Global Warming Politics
Panel
10:35 AM Bill McKibben: I tend to lurk more than post, but it's an important part of my life. I know a lot of people in the mainstream media, including David Sanger, Nick Kristof, and Jeffrey Toobin. It's exciting to meet the people here.
The magnitude and pace of climate change are larger than what we would have expected.
We've got to figure out how to get Congress and the White House to move quickly and aggressively.
I wrote a book called End of Nature, so I'm not always the most optimistic person. However, there is a movement starting. If Congress's courage is to be bucked up, there needs to be a movement on the order of the civil rights movement. The mainstream environmental movement was not doing its job. In January of this year, with six students at Middlebury College, we started Step It Up. When we started it with 12 weeks of time and no money, we hoped for 100 demonstrations. Instead, the thing took off in a viral way and there were 1400 demonstrations in all 50 states. Our goal, which people called as overambitious when we began, of 80% by 2050, by eight weeks in, the Edwards campaign joined our goal. Just after Step It Up, Clinton and Obama agreed with it.
Movements by their nature need to keep moving. I'm pre-announcing that we're going to do the next round of these demonstrations on November 3, about a year before the elections. We need not vague promises but serious commitments.
I know there's an aversion to meta-discussions on Daily Kos sometimes. The politics of protest and demonstration are just as important as electoral politics. The next two years are really all the time we have left.
10:48 Inslee Message read by Kit Batten: I'm whipping votes on the energy bill, which will hopefully include a renewable energy standard. The bill should reduce emissions by 20% by 2030. We're pushing a bill that will reduce emissions by 60% by 2050. My book, Apollo's Fire, will come out in the fall. I'm going to spend a few megawatts of energy on impeaching Alberto Gonzales.
10:51 Kit Batten Much has changed in Congress in the last two years, even in the last year. Whereas there was just Lieberman-McCain, now there are four power sector bills, and five general emissions bills. Thanks in large part to Pelosi and Reid, we've moved from talking about whether global warming is real to how to deal with it. We're going to see votes in the Senate and House in the fall. We're hoping for something good for the next President to sign in his first few days of office.
Cap-and-trade is the basis for most of the proposals on the table. Cap-and-trade can be tied directly to the targets we need. Cap-and-trade is tried and true. People are focused on the cost of climate change legislation. I would counter that by saying this is a huge opportunity for developing jobs. We need to make sure there are other issues--environmental and social benefits. We don't want to see just reductions in the power sector. We need, for example, to reduce transportation emissions, CAFE standards, low-carbon fuel standards, and changes in the infrastructure to reduce miles driven.
This is a real opportunity for job growth. We could make sure that this revolution will include those who have been left out in the high-carbon economy.
We need to make sure that the US is resilient against the effects of climate change. Serious money needs to go to communities--more intense hurricanes, droughts, wildfires. I see a continued role for the blogosphere in pushing progressive goals, to remind Congress not to focus just on the the economy.
You can help the American people get involved and interested in the issues. Energize America is amazing.
The messages Senators get from constituents is very important. When I worked there, each week we went over what the top messages were and how we would respond to them.
10:59 Nayak LCV launched The Heat Is On last year to cover the presidential candidates. The next president will shape the future of the world. This election is wide open in a way that hasn't been seen since 1928. The campaign we launched is HeatIsOn.org, with organizers on the ground in the early primary and caucus states. In April Sen. Edwards came out with a comprehensive plan, then Dodd came out with a plan plus a carbon tax, then Richardson's plan stepped up the numbers. The difference between 35 MPG standard and 45 MPG is 2 million barrels of oil a day. We don't need Congressional approval for this. The president could change CAFE standards on January 22, 2009.
80% of our energy use is from fossil fuels. In two generations we have to flip that equation.
Both Kerry and Gore were champions of environmental issues. Even if they had served in office, they would not have been able to take the action we need because they had not built the mandate. We only get one shot at this. We passed the Clean Air Act in the 1970s. It's only been changed once in a serious way in the 30 years. We have to get it right at first. When Roosevelt set up the New Deal, JFK set up the Apollo program, future generations followed those frameworks.
11:08 Roberts Grist is running a series of interviews with all the presidential candidates. We just put Kucinich up a few days ago, in which he compares himself to an eagle. Global warming is a strange sort of issue. The mainstream media seems to be ahead of the netroots on this issue. We want to talk everyone who has a blog part of what touches their hearts. I want to make a few points about the debate and how to change the debate.
- Global warming is getting packaged with energy independence. Republicans want to change the subject; Democrats are perpetually eager to look tough. The proper framing is that energy independence is a side benefit of dealing with global warming.
- Energy independence gives a focus on coal. There's a deep antipathy on the left for Big Oil. I'd like to see equal time given to demonizing Big Coal. Coal is the crucial issue upon which our success or failure turns. We're going to burn up all the oil, but there's a chance we can leave some of the coal in the ground. Big Coal doesn't even employ that many people. Liquid coal: no. We can talk about sequestration if you want.
- When people talk about renewables, it's always talked about as something in the future, which is why we need coal. That's bullshit. The problem is political, not technological. It's moral. In a fair and free market, renewables are already better than the alternative.
- America is not going to do anything until China and India sign on-- that's moral cretinism. We burned up most of the fossil fuels. America needs to lead on this. We're morally obliged. That argument needs to be shouted down and mocked.
11:16 Bill Scher I want to start about blogging about global warming; contact me. Avoiding the greenwash problem. What are the red lines we need to politicians' feet to fire to make the 80% cap real?
McKibben When we do Step It Up Two (Electric Bugaloo?) we're asking politicians to sign the OneSky pledge:
- 80% cuts by 2050.
- 10% cuts in three years. We need hit the ground running.
- No new coal. We're winning on this one.
- Aggressive green jobs campaign. Renewables are here. We don't have the technical basis to even get new insulation. Energize America has the comprehensive list
11:20 Q: Is there are group out there to raise money to support the good candidates on global warming?
Nayak: LCV and Sierra Club are spending money, but there needs to be more.
11:21 Q: Gore presented a ten-point plan. None of the existing candidates have signed on. What are the specific problems with the candidates' plans?
Nayak: I don't know if we're going to find the perfect candidate. Energy is a complex issue. Can we get them committed to the big picture of the scale of the problem and the speed of the solution? Dodd was the only candidate to sign on to Sanders-Boxer six months ago. Now they're all there. Only Dodd, Edwards, and Richardson are signed on to no new coal. Not many candidates talk about energy efficiency. If you asked me a year ago, I never would have thought the candidates would be this far. There's still a long way to go.
11:26 A Siegel: How do we avoid a bad bill?
Roberts: Our goal is solid effective long-term legislation. Congress wants accomplishments. Noone's biting on the wait until 2009 logic. This is a real inflexion point. Now is the time to make big noise.
Batten: I think the proposals we're getting now are much better. Lieberman-Warner can really get us where we need to be. We can't be afraid of advancing the climate legislation process.
11:28 Sierra Club: There needs to be a grassroots push. We need folks out there outside the core environmental movement.
11:30 Dean didn't mention the issue at all in his keynote. What would a Gore entry do to the discussion? What about cap-and-trade vs. carbon tax?
Roberts: Remember Wesley Clark. It would be transformative in many ways, one which would be to make Gore's life a lot worse.
Batten: Congress thinks cap-and-trade is the way to go. Economists like the tax. Cap-and-trade gives you emissions certainty, but cost uncertainty. The tax is the reverse.
McKibben: We're going to have some kind of cap-and-trade system. The auction is important. All of these things work as a tax in one way or another.
Batten: there needs to not be a safety valve which then makes the emissions targets uncertain again.
Roberts: Soundbite: a good cap-and-trade system works like a carbon tax. The important thing is for progressive pressure to be a good cap-and-trade system. Mandatory caps, auction instead of give-away, where do the proceeds go.
Q: Lieberman-Warner?
Roberts: The cost containment proposal in Lieberman-Warner seems very reasonable. It holds to the long-term targets. It gives away credits to big coal. But I was surprised a the lack of awfulness.
Batten: Only 24% of the credits are auctioned. Some are given to states in good ways. I don't think we should be giving as many of these credits for free. In Europe the power sector got free credits and kept the windfall profits.
McKibben Don't get lost in the thicket.
11:39 Jerome A Paris: The progressive values of the positive power of government, tax and spend for public infrastructure: regulation. Push the progressive values of good government, taxes, the common good.
11:40 Climate411: France has a tiny carbon footprint because they're so heavily nuclear.
Nayak Our approach is that nothing has changed with nuclear. Are we going to invest billions of dollars in nuclear, or are we going to spend that money on efficiency and renewables? The wedges approach. To solve the problem we need seven wedges. They came up with 15 possible things. Nuclear to be one wedge we'd have to double the number of the plants in the world. We'd have to build another 100 nuclear power plants, a $300-$400 billion investment. It doesn't make economic sense.
Roberts This is a debate that has gotten into a rut. The two things I would recommend that are underplayed on our side: Let's be agnostic toward nuclear power. If nuclear can pay for its own costs and private capital wants to fund it, then let it happen. Private capital, unlike most governments, is not stupid. It recognizes an economic turkey. Another aspect is water: we have serious problems with freshwater. Nuclear and coal plants use lots and lots and lots of water.