In 2016, Rhode Island’s Executive Climate Change Coordinating Council released updated targets for greenhouse gas emissions — calling for a 10% reduction from 1990 greenhouse gas emission levels by 2020.
On Oct. 20, the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management announced that the state had reached those targets, enshrined in the 2021 Act on Climate. The state’s 2020 Greenhouse Gas Inventory Statement shows that statewide emissions decreased 20.1% from 1990 levels — and 6.5% between 2019 and 2020. These statistics were determined by DEM air quality specialists, according to a DEM press release.
“There's been a need to assess Rhode Island's greenhouse gas emissions to see how we're doing with our state laws,” said Joseph Poccia, senior air quality specialist for RIDEM.
The Greenhouse Gas Inventory Statement assesses Rhode Island’s progress towards meeting the targets outlined in the Act on Climate, which calls for the state to reach net-zero emissions by 2050. Inventories currently lag the year of their data by three years — a gap that the Department of Environmental Management is working to decrease, according to the release.
The 2020 inventory cited a decrease in transportation activity during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic as the source of 2020’s emission reductions in the release. To gather information, air quality specialists collaborate with neighboring states to see what methodology they use, along with tapping into resources like the Environmental Protection Agency’s Motor Vehicle Emission Simulator and the resources from the U.S. Climate Alliance, according to Poccia.
Poccia explained that the department primarily uses “federal data and shrink(s) it down to Rhode Island.”
But the emission reductions observed in 2020 do not necessarily indicate future reductions, experts wrote in the published inventory. The DEM expects to see a “rebound in emissions” in the 2021 GHG inventory, to be published in fall 2024.
“None of the findings are surprising, nor meaningful,” wrote J. Timmons Roberts, professor of environmental studies, environment and society and sociology, in an email to The Herald. “2020 was a completely anomalous year, with the COVID shutdown, so we knew they'd be meaningless numbers.”
In the press release, Governor Dan McKee explained that while the reduction in emissions may be skewed, the inventory “demonstrates what can be achieved through emissions reductions, particularly in the transportation sector.” He added that the achievement shows that more work is necessary to reach net-zero targets.
Poccia agreed that even with the pandemic, the inventory could be an indication that R.I. is making progress. “Direct impacts of the pandemic on electricity consumption, residential heating and a lot of the other sectors which still saw declines in 2020” are “less clear,” he said.
Roberts warned readers of the inventory against optimism. “The rate of decline really must be far steeper than what we're seeing,” he wrote, adding that “there's not actually good evidence that our policy is meaningfully moving the dial.”
“This report should really be titled, ‘Wait Til Next Year,’” he wrote.
Maya Kelly is a Metro senior staff writer who covers health and environment. When she's not at The Herald, you can find her hanging from an aerial silk, bullet journaling, or stress-baking.
