Existing law establishes the State Air Resources Board as the state agency responsible for monitoring and regulating sources emitting greenhouse gases. Existing law requires the state board to establish a Carbon Capture, Removal, Utilization, and Storage Program, as provided, to evaluate the efficacy, safety, and viability of carbon capture, utilization, or storage technologies and carbon dioxide removal technologies and facilitate the capture and sequestration of carbon dioxide from those technologies, where appropriate. Existing law requires the Secretary of the Natural Resources Agency, in consultation with the state board, to publish a framework for governing agreements regarding 2 or more tracts of land overlying the same geologic storage reservoir or reservoirs for purposes of managing, developing, and operating a carbon dioxide capture, removal, or sequestration project, as provided. This bill would require the state board to establish and administer the Carbon Dioxide Removal Purchase Program as a competitive grant process for eligible carbon dioxide removal projects, as specified. The bill would require the state board, on or before January 1, 2028, and annually thereafter, to conduct and publish on its internet website a survey of carbon dioxide removal projects existing or in development within the state, and, on or before December 31, 2027, and annually thereafter, until December 31, 2035, to publish on its internet website a report describing Carbon Dioxide Removal Purchase Program activities completed and carbon dioxide removal projects to date, as specified. The bill would require the state board, on or after July 1, 2026, but on or before December 31, 2035, to fund carbon dioxide removal projects in an amount totaling $50,000,000. The bill would authorize up to 10% of that amount to be used to supplement necessary administrative costs in establishing the program. The bill would prohibit carbon dioxide removal projects from exceeding $25,000,000 of grants toward qualified carbon dioxide removals in any one of specified project categories or $12,500,000 of grants towards any one individual carbon dioxide removal project sponsor, except as specified. The bill would require that eligible carbon dioxide removal projects permanently retire the contracted tons of removed carbon dioxide from any future carbon dioxide removals credit issuance. The bill would require the state board, on or before January 1, 2028, to adopt guidelines, including the definition of an eligible carbon dioxide removal project, for the program, which the bill would require to be consistent with certain provisions governing carbon dioxide capture, removal, or sequestration projects, as specified. The bill would make implementation of these provisions contingent upon an appropriation by the Legislature for purposes of the program. The bill would require all funds to be available for encumbrance or expenditure until June 30, 2035, and to be available for liquidation until June 30, 2035.
Existing law requires the State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Commission (Energy Commission) to adopt, on a biennial basis, an integrated energy policy report that contains an overview of major energy trends and issues facing the state, including supply, demand, pricing, reliability, efficiency, and impacts on public health and safety, the economy, resources, and the environment. Existing law requires that the report present policy recommendations based on an in-depth and integrated analysis of the most current and pressing energy issues facing the state. This bill would require the Energy Commission, on or before March 1, 2027, to designate a person within the Energy Commission or identify and retain an external candidate to serve as the Senior Counselor on Industrial Policy and Clean Energy Development, and would require the senior counselor to, among other things, convene working groups that focus on certain issues, as provided. The bill would require the Energy Commission, the Governor's Office of Business and Economic Development, the Labor and Workforce Development Agency, the Public Utilities Commission, the Department of General Services, and the office of the Treasurer, on or before March 1, 2027, to enter into a memorandum of understanding on equitable clean energy supply chains and industrial policy in California with specified goals and provisions, as provided. The bill would require the senior counselor to track and coordinate the work under the memorandum of understanding and to prepare an annual report summarizing the key findings and recommendations resulting from that work. The bill would require that the report be presented at a public meeting of the Energy Commission and be published on the Energy Commission's internet website. The bill would establish in the State Treasury the Equitable Clean Energy Supply Chain and Industrial Policy Fund and would, upon appropriation by the Legislature, authorize the moneys in the fund to be expended for purposes of the bill.
Existing law requires the Department of Toxic Substances Control, on or before January 1, 2029, to adopt regulations to enforce specified covered perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) restrictions, which include prohibitions on the distribution, sale, or offering for sale of certain products that contain specified levels of PFAS. Existing law requires the department, on and after July 1, 2030, to enforce and ensure compliance with those provisions and regulations, as provided. Existing law requires manufacturers of these products, on or before July 1, 2029, to register with the department, to pay a registration fee to the department, and to provide a statement of compliance certifying compliance with the applicable prohibitions on the use of PFAS to the department, as specified. Existing law authorizes the department to test products and to rely on third-party testing to determine compliance with prohibitions on the use of PFAS, as specified. Existing law requires the department to issue a notice of violation for a product in violation of the prohibitions on the use of PFAS, as provided. Existing law authorizes the department to assess an administrative penalty for a violation of these prohibitions and authorizes the department to seek an injunction to restrain a person or entity from violating these prohibitions, as specified. This bill would, on and after January 1, 2028, prohibit a person from distributing, selling, or offering for sale a cleaning product, dental floss, juvenile product, food packaging, or ski wax, as provided, that contains intentionally added PFAS, as defined, except for previously used products and as otherwise preempted by federal law. The bill would, until January 1, 2031, exempt certain components of a cleaning product from this prohibition, as specified. The bill would clarify that, on and after January 1, 2028, a cleaning product is required to comply with certain regulations adopted by the California Air Resources Board regarding volatile organic compounds in consumer products, and would prohibit the use of a regulatory variance to comply with those regulations, as specified. The bill would, on and after January 1, 2030, prohibit a person from distributing, selling, or offering for sale cookware that contains intentionally added PFAS, except for previously used products and as otherwise preempted by federal law. The bill would authorize the department, on or before January 1, 2029, to adopt regulations to carry out these provisions. This bill would require these prohibitions on products containing intentionally added PFAS to be enforced by the department pursuant to the existing authority described above, including, but not limited to, product testing and administrative penalties. The bill would require a manufacturer of a product regulated by the bill to provide a certificate of compliance to the department upon request instead of on or before July 1, 2029. The bill would exempt a manufacturer of a product regulated by the bill from the registration and registration fees required by the existing enforcement authority described above.
Existing law, the California Land Conservation Act of 1965, otherwise known as the Williamson Act, authorizes a city or county to enter into contracts with owners of agricultural land to preserve the land for agricultural use, as specified, in return for reduced property tax assessments. The act also authorizes a landowner of specified agricultural land to petition the city or county to cancel the Williamson Act contract in order to designate the land as a farmland security zone, whereby the land is eligible for a specified property tax valuation and taxed at a reduced rate for specified special taxes. Existing law authorizes the legislative body of a city or a county to establish an enhanced infrastructure financing district, with a governing body referred to as the public financing authority, to finance public capital facilities or other specified projects of communitywide significance. Existing law requires the public financing authority to prepare and adopt a proposed infrastructure financing plan, as specified. Existing law authorizes the plan to require a certain portion of specified taxes levied upon property within the district to be allocated to the district each year, as specified. Existing law authorizes certain local agencies to form a Community Revitalization and Investment Authority within a community revitalization and investment area to carry out a community revitalization plan in that area for specified purposes. Existing law authorizes the plan to require a certain portion of specified taxes levied upon property within the area to be allocated to the authority to finance improvements, as specified. This bill would exclude the taxes levied upon a parcel of land enrolled in or subject to a Williamson Act contract or a farmland security zone contract, as specified, from the above-described allocations to the district or authority, as applicable. This bill would incorporate additional changes to Section 53398.75 of the Government Code proposed by SB 516 to be operative only if this bill and SB 516 are enacted and this bill is enacted last.
Existing law requires the Secretary of the Natural Resources Agency, in consultation and coordination with the Salton Sea Authority, to lead Salton Sea restoration efforts. Existing law, to the extent that funding is appropriated to the Department of Fish and Wildlife for Salton Sea restoration activities, authorizes the Department of Water Resources, in coordination and under agreement with the Department of Fish and Wildlife, to undertake certain restoration efforts. This bill would require, except as provided, specified state agencies undertaking a Salton Sea restoration project in excess of $1,000,000 to obtain, as part of a contract entered into on or after January 1, 2026, an enforceable commitment that every bidder, contractor, subcontractor, or other entity at every tier, as defined, shall use a skilled and trained workforce, as provided, to perform all work that falls within an apprenticeship occupation in the building and construction trades.
Existing law requires the State Air Resources Board to adopt rules and regulations that will achieve ambient air quality standards required by the federal Clean Air Act, as specified. Existing law requires the state board, following a noticed public hearing, to adopt airborne toxic control measures to reduce emissions of toxic air contaminants from nonvehicular sources. Pursuant to this authority, the state board has adopted the Airborne Toxic Control Measure for Fuel Sulfur and Other Operational Requirements for Ocean-Going Vessels within California Waters and 24 Nautical Miles of the California Baseline regulation to require the use of low-sulfur marine distillate fuels in order to reduce emissions of particulate matter, diesel particulate matter, nitrogen oxides, and sulfur oxides from the use of auxiliary diesel and diesel-electric engines, main propulsion diesel engines, and auxiliary boilers on oceangoing vessels. This bill would require the State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Commission (Energy Commission) , in coordination with the State Lands Commission, the Transportation Agency, and the state board, to develop a plan on or before December 31, 2030, for the alternative fuel needs of oceangoing vessels that call at California's public seaports and that enables the seaports to meet their emission reduction goals. The bill would require that the plan do specified things, including, among other things, identify barriers to permitting alternative fuel facilities at seaports and opportunities to address those barriers. The bill would require the Energy Commission to convene a working group to advise the Energy Commission on the development of the information required to be included in the plan, as specified. The bill would require the state board to provide the Energy Commission with information regarding fuels for oceangoing vessels that comply with the state board's regulations for those vessels.
Existing law requires the Department of Water Resources to gather and correlate information and data pertinent to an annual forecast of seasonal water crop. Existing law also requires the department to update every 5 years the plan for the orderly and coordinated control, protection, conservation, development, and use of the water resources of the state, which is known as "The California Water Plan." This bill would require the department, on or before January 1, 2027, to update its water supply forecasting models and procedures to address the effects of climate change and implement a formal policy and procedures for documenting the department's operational plans and the department's rationale for its operating procedures, including the department's rationale for water releases from reservoirs. The bill would also require the department to establish, and publish on the department's internet website, the specific criteria that it will employ to determine when its updated water supply forecasting model has demonstrated sufficient predictive capability to be ready for use in each of the watersheds. The bill would require the department, on or before January 1, 2028, and annually thereafter, to prepare and submit to the Legislature a report on its progress toward implementing the new forecasting model and to post the report on the department's internet website. The bill would also require the department, on or before January 1, 2028, and annually thereafter, to prepare and submit to the Legislature a report that explains the rationale for the department's operating procedures specific to the previous water year.
The California Beverage Container Recycling and Litter Reduction Act, a violation of which is a crime, requires a distributor of beverage containers, as defined, to pay to the Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery a monthly redemption payment for every beverage container sold or transferred, as provided. The act requires the department to deposit those amounts into the California Beverage Container Recycling Fund. The fund is continuously appropriated to, among other things, pay refund values and administrative fees to processors that receive empty beverage containers from recyclers. Until January 1, 2028, the act continuously appropriates $60,000,000 annually from the fund to the department to make market development payments to glass beverage container manufacturers who purchase recycled glass collected within this state for use in manufacturing new beverage containers in this state. This bill would require the department, subject to the availability of funds, to pay a market development payment to a person who purchases a material produced from a by-product of glass recycling or processing that contains certain contaminants, cannot be remelted for use in glass beverage containers or fiberglass insulation, as specified, and that would otherwise be sent to a landfill or be used as low grade aggregate. The bill would, until January 1, 2030, authorize the department to expend up to $5,000,000 annually from the fund for these market development payments and up to $1,000,000 annually to facilitate the transportation of waste glass product by waste glass product end users. By authorizing new uses for continuously appropriated funds, this bill would make an appropriation.
Existing law prohibits any person, except as specified, from using or operating any vehicle, machine, tool, or equipment powered by an internal combustion engine operated on hydrocarbon fuels, in any industrial operation located on or near any forest, brush, or grass-covered land between April 1 and December 1 of any year, or at any other time when ground litter and vegetation will sustain combustion permitting the spread of fire, without providing and maintaining, for firefighting purposes only, suitable and serviceable tools, as prescribed. Existing law requires a sealed box of tools, containing specified items, including one backpack pump-type fire extinguisher filled with water, to be located within the operating area and accessible in the event of a fire. This bill would instead require a dedicated set of tools, as specified, including a sufficient number of fire extinguishers, to be located within the operating area and accessible in the event of a fire, so that, when added to any other tools on the industrial operation, each employee at the operation can be equipped to fight fire. The bill would make other nonsubstantive changes to these provisions.
The California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, until January 1, 2031, authorizes the State Air Resources Board to adopt a regulation establishing a system of market-based declining aggregate emissions limits for sources or categories of sources that emit greenhouse gases (market-based compliance mechanism) that meets certain requirements. Existing law establishes the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund and requires all moneys, except for fines and penalties, collected by the state board from the auction or sales of allowances as a part of a market-based compliance mechanism to be deposited into the fund and requires the Legislature to appropriate moneys in the fund for the purpose of reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the state, as provided. Existing law, the California Climate Crisis Act, declares that it is the policy of the state both to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible, but no later than 2045, and achieve and maintain net-negative greenhouse gas emissions thereafter, and to ensure that by 2045, statewide anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions are reduced to at least 85% below the 1990 levels. This bill would enact the Polluters Pay Climate Superfund Act of 2025 and would establish the Polluters Pay Climate Superfund Program to be administered by the California Environmental Protection Agency to require fossil fuel polluters to pay their fair share of the damage caused by greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere during the covered period, which the bill would define as the time period between the 1990 and 2024 calendar years, inclusive, resulting from the extraction, production, refining, sale, or combustion of fossil fuels or petroleum products, to relieve a portion of the burden to address cost borne by current and future California taxpayers. The bill would require the agency, within 90 days of the effective date of the act, to determine and publish a list of responsible parties, which the bill would define as an entity with a majority ownership interest in a business engaged in extracting or refining fossil fuels that, during the covered period, did business in the state or otherwise had sufficient contact with the state, and is determined by the agency to be responsible for more than 1,000,000,000 metric tons of covered fossil fuel emissions, as defined, in aggregate globally, during the covered period. This bill would require the agency, within one year of the effective date of the act, to conduct and complete a climate cost study to, among other things, quantify the total damage amount, which the bill would define as all past and future climate harms and damages to the state from January 1, 1990, through December 31, 2045, inclusive. The bill would require the agency to update the climate cost study, not less frequently than every 5 years, through January 1, 2045, as provided. The bill would require the agency, within 60 days of the completion of the climate cost study, to determine and assess, as provided, a cost recovery demand for each responsible party listed, which represents the responsible party's proportionate share of the total damage amount. The bill would require responsible parties to pay their cost recovery demand, as provided. The bill would require the collected cost recovery demands to be deposited in the Polluters Pay Climate Superfund, which the bill would create in the State Treasury. The bill would, upon appropriation by the Legislature, require moneys in the fund be expended for, among other things, qualifying expenditures, which the bill would define to include expenditures for projects and programs to mitigate, adapt, or respond to the damages and costs caused to the state from climate change. The bill would require all interest earned on moneys that have been deposited into the fund to be retained in the fund for use in implementing the program. The bill would require the agency to determine the initial implementation costs for the act, as provided, and would require the agency to assess an amount allocated equitably among responsible parties to cover those costs. This bill would require the Director of Finance, within 45 days of the effective date of the act, to perform an initial assessment of the reasonable and appropriate initial implementation costs that will be incurred by the agency. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.
