Marco Rubio's political evolution on the environment

Politico Florida ^ | 10/30/2015 | Bruce Ritchie

[JediJones]

As speaker of the Florida House of Representatives in 2008, Marco Rubio helped pass a sweeping energy bill - backed by a number of environmentalists - that seemed to reflect a bipartisan interest in renewable energy, climate change and the environment.

Rubio's positioning on environmental issues has inarguably changed as he evolved from local Republican legislator to high-profile U.S. senator and, now, presidential candidate.

"This nation and ultimately the world is headed for an emissions tax and energy diversification," Rubio told the Legislature. "Those changes will require technological advances that make those measures cost effective. The demand for such advances will create an industry to meet it. Florida should become the Silicon Valley of that industry."

"I'm in favor of them designing it," Rubio said in 2008 of the cap-and-trade program.

Rubio, for his part, had begun to say the 2008 bill had always been designed to kill a cap-and-trade program.

Much of the language in the 2008 energy bill has since been stripped from statute, in bills sponsored by Republicans who have expressed skepticism about climate change.

[tumblindice]

Where do I pay my ‘emissions tax’ for farting in this clown’s general direction?

[beethovenfan]

One more reason I won’t vote for the Rube.

[Lera]

He helped drive up energy cost in Florida .
I can’t stand this guy , I see him as two faced .
He is typical of the politicians from south Florida where tons of extra stuff is added to project that drive up the cost and end up enriching them and their friends.

[palmer]

What happened in Florida, thanks to Rubio's measure, is that people with some land near some manufacturing plant set up solar panels and ran wire to the manufacturing plant, completely bypassing the electric company. That may sound great, free market and all. But the problem is that the plant would simply switch to the grid for those occasions that it needed to. The grid was always there, paid for by the rest of us. The problem is that the grid would have to be provisioned to provide the maximum possible power as if there were no solar at all anywhere. Those plants are expensive and are an unavoidable sunk cost for the rest of us. They need to be utilized so they can be paid down.

The answer is not to ignore or ban solar, but to let the utilities work it into the grid as they can profitably do so. The key is to not let solar shysters and scammers run the show.

[Joe Boucher]

Rubio gained his senate seat on LIES.

[arthurus]

Rubio comes off as a standard out of the box Democrat.