Climate Change

How The Climate Change Bill Can Help Save 4 Million Jobs

Isaiah J. Poole — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 07:54:32 -0700

Taken out of context, this argument sounds almost like a right-wing or corporatist knock against the climate change bill that's pending in the Senate: The bill that was introduced this week by Sens. John Kerry and Barbara Boxer could put at risk 4 million American jobs unless it's amended to help American manufacturers.

But it's anything but. Here's why.

As Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Leo Gerard of the United Steelworkers explained in a conference call with reporters Thursday, it doesn't matter how good climate change legislation is in the United States if corporations can get out from under it by moving production to other countries that don't have the same regulations. In fact, we could end up making the greenhouse gas problem worse.

The solution is to extend the principle of imposing a price on pollution that's at the heart of the climate change legislation to imports whose production results in high carbon pollution.

That's the idea behind the "border adjustment mechanism" that Brown is trying to get written into the climate change legislation with the support of several other Midwest senators. The basic idea, as Brown explained it, is to impose a tax on the pollution produced by the imported item that parallels the tax imposed on domestically produced goods that cause pollution. The effect would be that in order for imported goods to be competitive in the American market, they would have to employ green manufacturing processes.

According to a report released Thursday by the Economic Policy Institute:

If the United States develops climate change policies that only apply to domestic companies without regard for their effects on trade, two outcomes are likely. Production of energy-intensive manufactured goods, especially price-sensitive manufactured products that already face high levels of import competition, could rapidly be outsourced to countries like China and India that do not restrict GHG emissions. This could lead to loss of jobs in manufacturing and related industries, and to a growing trade deficit.

Worse yet, increased production of energy-intensive goods such as iron and steel, pulp and paper, basic chemicals, and glass products in developing countries would be likely to increase net global GHG emissions.

That's already happening in the steel industry. Steel production outsourced to China produces twice the volume of greenhouse gas emissions—2.5 tons per ton of steel produced—than does steel produced in the United States, according to the American Iron and Steel Institute. China's failure to comply with the same environmental rules that American manufacturers do, and not labor costs as it is often believed, is a key reason Chinese suppliers can undercut American producers on price.

Gerard said that a climate change bill without border adjustment protections would not do the greatest harm to Rust Belt states but to states like California and Texas, based on EPI's findings. Those are the two states that have the highest dependence on the industries that would be most directly affected by climate change legislation.

"A border adjustment mechanism and allowances are by no means protectionism," said Scott Paul, director of the Alliance for American Manufacturing. "They are permitted by World Trade Organization rules. The Nobel laureate Paul Krugman, who is one of the fathers of modern free trade theories, recognizes that border adjustment is the most effective way to have a global solution on this."

He added that in order to get a meaningful global agreement at the climate change summit in Copenhagen in December, "we need to have all sorts of tools in our toolbox." One of those tools, Brown agrees, is technical assistance to other countries to help them meet pollution-lowering goals.

While the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee prepares for hearings on the climate change legislation, the Alliance for American Manufacturing on Monday will host in Philadelphia a "Keep it Made in America" town hall meeting with Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., who is one of the supporters of a border adjustment provision.

The usual coalition of businesses and conservative ideologues will be fighting this with doomsday scenarios of protectionism, but blue-collar workers have lost too much already as a result of the policies borne out of the Chamber of Commerce-Heritage Foundation axis to reject the simple, elegant argument of a level and fair playing field.

Climate Change Legislation Must Stimulate Demand, Be Tough On Pollution

Natasha Chart — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 04:42:26 -0700

Consider these three worrying things: First, there's some risk that putting the wrong type of price signal solely on domestic pollution may transfer both jobs and pollution overseas, while increasing pollution. Second, that prices put on imports, like a recent tariff on imported solar panels, may not withstand the various political pressures brought to bear against it. Third, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) proved to have been too optimistic, because climate change is happening much faster than they first thought it would.

Can these problems be solved together? They must.

Preserving Manufacturing

When looking at the state-by-state data for yesterday's post on popular support for the public option, I started off using 2005 census data, but soon found the 2008 data instead. While going through and changing the numbers, which mostly shifted up by some small amount, Michigan's figures were startling just in those three years. But it gets worse.

Between 2001 and 2009, Michigan lost 465,000 residents. It gets worse. The outmigration consists mostly of younger, more educated workers, leaving collapsed home values and eroding the local tax base for essential services and infrastructure maintenance.

Not coincidentally, from 2000 to 2006, Michigan lost 336,000 jobs, mostly in manufacturing. Between 2006 and 2008, the state lost another 74,000 manufacturing jobs. Early this year, Gov. Granholm reported that one in ten residents was unemployed, while talking about retraining efforts the state had implemented to reduce reliance on the auto industry.

If the US continues losing manufacturing jobs, Michigan will have a lot more company in misery.

Nonetheless, international trade agreements and the status of upcoming climate negotiations make it very thorny to implement tariffs. Stiff opposition to trade barriers used to be the bane of developing nations who wanted to protect nascent, homegrown industries from competition with mature manufacturing economies. The same opposition to trade protections the United States and others embedded into the fabric of groups like the World Trade Organization can easily come back to bite us.

Reaping Renewable Jobs

As workers and investors look for new opportunities in the shifting global marketplace, renewable energy seems like an increasingly better choice. Though as Deutsche Bank analysts warn, if the US doesn't have a strong energy policy, investment capital will go elsewhere.

A decent case scenario for solar manufacturing in the US is probably for enough of a tariff to stand to encourage Chinese companies to bring final stage manufacture to the US. A better case would be winning a dumping dispute against China. Yet in a recent reaction to US charges that China was dumping tires in the US, China brought dumping charges against US chicken and auto parts industries. If it works, they'll probably go that route again, and our trade interdependence can make them hard to argue with.

The risk is that any US domestic industry that wants the government to hold back Chinese competition could trigger retaliation against another industry, possibly pitting US industries against each other.

For example, China also has a lock on many of the rare earth minerals, over 90 percent of the available supply of some, used to make wind turbines and many other devices essential to a high-tech green reformation. They've lately been tightening exports. Long-term, the wind industry and the jobs it creates isn't just vulnerable to pressure from China, it's dependent upon them.

For those seeking less conflict, the Deutsche Bank analysis did point to another type of support long provided to the domestic renewable energy sector in Germany, several other European countries, India and a few states here in the US: the feed-in tariff.

Feed-in tariffs establish a base price for renewable energy generation that's paid for across the system, guaranteeing that homeowners and commercial power utilities using less-polluting technologies can sell into the grid.

The local demand support and reliable cash flow makes all sorts of renewable energy attractive, like solar photovoltaic in Germany, a country not known for its abundance of sunny weather. As the Deutsche Bank report pointed out, Germany's seven years of feed-in tariffs created 300,000 jobs, without running afoul of the international community.

Demand support works on another problem, too, the limited availability of clean energy technologies. Last year. demand for PV panels so outstripped supply that customers missed a tax credit window. (If a business misses a tax credit window, I think it can safely be assumed that the situation is serious.) If the global supply chain can't meet the current needs for renewable energy technologies, a steady uptick in demand provided by strong federal energy policy is likely to create a larger window of opportunity for American manufacturers to step through.

And there are a great many other renewable energy technologies, from geothermal to solar thermal, to solar water heating. Congress already showed a willingness to support demand for many of them in the stimulus bill, where business and individual tax credits for renewables were expanded for 2009. Hopefully they can be nudged a few more steps in that direction.

From manufacture to installation and servicing, each of these technologies holds out a chance for a variety of dignified jobs in industries that the recently released Senate climate legislation will already require to pay prevailing wages.

Climate Deadline

The 2007 IPCC report wasn't able to include papers like this 2007 report, showing that the American southwest was on the edge of entering a permanent drought, because the studies came in after their deadline. In the subsequent two years, some environmental indicators, like ice that's melting 30 years ahead of IPCC projections, has shown the IPCC to have been much too optimistic.

Scientists think we may have already locked in a dangerous degree of warming but there are still some hopes remaining if we act quickly.

One thing the US almost certainly can't for is every other nation on earth agreeing to help us solve this problem in a way satisfactory to us. The ensuing standoff could last, has lasted, far too long. Not only will it prevent our using this period of calm before the storm to grow and attract new industries, it may mean we can't even act in time to mitigate the damage that will be caused by worsening droughts and increasingly unpredictable, violent weather events.

Now is the time to address the climate crisis.

So while I admire Sen. Sherrod Brown's commitment to preserving manufacturing jobs, I hope he'll bring all his creativity to bear on helping Senate colleagues open up new avenues of demand for our nation's talented workers, ones that still allow us to move forward in meeting the challenge of preserving our species' global habitat. We'll only meet that challenge if a large portion of the US' labor pool is working hard at fixing it.

Congress Connecting the Dots? Climate Change is a Security Threat

Armand Biroonak — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 04:36:38 -0700

Recently reported in the New York Times, Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) hopes to win Senate support for climate change legislation by linking global warming with national security. Long time hawk and former Sen. John Warner (R-VA) has also caught on to the idea, testifying on the Hill even, proving it a possible strategy to sway more hawkish conservative Republicans and Democrats to support the Waxman-Markey bill in September.

Military experts understand the threats associated with climate change. A number of reports published from the National Intelligence Assessment and the Defense Department have warned of the possible geo-political strife –caused by events like natural disasters and mass migration –that will likely strain and overwhelm our military’s capabilities to respond, assist and maintain stability.

Recent findings by the Center for Naval Analyses –that includes top retired military officials –brings the problem closer to home by demonstrating the connection between energy, security, economics and climate change.

In summary the report warns:

• U.S. dependence on oil weakens international
leverage, undermines foreign policy objectives,
and entangles America with unstable or
hostile regimes.

• Inefficient use and overreliance on oil burdens
the military, undermines combat effectiveness,
and exacts a huge price tag—in dollars
and lives.

• U.S. dependence on fossil fuels undermines
economic stability, which is critical to national
security.

• A fragile domestic electricity grid makes our
domestic military installations, and their critical
infrastructure, unnecessarily vulnerable to
incident, whether deliberate or accidental.

Most important to national security, America must end its dependency on oil. Beyond concerns of the continued burning of fossil fuels that contribute to the greenhouse effect, America’s energy security is a cause for alarm. The U.S. relies upon foreign oil to meet energy needs. Right now nearly 60 percent of our oil is imported, placing the U.S. in an extremely vulnerable position—we are at the mercy of the world markets.

Secondly, oil reserves are dwindling with greater global demand. The U.S. holds just over 2 percent of the world’s total oil reserves. The solution? Renewable energy can place us on the path to energy independence and security.

Source: BP's 2009 Statistical Review of World Energy

The catastrophic effects of global warming place the U.S. at definite risk. Not even the strongest military in the world will be able to handle the pressures induced by what UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon states “is the greatest collective challenge we face.” This is why Congress must pass cap-and-trade legislation in September to begin to tackle climate change; but surely many in the Senate will stand in the way. Reframing the argument with a national security bent may be the last chance for opponents to warm in support of cap-and-trade or it's toast.

Harry Alford's Condescension

Isaiah J. Poole — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 11:49:08 -0700

The right-wing blogosphere is abuzz over the supposed smackdown between Sen. Barbara Boxer and Harry C. Alford, who portrays himself as an "African American and a veteran" who is insulted at Boxer's alleged racism and calls her on it.

Well, as an African American I don't know what the hell Alford was upset about — other than the fact that Alford was shown that his shilling for the right is not appreciated in much of the community he claims to represent.

Alford is the president of the National Black Chamber of Commerce, an outfit he and his wife, Kay Debow Alford, run out of a small office in Washington. The Chamber took in about $880,000 in 2006, according to the most recent publicly available Form 990 filed with the IRS, most from membership dues and a $90,000 grant from AT&T (which may have something to do with Alford's opposition to "net neutrality," the idea that broadband providers such as AT&T should not have to right to limit what content people can receive via the Internet).

But what was at the core of Alford's outburst was the reason he was on Capitol Hill testifying before Boxer's Environment and Public Works committee to begin with: to oppose climate change legislation.

Alford's organization had already joined forces with carbon-based fuel interests and conservatives to torpedo the Waxman-Markey climate change bill in the House. It released a study in May from CRA International that asserted that by 2030 Waxman-Markey would cost the economy $350 billion in lost gross domestic product and 2.5 million jobs. The National Resources Defense Council has a detailed dissection of the study's flaws and the disclosure that the NBCC has received $275,000 from ExxonMobil.

In fact, Greenpeace has a page of global-warming-denial comments that Alford has made over the years, which is why ExxonMobil has been so generous with its funding of this relatively obscure organization.

Alford is also an ardent opponent of the Employee Free Choice Act—no surprise, since he also sits on the board of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a leading EFCA opponent. He's been claiming that EFCA would harm African-American-owned businesses. His April op-ed for Roll Call on the issue of enabling workers to form unions is an example of how he is willing to use race to push an anti-labor agenda:

The Employee Free Choice Act would eliminate one of the most fundamental tenets of our democracy: the secret ballot. By eliminating the right to vote in private, workers would not only be deprived of the right to vote their conscience, but would also be more vulnerable to the intimidation and coercion tactics known to be used by
union organizers. ... African-Americans, in particular, have bitter memories of voter intimidation and have a responsibility to stand up against any proposition that will take away their democratic voting rights.

For a man who compares seeking to organize a union through a person-to-person card-check drive to the efforts of Southern segregationists to violently suppress the black vote, a complaint that Boxer citing a resolution by the NAACP on climate change in a climate change hearing is somehow "racial" and something that would "explode" is certainly audacious. Condescending, though, is more apt.

So let's be clear: Harry Alford does not speak for the African-American community. He does not speak for me. He speaks for a cabal of conservative obstructionists who are hell-bent on protecting the old order of oil companies being unaccountable to the environment, employers being unaccountable to their workers—and of African Americans who won't pimp for the interests of corporate America being kept in their place.

Don't Believe the Doomsayers

Isaiah J. Poole — Sun, 31 May 2009 20:03:27 -0700

America Needs a 12-Step Program

Kari Fulton — Wed, 20 May 2009 09:18:02 -0700

It is a Monday morning in Washington, D.C. and the children of River Terrace Elementary are walking past carry-outs, liquor stores, traffic, and plumes of smoke from the Benning Road Peaking Power Plant dancing in the sky. The dance ends with a sprinkle of pellets of chemical warfare falling onto the community below. Scientists at the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry call it "particulate matter" and it has been linked to the area's high rates of asthma, bronchitis and cancer .

A few states away, at Marsh Fork Elementary in West Virginia, little children are also filing into class, smack dab in the middle of coal country. Sludge fills their drinking water, so they are told not to drink it. Sometimes they cannot even go out to play, because the cracks in the playground are oozing out toxic coal sludge. Why?

Why are these children and so many more people around the world suffering from cancer, disease, chemical warfare, increased violence and economic instability? All for the sake of fossil fuels. Brittanica Encyclopedia defines fossil fuels as, "any of a class of materials of biologic origin occurring within the Earth's crust that can be used as a source of energy. Fossil fuels include coal, petroleum, and natural gas. They all contain carbon, and were formed as a result of geologic processes acting on the remains of (mostly) plants and animals that lived and died hundreds of millions of years ago." This ancient source supplies 90 percent of all the energy used by industrially developed nations. It turns on our lights, heats our stoves, fuels our cars.

The Politics of Energy: How Much Capping And Trading?

In the days leading up to the America's Future NOW! conference starting June 1, we're hosting an online dialogue featuring conference speakers on the key issues they will be addressing during the conference. Join the conversation by clicking the "Discuss" link below or contribute your own post.

For almost a century, scientists have been developing technology to make us less reliant on fossil fuels. In 1910, American Engineer Frank Schuman built one of the first practical industrial scale solar plant, at Meadi, Egypt. Schuman proclaimed enthusiastically, "Sun power is now a fact and no longer in the 'beautiful possibility' stage... It will have a history like aerial navigation. Up to twelve years ago it was a mere possibility and no one took it seriously."

Unfortunately Schuman's innovative technology and his solar powered predecessors have been placed on the back burner, as world economies lean toward less expensive, but more dangerous fossil fuel. This dependence on fossil fuels has become a monkey on our back that we cannot seem to shake. Almost 100 years later, we are still facing the threats of oil shortages and struggling with an addiction to this dangerous, life threatening commodity. But why?

Why. Because the fossil fuel industry is so addicted to the profits from controlling the masses with oil and coal, that they even have the audacity to call it "clean".

Please, don't believe the hype. Ain't no such thing as clean coal. Ask the parents of the children at Marsh Fork Elementary, who live in the Appalachian mountains, and work in the coal mines blowing up mountaintops to gather up coal.

Thedirtylie.com, found that in the past twenty years, "mountaintop removal has obliterated an estimated 470 mountains in Appalachia, crushing 1 million acres of the world’s most productive and diverse temperate hardwood forests and smothering 1,200 miles of streams. At the current pace, the coal industry will have decimated a piece of Appalachia the size of Delaware - more than 1.4 million acres — by the end of the next decade."

The falling rock from mountaintop removal tumbles and hits the homes of the Appalachian people below. With one stroke, seven, nine, ten generations of memory falls to pieces. The rock breaks the homes, but the work breaks the soul.

In Nigeria, the quest and acquisition of fossil fuels has also lead to oil related violence. A 2004 Fact Finding Report by the Human Rights Watch, “Rivers and Blood: Guns, Oil and Power in Nigeria’s Rivers State,” found companies like Shell have taken over indigenous land and partnered with corrupt politicians to maintain control over oil markets and Nigeria's government. Since late 2003, the running fight for control of these villages and towns has resulted in the deaths of dozens of local people and forced tens of thousands to flee their homes. Schools and businesses have closed. Homes and property worth millions of dollars has been destroyed. Hundreds of mostly young male fighters have also been killed. The violence has created a profound climate of fear and insecurity in Rivers State, leaving local people reluctant to return to their homes or to seek justice for the crimes committed. Although it is dangerous, the people work in the mines because that is all they know. They are now addicted too, but crying for a twelve step program.

Please America, check-in to rehab from fossil fuels. Please America, go into rehab for our souls. We are watching the earth die, not realizing that the same things that are killing our planet are the same thing that are killing us too.Greenhouse gases are the number one cause for climate change around the world. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that over half of the greenhouse gas emissions from United States come from power plants like the Benning Road Peaking Plant, in the River Terrace Community, in Washington, DC. Another third comes from transportation and the exhaust that comes from automobiles fueled with oil from oil refineries like the ones in Nigeria's River State. As one of the world's largest emitters of greenhouse gas emissions, our energy usage is causing the world to heat up with vengeance.

This addiction is worse than any drug, and runss so deep that most of us don't even realize we are fiends; from petrolatum jelly vaseline to cars that run on gasoline, to month after month of making ends meet to pay a light bill, or heating bill — while Mother Earth continues to be pimped for our comfort and satisfaction.

But can you really blame the people when you have fossil fueled fiends running our markets and our country? They introduced us to the good stuff and said we had to have it to succeed; to run that red-hot corvette and thaa private jet is what will really make you feel free. Unfortunately, this type of "freedom" doesn't come to many. So most people in the world are just reading the advertisement and breathing the fumes from car exhausts and jet fuels. Particulate matter slowly falling is inhaled, causing yet another child to miss a day of school. The doctor will say it's just another asthma attack.

There is another way to freedom. Today, more and more countries are revisiting the work of engineers like Frank Schuman who saw renewable energy such as wind and solar as more than just a "beautiful possibility". As an activist in the Youth Climate Movement and organizer with the Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative, I've had the honor to work with amazing leaders from around the world, all working together to spark a truly clean and just energy revolution that creates healthy and sustainable jobs, preserves our planet and frees millions of people around the world from addiction to fossil fuels.

In 2007 the Energy Action Coalition, which is made up of 50 organizations, including EJCC, came together to host the first ever youth summit on the Climate Crisis. The event gathered together over 6,000 young people from the U.S. and Canada. With Power Shift 2007, we held the largest lobby day on climate in U.S. history. Power Shift 2007 engaged a nation and helped to make climate change and renewable energy a major topic in state and national elections.

In January of 2009 the Energy Action Coalition came together once again within the first 100 days of President Barack Obama's term for Power Shift 2009. Through Power Shift 2009, we gathered 12,000 young people from around the U.S. and the world, all in solidarity for a truly just renewable energy economy. We gained the attention of our local senators and congress people by storming the halls of Capitol Hill, wearing green hard hats symbolizing a unified call for more green jobs and investment in a new green economy.

With a new administration, the voices of the Youth Climate Movement and the calls from the grassroots advocacy of communities living near the coal fields, power plants and oil refineries are finally starting to be heard. On March 24, 2009 the Environmental Protection Agency announced it will suspend and review permits for two mountaintop removal coal mining operations — and putting hundreds more mountaintop coal-mining permits on hold until it can evaluate their impact on our nation’s streams and wetlands. On April 17th, the agency announced its findings from a 2007 Supreme Court Ordered report and found that greenhouse gases are a serious threat to public health and welfare. With a sense of hope for the future, EPA administrator, Lisa Jackson announced, “This finding confirms that greenhouse gas pollution is a serious problem now and for future generations....This pollution problem has a solution – one that will create millions of green jobs and end our country’s dependence on foreign oil.”

Within the first 100 days of the Obama Administration, the United States has taken the first steps in a twelve step process to end our addiction to fossil fuels. We have acknowledged that we have a problem and it is directly connected to the fossil fuels we consume. If we want to live free, if we want to continue living in our perceived luxuries, we must take a moment to reduce our waste, reduce our pace of energy consumption, and thinkt.

Today is the time to make a decision. Just like the workers in the coal mines of West Virginia, we are reaching our rock bottom and it is time for an intervention and introduction to a twelve step program to end this addiction to fossil fuels. By reviewing the twelve step program developed in 1935 by Alcoholics Anonymous founders Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith, I have created 12 steps the United States and the American people must take to alleviate this addiction and truly reach Eco-freedom and Environmental Justice.

Step 1. Admitting we have a problem, and that the United States is the largest emitter of greenhouse gases that are causing climate change. We are dependent on unhealthy and unstable fossil fuels, and are playing a role in the destruction of ourselves, others and the planet.

Step 2. Start to believe there is a power higher than ourselves. For whatever reason, that higher power allowed us to live on this planet. We must give thanks by tending to this planet as the planet has tended to us.

Step 3. Make a decision to embrace the "WE" mentality instead of the "ME" mentality. The world is more that one person. At this stage, we begin to live our lives with conscious respect for the planet and all beings inhabiting this world.

Step 4. Take a soul searching and fearless inventory of our personal practices, and the social circumstances that have allowed this addiction to fossil fuels to run our lives.

Step 5. Continue our soul searching quest, and publicly admit to ourselves, Mother Earth, and the world the exact wrongs we have done to the earth and to our bodies through this addiction to fossil fuels.

Step 6. Be entirely ready to transition off of fossil fuels and unsustainable habits, purchases and practices.

Step 7. Work together to create a grassroots and mainstream culture of support in removing our countries over materialistic and consumerist shortcomings that allow this addiction to fossil fuels to grow larger as a threat to our planet and our humanity. Humbly ask and listen for guidance and support from Mother Nature and the international greater good.

Step 8. Making a list of people countries and environments we have harmed and be willing to make amends to them all. This will be quite a feat for United States, or almost any developed nation, to accomplish. However, in our own lives we can begin by making a list of environmental hazards in our communities or in communities that may receive the waste from our community.and pledging to advocate for land remediation and support with environmental justice concerns.

Step 9. Making direct amends to the communities, countries and environments that we have harmed due to our addiction to fossil fuels, except when to do so would injure them or others. While we must make amends for our wrongs, we must listen to the needs of people we have wronged first, and make sure they even want our help. We can make direct amends to the earth and to communities impacted by our environment by giving back through tree planting, advocacy work, fundraising support for local grassroots actions and clean-up/service projects to restore our communities and our environment.

Step 10. Continuing taking personal inventory and not be afraid to admit when we are wrong. As a world leader, America must shred an misconceived image of superiority. This image has helped greatly in allowing us to fall into one of the worst recessions since the Great Depression. At this step we won't allow our pride to keep us from saving people and the planet.

Step 11. Staying connected and in tune with a higher power, grassroots community efforts and to the mission of our country that is expressed in the constitution. Through a process of deep thought and research making sure that we realize who we truly are in this world and in this universe. Becoming more aware of the deeper role America can play in protecting our environment and reducing the threat of drastic climate change.

Step 12. At this point our country will have experienced such a dramatic sociological and cultural shift that if asked we could truly work with other countries like China, India and Europe as we all overcome our addiction to fossil fuels.

However in order to reach step twelve, we must all take step one.

The Environmental Protection Agency, grassroots environmental advocates and everyday people around the world have started taking the first steps towards Eco-freedom. We are gathering together to make sure our country makes the first step as well. This year, 2009, is a critical turning point in our future. Major legislation on climate change is being debated on the floors of Capitol Hill, and in December, leaders of industrialized nations around the world will come together in Copenhagen, Denmark for the 15th annual United Nations Climate Change Conference.

For 8 years the world has been waiting for the U.S. to make a statement. This year will be the first time the Obama administration will be a part of the negotiations, and it is the hope of the world that the U.S. will take a lead in addressing global climate change by making true steps to reducing our greenhouse gas emissions. The decisions we make today will decide the future of our children and generations to come. It's time to listen to seven generations from today. It's time to drop the fossil fuel habit and start creating the beautiful reality of a renewable energy economy that is based on justice, human rights and sustainability!

To learn more about what you can do to advocate for getting the United States into a Fossil Fuel Rehab program visit powershift09.org, ejcc.org and checktheweather.net.

Kari Fulton

Kari Fulton — Wed, 20 May 2009 07:49:48 -0700

Featured as a young leader to watch by both Elle and Glamour Margazine, Kari Fulton is a noted activist in the Environmental Justice and Youth Climate Movement. Currently she is the National Campus Campaign Coordinator for the Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative. Through EJCC Fulton works to mobilize young people of color around environmental justice and campus sustainability. Recently Fulton was awarded the Brower New Leaders Award (Earth Island Institute) and the Damu Smith Power of One Young Professional Award (Deep South Center For Environmental Justice at Dillard University). Currently, Fulton acts as a spokesperson for the Energy Action Coalition is a senior fellow with Young People For the American Way (YP4) and a member of the YP4 Leadership Academy. She is also a graduate of the John H. Johnson School of Communications at Howard University. In her spare time Fulton is a blogger on checktheweather.net a member of the board of directors for the Lets Raise A Million Project and Dreaming Out Loud, an after-school program in DC.

john elfrank-dana

john elfrank-dana — Fri, 08 May 2009 20:14:54 -0700

Newt's Wrong About The Carbon-Cap Bill

Isaiah J. Poole — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 08:27:02 -0700

How To Get 60 Votes For a Carbon Cap

Bill Scher — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 06:53:23 -0700

In an oped published Sunday by the Omaha World-Herald (and reprinted today by Grist), I argued for a climate compromise with the coal- and oil-state Senators needed for a 60-vote supermajority: a strong carbon cap that makes polluters pay to pollute, but steering that revenue back into the same states to cushion the transition away from fossil fuels.

On Friday, Rep. Henry Waxman indicated to Bloomberg that a compromise along those lines is possible. Bloomberg reports: "Waxman said Representatives John Dingell, a Michigan Democrat who once chaired the committee, and Rick Boucher, a Democrat from Virginia’s coal country, will support his 20 percent reduction [in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020] even though they have previously called for a reduction of just 6 percent. Dingell and Boucher may be willing to accept the higher reductions in part because of Waxman’s proposal for allocating the permit revenue."

If this idea gains traction, expect coal and oil CEOs to squeal with more misinformation about how capping carbon would affect families and businesses. When we respond, it's incumbent on us not to view polluter CEOs as proxies from the voters in coal and oil states.

Because in order to gain the support of wavering Senators, we need to build support among their constituents. And the interests of their constituents (stable and manageable energy bills, safe environment) is not the same as the CEOs (personal profits, no competition from new clean energy companies).

For more background, my oped is below.

***

Obama’s Carbon-Cap Plan Tests Democratic Coalition
By Bill Scher

Democratic gains in the Plains, the interior West, the Rust Belt and the Old Confederacy have transformed the political landscape. But one primary goal of the Obama administration is straining the geographic diversity of the new Democratic coalition: capping carbon pollution to avert a climate crisis.

While a rapid transition to a clean energy-powered economy is a main plank of the Democratic platform, 17 Democratic U.S. senators hail from the top coal-producing states, with another four representing the biggest oil-producing states. Several more (including Nebraska’s Ben Nelson) serve constituents whose electricity is primarily generated by coal, which would intentionally become more expensive in any effective climate protection strategy.

Many of these senators have signaled their reluctance to pass a strong carbon cap. Yet Speaker Nancy Pelosi and top House Democrats have pledged to pass climate protection as part of a broad clean-energy bill this year.

As energy is a hot-button issue felt by every voter every day, an intraparty regional clash would jeopardize the new Democratic coalition. Can Democrats creatively bridge geographic differences to craft effective legislation? Or will they take a path of least resistance: a paper-thin compromise that fails to address the crisis?

The big sticking point is how much polluters pay. President Barack Obama’s initial proposal would cap carbon, create new pollution permits and sell them. Since there would be a limited number of permits, we would be able to control the amount of carbon gumming up the atmosphere.

Since private companies would no longer get to pollute the public’s sky for free, the cost of carbon-heavy goods would rise. The revenue from polluters would fund both clean-energy production and consumer rebates, making low-carbon goods more affordable.

Businesses that burn a lot of carbon — like coal and oil companies — are not enamored with paying to pollute. They want the permits given away for free. This makes some political sense; it buys off the opposition.

But we saw what happened with freebies when Europe struggled with its attempt at capping carbon. As the Wall Street Journal recently explained: "That let utilities pocket billions of euros in windfall profits, because they got the permits for free, yet were able to pass on higher electricity costs to consumers."

The crudest way to compromise is to split the difference, give away most permits for free to start with, and then gradually sell more as the program ramps up. But there is great concern in the scientific community that we don’t have time for a slow start.

There is a better way to compromise. It still would not appeal to coal and oil CEOs, but — more importantly for senators thinking about re-election — potentially would appeal to voters in fossil-fuel states.

Sen. Evan Bayh, from coal-heavy Indiana, last month on MSNBC criticized President Obama’s intention to take carbon-cap revenue from polluters and steer it to taxpayers across the country: "You’re taking money from carbon-intensive states like Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and redistributing it to California, New York." But in that concern lies the key to compromise.

Jesse Jenkins, director of energy and climate policy at the Breakthrough Institute think tank, has a simple solution: "Return 80 percent to 85 percent of the revenue back to the states where it came from. Because they have the most to lose, and they need the most help."

Jenkins further recommends focusing on clean-energy investments rather than taxpayer rebates to get the best bang for the buck: creating clean-energy jobs, lowering the cost of clean energy, easing our ability to purchase less energy and making our bottom-line energy bills manageable and stable.

Coal and oil CEOs would still complain, but that’s inevitable. After all, the whole idea is to lessen our dependence on their products. But if voters in carbon-intensive states know that there will be money on the table to create green jobs and keep their energy bills in check, the corporate scare tactics will ring hollow and skittish senators should be reassured.

The key to keeping the Democratic coalition geographically solid so it can effectively govern is thoughtful policymaking. If communicated directly to voters, that could lock in grass-roots support.

Splitting the difference in back rooms with special interests will not only lead to bad policies that sell voters short but also will greatly shorten the era of Democratic dominance.