Lieberman Warner Climate Act Went Bye-Bye in Senate--Okay

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Posted June 9, 2008 with 83 reads

Keywords: cap and trade, carbon emissions, climate, legislation, renewables, solar power, Environmental Policy, Wind, Politics & Legislation

Cap it.

Don't trade carbon credits in order to pollute in your neighbor's backyard.

The Lieberman-Warner Climate Act was voted down in the Senate, which is fine by me. It was worded to favor polluters, who'd be able to buy credits in order to continue polluting.

We need caps on carbon.

We need taxes on carbon.

We need the money raised from a carbon tax to develop renewable energy.

We don't need an elaborate market scheme that won't work to lower carbon emissions and spur renewable energy innovation.

The Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) wrote a great press release about why cap and trade schemes don't work. They base their information on concrete examples from similar schemes that did not work in Southern California, Chicago and New Jersey.

Case in point:

In Southern California, South Coast Air Quality and Management District (SCAQMD) implemented a Regional Clean Air Incentive Market (RECLAIM) to reduce SOx and NOx, two "deadly" components of air pollution. 350 Southern California polluters were to comply and lower emissions through market incentives.

A nine year EPA review said they failed. They didn't come close to meeting reductions. They didn't spur innovation.

Let's not create an atmosphere for an environmental market disaster a'la Enron, and continue talking about an ineffectual cap and trade market scheme.

Before moving forward, let's learn from history and get on with solutions like big money for "Big Solar" as Dave Freeman would say in his award-winning book, Winning Our Energy Independence.

Read PEER's press release here.

Read about Canada's first carbon tax, and climate dividends to be used for energy efficiency and renewables here.

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Geoffrey Styles said:

Bringing a "pollution" mindset learned from decades of dealing with air quality issues to climate change is a serious mistake. It creates unhelpful barriers to dealing with a problem that is quite different from emissions of sulfates, nitrates, mercury, etc. A ton of CO2 emitted in Beijing has essentially the same impact on the climate as one emitted in Boston, and that opens up all sorts of avenues for reducing the cost of abatement. The cheaper emissions reductions are, the more of them we can afford, and the more effective our response will be.

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Wed, 2008-06-11 08:56 — Geoffrey Styles

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MarkLazen said:

Unfortunately, the choice is not between cap and trade and a carbon tax, but between cap and trade or nothing. If we can't pass cap and trade legislation, we're certainly not passing a far more politically radioactive option.

For reference, the PEER release Donna calls out is here.

At issue are the claims of a pair of EPA attorneys that effectiveness of cap and trade is vulnerable to poor verifications, inflated caps, and trading scams.

No doubt they are correct. But a carbon tax would be subject to similar loophole and enforcement challenges. So I really don't see any reason to celebrate our failure to enact cap and trade.

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Tue, 2008-06-10 09:17 — MarkLazen

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