Part 1 in a 4-part series examining the California Ballot Initiatives from a Jewish lens.
At the One Nation rally in Washington, D.C. on October 2, 2010, Marian Wright Edelman said that the primary lesson of Noah's Ark is simply this: "Don't miss the boat." Edelman's observation is particularly relevant to the questions posed by Proposition 23, the California initiative designed to defeat state-based climate change reform.
Last month, more than 14 million people were displaced by floods in Pakistan, fires burned in Russia as temperatures soared , and the media paid tribute to the lives and promise lost in Hurricane Katrina. As in Noah's time, we live perilously -- our existence on this fragile planet threatened by the shifting and intensifying weather patterns that accompany climate change. But imagine. Imagine you knew exactly what you could do to prepare and protect your family, community, country, and world from climate change. Imagine there was a blueprint for survival. What would you do?
In this week's parsha, we learn that Noah had a blueprint. Forewarned of the Flood, he planned ahead and began building an Ark to God's precise specifications. The entire 120 years it took to construct the Ark, Rashi tells us, represented an open invitation for humanity to turn away from acts of corruption and dishonest gain toward righteousness, compassion and justice. It has been more than 120 years since the start of the Industrial Revolution, long years of ill-gotten gains and time enough to create our own blueprint for redemption.
That is why so many of us rejoiced at the passage of California's Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, known as AB 32. AB 32 contains precise specifications needed to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases, such as a trading system for emission permits, decreases in the carbon intensity of gasoline, and orders for utilities to generate more electricity from solar and other renewable sources. AB 32 has inspired a leading-edge "clean tech" industry that encompasses 12,000 companies, 500,000 jobs, and billions of dollars of private investment. In the last two years alone, the burgeoning green economy has been California's single largest source of job creation.
Given the gridlock in Washington, DC over federal climate change legislation, state action seems the surest way of building our Ark and inspiring others to do the same. And given the urgent need for action, one might question why anyone would want to delay that effort. Yet, that is exactly what we have in Proposition 23, an initiative on the November 2010 ballot that would delay implementation of AB 32 until California's unemployment rate drops to 5.5% for a full year, something that has happened only three times in the last thirty five years.
It comes as no surprise that out-of-state oil companies such as Valero, Tesoro, and Koch Industries are backing Proposition 23. The New Yorker describes the Koch Brothers as believers in "drastically lower personal and corporate taxes, minimal social services for the needy, and much less oversight of industry -- especially environmental regulation." The University of Massachusetts at Amherst named Koch Industries one of the top ten air polluters in the nation and Greenpeace identified the company as a "kingpin of climate science denial." By funding efforts such as Proposition 23, Koch Industries and its corporate allies have sought to keep Americans addicted to dirty, costly, and dangerous fossil fuels.
The proponents of Proposition 23 say the measure is necessary to protect jobs and working people. But is that the truth? In California, climate change is contributing to rising sea levels, intensifying droughts, wildfires and rapidly melting snowpacks -- all of which necessitate costly government action. Wide swings in energy prices create uncertainty for businesses, which may discourage additional hiring. And without government regulations, working families will encounter higher energy prices and remain vulnerable to the health consequences of exposure to fossil fuels, consequences especially acute for those living in poor neighborhoods adjacent to ports and freeways.
Perhaps that is why the coalition against Proposition 23 includes such an unprecedented spectrum of allies, including business, labor, public health, environmental, transportation and religious groups, including many Jewish organizations, such as the Progressive Jewish Alliance , the Religious Action Center, the American Jewish Committee and social justice-oriented synagogues throughout the state.
The change we need will not materialize overnight, but if we -- like Noah -- keep building our Ark, decade after decade, our children and our children's children will reap the benefits of a greener world in which prosperity is more widely shared. Without AB 32, our emission of greenhouse gases will continue to disrupt ecosystems around the world, including our own. We who consume a disproportionate percentage of the Earth's resources must therefore begin to repair the damage and vote no on Proposition 23.
Anything less and we certainly will have missed the boat.
Elissa D. Barrett is the Executive Director of the Progressive Jewish Alliance and a leader in the Jewish Social Justice Roundtable. David Levitus is a member of PJA's LA Regional Council, a PJA Jeremiah Fellowship alumnus, and a Ph.D. candidate in History at the University of Southern California. PJA's voting recommendations on all the California propositions are available online.
" Don't rock the boat " Hues Corporation
2farleft
AB 32 was one of those exciting, lead-the-way ideas, and I hope it stands.
And then if we can pass the urgently needed PROP 25 to eradicate the onerous 2/3 budget requirement, we can get our internal affairs in order as well.
It is a corrupt and devious Big Energy giveaway to finance huge industrial projects in our publicly owned wilderness with our tax dollars so they can IPO out before the projects are even built (see Ivanpah). Meanwhile, every household that these desert solar installations claim they will be "serving" could produce its own power more affordably, and with much less destruction, if we only had the standard "feed in tariff" that all other countries have.
Big Solar is the worst possible manifestation of AB 32 and MUST BE STOPPED. Use the law to improve the planet, not kill it! And create improved property values, twice as many jobs, and local economic stimulus by supporting PACE loans and FITs instead of Chevron Boondoggles killing our wilderness for money.
Is there any city, state or country in the modern world that functions well with one third of total energy being produced by "renewable resources?" If solar power and wind power on unreliable, does this mean we will have brownouts when one third of the supply isn't there when it is needed?
5% to 10% for windpower feeding into a grid seems to be about the maximum before there are serious problems, according to some engineers.
Did anyone ask the electrical engineers who deal with these issues whether this was feasible, or what the economic impact would be on the average citizen's monthly electric bill? Has any arms-length, independent, objective analysis been done? Or is this simply a Hollywood fantasy about our energy future?
http://www.greenbiz.com/news/2010/07/15/californias-buildings-waste-huge-amounts-energy-study-says
What some companies are doing on their own:
http://www.electricenergyonline.com/?page=show_news&id=139981
And if you really want something to shoot for, this German town produces 4x what it needs from solar alone.
http://inhabitat.com/2010/08/16/sonnenschiff-solar-city-produces-4x-the-energy-it-needs/new-1-52/?extend=1
This constant whining about what WON'T work and what we CAN'T do is tiresome and silly. There is no reason why we can't move ahead on this. I will go you one better. I don't see why there is one reason we can't go ahead with solar without the large solar farms so as not to ruin the environment as illustrated by the German town.
If the EPA wants to support legislation that shuts off cheap sources of electricity and forces the use of untried and expense sources of electricity, then it should support national legislation so that taxpayers in every state face the same inflated expenses that Californians will soon face. In that way, at least Californians will not be placed at a disadvantage compared to their neighbors in other states, which is the situation we face right now in California.
Californians are now forced to vote "Yes" on Proposition 23, which will postpone the sharp escalation of monthly utility bills, due to the forced substitution of expensive and unreliable wind and solar energy, for inexpensive and reliable energy from gas turbines within California and from coal fired generators from the Southwestern states outside of California.
First of all, any tinkering with AB 32 should only be done on the basis of changing tactics to embrace new technology or possible, limited exemptions if there are any snags bringing a particular project to fruition. Prop 23 ends AB 32.
It should certainly NOT be done at the behest of out of state oil companies whose only goal is to keep making pots of money spewing their filth everywhere.
TEXAS oil companies. I love it. I am not sure what they do now, but it wasn't that long ago there were no environmental safeguards in Texas regarding where polluting activities could be done. You could literally build a refinery next to an elementary school or a hospital.
Those are exactly who we need to tell us what to do. No thanks.
Who says alternative power is untried? And before you say it is expensive, please factor in, with sources and links, how much fossil fuel energy REALLY costs what with subsidies and clean-up.
NO ON PROP 23