Sep
23
Written by:
Mark Lavergne
9/23/2009 2:16 PM
The Public Utility Commisison's summit on federal Cap and Trade legislation continued yesterday. The Cap and Trade bill, HR 2454, would put a nationwide cap on emissions, require companies to trade CO2 "credits" for the right to emit, and set goals every few years for reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, including 83 percent by 2050. Here are some more highlights from the summit:
Karen Campbell with the Heritage Foundation, a conservative Washington-based think tank, said the 1000-plus-page bill would increase compliance costs, and drive up electricity bills and gasoline prices, and result in the loss of trillions of dollars in gross state and gross domestic products. She argued that economic liberty would allow the private sector to invest more resources in emissions-reducing innovation than would a command-and-control approach from Washington.
Kathleen Hartnett White, former commissioner at the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, gave an overview of the five titles in the 1,427-page bill, the third title of which is the cap-and-trade portion. The fourth title, "Transitioning to a Clean Energy Economy," amounts to an admission on the part of the bill's authors that it will reduce the number of jobs, requiring even more government intervention to help those who will lose their jobs to get back on their feet.
Jim Greenwood with Valero Energy pointed out that an 83 percent reduction in CO2 output by 2050 would mean that each person would have to produce no more than about two tons of CO2 per year. Even in colonial times, he observed, in a horse-drawn economy, the per person CO2 yearly output exceeded that.
He and other energy representatives said that it would simply be irresponsible to expand or move forward with new fossil-fuel projects until the specter of heavy Washington regulations had dissipated.
On the less doom-and-gloomy side, Prof. Michael Webber of the University of Texas said that while the bill would constrain Texas' fossil fuel resources, the state is also awash in natural gas, solar, and wind, and could "sell those at a handsome price, too." He said natural gas is particularly good for Texas.
But others pointed out that natural gas is one area of the energy sector left in the cold by the bill, getting almost no CO2 credits.
The biggest benefit for Texas in the bill is the section calling for carbon capture and sequestration, of which Texas has been at the forefront and in which it can take a leading role going forward, Webber said.
Webber and others, including Tom "Smittee" Smith of Public Citizen, argued that while the future costs of Cap and Trade may be considerable, the future costs of doing nothing to combat global warming would be far worse.
Also of note: Barbara Budde of the Catholic Diocese of Austin cautioned that the higher electric rates will hit poorer families, who seek assistance from charitable organizations like Catholic Charities, the hardest. The Austin American Statesman published an op-ed Sept. 18 from Msgr. Michael Mulvey, the diocesan administrator (on an interim basis until the diocese receives a new bishop), to that effect.