California Will Win Its Global Warming Fight
- Craig Noble
- NRDC alum
- Blog | About
- Posted May 22, 2008 in Solving Global Warming
The lead editorial in today’s San Francisco Chronicle reminds me why I’m so proud to be a Californian. The editorial, “A Gust of Fresh Air,” asserts that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s refusal to let California enforce its global warming clean cars law will eventually be reversed. The Chronicle got it right.
The newspaper was commenting on yesterday’s vote by the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, chaired by California Sen. Barbara Boxer, to force the EPA to get out of California’s way. NRDC’s David Doniger told the Chronicle, “The long-term prospects for California to get the green light are good.” You can read Doniger’s statement here.
Under California’s 2002 clean cars law (AB 1493), automakers are supposed to sell vehicles that emit less heat-trapping pollution starting in the 2009 model year. That’s just around the corner. And while it’s been frustrating to see the automakers fight and lose – first in Sacramento and then in the courts – only to get what they wanted from the Bush administration, I’m still optimistic. I truly believe that California will eventually win and that its efforts will be remembered as the turning point in the fight against global warming.
While my colleagues back East have been fighting for nearly eight long years to prevent environmental rollbacks in Washington, we Californians have had the privilege of moving the ball forward. We’ve also shown that we can do it in a bipartisan fashion. The clean cars law was signed by a Democrat, Gov. Gray Davis, and California’s latest, greatest law, The Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 (AB 32), was signed by a Republican, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. In the face of our climate crisis, continued bipartisan cooperation has never been more important.
Today NRDC released a new report that should give pause to all the naysayers who don’t seem to care about rising sea levels, droughts, wildfires, drowning polar bears and children with asthma. The report finds that doing nothing on global warming comes with a huge price tag – $1.9 trillion annually (in today’s dollars) by 2100. That should motivate those who only care about the kind of green that you put in your wallet.
I have no doubt that we will pass national legislation limiting global warming pollution. The question is will we act soon enough? Our best chance right now is the Climate Security Act in the U.S. Senate. The world our children and grandchildren inherit depends on whether our leaders in Washington act now and follow California’s example.
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Comments
Earl Killian — May 23 2008 12:31 AM
California's record on greenhouse gas mitigation is impressive, but lately we've taken a dead-end detour. I hope we soon realize our mistake and make a U-turn.
On the plus side, besides AB32 and AB1493, which you mentioned, there are SB1 and SB107, and a host of smaller items. But the biggest probably dates all the way back to 1974 when Governor Reagan signed the Warren-Alquist bill, which created the California Energy Commission, and eventually led to efficiency standards for new buildings and appliances (Title 24 and Title 20). (Reagan actually vetoed the bill and then reversed himself after the embargo.) Also starting in the 1970s, electric and natural gas rates changed to an inverse tier structure: larger users pay more per unit of energy than smaller users, encouraging efficiency. The CPUC also began to decouple utility profits from revenue in 1978 (Natural Gas) and 1982 (electricity), which has allowed the utilities to use lowest-cost generation to meet new demand, which is often getting their customers to use electricity more efficiently (called negawatts).
But lately California has been pursuing a dead-end strategy: hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. This is not a good sign. When did we go so far astray? FCVs make it 2-4x harder to substitute renewable energy for greenhouse energy, and they destroy far more wildlife habitat. They are a prescription for failure, and yet CARB keeps delaying clean air in California in the hopes that its FCV research program will someday yield results even when the goals of the program are still 2x worse than the alternative it ignores.