The California legislature has passed several of the twelve bills in its "climate package" and others will be voted on this week. http://focus.senate.ca.gov/... These bills continue California's effort to be a leader in the fight against climate change:
SB 9 Transit and Intercity Rail Capital Program - ensures Cap and Trade funding is invested responsibly in projects that maximize greenhouse gas reductions and meet the goals of AB 32.
SB 32 California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006: emissions limit - sets the overarching climate pollution reduction target for 2050 that will provide California businesses with regulatory certainty, improve public health, and strengthen the economy.
SB 64 California Transportation Plan - reduces greenhouse gas emissions, increases sustainability, and helps prepare the state transportation system to deal with long-term climate change.
SB 185 Investing with Values and Responsibility - divests public pension funds from investments in coal
SB 189 Maximizing Jobs and Economic Growth - supports jobs in solar energy
SB 246 Climate Adaptation - establishes a program to develop and implement mitigation and adaptation plans to ensure a comprehensive approach to California’s overall climate strategy.
SB 350 Golden State Standards - sets the following goals for 2030: 50% reduction in petroleum use; 50% utility power coming from renewable energy; 50% increase in energy efficiency in existing buildings.
SB 367 Agriculture Climate Benefits Act - helps California agriculture reduce greenhouse gas emissions and develop healthy soils that sequester atmospheric carbon.
SB 379 Climate Adaptation - ensures cities and counties are providing for the safety and protection of their communities in the future by including climate adaptation and resiliency strategies as part of the safety elements of their general plans.
SB 398 Green Assistance Program - provides technical assistance to small businesses, small non-profits and disadvantaged communities to access funding for energy efficiency upgrades or projects that lessen the negative health impacts of poor air quality.
SB 758 Atmospheric Rivers - requires study of atmospheric river patterns to increase water supply reliability and flood protection to make more effective use of their patterns as they produce 30 to 50 percent of California’s rain and water supply within a handful of days each year.
SB 788 California Coastal Protection Act of 2015 - ensures that the Coastal Sanctuary Act and Marine Protection act are able to provide their intended protections by repealing outdated sections of the Public Resources Code.
For the text of the bills and how legislators voted, use this link: http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/... In the upper right, put the number of the bill you're interested in.
UPDATE: Gov. Jerry Brown is supporting efforts to pass the key climate bills. He said Wednesday, 9/09, that he wouldn’t let the oil industry block his efforts to reduce greenhouse gases in California.
“Oil has won the skirmish, but they’ve lost the bigger battle,” he said. “Because I am more determined than ever to make our regulatory regime work for the people of California: cleaning up the air, reducing the petroleum and creating the green jobs that are going to put hundreds of thousands of people to work over the coming decades.” http://thinkprogress.org/...
SB 350, amended, passed on Sept. 11 (Henry T. Perea, a leader of the Democratic opposition, voted for SB 350 as amended.)
http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/... SB 32, defeated in the Assembly, will have another vote next session.
http://sd27.senate.ca.gov/... For more details about the power of the oil industry in California and Brown's environmental record, see:
http://www.dailykos.com/...
Other climate bills such as SB 367 did not pass because the legislature could not decide how to allocate cap-and-trade funds among the different proposals. According to the California Climate and Agriculture Network:
California’s 2015 legislative session ended on September 11th with some big disappointments on climate policy. Among the setbacks was a delay in allocating $1.7 billion in cap-and-trade funds for a number of climate change programs, including the Governor’s proposed Healthy Soils Initiative.... SB 367 proposed up to $40 million for farmland conservation and $25 million for on-farm practices that reduce greenhouse gas emissions and sequester carbon. The bill...gained almost unanimous bipartisan votes from both parties at every step of the legislative process, as well as support from environmental and conventional agriculture organizations. However, in the end, the legislature did not move forward on either SB 367 or any of the other bills that allocated cap-and-trade dollars.This is not the end of the effort, however. The legislature will return in January, and climate change will surely be back on the agenda, including future cap-and-trade allocations. http://calclimateag.org/...