11-24-09 by dugan
California doesn’t have many bright spots lately, what with a new $21 billion hole in its budget, more than 12% unemployment and a hapless state Legislature. But its prospects looked up today with a climate regulation proposal. It’s just a draft regulation, but because the underlying legislation (small PDF) is already in place the state is way ahead of Washington. Congress is drowning in lobbying money and corporate influence that may effectively–and stupidly for long-term economic health–kill effective reductions of U.S. global warming emissions.
There’s no doubt that Chamber of Commerce and oil industry critics will go nuts on the California Air Resources Board draft plan, which would cut emissions beginning in 2012 on not just utilities and big emitters, but the whole transportation sector. Jobs lost! Profits down! Icky utility increases! But those arguments are getting tired. Centrist economic thinker Thomas Friedman, in his NY Times column last week, made an airtight case that only green technology will save anyone’s economy and living standards in a world of growing population and powerful petro-dictators. It doesn’t really matter, he says, whether you believe in global warming.
From Friedman:
[E]ither the opponents of a serious energy/climate bill with a price
on carbon don’t care about our being addicted to oil and dependent on
petro-dictators forever or they really believe that we will not be
adding 2.5 billion more people who want to live like us, so the price
of oil won’t go up very far and, therefore, we shouldn’t raise taxes to
stimulate clean, renewable alternatives and energy efficiency.
Green
hawks believe otherwise. We believe that in a world getting warmer and
more crowded with more “Americans,” the next great global industry is
going to be E.T., or energy technology based on clean power and energy
efficiency. It has to be. And we believe that the country that invents
and deploys the most E.T. will enjoy the most economic security, energy
security, national security, innovative companies and global respect.
And we believe that country must be America. If not, our children will
never enjoy the standard of living we did. And we believe the best way
to launch E.T. is to set a fixed, long-term price on carbon — combine
it with the Obama team’s impressive stimulus for green-tech — and then
let the free market and innovation do the rest.
Coal, oil and friends are spending frantically to make the public believe anything else–that to save maybe $100 a year now in utility bill increases, we should all stop caring about where oil comes from or when (not if) economy-destroying $5.00 a gallon gasoline will be back, much less the current and future disruptions of climate change on our children’s and grandchildren’s lives.
Corporate money pouring into Congress has even baser aims–influence and intimidation. In the House, where a climate bill passed this year by a squeak, the 212 members who voted no got twice as much money from those opponents as 219 who voted yes, according to an analysis by OpenSecrets.org. The bill has stalled in the Senate, where opponents are pouring money at vulnerable members of the Senate Finance Committee, which will be the key committee on the economic portion of a climate change bill–as it has been on the health reform bill.
In the Senate, small-state and large-state Senators have equal power. The money given to a senator from Arkansas or North Dakota isn’t just to buy influence. It’s a reminder that the same money, and more, could go to a primary opponent if the senator doesn’t behave as the donor wishes.
From a recent story by Greenwire:
All told, those likely to be affected by climate and energy
legislation for the current election cycle have given nearly $390,000
to Democrats on the Finance Committee and nearly $251,000 to Republican
members, an E&E analysis of campaign contributions shows.
Chairman
Max Baucus (D-Mont.) has indicated the panel will likely rewrite and
vote on the portion of the climate bill that caps carbon emissions and
lets businesses buy and sell emissions permits. Any rewrite would
affect a broad cross-section of businesses now giving contributions.
…
Of all those on the Finance Committee, Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.)
has received the most money from companies and trade groups with an
interest in climate legislation in this campaign cycle. A third-term
senator who this summer became chairwoman of the Agriculture Committee,
Lincoln is one of five committee members up for re-election. A moderate
Democrat, she is also considered a key swing vote on the climate bill.
Some of the money to Lincoln has come from green industries like wind power, but it is a pittance compared to fossil-fuel bucks. And the direct contributions are nothing compared to the implied threat. If the Arkansas senator doesn’t toe the industry line, unlimited industry ads next year could say things like "Did you know that Sen. Lincoln voted to kill Arkansas jobs and raise your electricity bills?"
A ray of optimism comes from action like California’s. Another comes from groups like OpenSecrets and Maplight.org, which are making campaign and lobbying money ever more visible and traceable. The race is between public knowledge and corporate money. Right now the money is winning, but our knowledge tools are sharpening.