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Reid: “I think if we do it right, the energy bill, the climate bill can be very, very job productive” — plans floor debate on bipartisan bill “sometime in the spring”

November 17, 2009

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) today confirmed that floor debate on a sweeping energy and global warming bill that will be sold to the American public in part as an economic stimulus measure will be held early next year.

“We’re going to try to do that sometime in the spring,” Reid told reporters when asked about the window for moving a climate bill onto the Senate floor.

So E&E News PM (subs. req’d) reports.   Ideally the debate would start by the end of February, so the Senate vote could be finished by early spring, as I recently wrote.   The bipartisan team of Senators crafting a bill with the White House plan on a blueprint by Copenhagen:

Kerry and Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) are taking the lead in writing the climate and energy bill with a goal of releasing a blueprint before U.N. global warming negotiations start Dec. 7 in Copenhagen.

The good news is that Reid sees this bill as part of the economic stimulus and jobs package the administration is putting together, which should increase the motivation to pass it:

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Post by Joe | November 17, 2009 | 6 comments |
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U.S. and China announce “positive, cooperative and comprehensive” plan for collaboration on clean energy and climate change

November 17, 2009

“Very exciting day here in Beijing.  There’s enormous interest in both governments in working together to fight climate change.  The package announced today is far-reaching and can make a real difference in cutting emissions.”

That’s an exclusive quote from David Sandalow, DOE’s Assistant Secretary of Energy for Policy and International Affairs, who just emailed me from China about the newly announced U.S.-China cooperation plan.  Sandalow is going to be in Copenhagen, so I hope to have a real interview with him then.  For details on this plan (with links) and what it means, here is analysis by Andrew Light and Julian L. Wong of the Center for American Progress.  Note that the deal goes beyond “obvious” areas like efficiency and renewables to include things like shale gas, which appears to exist in abundance in China and could allow repowering of existing Chinese coal plants and more rapid medium-term reductions than people have thought possible.

This morning, a comprehensive plan for U.S.-China cooperation on clean energy and climate change was announced in Beijing by President Barack Obama and President Hu Jintao. The overall plan is much more ambitious in scope and depth than we had anticipated and contains directives to create various institutions and programs addressing a wide array of cooperation on clean-energy technologies and capacity building, including very important efforts on helping China build a robust, transparent and accurate inventory of their greenhouse gas emissions.

These efforts include cooperation in the following areas:

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Post by Guest | November 17, 2009 | 14 comments |
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Time magazine: “The science of climate change grows more dire.”

November 17, 2009

“World leaders say Copenhagen to be a steppingstone to final climate deal,” as I wrote on Sunday.   Here is an excerpt from  Time magazine’s take on the matter, “World Leaders Put Off a Climate Change Treaty,” by Bryan Walsh:

If there is a bright side, however, the deliberate downshift in expectations for Copenhagen could make it easier for world leaders, including Obama, to attend the summit and draft a stronger political agreement. In addition, diplomats could build out the framework of a future agreement, with the hope that, should the Senate pass carbon legislation early next year, a deal with real numbers could be finalized relatively quickly.

But there’s no getting around the fact that as the science of climate change grows more dire, the global political system seems increasingly unable to deal with that reality. “We don’t want a global suicide pact,” said Mohamed Nasheed, the president of the Maldives, a low-lying Indian Ocean nation that could be swamped by global warming – caused flooding. “We want a global survival pact.” But the world’s most influential leaders still aren’t ready for that.

Post by Joe | November 17, 2009 | 7 comments |
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Energy and Global Warming News for November 17: South Korea adopts its most strict CO2 cuts for 2020; Concentrated solar thermal goes dry (cooling)

November 17, 2009

South Korea to Cut Greenhouse Emissions 30% from expected 2020 levels

South Korea, Asia’s fourth-largest polluter, said it plans a 30 percent cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 even as a binding global accord on climate change appears unlikely at next month’s summit in Copenhagen.

“South Korea’s voluntary target will stimulate efforts by the global community despite the pessimistic outlook for the Copenhagen meeting,” President Lee Myung Bak said in a statement today. The goal is set at the highest level recommended for emerging economies by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change under the United Nations, according to the statement….

South Korea had outlined in August three proposals: cutting emissions by as much as 4 percent by the end the next decade from 2005 levels; capping them at the 2005 output; or allowing an 8 percent increase by 2020….

The target “basically corresponds to 4 percent cut from 2005,” Choi Seung Kook, secretary general of Green Korea United, non-profit environmental group, said by telephone. “Still, a forecast based on business as usual levels in 2020 is changeable and the target itself falls short of goals of other countries.”

South Korea’s annual emissions may rise to 813 million metric tons by 2020 in the absence of measures to curb carbon output, a committee under the presidential office said Aug. 4. That would be an increase of 37 percent from the 594.4 million tons produced in 2005.

This target will be a true “challenge for South Korean industries, where carbon emissions doubled in the period from 1990 to 2005, the fastest rate in the OECD,” as the WSJ noted.  “The steepest cuts will occur in construction and transportation, the government said. In construction, which accounts for 25% of carbon emissions, South Korea is targeting a 31% reduction by what they would have been in 2020. In the transportation sector, which accounts for 17% of emissions, it plans to trim emissions by 33% to 37%.”

Concentrated solar thermal goes dry (cooling)

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Post by Michael | November 17, 2009 | 11 comments |
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Superfreakonomics authors abandon climate science

November 17, 2009

The authors of SuperFreakonomics simultaneously insist they accept the science — “Like those who are criticizing us, we believe that rising global temperatures are a man-made phenomenon” — while at the same time labeling global warming a “religion” (see here).  And we’ve seen one award-winning journalist explain “Freakonomics Guys Flunk Science of Climate Change.”  But now, as this stunning Charlie Rose video shows, we have the clearest demonstration that both Levitt and Dubner don’t accept and don’t understand the science.  This is a Wonk Room repost.

Appearing on PBS’s influential Charlie Rose Show last week, SuperFreakonomics authors Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner expanded upon their destructively uninformed portrayal of climate science, even throwing into question man’s influence on global warming. When Rose asked him about the controversial “global cooling” chapter, Levitt fatuously claimed that “what we actually said is not even very controversial.” Levitt said that SuperFreakonomics is “not denying that the Earth has gotten warmer.” After Rose interjected, “And it’s man created,” Levitt said, “It’s harder to know whether it’s man created”:

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Post by Brad Johnson | November 17, 2009 | 20 comments |
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Rogue Palin: “I always remind people from outside our state that there is plenty of room for all Alaska’s animals — right next to the mashed potatoes.”

November 17, 2009

It is not really news that former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin is not an animal lover — or, I should say, is not a live-animal lover.  That’s especially true for animals that happen to stand in the way of producing more fossil fuels:

But if the Washington Post, which has four stories on Palin and her new book, Going Rogue, today, can take the headline quote above and put it on their front page in big type, well, then it must be news:

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Post by Joe | November 17, 2009 | 6 comments |
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Pawlenty completes climate science flip flop, after flip flopping on support for bipartisan climate action

November 17, 2009

Conservative ideologues have increasingly made opposition to bipartisan action on global warming a litmus test for Republicans seeking national office (see “Honey, I shrunk the GOP, Part 1: Conservatives vow to purge all members who support clean energy or science-based policy” and”Part 3: RNC Chair Steele withdraws support for Rep. Kirk over his vote on climate and clean energy bill“).  Apparently this litmus test doesn’t just include embracing ideological positions on policy, but also on science.  The best example of that is Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R-MN), who is widely seen as a top-tier candidate for the 2012 presidential nomination.  Pawlenty already earned a “Full Flop” from PolitiFact because of his complete reversal of position on cap and trade policy — from strong support to strong opponent.  As Think Progress reports, he clearly deserves another for his politically motivated questioning of basic climate science.

Speaking to the Economist recently, Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R-MN) told reporters that he questions the science underpinning climate change. Pawlenty explained that while the earth might be warming, it is unclear “to what extent that is the result of natural causes.” As ThinkProgress has noted, Pawlenty has veered sharply to the right to appease a right-wing, tea party base. Although the tea party movement demands strict adherence to far right positions, as a Democracy Corps study shows, much of the movement sees political issues through a prism that is simply divorced from reality.

In appeasing the tea party base, Pawlenty not only dismisses the stark reality that human-caused carbon emissions are the largest contributor to climate change, but he also sacrifices his own credibility. Over the course of the last three years, Pawlenty has gone from an outspoken proponent of clean energy to a Glenn Beck pandering climate change denier:

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Post by Guest | November 17, 2009 | 3 comments |
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General Motors to start repaying government loans

November 16, 2009

Question of the day:  Will GM ultimately pay back all of the taxpayers’ loans?

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2009/08/12/business/12auto01-600.jpg

The NY Times story has one of the true glass-is-half-full headlines of our times:

G.M., Citing Progress, Reports Loss of $1.15 Billion

But these days, you take good news where you can find it, and the rest of the story is certainly a pleasant surprise:

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Post by Joe | November 16, 2009 | 6 comments |
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Energy and Global Warming News for November 16: Brazil announces ‘historic’ drop in deforestation; Russia’s President warns of “catastrophic consequences” of inaction on climate; “Solar is cheaper than coal today” — Jigar Shah

November 16, 2009

Brazil announces “historic” drop in deforestation

Deforestation of the world’s largest tropical rain forest, in Brazil, fell by the largest amount in more than 20 years, dropping 45 percent from nearly 5,000 square miles to some 2,700 square miles this past year, the Brazilian government announced yesterday.

From August 2008 to July this year, deforestation fell to the lowest it has been since Brazil’s Space Institute began monitoring the destruction with satellite technology, said Gilberto Câmara, the institute’s head.

“This is a very happy moment — to note that the efforts of Brazilian society to contain the deforestation of the Amazon have reached a very satisfactory level,” he said.

The new figures were reportedly rushed out ahead of the U.N. climate talks in Copenhagen next month. Earlier this week, Brazil said it would take a proposal to the summit that would see it voluntarily reduce carbon emissions by up to 42 percent by 2020, partly by continued efforts against illegal deforestation.

Environmental groups welcomed the news, but also pointed out that the falling trend coinciding with a worldwide recession, which resulted in a reduced demand for products linked to deforestation.

“We must stay alert so that this falling trend becomes consolidated and allows us to achieve the dream of zero deforestation in the Amazon,” said Paulo Adario, Greenpeace’s Amazon director. “It is an important drop — but a lot of forest is still coming down”

Russia’s Medvedev warns of climate catastrophe

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Post by Michael | November 16, 2009 | 12 comments |
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Palin’s “Going Rogue” spreads falsehoods about bipartisan clean energy legislation

November 16, 2009

During the 2008 campaign, the Washington Post itself gave Sarah Palin its highest (which is to say lowest) rating of “Four Pinocchios” for continuing to “to peddle bogus [energy] statistics three days after the original error was pointed out by independent fact-checkers.”  That didn’t stop the Post from running a 2009 piece by her filled with bogus information attacking climate action and clean energy action, which Senators Boxer and Kerry later debunked: “The governor’s new refrain against global warming action reminds us of every naysayer who has spoken out against progress in cleaning up pollution.”  Still Newt Gingrich said she was a conservative leader on energy issues.

So now Palin’s book Going Rogue is out — hmm, the subtitle of the original Freakonomics is A Rogue Economist explores the Hidden Side of Everything – and Media Matters has two debunkings of it that I’ll repost below.  First, MM’s “ongoing list of falsehoods in Palin’s memoir“:

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Post by Joe | November 16, 2009 | 6 comments |
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NASA reports hottest June to October on record*

November 16, 2009

Fast on the heels of the hottest June to September on record*, NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies reports that last month was tied for the second hottest October on record (after 2005).

Unlike NOAA, which announced its October global analysis with a major “State of the Climate” monthly update, NASA just quietly updates its data set (here).  So you have to do a little math to see that for the June through October period, 2009 now tops both 1998 (easily) and 2005 (just barely, hence the asterisk).

For NOAA, it was the sixth warmest October on record, and the fifth-warmest January-through-October period:

NCDC 10-09

Yes, the one place in the world where it warmed the least is, of course, the good old (continental) U.S. of A. — though it was the wettest October on record for the lower-48 (see WWF’s U.S. Sees Wettest October on Record; Arkansas Records are Washed Away).

That’s the continental United States, of course.  Once again, the geographical distribution of the warming continues to be bad news for those worried about the permafrost permamelt, since temps even in the summer ran upwards of 5°C (9°F) warmer than the 1961-1990 norm over much of Siberia and parts of Alaska and Canada.  Siberia contains probably the world’s largest amount of carbon locked away in the permafrost (see here).

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Post by Joe | November 16, 2009 | 26 comments |
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Best. Review. Ever.

November 16, 2009

Freakonomics got super freaky. And super wrong.

Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner are to blame for the global financial crisis.

See, back in 2005, they wrote “Freakonomics,” a wildly successful book brimming with interesting stories about why incentives matter and how actions have unintended consequences. Indeed, incentives do matter, and actions (or publications) do have unintended consequences: Their book made economists around the world more inclined to come up with cute little analyses of the business of being a drug dealer or the impact of a first name on a child’s success. And that distracted them, so they didn’t notice the giant housing and credit bubbles that in hindsight were plain to see. A global collapse ensued.

That’s all nonsense, of course. The forces that led to the current economic troubles were far too big for any one book, or even one current of economic thought, to have caused them. The argument that the Freakonomics guys are to blame for the crisis is provocative and clever and sounds vaguely plausible. It may even contain a kernel of truth. But it fundamentally defies any clear-headed look at reality.

In other words, it’s just like many of the anecdotes that fill “Superfreakonomics,” the sequel to the original bestseller.

This is the Washington Post book review by Neil Irwin.  I think this review just edges out Elizabeth Kolbert’s, but it’s close.  In particular, Irwin covers the U.S. economy and the Federal Reserve for the paper, not climate, so he hits some other parts of the book, like “Patriotic Prostitutes” and drunk walking:

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Post by Joe | November 16, 2009 | 5 comments |
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Status-quo-media stunner: David Broder urges Obama to make a decision on Afghanistan right now, “whether or not it is right.”

November 16, 2009

When we last left David Broder back in April, the dean of the DC press corp and the sultan of the status quo centrists, he was criticizing Obama for “launching highly controversial efforts in health care, energy and education.”  What was his argument?  “Each of those issues has a history in Washington — a history marked by congressional gridlock and legislative frustration.”

Never mind the fact that inaction on energy would destroy a livable climate for billions.  No, Obama was rocking the establishment boat by trying to do too much too fast, taking on problems that were mired in decades of inside-the-beltway inaction because they were too difficult.

But now, in a stunning piece titled, “Enough Afghan debate,” Broder flips his criticism entirely.  Obama simply can’t act fast enough on perhaps the most complex issue of his presidency — even if it means getting this vital and dangerous issue completely wrong:

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Post by Joe | November 16, 2009 | 3 comments |
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World leaders say Copenhagen to be a steppingstone to final climate deal

November 15, 2009

Some very good news on the international front, as the UK Guardian reports today:

During a hastily convened breakfast meeting in Singapore, the US president supported a Danish plan to salvage something from the moribund negotiations by aiming for a broad political agreement and postponing contentious decisions on emissions targets, financing and technology transfer….

The deferral plan was outlined to 19 leaders, including Obama and Chinese president Hu Jintao, who were in Singapore for a summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum.

“Given the time factor and the situation of individual countries we must, in the coming weeks, focus on what is possible and not let ourselves be distracted by what is not possible,” the Danish prime minister, Lars Lokke Rasmussen, told the leaders after flying in overnight for the unscheduled discussion. “The Copenhagen agreement should finally mandate continued legal negotiations and set a deadline for their conclusion.”

… This would give breathing space for the US Senate to pass carbon-capping legislation, allowing the Obama administration to bring a 2020 target and financing pledges to the table at a UN climate meeting in Mexico or Germany in mid-2010.

This is no big surprise to CP readers or anyone who follows international negotiations or domestic politics.  For 8 years, U.S. negotiations were run by hard-core anti-scientific conservatives, who not only blocked any domestic action and opposed any international deal — but the Cheney-Bush negotiators actually actively worked to undermine the efforts of other countries to develop a follow on to the Kyoto Protocol.

It was never possible that team Obama — in just a few months — could undo that and simultaneously develop a final international deal and pass bipartisan U.S. climate legislation — a very slow process, given the experience with our last major domestic clean air bill, the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments.

As the NYT’s Revkin blogs this morning, “Many seasoned participants in nearly two decades of treaty negotiations aimed at blunting global warming had predicted this outcome.”

The new plan for Copenhagen makes the prospects for a successful international deal far more likely — and at the same time increases the chance for Senate passage of the bipartisan climate and clean energy bill that Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and John Kerry (D-MA) and Sen Lieberman (I-CT) are negotiating with the White House.  The NYT print story reports:

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Post by Joe | November 15, 2009 | 55 comments |
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The environMENTALIST contest: On what day will Obama sign the bipartisan climate and clean energy bill into law?

November 15, 2009

http://sharetv.org/images/the_mentalist-show.jpgOne of my guilty pleasures is the CBS crime show, The Mentalist.  One-time fake psychic Patrick Jane uses his powers of observation and deduction to figure out the answer to the mystery before everyone else.

So here’s the contest for all you would-be environ-Mentalists.  Use your amazing powers of observation and deduction to figure out on what day Obama will sign the bipartisan climate and clean energy bill into law.  The winner gets to write a blog post for Climate Progress — woo hoo!

Remember, the bill has to pass the Senate, go into conference, pass the House and Senate again, and then a few days after that, Obama has the big signing ceremony.

Yes, you could pick “never” but, of course, you’d never collect!  Plus the bill remains a likely prospect since the breakthrough Senate climate partnership between Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and John Kerry (D-MA) — see E&E News: “At least 67 senators are in play” on climate bill.

Indeed, with the addition of Sen Lieberman (I-CT) to the bipartisan (tripartisan?) team and the beginning of talks with White House “to discuss a possible compromise” the chances may be greater than ever.  Heck, even the moderate coal-state Democrat Sen. Baucus (D-MT) said last week, “There’s no doubt that this Congress is going to pass climate change legislation.”

That said, it seems increasingly unlikely that the bill will get to Obama’s desk before the summer.  Indeed, The Washington Times Washington Insight/Energy (sub. req’d) has these remarkable prognosications from a former Senate majority leader and a leading industrial expert:

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Post by Joe | November 15, 2009 | 32 comments |
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Superfreakonomics coauthor replies to “scathing review” by Elizabeth Kolbert: “she somehow accomplished all this with a degree from Yale in … literature.”

November 14, 2009

On Monday, The New Yorker published Elizabeth Kolbert’s lengthy review of SuperFreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance.  In her 2400-word review, titled “Hosed:  Is there a quick fix for the climate?” she writes:

Given their emphasis on cold, hard numbers, it’s noteworthy that Levitt and Dubner ignore what are, by now, whole libraries’ worth of data on global warming. Indeed, just about everything they have to say on the topic is, factually speaking, wrong. Among the many matters they misrepresent are: the significance of carbon emissions as a climate-forcing agent, the mechanics of climate modelling, the temperature record of the past decade, and the climate history of the past several hundred thousand years.  Raymond T. Pierrehumbert is a climatologist who, like Levitt, teaches at the University of Chicago. In a particularly scathing critique, he composed an open letter to Levitt, which he posted on the blog RealClimate.

On Friday, coauthor Stephen Dubner replied in a post titled, “With Geoengineering Outlawed, Will Only Outlaws Have Geoengineering?“  Notwithstanding the title, the piece is clearly meant to be serious.  Here is what they have to say about Kolbert’s review:
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Post by Joe | November 14, 2009 | 31 comments |
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Record high temperatures far outpace record lows across U.S.

November 14, 2009

Spurred by a warming climate, daily record high temperatures occurred twice as often as record lows over the last decade across the continental United States, new research shows. The ratio of record highs to lows is likely to increase dramatically in coming decades if emissions of greenhouse gases continue to climb.

temps

This graphic shows the ratio of record daily highs to record daily lows observed at about 1,800 weather stations in the 48 contiguous United States from January 1950 through September 2009. Each bar shows the proportion of record highs (red) to record lows (blue) for each decade. The 1960s and 1970s saw slightly more record daily lows than highs, but in the last 30 years record highs have increasingly predominated, with the ratio now about two-to-one for the 48 states as a whole.  (©UCAR, graphic by Mike Shibao.)

This is from the news release of the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR).  The scientific paper itself is here (subs. req’d).  A blog post on this by the NYT’s Andy Revkin is here.  And NCAR posted a video of lead author Gerald Meehl discussing his findings:

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Post by Joe | November 14, 2009 | 13 comments |
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Energy and Global Warming New for Novermber 13: Energy industry gives heavily to Senate Finance panel; UK PM to attend Copenhagen

November 13, 2009

Energy industry well acquainted with Finance panel members

Oil and gas companies and electric utilities over the past two decades have poured $8 million into the campaign coffers of lawmakers on the Senate Finance Committee who could now look to shape climate legislation.

Senators on the committee also have received campaign money from other segments of the energy industry that would be affected by a sweeping climate and energy bill, including wind, solar, coal, nuclear power, steel manufacturing and the forest and paper industry.

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.

“Companies have a lot to win or lose with legislative outcomes, and they are clearly positioning themselves to be winners,” said Tyson Slocum, director of watchdog group Public Citizen’s energy program.

“It’s all an effort to get access,” Slocum added. “That’s what making campaign contributions provides you, is enhanced access with members of Congress. It doesn’t guarantee outcomes but it increases your odds of being able to influence the outcomes.”

The Finance Committee has jurisdiction over much of the structure of a cap-and-trade program including how much companies will be able to bank emissions permits in one year and use in another, and whether free permits given to companies could be turned into a kind of security that could be bundled and sold like mortgages, said Kenneth Green, resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.

Baucus has said he might want to look at how any free greenhouse gas emission allowances would be doled out to regulated industries.

“There are two reasons for a company to donate,” to a political campaign, Green said. “One, they are hoping to make a profit either selling carbon credits, or having their competitor disadvantaged. Or, two, they are staring high costs in the face and they want to get something in the bill to reduce the costs.”

The Finance panel is one of the most powerful on Capitol Hill, and a good portion of those on the committee have been in the Senate at least 20 years, the time period over which the oil and gas industry has given a combined total of at least $5.6 million to those now on the committee, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Electric utilities gave at least $2.4 million during that same period.

Lincoln, Grassley are tops

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Post by Michael | November 13, 2009 | 11 comments |
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Ban Ki-moon climate deputy says Copenhagen deal may take two stage approach; Outline of bipartisan Kerry, Lieberman, Graham proposal likely beforehand

November 13, 2009

The top climate lieutenant to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said Thursday that a major — though perhaps preliminary — international agreement to curb global warming is still possible in Copenhagen. One leading option is to set low targets for emissions reductions initially and to boost them if global warming gets worse.

Janos Pasztor, director of the climate change support team under Ban, told reporters that the Copenhagen global warming conference could yield a breakthrough on greenhouse gas reduction targets and financial aid to poor countries. A binding agreement would be written in 2010, he said….

Ban visited Washington last week to meet with Obama officials and with senators, and said he was optimistic about the chances for a bill to pass the Senate sometime next year. Two of the three senators working to build a bipartisan coalition for the legislation — John Kerry, D-Mass. and Joe Lieberman, I-Conn. — said after the meeting they would try to release an outline of their proposal before the Copenhagen conference.

That’s the news today from The Washington Times Washington Insight/Energy (sub. req’d).

It is no surprise to CP readers that “administration officials have stressed that it will not agree to a global treaty that cannot win approval in the Senate.”  For a related story, see the WashPost’s “U.S. weighs backing interim international climate agreement.”  And this is similar to the “Statement by Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen at the GLOBE Copenhagen Legislators Forum on 24 October 2009,” which I’ll excerpt below.

First, more from the Insight story:

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Post by Joe | November 13, 2009 | 7 comments |
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Climate bill would be a boon to farmers

November 13, 2009

Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack has argued that for American agriculture, the income benefits from climate and clean energy legislation will outweigh the costs (see “USDA: Economic benefits of climate bill for farmers ‘easily trump’ the costs“).  Unrestricted greenhouse gases emissions would certainly be a disaster for farmers (see “A Stormy Forecast for U.S. Agriculture“).  In this CAP repost, guest blogger Tom Kenworthy, looks at some recent studies on the direct economic benefits a climate and clean energy bill would have for farmers.

When it comes to legislation cutting carbon pollution, two Iowans steeped in agriculture policy take very different views of the likely impact on rural America.

“The agriculture industry and rural communities will be some of the hardest-hit areas,” says Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA).

“For American agriculture, the income benefits will outweigh costs, particularly over the long term,” says Tom Vilsack, Iowa’s former governor and now secretary of agriculture in the Obama administration. “For rural Americans, it will help create new economic opportunities and green-energy jobs.”

Secretary Vilsack has it right. While no one can precisely predict what the economic impacts will be of either the American Clean Energy and Security Act, H.R. 2454, which passed the House in June, or the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act, S. 1733, now under consideration in the Senate, most thoughtful analysis contradicts the doomsday scenarios seen by some farm state lawmakers and representatives of big agriculture.

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Post by Joe | November 13, 2009 | 6 comments |
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