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Posts Tagged ‘Waxman’

Year in Review: The Little Climate Bill That Couldn’t

Posted in Energy, Global Warming, Renewables, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on January 8, 2010 |

EDITOR’S NOTE: At this rate, we may actually finish reviewing the year in blog 2009 by the end of January 2010– just how we wanted to start the year!!  But… stuff keeps happening…. and we can’t blog! Or we have to blog about the important, breaking news stuff!  So, sorry for dragging this out, but we hope you’re having fun reminiscing as much as we are blogging about it.

5. The Little Climate Bill That Couldn’t

We had high hopes coming into 2009.  Congressmen Waxman and Markey were hard at work on draft legislation that they promised would meet scientific standards on climate change.  They had even collected signatures from the majority of their caucus on principles that they would build off of. And those principles were pretty good.  So was Obama’s proposed budget, which showed they had revenue plans starting in 2012 of a 100% auction of CO2 credits- a 100% auction being the method that most agree brings quicker pollution reductions and is also, according to the EPA, the least regressive method of implementation.  Hey, anything that hurts poor people the least is what we want to do, right?

WRONG. Clearly, you think differently than the majority of the US Congress.

Then Waxman and Markey released their draft legislation – our reaction was not pretty. Texas Congressmen had been complicit in weakening the bill away from the standards of the original principles.

Good Points:

  • AMAZING building code and appliance standards for energy efficiency
  • Good long term (2050) and short term (2020) goal for carbon reduction (still needed to be improved to what science calls for- but a good start)
  • Had a renewable energy mandate and an efficiency mandate: we’d get 20% of our power from renewables by 2020 and increase energy efficiency by an additional 10%.

Bad points

  • Well… all of those goals could be bigger.
  • No language on how the carbon credits would be auctioned or allocated.  Nada. Left to be decided later. Like a “scene missing” slide in a Nine Inch Nails video that gets crazier and scarier as time goes on….

And then the hearings on the bill started.  In typical fashion, climate denier troglodytes like Texas’ own Joe Barton tried to slow down the proceedings– by insisting that the entire bill and its amendments be read aloud before the committee.  Because of this unprecedented demand, the House Energy and Commerce Committee simply hired a speedreader.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_SB7g_Yb-0]

If only that had been the extent of the funny business with the bill… but both behind closed doors and by amendment in the committee, the climate bill got gutted.  First, special giveaways to the nuclear industry. Then to the coal industry. Then decreasing the renewables and efficiency goals by almost half.  Then offsets language that guaranteed that polluters would be able to continue to pollute above the cap– meaning in a bill whose primary purpose is to make sure we curb pollution so we don’t fry the planet, our emissions might actually GO UP, not down. And the bill passed the House Energy and Commerce Committee, its largest hurdle, but by then it had been incredibly compromised.  Our immediate reaction was:  follow the money (ad this remains the single best explanation of what happened to the climate bill to date, imho– it also helps that I wrote it).

But they weren’t done with the gutting of the bill yet…

Then special giveaways to the agribusiness industry. And finally, the coup de grace, they stripped the EPA of their authority to regulate greenhouse gases through the Clean Air Act.

During all of this, we were trying our best to stand up for ordinary Texans against these corporate interests– you may have seen us at the King William Parade in San Antonio, telling San Antonio’s Congressman Gonzalez, “Sorry Charlie, Bailouts Aren’t Green.”  I think aside from crashing the Energy Citizens Rally this was the most fun I had all year.

We were, to say the least, conflicted.  We REALLY REALLY REALLY wanted a climate bill.  But what we got was a climate disaster.  The Waxman-Markey Bill, co-authored by your special interest friends, passed on June 28.  Ugh.  It’s like sending out a birth announcement of a really, really ugly baby.  Or opening a beautifully wrapped present you thought was the perfect gift but finding instead the world’s ugliest Christmas sweater.  Disappointment? That’s not strong enough.  To use the parlance of our day: #EPIC FAIL.

The Senate side hasn’t fared much better.  Despite a decent framework from Senators Kerry and Boxer (it really needs to be improved, but it could be worse) passing through the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee (partisan knuckledraggers, led by Denier-in-Chief James Inhofe, actually boycotted the hearings and the vote), it has yet to be worked on by the Senate Finance Committee (who, you may have heard, was REALLY busy working on some bill having to do with health care.  It didn’t get much media coverage, so you may have missed it. </sarcasm>)

Meanwhile, others felt that both the Boxer bill and the Waxman-Markey bill were DOA in the Senate, so a tri-partisan group of Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), John Kerry (D-MA- look! I got my name on TWO climate bills this Congress!), and Joe Lieberman (I-CT) have said they would develop their own climate bill.  No word yet on their framework (a draft could come any day now), but, unfortunately signs are pointing to “not good”.  It seems the only thing the three of them can really agree on is more pork for nuclear.

However, the EPA in December issued an endangerment finding for greenhouse gases, the next step in actually regulating them, as they were ordered to do in 2007’s Massachusetts v EPA Supreme Court case.  So a year that began on a hopeful note went bad, then worse…. but ended with a little ray of sunshine.  Here’s to a New Year’s Resolution of ACTUALLY passing a climate and clean energy bill that can ACTUALLY fight climate change and create more clean energy. And just like that New Year’s Res to lose 10 pounds, this year we REALLY mean it!

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By promoting cleaner energy, cleaner government, cleaner cars, and cleaner air for all Texans, we hope to provide for a healthy place to live and prosper. We are Public Citizen Texas.

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Everyone Weighing in on Climate Bill

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 22, 2009 |

Let the news storm begin.  For those thirsting for more information on the American Clean Energy and Security Act, which passed the House Energy and Commerce Committee, a few recommendations:

Watch Tyson Slocum, director of Public Citizen’s Energy Program, weigh in on Democracy Now! — Environmental Groups See Divide over Landmark Climate, Energy Bill Weakened by Industry Lobbying

Greg Harman at the San Antonio Current takes Charlie Gonzalez to task for his efforts to weaken ACES (look for a cameo quote from our very own Andy Wilson, Global Warming Program Director here at the Texas office — Gonzalez bombs climate change bill

The Washington Post’s business column op-ed: Climate-Change Bill Hits Some of the Right Notes but Botches the Refrain

The Economist breaks down the Handouts and loopholes

And to close out, words from the President:

I commend Chairman Waxman and the Members of the Energy and Commerce Committee for a successful effort to pass a comprehensive energy and climate bill out of their committee today. We are now one step closer to delivering on the promise of a new clean energy economy that will make America less dependent on foreign oil, crack down on polluters, and create millions of new jobs all across America. The bill is historic for what it achieves, providing clean energy incentives that encourage innovation while recognizing the concerns of sensitive industries and regions in this country. And this achievement is all the more historic for bringing together many who have in the past opposed a common effort, from labor unions to corporate CEOs, and environmentalists to energy companies. I applaud the committee for its action and look forward to signing comprehensive legislation.

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Climate Change Bill Suffers from Backroom Dealings, Industry Influence

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 18, 2009 |

Over the weekend we had a little more time to look over the language in the American Clean Energy and Security Act, and have found it wanting.  Check out this thoughtful statement from our Energy Program Director for the skinny on the bill and what went wrong:

Statement of Tyson Slocum, Director of the Energy Program at Public Citizen

The climate change legislation that will be debated this week is a huge disappointment. Not only will it prove a boon to energy industries, but it won’t protect consumers and may very well not even curb global warming. The first draft, penned months ago, was on track to accomplish these goals, and we applauded it as a great start. Since then, however, lawmakers have met in secret with representatives of the coal and oil industries and facilitated industry efforts to gut the bill.

The Obama administration got it right when officials released a budget that would auction 100 percent of pollution allowances. As long as pollution allowances are auctioned, the government will have the revenue necessary to mitigate energy price increases through rebates while having money to invest in the sustainable energy infrastructure we need to end our reliance on fossil fuels.

This was further reinforced by President Obama’s selection for the new chair of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Jon Wellinghoff, who said that “we may not need any” new nuclear or coal power plants because we have yet to harness the capacity of renewables and energy efficiency.

But the House of Representatives has not followed the administration’s lead.

When Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) released a draft climate bill in March, we praised it as a great first step but noted that it needed to be improved during the committee mark-up process.

But instead of a transparent process involving debate and voted-upon amendments, committee leadership conducted closed-door negotiations with polluters. The result: The bill was radically altered to accommodate the financial interests of big energy corporations while giving nothing new for the environment or for working families. This is hardly the transformation this country needs to jump-start its economy and curb climate change. This is more of the same old wait-and-see, special-interest-bailout approach that has gripped Washington for ages. (more…)

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Waxman/Markey Draft Released, Deals Struck with Texas Congressman

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 15, 2009 |

This afternoon Waxman and Markey finally formally introduced H.R. 2454, the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009. Up to now, they’ve just been circulating an unofficial ‘discussion draft’, but now that we’ve got some actual language (932 pages of it), we’ve got a better idea of the bill’s specifics.

And it looks like some of the specifics are significantly watered down from the original draft, largely thanks to Texas’ own Congressmen Charlie Gonzalez and Gene Green.  According to a CongressDaily article, “Waxman To Release Draft Text After Striking Late Deals,”

Eyeing the start of the bill’s markup Monday, House Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman struck a deal early this morning with Texas Reps. Gene Green and Charles Gonzalez that strips out a low-carbon fuels mandate and hands out credits to petroleum refiners amounting to 2 percent of all emissions under the bill’s cap-and trade-program from 2014-26. The deal might be enough to get Green, Gonzalez and perhaps other oil-patch Democrats on board. Green called the deal “a reasonable first step to protecting our energy infrastructure and keeping good-paying jobs here at home.”

The thrust of the bill, and how it differeniates from the drafts, is as follows:

  • 17% emissions cut from 2005 levels by 2020 (instead of 20%)
  • giving away 85% of allowances and auctioning just 15%

Unfortunately, this kind of means that no one has to really cut their emissions for 20 years.  Which is disappointing, to say the least. You can see how these allowances will allocated here.

The good news is that, though the bill is compromised… we’ve got a real carbon bill introduced! The bad news is… it isn’t nearly strong enough to create the economic revolution we need to really address the carbon crisis.  Now, the bill won’t go through markup until early next week, which could mean that there is a chance it could be strengthened… but it is more likely that in order to pass the whole House, it may be weakened even more.

Heavy news for a Friday, I know.  It can’t be all good news all the time.  We’ll keep you updated on the status of this bill through markup.

Have hope, my friends.  It ain’t over til the fat lady sings.

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San Antonio Rep. Charlie Gonzalez Wants CPS to Get a Free Ride

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 24, 2009 |

According to a Bloomberg article this morning, San Antonio Representative Charlie Gonzalez has joined

a group of Democrats on the House Energy and Commerce Committee (who) want to give utilities free permits for all their existing carbon emissions, according to people familiar with a plan sent to the committee’s chairman.

The article continues:

Representative Rick Boucher of Virginia sent the four-page list of recommendations to Henry Waxman, the committee’s chairman and the author of draft climate-change legislation that some of his fellow Democrats are seeking to temper, said the people, who declined to be identified before the plan is made public. Courtney Lamie, Boucher’s spokeswoman, didn’t respond to e-mail and phone messages.

Waxman’s measure would establish a cap-and-trade system of pollution credits designed to cut carbon dioxide 20 percent from 2005 levels by 2020. He needs to win the support of Boucher and the other Democrats pushing for changes in his plan because no Republicans are likely to vote for it, Representative Gene Green, a Texas Democrat, said yesterday.

“It’s all about the consumer,” said Representative Charles Gonzalez of Texas, whose San Antonio-area district has oil and gas operations. “It’s also the economic interests of a member’s district or region.”

Charlie Gonzalez just doesn’t have his facts straight on this one.  If you’re really concerned about consumers, giving away pollution credits for free is about the worst way you can write this bill.  Giving away allowances would force customers to pay for industry and utilities’ right to pollute without even cutting carbon emissions.  There is a right and a very wrong way to write a good climate change bill, and Charlie is supporting the wrong way.

EPA’s most recent analysis say that giving away pollution credits is “highly regressive”, meaning it hurts low-income families the most.  At best, this is a bailout and a free ride for the polluters.  At worst it will create windfall profits for huge energy companies at the expense of every lower and middle income family in Texas.  However, an auction fixes these problems.  EPA continues:

“Assuming that the bulk of the revenues from the program are returned to households, the cap-and-trade policy has a relatively modest impact on U.S. consumers. . . . Returning the revenues in this fashion could make the median household, and those living at lower ends of the income distribution, better off than they would be without the program“

A good climate change bill will create billions of dollars of revenue by charging large polluters for the dangerous pollutants they’ve been emitting for decades.  This money could then be returned to taxpayers, particularly low-income households, to protect them from any price increases that energy industries may try to pass through to consumers.  Another portion of the money could also be used to pursue aggressive energy efficiency programs, so that citizens can save even more money by using less electricity.  Every dollar spent on energy efficiency will then also help reinvigorate local economy by putting people back to work doing energy audits and retrofitting inefficient homes.

Congressman Charlie Gonzalez needs to hear that what consumers really need is energy efficiency, renewable energy, lower electric bills and less pollution — not more industry giveaways.  So far, it looks like he’s only heard from the lobbyists for the big polluters.  We’ve heard that  Congressman Gonzalez will cast a deciding vote on whether Texans will be given the tools to forge a new, green economy, or left unprotected from the worst effects of extreme weather and high energy prices.

Congressman Charlie Gonzalez is the swing vote on this issue.  Please pick up the phone and call him.  The phone number for his DC office is (202) 225-3236 and his office in San Antonio is (210) 472-6195.  You can also email his office from his website

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EPA’s Declaration that Greenhouse Gas Emissions Endanger Public is Long Overdue

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 20, 2009 |

shockingNEWSFLASH!  Carbon Dioxide emissions may represent a threat to public health or welfare.

Shocking, I know.  But what is old news to the rest of us, released in the form of a proposed endangerment finding by the EPA, is actually a really big deal.  Environmentalists and concerned citizens alike have been waiting years for this announcement.  In 2007, as a result of the landmark Supreme Court case Massachusetts v. EPA, the court ordered the EPA administrator to determine if greenhouse gas emissions could “cause or contribute to air pollution which may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health or welfare.”  The Bush Administration delayed reacting to this order, but Friday EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson signed a proposed endangerment finding which identified six global warming gasses that pose a threat to human health.

The finding will now enter a 60-day comment period, and have no immediate regulatory effect, but could give the EPA power to regulate CO2 under the Clean Air Act.

According to the EPA’s official statement,

Before taking any steps to reduce greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act, EPA would conduct an appropriate process and consider stakeholder input. Notwithstanding this required regulatory process, both President Obama and Administrator Jackson have repeatedly indicated their preference for comprehensive legislation to address this issue and create the framework for a clean energy economy.

After years of global warming being the elephant in the room that the government would not address, the EPA’s proposed finding finally gives the agency the ability to take action on climate change — though as stated, everyone would rather Congress take care of business.  Hopefully, this finding will light a fire under cap-and-trade negotiations.

Its kind of like when my mother used threaten that she’d clean my room herself if I didn’t get cracking — which I knew meant she would just come in with a trash bag and clear everything out.  The EPA could straight up regulate carbon dioxide — but few people would really be happy with the result, most environmentalists included.  By creating new policy, Congress is simply better equipped to deal with our greenhouse gas emissions than the EPA.

So sorry Congress — no more reading the comics you found with the dust bunnies under the bed.  Go clean up, or Mom’s going to start vacuuming.

But don’t take my word for it.  Andy Wilson (Citizen Andy, if you will), Global Warming Program Director here at the Texas Office, wrote a statement on how this finding relates to the big picture, and Texas specifically.  Check it out!

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House Democrats Want More!

Posted in Efficiency, Energy, Global Warming, Good Government, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 2, 2009 |

President Obama has voiced that two of his top priorities will be climate change and energy.  Earlier this month he picture-5announced an energy plan that would call for 14% reduction in emissions from the 2005 levels by 2020, and an 83% reduction by 2050.

But House Democrats Henry a. Waxman (California) and Edward J. Markey (Massachussettes) want more!  They drafted a bill with even more gusto to capture greenhouse gases—a 20% reduction in emissions by 2020!

Remember that this power team was also responsible for the bill to put a moratorium on coal plants introduced a year ago.   The new Waxman-Markey bill will require every region of the country to produce 25% from renewable sources such as wind, solar, and geothermal.  This could be a huge factor to increase the demand for sustainable energy to spur wide-range development and adoption of energy technology.

Mr. Waxman, the chairman of the Energy and Commerce committee said regarding his bill:

This legislation will create millions of clean energy jobs, put America on the path to energy independence, and cut global warming pollution.  Our goal is to strengthen our economy by making America the world leader in new clean energy and energy efficiency technologies.

However, the bill also makes some concessions to the states whose economy rests upon coal and energy-related industries, with the hope that it will smooth the transition to cleaner forms of energy.   To read more, check out this press release from Tyson Slocum at our D.C. office.

EDITOR’S NOTE: This bill is a really great start.  Obama started the bid at a 14% cut, the House upped the ante to 20%, but according to the Nobel-prize winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the real target we should be shooting for is about 35%.  Unfortunately, none of the bills in the House or Senate is shooting for this target.  The good news is, according to an analysis by McKinsey and Company, almost all of that 35% can be achieved at a net cost savings through things like energy efficiency.  And realistically, that’s only 3.5% per year for the next decade. ~~Citizen Andy

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