from writing more stringent regulations for power plants — just as the president is expected to take the world's stage to tout his aggressive climate plans.

— The House is eyeing legislative action on President Joe Biden's climate spending package this week.

AND SUDDENLY IT'S NOVEMBER. I'm your fill-in host Kelsey Tamborrino, back in the ME driver's seat for the morning. The trivia win goes to Ørsted's Rennie Meyers for correctly naming Athena as the Greek goddess born from Zeus' head. For today, in honor of COP26: What is the most popular soft drink in Scotland? Send your tips and trivia answers to [email protected] and [email protected].

Check out the POLITICO Energy podcast — all the energy and environmental politics and policy news you need to start your day, in just five minutes. Listen and subscribe for free at politico.com/energy-podcast. On today's episode: The latest climate top line.

https://politico-energy.simplecast.com/episodes/reconciliation-gives-big-bucks-to-climate

Driving the Day

WHEN I CALLED YOU LAST NIGHT FROM GLASGOW: Biden joins global leaders today for the COP26 summit, the U.N. gathering that's seen as the most important climate meeting since the 2015 conference that gave us the Paris Agreement. On the eve of the conference, Biden laid out a strategy to reach his climate goals in a bid to prove the U.S. was committed to leading the global effort, Pro's Zack Colman reports.

The 65-page strategy analyzed pathways for reaching Biden's net-zero emissions target by 2050, which the administration said would meet the U.S. contribution to the global effort of preventing global temperatures from rising 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Separately, the administration announced a plan today to deliver $3 billion in annual climate finance by fiscal year 2024 to help developing nations most vulnerable to climate change adapt and become more resilient.

The programs would require congressional approval. The long-term climate analysis released by the White House accounted for 12 different pathways across six sectors: electricity, transportation, carbon removal, industry, buildings, carbon removal and non-carbon dioxide gases.

U.S. special climate envoy John Kerry said the U.S. would bring "a very strong presentation" to the climate talks in Glasgow, Scotland, adding the Biden administration and its allies aim to accomplish key goals at the two-week conference: raising global ambitions to prevent global temperatures from rising 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels; delivering more finance for a clean energy transition; and filling out the rulebook underpinning the Paris climate agreement, such as designing accounting guidelines for trading carbon credits.

So far, things are off to a not-so-great start. Countries had to submit climate action plans — known as Nationally Determined Contributions — to the U.N. as part of their commitments under the Paris Agreement. Those updated pledges were supposed to be delivered ahead of COP26, as Zia Weise explains in the full run-down on everything you need to know about the summit, but just 119 of the nearly 200 signatories have done so.

The talks are also beginning against a backdrop of an energy crunch in much of the world that's raised questions about whether the clean energy transition is moving too quickly. Kerry told reporters that it's "not inconsistent" that Biden has called on OPEC nations to produce more oil to boost supply and lower prices while simultaneously calling for a greener economy. And he's noted the rebounding economy as coronavirus fears ebb has led to a supply and demand mismatch, even as he acknowledged the transition will take time and that maintaining public buy-in is essential. "If life is so miserable … and the prices go up," Kerry said, "You're going to lose. I think it becomes more challenging to get the job done. So I see no inconsistency in that. Again, if it were a long term thing that would be bothersome, but it's not."

G-20 VISION: G-20 leaders backed action over the weekend to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius at their summit in Rome. But the G-20 confab might also illustrate the challenges ahead for nations at COP26, as diplomats from the U.K. and continental Europe had pressed for a commitment by large economies, including Australia, India, China and Russia, to phase out coal — something organizers had hoped would send a signal ahead of climate talks — to no avail, report Karl Mathiesen and Jacopo Bariagazzi for Pros.

Ultimately, the text that emerged commits leaders "to take further action this decade and to formulate, implement, update and enhance, where necessary, our 2030" contributions. They agreed that was the minimum required to keep the lower 1.5 degrees Celsius temperature goal "within reach," but they stopped short of agreeing on phasing out coal power or to stop building new coal plants, instead agreeing to end international public financing of new coal power by the end of this year. The leaders also recognized for the first time that methane emissions are a significant climate problem and tackling them is a cost-effective fix, but rejected a proposal to cut them during this decade.

Kerry defended the communiqué, saying the final text showed "everybody's buying in the notion we're now working toward the 1.5 [degrees]," and noting 65 percent of global GDP and more than half of G-20 countries are covered by 1.5 degrees C goals. The document also reiterated previous commitments from nations, such as scaling up finance for measures to adapt to climate change. Kerry said the call to end external finance of coal-fired power plants without technology to trap greenhouse gases would nix 330 million tonnes of heat-trapping emissions annually.

Related: Why the COP26 climate summit won't save the planet | Travel disruption hits COP26 as London trains thwarted by fallen tree| What Utah Republican John Curtis is bringing to the U.N. climate summit | Blinken on Glasgow climate summit: 'We have our work cut out for us'

Trade

U.S., EU AGREE ON STEEL, ALUMINUM TARIFFS: The United States and the European Union announced an agreement Sunday to address tariffs on steel and aluminum imports from the EU, easing Trump-era tensions that for years has tarnished trade relations between the allies, Pro's Steven Overly reports. Under the new agreement, the EU will be permitted to send a set amount of steel and aluminum each year into the United States duty free.

They also agreed to develop a long-term plan that applies pressure on exporters of carbon-intensive steel. U.S. officials described the deal as a first-of-its kind but did not outline specific commitments. The White House said the two trading partners will negotiate future arrangements for trade in the steel and aluminum sectors — among the most carbon-intensive industrial sectors — that weigh global non-market excess capacity, as well as the carbon intensity of the industries.

Supreme Court

SUPREME COURT TO DIG INTO CARBON: In a case of exceptionally awkward timing, the Supreme Court on Friday afternoon said it will consider arguments from Republican-controlled states and coal companies that EPA has only a limited authority to regulate greenhouse gases from power plants. It will be the most important climate case before the Supreme Court since the justices ruled in 2007 that the Clean Air Act does give EPA authority (and, effectively, a mandate) to regulate greenhouse gases. And it comes right as Biden will stand on the world stage and tout America as a global leader on climate change again.

The question: Can EPA issue sweeping rules for power plants that use generation shifting to achieve significant reductions? Or is the agency limited to only what can be done at an individual coal plant — like the efficiency improvements advanced by the Trump administration?

The decision sent shock waves through the climate law world, as most observers felt confident the court would not take the case. "As far as I know, it's the first time the Supreme Court has taken a case like this one, where a lower court has struck down an EPA rule and EPA itself, under a new administration, does not want to appeal that decision," said Jeff Holmstead, a George W. Bush-era air chief at EPA.

Meanwhile, it's not clear whether EPA can effectively continue work on a replacement rule given the Supreme Court's plans to settle these legal issues. The agency declined to clarify its rulemaking plans, but Administrator Michael Regan jumped onto Twitter to defend his agency's authority. "EPA … will continue to advance new standards to ensure that all Americans are protected from the power plant pollution that harms public health and our economy," he tweeted on Friday.

National climate adviser Gina McCarthy told reporters the courts have repeatedly upheld EPA's authority to regulate power plant pollution. "We'll see what the Supreme Court might have in mind, but we're confident that the Supreme Court will confirm what those have before them, which is EPA has not just the right but the authority and responsibility to keep our families and communities safe from pollution," she said.

Fool me thrice: It's going to be hard for the Biden administration to spin this as a positive just when the rest of the world is wondering if it can or should trust the U.S. to lead on climate change. A strong signal from the judiciary that it plans to rein in EPA's authority over power plants could be enough to make other nations waffle on more aggressive climate action in Glasgow. The U.S. reneged on the Kyoto Protocol and then President Donald Trump trampled on the Paris Agreement. Will other nations be willing to place their eggs in the U.S. Supreme Court's basket?

Talk about a scrivener's error! A one-character typo in the Supreme Court's orders created chaos and confusion for about an hour on Friday afternoon. The court at first said that in addition to scrutinizing the scope of EPA's authority, it would consider a labyrinthine argument advanced by one coal company that could have blocked any climate regulation of power plants at all. (The explanation of the theory is a notorious headache; Brett Kavanaugh, then a D.C. Circuit judge, declared in 2016 it made him want a "stiff drink.") But just an hour later, the court issued a correction; it actually meant to decide specifically not to consider the so-called 112 exclusion argument. The oopsie doesn't change the top takeaway that EPA's authority could be restricted, but it does lessen the chances that the high court will completely block EPA from addressing power plant CO2 emissions.

On the Hill

HOUSE TEES UP VOTE: Biden might have arrived in Glasgow without final climate legislation in hand, but Democrats are plotting another go at passing Biden's agenda this week, though any vote would likely have to wait until Tuesday's pivotal gubernatorial race in Virginia, POLITICO's Heather Caygle, Sarah Ferris and Laura Barrón-Lopez.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her leadership team instructed committee chairs to formalize their revisions to the initial 1,684-page draft of Biden's bill by Sunday night. After a five-hour hearing on the social spending bill on Thursday, Democrats on the House Rules Committee plan to reconvene as soon as today to continue teeing up its roughly $1.75 trillion investment in climate action and the safety net.

Around the Agencies

NEW LEASE ON LIFECYCLE EMISSIONS: The Interior Department will examine potential greenhouse gas emissions from the acreage it plans to lease for oil and gas drilling, the department said Friday. The Bureau of Land Management will take a look at the impact from parcels in Colorado, Montana and the Dakotas, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming and several eastern states before holding the lease sales in early 2022. The reviews will consider what Interior called "the social cost of greenhouse gases" — analyzing how potential energy development would affect air and water quality, wildlife habitat and nearby communities.

As Pro's Ben Lefebvre reports, the news marks a major change to Interior's methodology that could make it tougher to extract fossil fuels from federal land. The move is likely to rankle oil and gas companies that have already complained the Biden administration was taking too long to make more land available for drilling.

BLM on Friday also released a study on the total greenhouse gas emissions originating from fossil fuel production on federal lands, including data on the total lifecycle emissions. It estimates that projects extracting coal, oil and natural gas on federal lands would emit 1.3 billion tons of greenhouse gases in the next 12 months, up 45 percent from current levels.

NEW YORK STATE OF MIND: Vice President Kamala Harris will be joined by Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm this afternoon at JFK Airport in New York to discuss climate change and the president’s infrastructure and Build Back Better framework. While there, Granholm will announce $127 million in SuperTruck funding for five companies focused on development of zero-emission medium- and heavy-duty trucks, including electric and hydrogen fuel cell trucks, as well as a new partnership between the Energy Department and six HVAC manufacturers to deploy residential cold climate heat pumps, according to a White House official.

SPOTTED: Granholm (and family) at Duffy's watching the Michigan State-University of Michigan football game on Saturday. The former Michigan governor sported a University of Michigan tee, (which one POLITICO energy reporter informed her was the wrong team for someone trying to Go Green.)

The Grid

— "Biden 'reluctant' to detail response if OPEC won't boost output," via Bloomberg.

— "Despite their climate pledges, the U.S. and others export huge amounts of fossil fuels," via NPR.

— "Earth gets hotter, deadlier during decades of climate talks," via Associated Press.

— "Shell is the greenest Big Oil company. Look what that got it," via The Wall Street Journal.

— "Federal judge vacates EPA's withdrawal of Bristol Bay watershed protections," via Alaska's News Source.

— "'It is a game changer': Waging war on climate change from space," via POLITICO.

THAT'S ALL FOR ME!