Why We Can't Wait for the Perfect Climate Bill

Right now, we are the closest the United States has ever come to confronting the crisis of global warming. The House of Representatives passed the American Clean Energy and Security Act, and now the Senate will consider similar legislation. It will be a tough fight, but this is our best chance to bring clean energy solutions to America before it is too late.

ACES is a good bill that needs to be strengthened. NRDC is working relentlessly to achieve that as the bill moves through the Senate. And we will continue to bolster it even after it has passed into law.

But here is what we will not do: we will not sit this bill out. We will not wait another year or another Congressional session in order to begin drafting a different climate bill that may have a few more provisions we like.

The Earth simply doesn't have that luxury. We have no more time to waste.

The last few months have brought an avalanche of climate data, culminating with the administration's analysis that the effects of global warming are already upon us and a recent MIT study that found the planet is warming twice as fast as previously thought.

Rajendra Pachauri, the head of the Nobel-Prize winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, said: "If there's no action before 2012, that's too late. What we do in the next two to three years will determine our future."

He made this comment two years ago.

We have passed the point of waiting to tackle global warming until some indefinite, ideal time in the future. And we have passed the point of speculating about other mechanisms, such as the even-more politically charged proposal of a carbon tax.

In order to prevent the worst effects of global warming from becoming inevitable, we must start reducing carbon pollution right now.

The ACES bill gets us moving down that path. It will lower carbon emissions by 17 percent by 2020 and 83 percent by 2050 (the latter figure is higher than the target Obama proposed on the campaign). The bill will also unleash billions of dollars of investment in renewable energy, energy efficiency measures, and clean-car technology.

And make no mistake: it is the strongest bill we can get through Congress. Indeed, it is too strong for many members, and getting it passed will require the efforts of all Americans concerned about clean energy and climate security, including well-intentioned fence-sitters.

Going forward, we can continue working together to fortify the bill if it becomes law. I am reassured by one critical element of the ACES draft: the science "look-backs." These dictate that if new scientific evidence comes in after the bill has pass that calls for stronger action, our lawmakers can tighten the pollution constraints.

This mechanism has already proven effective. Soon after the Montreal Protocol was ratified, scientists concluded that the treaty wasn't strict enough, and the international community rapidly agreed to strengthen it.

But this only works when there is a framework already in place. That is what ACES gives us, and building the framework is always the hardest part.

Comments

[rumsblogger]

Climate change is real and serious.
But the Democrats are working with a bad strategy. They are hoping that addressing climate change will be cheap (the "postage stamp"), and they gave away 80% of permits. Opponents say it will be expensive. Now Democrats are trapped.

Instead, they should level with voters. Say that we know it might be costly, that's why we are returning auction proceeds to people as a dividend. When the price goes up, your dividend goes up too. What would opponents say? No, don't give people money? Democrats can save the climate, and take the populist argument away from opponents.

NRDC has the clout to change the Senate's strategy. There's still time!

[britononthemitten]

Given that all of the credible green groups and even the head of the EPA ,Lisa Jackson have said ACES will make no differece to the fight against global warming you'd have to conclude the author has othe reasons for her urgency to see the bill passed.

[Rhetticent]

One more note, Frances: Would you be willing to list all of your donors who intend to make money off of ACES?

[Rhetticent]

Frances, if our government really, really wanted to address the environment,instead of just raising taxes through a federal takeover of the energy sector of our economy, they would immediately:

1) fund conversion of all cars, trucks and buses to compressed natural gas. Reduction of CO2 emissions by 20-25%, reduction of particulate emissions by 99%. This could be done TODAY, as we have the available technology. Jobs would be created to convert vehicles, build refueling stations, and develop transmission lines of domestic gas. This could almost immediately make us free of oil imports, as our domestic sources of oil would be sufficent to cover the reduced demand, and we are literally floating on oceans of natural gas.

2) Use the savings gained from not sending our billions to other countries for importing oil, and the taxes generated from the sale of domestic gas, exclusively for development of alternate fuels and wind/solar infrastructure.

I cannot for the life of me understand why we do not implement this TODAY. If global warming is indeed a problem, let's attack it the way we united in WWII, and do something. Cap and trade is absolute nonsense in the face of realistic, workable, effective and logical proposals. So why should it be passed?

[Rhetticent]

Frances, the reason why we absolutely MUST pass this cap and trade bill is because Goldman Sachs desperately needs the money from it's 10% stake the new carbon trading company, a company designed to become incredibly wealthy exactly from cap and trade. Also, Al Gore's company needs the money from all the offsets he's going to be trading: this bill will make him the first Green billionaire in a very short time. And Congress needs the hundreds of billions of dollars of new tax revenue immediately so they can bribe us with our own money before the elections.

And this HAS TO BE PASSED IMMEDIATELY, even if they don't read the bill, before people figure out what a scam this is.

The environment? Oh, yeah. Well, that's really not a problem anyway, or they would have proposed legislation that really did something about the environment.

[Virgil Kane]

What good does passing a climate change bill do if India, China, Mexico, and the rest of the world do not pass similar legislation besides line the pockets of Goldman Sachs? Cap and Trade is one giant racket.

[Jashand]

I share Beinecke's urgency about enacting effective climate legislation.

But cap-and-trade is so complex , takes so long to implement, and has shown so little promise that it's like rushing down a long, windy dead-end in a panic. Want the direct route? British Columbia enacted and implemented a revenue-neutral carbon tax in six months. And Premier Campbell won re-election in a direct challenge to his carbon tax. That's the fast way to get reductions and encourage investment in conservation and renewable energy.. And if carbon revenue were used to reduce payroll taxes or simply distributed directly to households, the effect would be a badly-needed stimulus, especially in low- and middle-income households.

Let's get serious and stop hiding the price. "Hide the price" (cap/trade) leads to all sorts of outrageous claims about the cost that no one can effectively refute. ACESA's cap/trade is doomed by its own mendacity. RIP.

Time for Plan B, a revenue-neutral carbon tax. (Incidentially, a revenue-neutral carbon tax was part of Al Gore's "Plan A" in the 1992 'Earth in the Balance." See p 349.)

[Rhetticent]

Al has changed his mind, though, because cap and trade will make him even wealthier.

The mendacity of this program is exactly the attraction. Consumers will slowly feel the increased costs of everything, jobs will slowly be lost as the remainder of our manufacturing leaves for other countries, it will take years for utilities to slowly raise rates to the levels the bill will ultimately require. Just like boiling a live frog, they'll just raise the temperature a little bit at a time.

we are voluntarily destroying our way of life. The mind boggles.

[joeneri]

It would be better to dump this bill and effect change through the rule making powers of the various government agencies charged with protecting the environment: EPA, Forest Service, Department of Interior, and even the Pentagon and Army Corps of Engineers. Trading pollution credits on the open markets is simply raising a ceiling that will enable polluters to pollute and speculators to create another asset bubble that will burst, destroying any last chances of financing an energy infrastrucutre rebuilding effort that can reduce the use of fossil fuels.

[Rhetticent]

Exactly. Why bother with those stupid elected officials in Congress, when you can give all the power over to un-elected bureaucrats? They sure do a good job everywhere else....

[valkano]

Beinecke says we can't afford to wait on climate change. I agree. That's why the ACES bill is bad news. It will take until at least 2012 to get up and running, whereas a carbon tax can be implemented within a year. Also, it will take 10 years to find out whether this convoluted scheme is working. At that point, if it isn't, it's too late. The best way to wean us off fossil fuels is to make alternative energy competitive with carbon-based sources. And the best way to do that is to tax carbon directly. Anne Applebaum made that point in her Washington Post column today:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/13/AR2009071302587.html

[henryscobie]

I sympathize with your concern for the global environment as I consider climate change to be a real and a daunting phenomenon. However, I respectfully disagree with your insistence on ACES as the proper approach to this massive problem. Firstly, ACES will have little to no affect on the global release of carbon emissions, this assertion is corroborated by the Administrator of the EPA, unfortunately we share the same atmosphere as China, India, Russia... Secondly, even if these reduction goals were emplaced it is very unlikely we would meet them, this has certainly been the case in other countries, such as England, and states, such as California, that have enacted cap and trade policy. Thirdly, now is not the right time for a cap and trade program, which will incentivize green energy merely by taxing carbon emitting energy sources thus driving up the costs of energy and manufacturing in the U.S.. I have read much of HR 2454 as well as several studies examining the economic ramifications of such legislation and it is abundantly clear to me that, though climate change is a very pressing issue, it is imperative that we get climate change legislation right. I would also like to point out that is the duty of the Senate to debate and discuss the pros and cons of such legislation. I recommend we let them do their job and not rush them into passing a bill loaded with compromises, concessions, and hand outs as the House did.