The European Commission is considering proposing a carbon dioxide tariff on imports from states failing to tackle greenhouse gas emissions, while also considering a toughening-up of the EU's own emission trading system.
According to a draft commission proposal, firms from heavily polluting countries outside Europe would be obliged to buy EU carbon emission permits as part of the bloc's Emission Trading Scheme (ETS), Reuters reports.
The former House Speaker’s latest book, "A Contract with the Earth" co-authored with Palm Beach Zoo CEO Terry Maple, is an appalling paean to environmental naivete and taxpayer-subsidized profiteering.
While the book’s theme — i.e., let’s all just happily pitch in and do what it takes to save the environment — may sound reasonable, at least on a superficial basis, Mr. Gingrich’s notions are often wrong or simply bizarre, and his prescriptions amount to little more than a full embrace of rent-seeking "green" business and left-leaning eco-activist groups, both of which often masquerade as "protectors" of the environment.
The stark headline appeared just over a year ago. "2007 to be 'warmest on record,' " BBC News reported on Jan. 4, 2007. Citing experts in the British government's Meteorological Office, the story announced that "the world is likely to experience the warmest year on record in 2007," surpassing the all-time high reached in 1998. But a funny thing happened on the way to the planetary hot flash: Much of the planet grew bitterly cold.
The state of Maryland, which is running a climate change study commission like many other states, is ready to implement laws restricting carbon dioxide emissions before its panel even finishes its work. The Maryland Commission on Climate Change released interim recommendations early last month, which include a call for emissions reductions even greater than those made by California last year. The state legislature is ready to go to work now on it, the Associated Press reports:
Several lawmakers say a proposal to cap carbon emissions — possibly the nation's toughest plan to reduce greenhouse gases — stands to become the most ambitious bill of the General Assembly session. The environment could be a main topic of debate because the state's looming budget problems were largely addressed in last fall's special session.
The carbon bill, endorsed by a task force set up by Gov. Martin O'Malley, would call for carbon reductions of 25 percent by 2020 and 90 percent by 2050. If approved, the goals would be the nation's strongest carbon-reduction plans.
The caps could headline a long list of environmental proposals.
No kidding. If the interim recommendations are taken seriously by the General Assembly like the carbon cap is, then the state is in for serious economy-busting measures, which include a public benefits fund (a tax on electricity); mandating a higher percentage of renewables in its electricity-generation sources; greater tax subsidies for greenhouse gas emission reduction and energy efficiency; and new transportation initiatives like higher fuel taxes and pay-as-you-drive insurance.
As I’ve written in the past for the John Locke Foundation’s Carolina Journal, this partial menu of options is the adopted brainchild of an advocacy group called the Center for Climate Strategies, who manage these commissions for several different states and give them all their ideas. The difference with Maryland, it seems, is that their lawmakers aren’t bothering to wait until the ink is dry on the commission’s recommendations.
H/T: Mr. Horner
Do polar bears, which have become the poster child for the potential ravages of future global warming, need special protection from Uncle Sam now?
Chris Tollefson of the Fish and Wildlife Service, the federal agency responsible for protecting wildlife and their habitats, said the agency's recommendation is due by Jan. 9.
Some journalists are so confident that we're already cooked by global warming that they're scolding ignorant Americans in advance for all the now-unpreventable doom that's coming our way. Newsweek's Sharon Begley rings in the new year by shaking her head at the Stupid, Soon to Be Overheated Majority and how we'll have to adapt to being cooked:
When Al Gore ran for U.S. senator from Tennessee he debated – repeatedly.
When he ran for president he once more debated frequently.
Why is it that as a recipient of the Nobel Prize for his theorizing about global warming Mr. Gore has refused repeated and prominently published challenges to debate this issue with scientists?
I’d like to wish you a happy New Year, but I’m afraid I have a different sort of prediction.
You’re in for very bad weather. In 2008, your television will bring you image after frightening image of natural havoc linked to global warming. You will be told that such bizarre weather must be a sign of dangerous climate change — and that these images are a mere preview of what’s in store unless we act quickly to cool the planet.
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