SELLING LIKE HOTCAKES— California carbon emissions are as valuable as they’ve ever been. Last week’s auction of greenhouse gas permits fetched $35.20 per ton, according to figures released by the state today.

The high price indicates that companies are spooked by the state’s plan to eventually tighten its emissions cap. We knew they were, but this auction puts their money where their fears are.

A bit of background: The California Air Resources Board, which runs quarterly auctions for high-emitting companies to buy pollution allowances under the state’s cap-and-trade program, announced in workshops over the summer that it would be modeling scenarios for a tighter allowance budget to align with the state’s updated climate targets.

The agency outlined three scenarios: One to meet the existing legislative goal of a 40 percent emission reduction by 2030, one to meet the 48 percent reduction called for in CARB’s scoping plan and another just-for-kicks goal of a 55 percent reduction.

Allowances on the spot market have been trading at just over $35 per ton since then, as companies expect prices to eventually shoot up when the supply tightens. (The minimum state-set price is $22 per ton.) That’s even after the agency insinuated that it would most likely be aiming for the lowest ambition scenario.

“After these announcements, we saw prices on the secondary market go up,” said Katelyn Roedner Sutter, California state director at the Environmental Defense Fund. Last week’s sale saw prices about $5 per ton higher than the May auction.

Another reason prices could be going up is that companies are anticipating California will eventually link its market with Washington state, which just started its program (“cap-and-invest,” if you please) at the beginning of the year. It’d be California’s second steady trading partner after Quebec.

“There are very substantive conversations between California, Quebec and Washington,” former Washington state Sen. Reuven Carlyle (D) said of plans to link the markets. Since Washington’s program is more stringent, combining the markets would drive up prices in California.

That’s all great news for state coffers: The auction raised about $1.2 billion for the state’s greenhouse gas reduction fund, which goes to things like transportation electrification, affordable housing construction and tree planting, with the majority of benefits going to disadvantaged communities.

But it doesn’t have much impact on actual emissions, energy economists said. Prices would need to be a lot higher to entice industry to change their practices instead of buying permits.

“On the one hand, $35 a ton is real money,” said Dallas Burtraw, a senior fellow at Resources for the Future. “But the price by itself is not sufficient at this level to do the work of driving decarbonization in the California economy.” The primary way that emission reductions have been achieved so far is through regulatory programs and performance standards, he said.

Next steps are for CARB to hold more workshops and eventually a rulemaking. Some are hoping for a dramatic tightening of the cap (which would bring commensurately dramatic price increases).

“The assumption in all of the scoping plans is that the cap-and-trade program will produce actual scarcity in the allowance market and will force emissions down to program cap levels over the next few years,” said climate economist and policy expert Danny Cullenward. “So long as the large chunk of allowances persists, that’s not likely to be the case.”

EMISSION STATEMENT — Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) vowed this afternoon to keep fighting for one of the most consequential climate bills of the next three weeks — his proposal to force corporations to disclose emissions data.

Acknowledging a “real fight” ahead in getting SB 253 from the Assembly Appropriations Committee to a floor vote in that chamber, Wiener positioned the bill as a battleground in a national Republican vs. Democrat fight over corporate accountability for climate change.

“In the broad political context, we need to be clear where California stands,” he said in a press conference at the Capitol, flanked by Sen. Henry Stern (D-Sherman Oaks), Assemblymembers Ash Kalra (D-San Jose), Tasha Boerner (D-Encinitas) and Christopher Ward (D-San Diego) and a cloth globe affixed with images of a hurricane and fires lying on a hospital stretcher.

Wiener said he would stand firm on key planks of the bill, including a requirement that corporations disclose supply-chain emissions known as Scope 3 emissions — a provision that’s not included in a parallel federal disclosure rule.

While a collection of large corporations have backed the proposal — including four apparel-industry groups weighing in today — California business lobbies say they’re throwing everything they’ve got at the bill and at Stern’s SB 261, which would require corporate disclosure of climate risks. — Wes Venteicher

HUMANS VS. CAPITAL — Are AVs a climate story? We’re not sure yet. Email Wes with any thoughts — he’s still skeptical.

Either way, we’re highlighting this story from Jeremy White on how Newsom is all in on autonomous trucks, at the expense of his relationship with labor. His administration is opposing a bill to require autonomous trucks to have a human driver aboard.

The calculus is that the state wants tech jobs even if it imperils truck driver jobs. “Our state is on the cusp of a new era and cannot risk stifling innovation at this critical juncture,” Dee Dee Myers, the administration’s top business official, wrote to legislators.

Lawmakers are more cautious. “They think I’m not embracing the future,” said Assemblymember Cecilia Aguiar-Curry (D-Winters), who’s carrying the bill. “But I am, because I think if we don’t do it right, the first thing that’s going to happen is we’ll be on the front page of the paper for what we’ve done wrong.”

SAN DIEGO WATER SHUFFLE — One of the two water districts trying to leave the San Diego Water Authority to join Riverside County’s Eastern Municipal Water District in pursuit of lower rates for its growers is facing an internal shake-up of its own.

Jake Wiley will become Rainbow Municipal Water District’s new general manager, hopping over from Rancho California Water District. He succeeds Tom Kennedy, who has been RMWD’s general manager since 2014 and has championed the divorce from San Diego’s water wholesaler. The handover is happening Oct. 4. — Camille von Kaenel

— Think permit reform is about cutting red tape? Think again, a new report from progressive think tank Roosevelt Institute says.

— Occidental’s $1.1 billion purchase of a direct air capture firm raises questions about the role of oil companies in the carbon removal business.

— Metropolitan Water District GM Adel Hagekhalil is trying to adapt the SoCal water behemoth to a new era.