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[greenyes] OUTSIDE BUSH ADMINISTRATION, REPUBLICAN SUPPORT GROWS FOR ACTION ON GLOBAL WARMING
- Subject: [greenyes] OUTSIDE BUSH ADMINISTRATION, REPUBLICAN SUPPORT GROWS FOR ACTION ON GLOBAL WARMING
- From: "Peter Anderson" <anderson@no.address>
- Date: Wed, 23 Feb 2005 11:10:56 -0600
WALL STREET JOURNAL
POLITICS AND POLICY
Senators Warm Up to Emissions Curbs Key Republicans Ease Opposition As
Suspected Climate Change Causes Damage in Alaska
By JOHN J. FIALKA
February 22, 2005
WASHINGTON - Republican opposition to "greenhouse gas" curbs is slowly
easing, as concerns mount over damage from climate change.
In Alaska, where severe storms, flooding and permafrost melting have caused
widespread damage, the two Republican senators say they are willing to
reconsider carbon-dioxide regulation after voting against it two years ago.
Sen. Ted Stevens, in an interview this week, said he is now willing to
discuss ways to reduce man-made emissions if they can be shown to be
contributing to the damage. He didn't rule out the possibility of switching
his position to favor the bill -- reintroduced last week by Sens. John
McCain, the Arizona Republican, and Joseph Lieberman, the Connecticut
Democrat -- that would require industry to reduce emissions to 2000 levels
by the year 2010.
"This is an issue of conscience more than anything else," Mr. Stevens said,
referring to the damage in Alaska. "It's the most difficult challenge I feel
as a senator from my state."
Alaska's junior senator, Lisa Murkowski, expressed similar sentiments in a
separate interview. "I need to be sensitive that there are changes going on
right now," she said. "If that change is due in part to what man is
contributing to the atmosphere, I think it would be prudent to look at."
Even if the two senators switch sides, the bill's prospects remain
uncertain. Many politicians aren't sure to what extent man-made carbon
dioxide is contributing to climate change, and some scientists dispute the
link between industrial activity and global warming. Experts, executives and
policy makers also argue that the economic costs of regulating
carbon-dioxide emissions could well exceed the environmental benefits.
And the Senate has turned more Republican and more antiregulation since the
chamber rejected the McCain-Lieberman bill by a vote of 55-43 in 2003. So
far, President Bush is opposed to regulation, and the House appears poised
to follow the administration's lead.
Yet a change in the Alaska delegation would mark a turning point in the
long-running debate, in which the U.S. remains at odds with most other
industrialized nations. The U.S. has so far refused to join 140 nations in
ratifying the emission-limiting Kyoto Protocol, which took effect Wednesday.
Beyond the Alaska delegation, other Republican senators are lining up to
support measures that would cut carbon-dioxide emissions -- though many
favor incentives rather than mandates.
One influential Republican working to reposition himself is Nebraska Sen.
Chuck Hagel. In 1997 he helped lay the political groundwork for U.S.
rejection of the Kyoto Protocol when he co-wrote a Senate resolution that
said the U.S. should join only if China and other large developing nations
took part. The Senate approved the resolution 95-0.
This week, Mr. Hagel -- widely seen as a 2008 presidential candidate --
introduced three bills that would provide tax benefits and government-backed
loans to U.S. companies that export or invest in equipment to reduce
carbon-dioxide emissions.
One of Mr. Hagel's co-sponsors is Sen. Lamar Alexander, a Tennessee
Republican. "I'm willing to invest a lot of money if it makes sense to do
it," he said. Mr. Alexander said he isn't ready to support Mr. McCain's
bill, but he thinks the U.S. must move "more aggressively" to promote new
technology -- including coal gasification, which removes carbon dioxide, and
nuclear-power plants, which don't emit greenhouse gases. "The No. 1 issue in
my area is clean air," Mr. Alexander said, referring to power-plant
pollution, which increasingly clouds the views in Tennessee's Great Smoky
Mountains National Park.
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_________________________
Peter Anderson, President
RECYCLEWORLDS CONSULTING
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