Environmentalists who want strong U.S. action to protect the climate have a lot not to like in the Waxman Markey or ACES bill passed by the House in June and now awaiting action by the Senate. At 900+ pages, the bill is a big target.
Identifying the bill's worst shortcomings is important, so activists can try to have them changed in the Senate version or use them to argue for defeat of the bill if they aren't.
The worst feature of the bill is not that it strips the EPA's newly won authority to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. (This is pretty bad.)
It's not the way permits are handed out free to carbon emitters.
It's not that it creates a market for carbon permits that will let Wall St. in on the action and skim off profits that should go to clean energy.
It's not that it fails to establish a carbon tax, which economists say is a more effective and efficient way to lower emissions.
It's not even that the cap is much too high and is lowered much too slowly over time, not doing nearly enough to prevent the worse effects of climate change.
It's that this cap will also establish a floor below which U.S. greenhouse emissions won't fall. (That is, if I understand the bill correctly, hence the "?" in the title.)
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