Energy Policy Act of 1992 (EPACT92)

Date: Signed into law October 24, 1992

The Energy Policy Act of 1992 covers numerous resource conservation initiatives, but Title 16 in particular puts into place mechanisms for monitoring and addressing climate change and global warming.

Background

The 1973 oil crisis in the United States created a sense of urgency for action to reduce America’s dependence on foreign oil while simultaneously reducing carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions. The 1975 Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA) established Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards. In 1978, the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act (PURPA) promoted development of alternative energy sources. The National Appliance Energy Conservation Act (NAECA) of 1987 envisioned a 21.6 million metric ton reduction in carbon emissions by the year 2010. Title VI of the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments responded to the domestic ozone depletion issue, which is related to reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Then, in 1992, the United States ratified the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which challenged industrialized countries to become leaders in reducing GHGs. The Energy Policy Act (EPACT) of 1992 represents the major initial response to that initiative.

Summary of Provisions

The Energy Policy Act of 1992, an extensive and varied act with twenty-seven titles, addresses various aspects of overriding issues such as improving energy efficiency, implementing measures to reduce GHG generation, and incentives to increase renewable energy and clean coal technology. Title XVI of the act, however, contains specific stipulations that address global climate change and global warming and provides partial fulfillment of obligations which the United States incurred upon ratification of the UNFCCC. The act contains four main mandates.

The act directed the secretary of energy to submit a report to the Congress by October 24, 1994, that was to assess a wide variety of implications for implementing policies that would enable the United States to comply with its obligations under the UNFCCC. These include potential implications relating to the economy, energy, society, the environment, and competition. The report was also to assess the feasibility and implications for jobs and of stabilizing GHG generation in the United States by the year 2005; of stabilizing GHG generation by the year 2005; of reducing the generation of GHGs; and of successfully reducing 1988 levels of CO₂ by 20 percent by the year 2005.

Section 1602 of Title XVI of the act required that each National Energy Policy Plan that the president submitted to Congress include a least-cost energy strategy prepared by the secretary of energy. The strategy had to consider economic, energy-related, social, environmental, and competitive costs and benefits. The strategy design had to be one that could achieve specific things at least cost to the country: federal energy production; utilization and energy conservation priorities; stabilization and eventual reduction in GHG generation; an increase in the efficiency of the total energy use in the United States by 30 percent over 1988 levels by the year 2010; an increase of 75 percent over 1988 levels in the percentage of energy derived from renewable resources by the year 2005; and a reduction in U.S. oil consumption from about 40 percent (1990 level) of total energy use to 35 percent by the year 2005. The strategy also had to identify federal priorities to include policies that implemented standards for more efficient use of fossil fuels, increased the energy efficiency of existing technologies, and encouraged new ones that included such things as clean coal technologies and others that lower GHG levels.

The secretary of energy was directed to establish a director of climate protection within the Department of Energy who would have three major responsibilities: to serve as the secretary’s representative for global change policy discussions, including activities of the Committee on Earth and Environmental Sciences and the Policy Coordinating Committee Working Group on Climate Change; to monitor domestic and international policies as to their effects on GHG generation; and to have the authority to participate in planning activities of relevant programs of the Department of Energy.

Section 1609 of the 1992 Energy Policy Act directed the secretary of the treasury, in consultation with the secretary of state, to set up the Global Climate Change Response Fund to be used for American contributions toward global efforts to effect global climate change. Management and uses of the fund were clearly stipulated: No fund deposits would be made before the United States had ratified the UNFCCC; the money was to be used by the president as authorized and appropriated under the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, exclusively for matters related to the UNFCCC; and $50 million was to be appropriated for deposit for fiscal year 1994, with amounts as deemed necessary for fiscal years 1995 and 1996.

Significance for Climate Change

The Energy Policy Act of 1992 began a debate which resulted first in developing a process for deregulating the electric industry. The act mandated open access for transmitting energy to wholesale customers, but not to retail customers. It addressed disposal standards for nuclear waste so as to protect individuals from abnormal amounts of exposure, specifically those in the Yucca Mountain repository site area. It initiated increased research on the production of alternative-fuel vehicles (electric, ethanol, natural gas, and propane) as well as on hybrid electric and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. The act further resulted in new efficiency standards for faucet fixtures, commercial air conditioning and heating equipment, electric motors, and lamps. Modifications were made in commercial and residential building energy codes. A program for federal support for renewable energy technologies was established, and standards were revised for long-term power purchases, in addition to a host of other provisions.

While some of the energy efficiency measures indirectly affected climate change and global warming—for example, reduction of GHG emissions— as a whole, performance reports on the Title XVI provisions (those concerning climate control and global warming) were disappointing; implementation deadlines, for one thing, were not met. Also, a number of measures were to be voluntary, thus weakening the impact of the law. The act did, however, provide a framework for pursuing its mandates and result in subsequent amendments that could enhance the odds of future realization.

Bibliography

Broecker, Wallace S., and Robert Kunzig. Fixing Climate: What Past Climate Changes Reveal About the Current Threat—and How to Counter It. New York: Hill and Wang, 2008. Explains why climate change may be getting out of control, but offers possibilities for reversing the trend.

Gore, Al. An Inconvenient Truth: The Planetary Emergency of Global Warming and What We Can Do About It. Emmaus, Pa.: Rodale, 2006. The climate crisis is seen as an opportunity for a generational mission and moral purpose. Addresses the numerous areas in which Americans, in particular, have contributed to a global warming crisis.

Leroux, Marcel. Global Warming, Myth or Reality? The Erring Ways of Climatology. New York: Springer, 2005. Outlines the history of global warming. Discusses climate models and their limitations, and postulates alternative causes of climate change.