Note that I live near San Francisco. I would claim that NorCal and (for example) Oklahoma (home of James Inhofe) are *far* more different in some ways than the UK and {France, Germany, etc}. Actually, even NorCal and SoCal are sometimes more different. Europeans (even including the UK, if that’s appropriate) often don’t quite understand this, hence my recommendations were quite serious.

The UK and France are *obviously* different, but by US standards, both are small, dense countries whose cities mostly grew up before cars, and (with exception of relatively recent North Sea), never had a lot of indigenous oil & gas to make suburbs cheap, and which have relatively less extreme climates compared to some parts of the USA. [Not here, thank goodness.]

In any case, *you* cannot be any more frustrated with US than we are here in CA, although after 8 years of having to sue the US Federal Government, hopefully we won’t have to be doing that.

If you’re not familiar with difference among states in energy use, you might want to check this, see righthand column. Arnold’s done well [even with the dysfunctional state government structures here, which do rival EU weirdness] with energy, but it certainly didn’t start with him.

It’s not all bad – as supine as the Democrats were, they still probably blunted the worst that the Bush Administration had to offer.

Back in the 1970s, the Republicans competed with Democrats over who offered the best enviro legislation. I figure after they lose two more presidential elections, they’ll finally start becoming realistic.

But his position on climate change has totally redeemed him in my eyes.

It’s a courageous position, one he has taken criticism for, among the deniers, who mock him and call him Schwarzenutter for his support of the issue.

I don’t buy your explanation, for one simple reason. UK climate legislation has flowed down from Europe, and there can be no more disfunctional institution than that, or more contrast between the member states! Yet somehow Europe as a whole is reducing emissions.

There could not be two more diferent countries than France and Britain. Culturally we are world’s apart and like all good neigbours we hate each other. Yet on climate change we seem to be more or les in accordance.

There seems to be a perception in the US that any form of CO2 reduction is impossible. The experience in the UK is that this is just not the case. My personal experience in our house is that a huge amount can be achieved relatively easily (insulation, light bulbs, turning stuff off when its not being used, line-drying clothes, etc). It is very satisfying to see the energy bills plummet as well.

The US just need to get started. That’s all.

That said, Mary knows her district. Wind farms run amok there, in Palm Springs, home of the “rat pack”, Sinatra, and, well, wind turbines. 4000 of them.

See for example…
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/ travel/ destinations/ northamerica/ usa/ 5251161/ Palm-Springs-USA-Hollywoods-desert-escape.html

She knows damn well, more than most, likely, that when a reporter includes a sexy photograph of wind turbines as a visual for an article about how “cool” it is to have a star pad in the desert — and with the caption —

“Exploiting the breezes that funnel through the mountain pass, some 4,000 wind turbines stand spinning in the fields in a silent ballet that provides power for the entire valley’ Photo: GETTY”

and goes on to talk about Brad Pitt and Bob and Delores Hope —

well, this is the future. No longer is wind energy relegated to “Public Utilities Fortnightly” or the AWEA website (with all due respect to the fabulous AWEA website and AWEA’s founder and director for decades, Randy Swisher..)

Mary knows her base. He base is wind. Wind is baseload power, well, almost. Pretty close to being baseload. She hit first base by siding with the Ds in E&C Commitee on the Waxman-Markey bill. She has chutzpah. She has charm. She has grace. She had Sonny. Sonny had Cher. The Gov wants Cher.

How perfect can this set-up be?????

We can’t be climate girlymen, we have to act.

Are we sure that Arnold means the DOE? It sounds like the EPA to me.

—————
Neil,
Then Gov. George Bush sighed Texas’ renewable electricity standard, the strongest in the country. Aside from their terrible emissions record, Texans actually have a great renewables program. The irony is pretty shocking.

[My wife is British; I've visited the UK probably 30 times; I once spent several hours explaining Silicon Valley to The Right Honorable (?) Peter Mandelson.]
Fond though I am of the UK:

1) The UK is about 60% of the size of California. Very few people live >400 miles from London. In San Francisco area, we’re 2400 miles from Washington, DC.

2) As complicated as the UK is, it is far less so than the US. States have jealously-guarded rights of various kinds. Economies and philosophies differ widely from area to area.

I often had friends from Europe, long used to (familiar-feeling) NYC/Boston visits, become quite disoriented on their first visit to NorCal. I recommend to European (including UK ) friends, that to better comprehend the US:

a) Read The Nine Nations of North America.

b) When comng to visit CA, instead of flying here, fly to NY (or even better, Boston), and then *drive* here. Boston->Pittsburgh->St. Louis->Kansas->Colorado->Arizona->NM->SoCal->NorCal gives you a quick look at 6 of the 9 nations (New England, Foundry, Breadbasket, Empty Quarter, Mex-America, and Ecotopia. Kansas alone is almost as big as the UK, and has less than 3M people.

3) Back to your question:

This past April, there was a nice lecture at Stanford:

How Energy Policy Is Really Made

Tara Billingsley, Professional Staff, Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, U.S. Senate
http://energy.senate.gov/public/

I often had colleagues from Europe, long used to NYC/Boston visits, become quite disoriented on their first visit to NorCal.

She gave a candid description, including reference to the old saw about “laws and sausages”, for which she offered frequent examples.

http://www.decc.gov.uk/ en/ content/ cms/ news/ pn058/ pn058.aspx

“…UK greenhouse gas emissions are expected to be about 23% below 1990 levels by 2010 – well in excess of the target of 12.5% set out under the Kyoto agreement.”

As UK citizens we are bombarded by TV advertising on a nightly basis imploring us to cut CO2 – switch things off, insulate homes, change bulbs, etc. It is working, although I think improvements will get progressively harder as the low hanging fruit is taken.