WASHINGTON -- The perils of climate change
are attracting much attention these days, with a popular
award-winning documentary on the subject, a UN panel
emphasizing the dangers and widespread agreement among
scientists that global warming presents a potentially
catastrophic threat.
The concern has prompted a flurry
of legislative activity on Capitol Hill, with four major
bills, soon to be five, vying for support and votes, and some
measure appearing likely to pass. But it remains unclear how
strong it will be, how far lawmakers are willing to go in
restricting U.S. industry, and whether President Bush might
veto a bill.
The documentary "An Inconvenient Truth,"
spearheaded by former Vice President Al Gore, focused
attention more clearly on the issue, especially after it won
two Oscars last month, but it is not the only catalyst. In the
last month, a United Nations-sponsored Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change released a study determining that the
world's temperature is rising and declaring with 90 percent
certainty that human activity is the cause.
Nearly a
dozen energy companies have joined with leading environmental
groups to form the United States Climate Action Partnership
and have begun lobbying the federal government to institute
strict standards for emissions reduction.
Meanwhile, in
the absence of binding national standards, many states, on
their own or in regional consortia, have adopted laws to
regulate emissions. Individual cities have even imposed
regulations.
"Things are moving right now at an
incredibly quick pace," said Antonia Herzog, a scientist with
the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental
advocacy group. "I think the people in Congress who matter
accept that global warming is a fact and are now trying to
figure out how to address it in a responsible
manner."
However, turning that political potential into
a nationwide law may take time, despite pledges from Senate
leaders to address the issue and promises from House Speaker
Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to bring a bill up for a vote on the
House floor by the summer. Although U.S. industry is
increasingly on board, there are competing proposals for how
to tackle the problem.
"It's going to be very
complicated, with a huge amount of political infighting," said
Myron Ebell, director of energy and global warming policy at
the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a conservative think
tank which opposes legislative efforts to combat global
warming. "We think we have a very good opportunity to stymie
everything so that nothing will
emerge."
Building consensus
Although
interest in global warming is increasing, enacting emissions
controls has proved a sluggish enterprise at best; there has
not been a new, overarching law on the subject since the Clean
Air Act of 1990. Today the challenge is building consensus in
a Congress with global warming naysayers.
There appears
to be at least a basis for dialogue, however, as all the bills
propose a "declining cap-and-trade" system. Under that
approach, an overall emissions limit would be established for
a subset of polluters. Companies could then engage in trade,
that is--bidding, buying or selling permits--so each could
continue to operate profitably while the overall level of
pollutants would go down. Over time, as the cap is lowered,
permits would decrease in value or be removed from
circulation.
"People are coalescing around that as the
broad approach, though there are differences on the
particulars," said Eileen Claussen, president of the Pew
Center on Global Climate Change. "There's some sense in the
business community and in Congress that this is a
tried-and-true approach."
It's a tack that was used
successfully to limit acid rain-causing emissions under the
Clean Air Act.
"When given a clear goal and an
opportunity for markets to develop the technology to meet the
goal, we've always met them," said Mark MacLeod, special
projects director for Environmental Defense, an advocacy
group. "There's no reason to expect we couldn't achieve the
goal this time."
Goals different
The
goals, however, differ from proposal to proposal. A bill
offered by Sens. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and Bernie Sanders
(I-Vt.) would aggressively reduce emissions to 80 percent of
1990 levels by 2050. At the other end of the spectrum, an
as-yet-unintroduced plan from Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) ties
emissions reduction to gross domestic product and does not
guarantee any reduction in emissions.
Because it's
unlikely that any one bill will make it through unchanged,
most observers are not expressly advocating any single
approach.
There is much more than just an emissions cap
to discuss, as each bill also brings its own priorities for
research. A proposal by Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Joseph
Lieberman (D-Conn.) includes controversial provisions for
advancing nuclear technologies, while one from Sens. John
Kerry (D-Mass.) and Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) focuses on small
businesses. Several reward firms for taking early action to
curb emissions.
Some also see this as an opportunity to
change the nation's energy habits more broadly.
"If we
begin to tap not just energy efficiency, but solar power, wind
energy, biofuels . . . we can make huge changes to cleaning up
the environment, and in the process create millions of
high-paying jobs," Sanders said.
