Today, Congressmen Henry Waxman (D-California) and Edward Markey (D-Massachusetts) unveiled a draft of their their bill to address climate change. Called the American Clean Energy and Security Act, the legislation sets out primarily to do three things – develop sources of clean energy, boost energy efficiency, and both cap and reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. The following clip concerning the specifics comes from the New York Times:
…The bill requires that emissions be reduced 20 percent from 2005 levels by 2020, while Mr. Obama’s plancalls for a 14 percent reduction by 2020. Both would reduce emissions of carbon dioxide, methane and other greenhouse gases by roughly 80 percent by 2050.
(The bill) emerges at a time when many Americans, and their representatives in Congress, are wary of wide-ranging environmental legislation that could raise energy costs and potentially cripple industry. The bill also comes as the Environmental Protection Agency is about to exert regulatory authority over heat-trapping gases under the Clean Air Act. The bill could pre-empt that effort and create a new cap-and-trade scheme to control carbon emissions.
The bill would require every region of the country to produce a quarter of its electricity from renewable sources like wind, solar and geothermal by 2025. A number of lawmakers around the country, particularly in the Southeast, call that goal unrealistic because the natural resources and technology to meet it do not yet exist.
The bill also calls for modernization of the electrical grid, production of more electric vehicles and significant increases in efficiency in buildings, appliances and the generation of electricity…
It sounds like the authors have also made some efforts to bring in coal mining states, by, according to the Washington Post, adding a “$10 billion fund to promote carbon capture and storage technology,” but so far, word is that no Republicans seem interested… So now, I guess, the debate begins.
Oh, and, for what it’s worth, word is that General Motors is against it…
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GM is against it? Where would they get that idea…oh yeah
–According to D Magazine, at a private lunch, GM chairman Maximum Bob Lutz said global warming is a “total crock of shit.”
From the Center for American Progress