Obama's Early Days

Obama's Early Days

February 09, 2009

Ken Silverstein
EnergyBiz Insider
Editor-in-Chief

Tough economic times won't obviate the need for new environmental controls. That's the message coming from Washington now that President Obama has taken two critical steps in the battle to combat global warming.

In the early days of his presidency, Obama has pushed aside a previous order by the former administration that prohibited California and 13 other states from enacting tailpipe emissions rules tougher than those imposed by the federal government. Obama has asked his Environmental Protection Agency to review those request for waivers while at the same declaring that the country would issue new fuel efficiency rules.

"President Obama has done more in one week to reduce oil dependence and fight global warming than President Bush did in eight years," says Daniel Weiss, director of climate strategy for the Center for American Progress. "His actions respond to scientists' urgent warnings to reduce global warming pollution now before it's too late. These fuel economy measures come on top of $90 billion of clean energy investments in his economic recovery package."

It's all part of Obama's environmental strategy -- to give science more credence than industry when it comes to developing public policies. The concrete moves are meant to help wean the nation from foreign oil imports and to push it to rely more on domestic sustainable sources. The green movement would then spawn both a cleaner environment and the next generation of jobs.

Since the 1970s, U.S. presidents have said that the country must loosen the Middle Eastern oil cartel's stranglehold. But they have had little success. Oil imports are reported by the Energy Information Administration to have risen from 36 percent during the Nixon administration to 67 percent during the second Bush administration.

In this regard, key scholars that include those involved with the United Nations say that greenhouse gas emissions must be substantially reduced by mid-century. Specifically, they are calling on global greenhouse gas emissions to be cut by 80 percent by 2050 to avert unprecedented heat waves and droughts.

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While it is likely that the 13 states will be given a pass from the current EPA requirements, it is also acknowledged that the waiver would raise car prices and all at a time when auto sales are down 18 percent from 2007 to 2008. That, in turn, would affect job creation. Meanwhile, the president has vowed to write new rules affecting fuel efficiency standards on all cars beginning for 2011 models so as to accelerate a 2007 law requiring such vehicles to get 35 miles to the gallon by 2020.

"A separate waiver for California would lead to a patchwork of greenhouse gas reduction laws when climate change is a global issue and should be addressed on a national level," says Keith McCoy, vice president of energy policy for the National Association of Manufacturers. The feds, he adds, are "currently in the process of setting fuel economy standards that will result in a minimum of a 40 percent increase in fuel economy and a minimum 30 percent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by 2020."

The issue of whether federal or state laws are paramount here is a compelling one. But the central point is that all sides appear to accept steps to curb climate change.

In 2002, California passed its Clean Car law that requires vehicles sold there to release 30 percent less greenhouse gases by 2016 -- a move that the state says will require cars to get 36.8 miles to the gallon by that time. That's a stricter standard than the federal law that passed in 2007. It's all part of a strategy to combat greenhouse gas emissions in cars and light trucks, which are responsible for 16 percent of all those pollutants.

Since 1967, the federal code has allowed federal agencies the power to grant waivers to states seeking to deviate from federal law. Under the previous Bush administration, however, the EPA rejected California's request, saying that the 2007 energy law applies to all 50 states. Specifically, the California Air Resources Board says that its fuel economy standards would cut annual carbon dioxide emissions by more than 32 million tons by 2020. That's compared to the nearly 19 million tons under the new federal law.

California subsequently sued the EPA. The state argued that the U.S. Supreme Court granted the EPA the right to regulate carbon dioxide emissions under the Clean Air Act if such releases are deemed harmful to human health and the environment. California says that the science is settled and that such concerns trump those tied to the auto economy.

California's law will not just regulate tailpipe emissions standards, which are still scheduled to take effect on all 2009 car models. It will also oversee other greenhouse gas emissions that emanate from refrigerants and alternative fuels. The state's goal is to cut such releases by 80 percent by 2050, which is consistent with that of the Obama administration and which is intended to match the demands of the UN scientists.

"For four years, California and a growing number of farsighted states have sought to enforce a common-sense policy to reduce global-warming