By Fred Krupp and Lew Hay
July 2, 2009
America is faced with a triple threat of challenges:
an economy in recession, an overdependence on foreign energy and a warming
planet. The U.S. House of Representatives has passed legislation that begins to
address all three.
By capping and setting a price on carbon dioxide emissions, the American
Clean Energy and Security Act, popularly known as the Waxman-Markey climate
bill, will help create a clean-energy economy for the 21st century, one that
will help pull the economy out of recession, strengthen America's energy
security in a volatile world, and address the threat of global climate change.
As members of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership - a coalition of 29 of
the world's leading environmental groups and cross-industry global corporations
- the Environmental Defense Fund and FPL Group helped develop a blueprint for
change (us-cap.org/pdf/USCAP_ Blueprint.pdf) that would address the nation's
energy and environmental challenges. We believe that only by capping and
setting a price on carbon can emissions-free energy technologies compete on a
level playing field with fossil fuels.
The American Clean Energy and Security Act is a critical step in the
nation's effort to combat what President Obama has called the "potentially
cataclysmic disaster" of climate change. By capping and pricing emissions,
the bill will harness the power of private markets to develop and deploy
carbon-reduction technologies at the lowest cost. Investors will respond to the
market's demand for clean energy and fund the most promising solutions.
Evidence shows that "cap and trade" systems can work. Applied
to the problem of acid rain in the 1990s, this approach cut pollution faster
and at a lower cost than anyone predicted. Not surprisingly, Gov. Crist's
climate and energy task force unanimously agreed that "a strong national
cap-and-trade program is the preferred method for achieving substantial
reductions in (carbon emissions), and Florida should advocate for a national
program."
The American Clean Energy and Security Act is carefully designed to
protect households and small businesses during the transition to a clean-energy
economy. It provides a portion of the emissions permits "exclusively for
the benefit" of energy consumers through electricity and natural gas
distribution companies. Put another way, the legislation is designed to keep
energy costs down.
Just as important, the bill protects American
competitiveness by providing assistance to manufacturing industries that could
face competition from countries that have not yet capped their own emissions.
Enacting legislation to cap and price carbon is the equivalent of buying
an insurance policy against the worst effects of climate change, such as more
intense hurricanes and droughts. The insurance won't be completely free, but
the costs will be worth it if we can ensure that our children and grandchildren
inherit a habitable world.
The United States has been debating climate change for more than 20
years. It's time for the country to take meaningful action. Every day we delay,
another 18 million tons of CO2 are released into the atmosphere, most of which
will remain there for close to a century. And with every year of inaction, the
carbon reductions needed to deal successfully with climate change become larger
and harder to achieve.
The legislation now before Congress isn't perfect - no bill ever is. But
it is the product of hard-fought compromises and has an advantage that no other
legislation to address climate change has ever enjoyed: It actually has a
chance of becoming law this year. To allow that opportunity to slip away would
be a tragedy for Florida, for the nation and for the planet.
Source: http://www.news-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009907020310