Climate change policy may be at fork in US: Think-tank

Washington (Platts)--5Nov2004

Climate change policy in the United States, according to a Washington
think-tank discussion Friday, may be at a fork in the road following the
re-election of an administration that has opposed regulation of carbon
dioxide. The administration may face a choice of balkanization among the
states or a national policy encouraged by industry seeking regulatory
certainty, according to Andrew Keeler of Ohio State University and the John
Glenn Institute for Public Service & Public Policy. 

Tuesday's results make it "far less likely [the country will] have a national
climate change policy," said Keeler. "The elections give much more impetus to
a state policy." But he noted the "red" or Republican voting states were
almost entirely without a greenhouse gas policy while the "blue" or
Democratic-leaning states, predominately in the Northeast and the West Coast,
were putting programs in place to control industry emissions.

There is some concern that development of unilateral policies will create a
barrier to getting a national policy, Keeler said, but if industry has to deal
with individual carbon controls it may pressure the federal government to
adopt a national climate policy. "State programs will put pressure on the
federal government to make it look at it seriously," said Keeler, noting that
industry may see the next four years as an advantageous time to formulate a
national policy with an administration adverse to strict carbon controls.
"Industry doesn't want to deal with balkanization," he said.

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