Waxman-Markey Will Mandate Greener Building and Drive Green Renovation
The Waxman-Markey climate and energy bill could take an important step toward becoming law by the end of the week. At the heart of the bill is a plan to create a cap-and-trade system that would limit--and put a price tag on--greenhouse gas emissions. The emissions cuts would be gradual and increasing, starting with a cut of three percent in 2012, and a target of 80 percent lower emissions by 2050.
Opposition rhetoric to the Waxman-Markey bill has grown increasingly shrill of late. Republican House leader John Boehner released a memo Tuesday stating that passage of the bill would devastate the economy by "crippling small businesses," sending millions of jobs overseas, and raising energy costs. On the other side of the aisle, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has scheduled a vote on the bill for Friday. Both seem to indicate that the fight is over, with Republicans posturing in the face of defeat and Democrats eager to get the bill passed.
As noted in a Washington Post editorial, Waxman-Markey will, in effect, create a federal building code, a drastic step given that states and municipalities have previously been able to set their own building standards. These new federal regulations would require that new buildings be 30 percent more efficient by 2012 and 50 percent more efficient by 2016. Although mandating such dramatic improvements so quickly may seem draconian, the technology needed to create that efficiency already exists. Building "green" costs about the same as traditional building methods, and may even prove cheaper over the life of a building due to lower energy costs.
The Post editorial also notes that the most egregious energy-wasters, old homes and buildings, "wouldn't necessarily be touched by the new code," but this isn't really the case. It's true that Waxman-Markey doesn't require efficiency upgrades for existing structures, but it does offer financial support for home and building owners who make efficiency improvements. The new code stands to render inefficient and environmentally hazardous building materials obsolete, making renovation projects greener than they would have been. Other provisions of the bill include setting new standards for lighting products, heating ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) systems, and other household appliances.
As energy-efficient buildings slowly become the norm, owners of older homes and other "dated" structures will be faced with an important decision: use green renovation techniques and technology to upgrade, or struggle to keep up with increasing energy prices and plummeting property values.
With the vote scheduled for Friday, it would be great if either the GOP or the Dems realized that the federal government is about to take a huge stake in local building codes. Whether they know it or not, Congress seems poised to move green building and green renovation practices squarely into the mainstream.
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"These new federal regulations would require that new buildings be 30 percent more efficient by 2012 and 50 percent more efficient by 2016."
Good!
And keep in the solar research funding, and other progressive things.
Just drop cap and trade.
"With the vote scheduled for Friday, it would be great if either the GOP or the Dems realized that the federal government is about to take a huge stake in local building codes. Whether they know it or not, Congress seems poised to move green building and green renovation practices squarely into the mainstream. "
Into the building codes? That's not a tenth of it. They're slowing taking over EVERYTHING. Any you guys are pleased with this? It's going to break the backs of the working poor who won't be able to afford utilities anymore. Is that what liberals are all about? Power to the feds, no matter who you oppress?
A major problem with building renovation is the tenet/landlord relationship. Any permanent installaion becomes the landlords property and the tenet pays the utility bills. Most business property is rented/leased. A tenet is reluctant to spend money on improvements whose ownership reverts to the landlord. A landlord is reluctant to spend money on improvements as the tenet receives the benefit in lower utility costs.
This bill in itself is quite literally treason. We have been taken for fools by our representatives.
Where did my country go?
Who tore up our contract with the Fed Government, formerly known as the Constitution?
Since they have shredded our contract, what are the new rules? Are we now just serfs under the oligopoly of the congress, the executive, and the Supreme Court, and they can make up the rules as they go, based on popular sentiment?
There seem to be no limits as to what the Feds can do any longer. Amendmend the constitution? We don't need no stinking amendments!
What do you want? Need healthcare? No problem.
Is global warming man caused? Will this bill reduce global warming if it is man caused? Who cares! It will provide more tax dollars for the government to spend. We don't need to read no stinking bill.....
Please employers, take note of all your employees with Obama stickers on their cars. Please let them be the first to go under the head count cuts you will be forced to make to survive your rising energy costs under Waxman Markey.
Remember the cost of energy per KW/hour and the price of gasoline today, June 25th, 2009. Write it down. Pull it up and look at it again in November of 2010.
Vote accordingly.
Post the bill so we can see the pork added by special interests. Guess who will be running the cap and trade market exchange other than the same bankers who worked the home mortgage market? But, there will not be any problems or speculation nor scalping.
Please. Al Gore has that market cornered. Done deal.
"Republican House leader John Boehner released a memo Tuesday stating that passage of the bill would devastate the economy by "crippling small businesses," sending millions of jobs overseas, and raising energy costs."
"As energy-efficient buildings slowly become the norm, owners of older homes and other "dated" structures will be faced with an important decision: use green renovation techniques and technology to upgrade, or struggle to keep up with increasing energy prices and plummeting property values.''
I don't feel as though I need to add anything, other than, welcome to the NWO!
Between this Cap and Tax and the Obama Healthscare America as we know it will cease to exist. Outside of politicians and the rich, the general public will do no more than eke out a small living as all income will go to the government. Thanks lefties.
'or struggle to keep up with increasing energy prices and plummeting property values." So the very people who can't afford these updates will be hurt the most. This recession has cost me a significant portion of my income to the point where I can barely afford my house. I can't afford costly improvements now, much less higher bills. Thanks, really appreciate it.
Change we can believe in! Third world here we come.
You're one of millions(me too). I wish you well.
Making more energy-efficient buildings sounds like a worthy cause (and it is). But it's getting hard to keep up with the spin here.
First it's "Global Warming", with CO2 playing the role of villain.
Then the planet cooled a bit and it became "Climate Change". Change is bad, right?
Then we got burned out on the CO2 debate, so "Energy Independence" became the rallying cry. Hard to argue with that one; it'd be nice if we could import less.
And now in today's headlines, it's apparently really all about the creation of millions of "green jobs". Ya, right. Why? It's the economy, stupid! Best of all, this miracle bill which saves the planet won't even cost anything, if we are to believe what we read in here.
Meanwhile, the albatross known as Waxman-Markey is not just a new building code. If you want a green building code, why package it as a complex derivative trading scheme for CO2? If you want to discourage use of hydrocarbon fuel, then pass a straight tax. But if you want to follow Europe's example and create a huge expensive mechanism which effectively does nothing to limit CO2, then by all means go for Waxman-Markey.
It's not bad enough dealing with local building codes and standards...now we have the Feds to deal with also. Federal oversight is the last thing we need.
Keep states rights. We know better.
He// yeah! My state passed legislation declaring sovereignty under the 10th Ammendment. If the feds keep up this ho.st.il.e takeover, then we reserve the right to tell them to get scr3w3d!
If the Waxman-Markey bill passes, unemployment will increase by nearly 2 million in 2012, the first year of the program, and reach nearly 2.5 million in 2035. Total GDP loss by 2035 would be $9.4 trillion. The national debt would balloon as the economy slowed, saddling a family of four with $114,915 of additional national debt. Families would also suffer, as the bill would slap the equivalent of a $4,609 tax on a family of four by 2035.
The National Black Chamber of Commerce and the Brookings Institution project huge job losses. Proponents of a national energy tax often point to a recent Congressional Budget Office memo and Environmental Protection Agency analysis suggesting low per family costs. Those estimates are grossly inaccurate, as both the CBO memo and the EPA's analysis contain flaws too serious for use as measures of the economic impact of the Waxman-Markey bill.
While national numbers are startling, many Members of Congress may be tempted to assume that their congressional districts will not be affected because they "cut a deal" or they have an incomplete view of how the American economy functions. Thus, it is crucially important that the Members making decisions, and the people affected by those decisions, understand how their congressional districts will be impacted by Waxman-Markey, or any type of national energy tax.
"Republicans posturing in the face of defeat and Democrats eager to get the bill passed."
Really?
"I'm hoping we can do it Friday. But I don't know how many votes we'll have"
~Pelosi
Democrats Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin of South Dakota., a co-chairwoman of the 51-member Blue Dog Coalition, said Wednesday she cannot support the bill.Of her Blue Dog colleagues, she said, "Many are skeptical; many are seemingly unmovable off of their 'no' positions."
~National Journal
"The measure, which is likely to have a tough go in the Senate"
~Politico
Mr. Freeman seems to be the only one who thinks this bill is a shoe in to pass.
Never called it a shoe-in, and never addressed how it will do in the Senate. And yes, Dems ARE eager to pass the bill, because while the party leadership is committed to it--and will find a way to get it passed--the public is far less enthusiastic. So the Dems are eager to the vote behind them and start talking about something else.
Yet they're not so eager to implement the changes. It appears that getting a few votes in the next two election cycles is more important than "saving the planet" and that may not be nearly as likely when Americans see just what this bill brings about in the way of lost jobs, decreased property values and higher energy bills.
"the public is far less enthusiastic"
There's one of the understatements of the year.....
If you think they are unenthusiastic now, wait until the effects kick in.
Hopefully before the 2010 mid terms.
Methinks this is why the blue dogs are being so cautious....
What drives me nuts about these DC bills is that they are always fueled by the special interests. Even assuming (a) there is scientific data to back this bill up (there is not) and (b) there is Constitutional authority for Congress to act here (there is not), any alleged benevolent act by Congress will always be corrupted by the special interests.
So what - we are going to create a derivatives market for greenhouse emissions? This type of trading was illegal until Congress enacted legislation in 1990 pre-empting any state law that prevented this type of trading (which almost every state did). What ensued was government-mandated economic chaos.
If we need these laws, why can't they be enacted to that the special interests and the financial elite don't necessarily have to get rich off of it. The bill is something like 900 pages long.
How about this - a law that says "All emissions must be reduced by 80% by 2050." That's it. Done!
Look. Lobbyists and politicians are like dogs and fleas. You'll never have one without the other. It's a fact as old as writen history.
What you have to realize is that the more power you give the government to regulate, the farther you stray from the limited powers granted by the constitution, the more opportunities you provide lobbyists to buy special deals for their clients from the politicians. A tax code change here, a rule change there, a requirement to use such and such (product and/or service) their client just happens to produce/provide in a bill about to be passed, etc.
That is exactly why our founders limited the power of government by the "chains of the constitution".
And now that we've allowed the SCOTUS to be the sole arbiter of what is and isn't constitutional, we now have these nasty knock down drag out fights over nominees to that court.
We've completely abandoned any efforts to amend the constitution to grant the fed the power to do all these things desired by the "masses", such as health care, fighting the global warming hoax, etc. because we know we are much more likely to get SCOTUS to go along with it than we are to get an amendment passed.
We have to get back to an originalist interpretation of the constitution to reduce the influence of lobbyists.
Anyone who rails against the influence of lobbyists without addressing those facts is simply blowing smoke out of their posterior orifice.
Ask a Spaniard how their cap and trade has worked out. It's unbelievable these fools would even contemplate this fiasco.
"A man's home is his castle." Remember when some people actually believed that? Goodbye to another American freedom.
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