Representatives of 193 nations are about to conclude
climate talks in Copenhagen. A new report has found
that an overall warming trend is continuing. Another
study suggests that the steps needed to slow that climb, or reverse it,
will cost trillions of dollars. The U.S. has said it will cut emissions by 17
percent from 2005 levels by 2020 and has promised to help raise $100 billion to
help poor countries make the transition to fewer emissions. China has said it
would cut its "carbon intensity," or the amount of emissions in relation
to production, by 40 to 45 percent, but has made it clear that a greater
percent is not negotiable. The European Union said December 17th that it will
not raise its 20 percent cuts to 30 percent, as it has offered, unless it sees
more ambitious actions from other countries, especially China. (AP)
Obama Heads to Copenhagen, Even
Non-Binding Deal In Question
Obama
will be on hand for the final day of the two-week, 193-nation U.N. climate
conference. But U.S.-China acrimony, a bitter divide between rich and poor
nations and dissatisfaction with the U.S. emissions-reduction pledge clouded
prospects for any agreement. Schedules for foreign trips and international
leader gatherings are usually set in advance in excruciating detail. Agreements
are almost always inked ahead of time, with all but the signatures filled in. Not
so for this trip …
Thursday's offer from the U.S. to help raise $100 billion a
year starting in 2020 to get poorer nations started on converting to clean
energy and recovering from climate damage offered some hope. China responded by
going some way to meet a firm U.S. demand that Beijing and other developing
economies make cuts in emissions growth that are open to international
verification. There has been much hope in Copenhagen that Obama would arrive
with a new proposal and salvage the talks. That's not likely … Any agreement is
expected, at best, to envision emissions-cutting targets for rich nations and
billions in help for poor countries, but to fall well short of the goal of a
legally binding pact … "Coming back with an empty agreement would be far
worse than coming back empty-handed," said Robert Gibbs, Mr. Obama's press
secretary.
Congress & The Obama Administration
Senators Kerry, Graham,
and Lieberman Unveil New Climate Bill
A new bipartisan climate bill
combines caps on greenhouse-gas levels with new offshore oil-and-gas
exploration and nuclear power plant incentives. Offered by Sens. John Kerry
(D., Mass.), Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.), and Joe Lieberman (I., Conn.),
President Obama called it a "positive development,” but it's still unclear
whether the proposal will win over Democrats from heartland states and
Republicans opposed to adopting caps on U.S. carbon emissions. Meanwhile, another
bill offering a “cap and dividend” solution instead of cap and trade is
being pushed by Senators Maria Cantwell (D-WA) and Susan Collins (R-ME).
The EPA announced Monday that
it has formally determined that greenhouse gases pose a danger to human health
and the environment. The so-called endangerment finding permits the Obama
Administration to regulate emissions through agency rule-making procedures if
Congress fails to enact climate legislation.
Hoping to jump-start his
plans for job growth, President Barack Obama is pushing Congress to pass
incentives for homeowners who retrofit their homes to make them more
energy-efficient. Last week, he advanced a new spending plan that would provide
tax breaks for energy-efficient retrofits in homes and, thereby, put some
people back to work. This would be separate from the climate and energy bill
expected to be debated next year.
How the Recover Act Supports a Clean Energy Economy
The White House has released
a memo that VP Biden presented to the president outlining ways that $80 billion
in direct funding from the Administration’s $787 billion Recovery Act funding
is making progress for toward a cleaner, more energy efficient economy. The
report details ways that stimulus funds have been used toward advances in
renewable energy, energy grid modernization, home energy efficiency projects
and green automobiles:
• Renewable Energy: The U.S. is
on-track to double renewable energy generation, including solar, wind and
geothermal, and double renewable manufacturing capacity in just three years
because of Recovery Act investments.
• Vehicles and Fuels of the Future:
Over the next six years, three new electric vehicles plants—the first ever in
the U.S.—and 30 new battery plants will be fully operational because of the
Administration’s $16 billion investment in plug-in hybrids, all-electric
vehicles and the infrastructure needed to power them, as well as new clean
fuels. When President Obama took office there were just 2 advanced battery and
electric drive component factories in the U.S.
• Grid Modernization: Twenty-six
million smart meters will be installed in U.S. homes by 2013 – more than triple
the number currently in service – as a result of the Administration’s $4
billion Recovery Act investment in a smart energy grid and the one-to-one match
in private sector funding. This technology allows consumers to monitor and
regulate their own energy usage and costs.
• Energy Efficiency: Because the
Administration is making the largest single investment in home energy
efficiency in U.S history through the Recovery Act and other initiatives,
nearly one million home energy efficiency retrofits will have happened by 2012.
• Carbon Capture: Because of Recovery
Act funding and existing loan guarantee authority, there will be 5 commercial
scale power plants operating with large carbon capture sequestration facilities
by 2015. When President Obama took office, there were zero.
• Science and Innovation: Through the
Recovery Act, the Administration is investing $400 million in some of the most
advanced research in wind, solar, and geothermal technologies through the
ARPA-E program to make these clean sources of energy more affordable and easier
to store and transport. A year ago, this critical program was unfunded.
Speaker Pelosi Story on Getting House Climate
Legislation Passed Last June
Time
Magazine, Dec 16, 2009 (Runner Up for “Person of the Year”)
Nancy Pelosi and her army of
whips had counted the votes and counted them again. [I]n the middle of a
recession, the Waxman-Markey climate & energy law that Republicans were
calling a job killer seemed too much to ask of her stressed-out caucus last
summer, especially after Democrats had already put their necks on the line to
bail out Wall Street and the auto industry and to pass a $787 billion
economic-stimulus package, and when they were looking ahead to a massive
overhaul of the health care system. But Pelosi was undaunted.
To win Rust Belt lawmakers,
Energy and Commerce Committee chairman Henry Waxman had whittled down the
bill's targets for reducing global warming and switching to renewable fuels.
But that was just the beginning of the dealmaking. He and Pelosi doled out
billions of dollars in pollution allowances to utilities, industry and
agriculture. One freshman Congressman from Florida demanded — and got — a
promise of a $50 million hurricane-research center in his district. For others,
there was money to train low-income workers for green jobs and to make public
housing more energy-efficient. Though some in the White House had misgivings
about the wisdom of pushing ahead, Obama worked the phones and even pulled
wavering lawmakers aside during a June 25 luau-themed picnic on the South Lawn.
The suspense went nearly down
to the wire, but when the gavel fell at 7:17 p.m. on June 26, Pelosi had won by
one vote. She recalled that moment in a recent interview, barely able to get
out the words as she battled a sore throat and nursed a cup of hot water, lemon
and honey through a straw. "I never thought for one minute that we
wouldn't win," she said in a raspy whisper. "Never." It can be
foolish — maybe even dangerous — to underestimate Nancy Pelosi.
Opinion Pieces
Will Big Business Save the Earth?
Jared
Diamond (Author of Guns, Germs, & Steel), NY
Times, Dec 5, 2009
There is a widespread view,
particularly among environmentalists and liberals, that big businesses are
environmentally destructive, greedy, evil and driven by short-term profits.I
have more nuanced feelings. The embrace of environmental concerns by chief
executives has accelerated recently for several reasons. Lower consumption of
environmental resources saves money in the short run. Maintaining sustainable
resource levels and not polluting saves money in the long run. So why do policy
changes face resistance from some businesses and many politicians?
I’m for doing the Cheney-thing
on climate — preparing for 1 percent. In the face of concerns that a Pakistani
scientist was offering nuclear-weapons expertise to Al Qaeda, reportedly
declared: “If there’s
a 1% chance that Pakistani scientists are helping Al Qaeda build or develop a
nuclear weapon, we have to treat it as... a certainty in terms of our response.”
Cheney contended that the U.S. had to confront a very
new type of threat: a “low-probability, high-impact event.” Many of the same
people who defend Mr. Cheney’s One Percent Doctrine on nukes tell us not to
worry at all about catastrophic global warming,
where the odds are, in fact, a lot higher than 1 percent.
Most
people would assume that 20 years from now when historians look back at
2008-09, they will conclude that the most important thing to happen in this
period was the Great Recession. I’d hold off on that. If we can continue
stumbling out of this economic crisis, I believe future historians may well
conclude that the most important thing to happen in the last 18 months was that
Red China decided to become Green China … China will continue to grow with
cheap, dirty coal, to arrest over-eager environmentalists and to strip African
forests for wood and minerals. Have no doubt about that. But have no doubt
either that, without declaring it, China is embarking on a new, parallel path
of clean power deployment and innovation. It is the Sputnik of our day. We
ignore it at our peril.
"Falling Behind on Green Tech" Jeff Immelt & John DoerrWashington Post August 3, 2009 America confronts three interrelated
crises: an economic crisis, a climate crisis and an energy security crisis. We
believe there's a fourth: a competitiveness crisis. This crisis is particularly
evident in America's worldwide standing in the next great global industry,
green technology.
Study: Clean Energy & Climate Policy for Growth & Job Creation
A robust climate bill could
boost the U.S. economy by about $111 billion by 2020 and create as many as 1.9
million jobs here at home. Their findings run contrary to claims made by
opponents of climate legislation in the U.S. Senate. Issued in late October 2009,
the study offers a state-by-state look at the economic implications posed by
comprehensive federal climate policy. The study's key findings are:
·All
50 states can gain economically from strong federal energy and climate policy,
despite the diversity of their economies and energy mixes.
·Contrary
to what is commonly assumed, comprehensive national climate policy does not
benefit the coasts at the expense of the heartland states.
·The
country as a whole can gain 918,000 to 1.9 million jobs, and household income
can grow by $488 to $1,176, by 2020 under comprehensive energy and climate
policy.
Flying Tigers: More Reasons to Worry About Asia’s
Clean Tech Push
The U.S. hasn’t actually
fallen too far behind yet. It’s the future that a new report is worried about.
Specifically, the next five years, when China, Japan, and South Korea are
expected to spend about $500 billion to directly promote clean-technology
development and depolyment, compared with about $170 billion in the U.S. ...
China is the dragon in the room. The country’s top-down policies to promote not
just clean energy but a clean-energy industry threaten to become a steamroller.
Happily, As Playing
Field Widens More Moderate U.S. Senators Speaking Out
Charting the way to 60 votes
in the U.S. Senate won’t be easy, but a sense of optimism is not
unjustified. Consider the developments among some skeptical senators from
both parties:
a)
Republican Senators Lindsey Graham (SC) & Lisa Murkowski (AK) as well as
Indpendent Democrat Joe Lieberman (CT) have opened critical bipartisan doors;
b)
Moderate and Rust Belt Senators Stabenow (MI), Baucus (MT), Begich (AK), Brown
(OH), Harkin (IA), and Klobuchar (MN) co-sponsored legislation that would
establish a domestic “offsets” program to address the interests of the
agricultural community;
c)
Senator Baucus (MT) – in spite of all the current demands of the health care
bill – has scheduled a Senate Finance Committee hearing on job implications of
global warming legislation;
e)
Even Senator Conrad (ND) was heard to say after the EPW vote: “It’s not the end
of the process. It’s just the beginning. So there’s lots of time & lots of
opportunity for everybody to engage.”
Stimulus Funds Speed Transformation Toward Smart Grid Wall Street Journal Sept 28, 2009
North American utilities are expected to spend $10.75 billion on computer
hardware, software and services related to the smart grid this year, up from
$7.56 billion in 2008 ...The smart-grid market "may be bigger than the
whole Internet," said John Chambers, CEO of networking giant Cisco. "Legislation's Benefits Far Outweigh Costs, New Study Finds" Wall
Street Journal Sept 8, 2009 As flawed as it may be, the US House
climate bill passed in June makes economic sense, offering benefits worth at
least twice as much as it costs, if not more. The NYU Law School’s Institute
for Policy Integrity, an outfit basically created to bring cost-benefit
analysis back to the environmental arena, states: "From almost any
perspective and under almost any assumption, H.R. 2454 is a good investment for
the United States to make in our own economic future and in the future of the
planet.” It’s a pretty simple job to tally up the potential benefits: the bill
provides $2.27 in benefits for every dollar spent. "Firms
Start to See Climate Change as Barrier to Profit" Washington Post Sept 2, 2009 "If we don't move now, it just
becomes more expensive, more complicated and a bigger risk," said Brad
Figel, director of government affairs at Nike ... [Many S&P500 companies]
see global warming as a threat to their bottom lines ... citing concerns
including a potential shortage of raw materials and supply-chain disruptions
because of severe weather. "China Racing Ahead of U.S. in the Drive to Go
Solar" NYTimes Aug 24, 2009 China has stepped on the gas in an
effort to become the dominant player in green energy -
especially in solar power, and even in the United States. "Green Power Takes Root in
China" NYTimes July 2, 2009
While the House of Representatives approved a requirement
that American utilities generate more of their power from renewable sources of
energy, and the Senate will consider similar proposals, China
imposed such a requirement almost two years ago.This year China
is on track to pass the United States as the world’s largest market for wind
turbines — after doubling wind power capacity in each of the last four years.
"We will pay to reduce greenhouse gas emissions today, or we will pay the price later in military terms. And that will involve human lives."
General Anthony Zinni on Operation Free's website
ACES Act Clean Tech Business Coalition
Pass an American Clean Energy & Security Act Now!
---
The
ACES Act Coalition exists solely to add many business voices to the
public debate on energy & climate debate many times. We coordinate
closely with
allies all over the United States including www.WeCanLead.org and
www.EfficiencyFirst.org
