William Yeatman

In 2007, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Working Group One, apanel of experts established by the World Meteorological Organization and theUnited Nations Environment Programme, issued its Fourth Assessment Report.The Report included predictions of dramatic increases in average worldtemperatures over the next 92 years and serious harm resulting from the predictedtemperature increases. Using forecasting principles as our guide we asked: Arethese forecasts a good basis for developing public policy? Our answer is “no”.

US greenhouse gas emissions fell 1.5% in 2006, while the EU’s greenhouse gas emissions increased .8%.

Yesterday, I attended an informative briefing by an official at the Department of Energy, who demonstrated the futility of any approach to climate change mitigation that does not include the developing world.

According to DOE research, even if the developed world reduced emissions 100% by 2050, developing countries would have hold their emissions constant at 2007 levels in order to reduce global emissions by enough to stem global warming.

But don’t count on the developing world to lift a finger to fight global warming. I have already made that point elsewhere, and it was underscored again this week after officials from China, India and Brazil reiterated their countries’ opposition to any limits on greenhouse gas emissions.

Senator Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) is determined that the Environment and Public Works Committee, which she chairs, will mark up the Lieberman-Warner cap-and-trade bill on December 5, so that she will have something to crow about when she flies off to Bali the next day for the thirteenth Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.  There has been much jockeying over the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act (S. 2191) in the past couple weeks.

On one side environmental pressure groups and some big companies are supporting S. 2191.  Environmental Defense has begun running television ads featuring Governors Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-Calif.), Jon Huntsman, jnr. (R-Ut.), and Brian Schweitzer (D-Mont.) that urge Congress to vote for a cap-and-trade bill.  This $3 million campaign is seen as providing generic support for Lieberman-Warner.  On the other hand, Friends of the Earth Action, which has endorsed John Edwards for President, has run radio ads in Iowa calling on Senator Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) to either fix the bill or vote against it.  In Friends of the Earth’s view, the problem is that the bill gives away most of the emissions allocations or credits to “big polluters” rather than requiring them to buy the allocations they need at auction.

In response to this complaint, Boxer has convinced Senators Lieberman and Warner to make some changes in their bill before next week’s mark-up.  The new version changes the initial mix so that more allocations are auctioned from the beginning and speeds up the schedule for switching from free allocations to auctioned allocations. 

But some long-time cheerleaders for cap-and-trade in the business community are starting to have heartburn.  Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers complained that the bill unfairly penalizes electric utilities that rely on coal-fired power plants because it would require them to buy most of the allocations they need.  Electricity rates will skyrocket as a result.  But he re-iterated that he still supports mandatory reductions in greenhouse gas emissions of 80% by 2050.  A message from Earth to Mr. Rogers: if that’s what you support, then you’re going to have to tell your customers that this means that their electric bills are going to increase dramatically and steadily for decades.

The House and Senate Democratic leaders are reported to be close to a deal on one piece of an anti-energy package.  It would include a big increase in the alternative fuel standard for gasoline and a big increase in Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFÉ) standards for new vehicles.  Action on other parts of the House and Senate anti-energy bills, such as the tax increases on oil companies and the Renewable Portfolio Standard for electric utilities, would be put off until next year