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"Cali-Fraud" alert
Posted on 05/28/2007 1:20:21 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
Since he made California the first state to limit greenhouse gases, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has been signing agreements with other governments to address global warming.
He has struck deals with Arizona, Oregon, New Mexico, New York, Utah and Washington. He signed one with the United Kingdom even before the California law came into being. And he's done them with a state in Australia and a province in Canada, where he travels this week to sign two more.
But the Democrats who wrote and passed the global warming bill Schwarzenegger signed into law are hardly celebrating the governor's deal-making.
While they appreciate the attention he is bringing to the issue, they say the splashy memorandums of understanding are distracting from the hard work that must be done to put California's law into place.
Moreover, they worry that the governor is using the agreements to help shift the emphasis of the law from strict regulation toward an emission trading system favored by businesses that could weaken it.
Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez recently warned Schwarzenegger in a letter that his push for a carbon trading market that could include other states and countries was "premature and unnecessary."
"Much of your administration's recent time and attention is singularly focused on establishing a cap-and-trade program," wrote Nunez, D-Los Angeles, referring to a system that would allow businesses to reduce their contributions to global warming by purchasing credits from other firms. "This was not the intent of the Legislature."
Schwarzenegger will sign MOUs this week with Ontario and British Columbia during a three-day visit to Canada that begins Tuesday and includes stops in Toronto, Ottawa and Vancouver. He also will promote California products and tourism with the state's second-largest trading partner.
Discussing ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions will be one of the main topics.
The state's global warming law requires industries, such as utilities, oil and gas refineries and cement manufacturers, to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions over the next 13 years to what they were in 1990.
Scientists say the gases, mostly carbon dioxide, are trapping heat that is melting the polar ice caps and could lead to coastal flooding, drought and other environmental calamities.
While Schwarzenegger acknowledges the dangers, he says companies need flexibility to meet their emissions targets to stay competitive. And he has favored carbon trading markets, like the one being developed in Europe, over the regulatory approach in California's law.
Under a cap-and-trade system, companies that cannot meet their reduction targets would be allowed to buy credits from firms that exceeded their goals.
California's law allows such an approach to be studied, but it says developing regulations to cap emissions takes precedence.
Administration officials say they can develop the new regulations while also fostering future carbon trading markets around the world.
But the state's nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office has raised concerns similar to Nunez's. It advised the Legislature to limit funding to the California Air Resources Board, which is implementing the law, to prevent it from moving too fast toward a carbon trading program at the governor's behest.
Many environmentalists are suspicious of emissions trading, especially if it means companies are buying credits from faraway places where it is hard to know whether actual reductions have taken place.
"It's a little bit like going on a diet and buying calories from other people," said John White, director of the Center for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Technologies. "The question is who is going to start eating less?"
Because no other state has adopted California's emissions caps, the agreements are largely symbolic, and their effects, if any, are years away.
Administration officials acknowledge the MOU's are not legally binding. But they say Schwarzenegger is pushing other states and countries to act on behalf of the environment.
The previous agreement with British Columbia, for example, is part of a collaboration with Oregon and Washington to extend a hydrogen highway from British Columbia to Baja California. Fueling stations would be built along the way, so that by 2010 a hydrogen-powered vehicle could travel that route.
Governments also are agreeing in principle to work on climate emission caps, energy efficiency and greenhouse gas tailpipe emission standards.
"You're getting states to make these commitments they wouldn't otherwise make for the sake of sharing some of the limelight with California," said Dan Skopec, undersecretary for the state Environmental Protection Agency.
But even among environmentalists who generally support what Schwarzenegger is doing, his tactics have created some concern.
"When the Democrats say, 'Hey, governor. Keep your eyes on the prize.' That's important," said Karen Douglas, California legislative director for Environmental Defense.
She said the first order of business must be implementing California's global warming law the way it was written.
"It's our most important job right now," she said.
What a fraud this Warming stuff is! I still remember the global freezing that was going to happen beginning in the mid seventies. By 2001, Toronto was supposed to be under a sheet of ice most of the year.
Whatever happened with that?
Don’t the State Department or Department of Justice have anything to say about a state negotiating & entering into these agreements?
Last I heard, interstate compacts, let alone international, were not allowed without specific authorization by Congress.
Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." -Manuel II Paleologus
State Governments cannot enter into Interstate Commerce agreements nor international treaties. These are areas that are clearly stated in the US Constitution. Unfortunately, the POTUS nor Congress are negligent in their duties under the Articles spelled out by the Constitution.
America is very much asleep.
Click on POGW graphic for full GW rundown
New!!: Dr. John Ray's
GREENIE WATCH
Ping me if you find one I've missed.
I like how drastic action on global warming is urgent despite the uncertainty, but Schwarzenegger's deals are "premature and unnecessary."
I think this GW hysteria is hooey, but this shows that the Dims are more interested in controlling the issue for their own benefit as opposed to some perceived benefit to the world.
The Austrian using his power to undermine the U.S. Constitution - using junk science, no less.
Oh, joy.
In a hundred billion eons,
Or tomorrow, for all we know,
Who will save the Spotted Owl
When our Sun begins its dying-sun glow?
When oceans begin to boil away
What will tree-huggers do?
When all is Gone With the Astral Wind,
The Old Growth as well as the New?
Who will care what happens to
The Whales or Snails who dart.
When Our sun turns white-hot
And blows itself, and us, apart.
So much for the Eko-Freaks’ cause
When all around us float
The Dust of everything that was,
But now is just a mote.
So use and enjoy our Worldly gifts
For Earth’s final fate
Is to be mere cinder bits
Drifting around in frozen space.
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