Date: 19-May-09
Country: US
Author: Richard Cowan
WASHINGTON - A leading US lawmaker behind efforts to tackle global warming predicted on Monday that his climate change bill will advance this week in the House of Representatives, even as Republicans warned it will ruin the ailing US economy.
Representative Henry Waxman, the Democratic chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, told reporters he believed "We'll have a majority" to move the legislation along after his panel heard opening statements about the 932-page measure.
The committee is expected to spend most of this week arguing details of the bill that aims to put new limits on emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas pollution that is blamed for global warming.
As the House panel began its work, the Obama administration prepared to attack global warming on another front. Sources said the White House would soon unveil a more aggressive timetable for improving automobile fuel efficiency.
"Our economy is suffering, we are squandering billions of dollars to feed our addiction on foreign oil and our environment is overheating," Waxman said, opening a contentious debate in his committee.
With the bill's mandate to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases 17 percent by 2020 from 2005 levels, Waxman said it would help the US economy by creating new high-tech jobs while also averting the ecological disasters some scientists link to global warming.
But Representative Joe Barton, the senior Republican on the committee, warned, "You are about to embark on an episode of putting the entire American economy, which is the world's largest, through an absolute economic wringer."
Barton and other Republicans predict US energy costs would skyrocket under the bill and have prepared hundreds of amendments to try to modify it.
With a 36-23 majority in the committee, Democrats are likely to defeat Republican moves to kill the proposed "cap and trade" system that would be imposed on US companies.
While many US firms support the plan, some are lining up against it. The largest US farm group, the American Farm Bureau Federation, said it opposed the bill, which it said would "increase our operating costs and reduce our competitiveness abroad."
"SIREN SONG OF LOW GAS PRICES"
Under cap and trade, an ever-decreasing number of carbon pollution permits would be available and companies that still lack the technology to meet the lower pollution requirements could buy more permits from companies with extra.
President Barack Obama has put climate control legislation at the top of his agenda and would like to see significant progress by December, when world leaders meet in Copenhagen to mull their next steps on reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
If Waxman is successful this week, other House committees would also review the legislation, which Democratic leaders want passed by the full House by August.
The fight would then shift to the Senate, where a minority of opponents would have an easier time stopping a bill.
Democratic Representative Edward Markey, one of the main authors of the House bill, said lawmakers should seize on the legislation that would encourage the wider use of cleaner alternative fuels such as solar and wind power.
"Do not be fooled by the siren song of low gas prices. Just as we know the American economy will come roaring back, so too do we know that a return to $4 a gallon gasoline looms just over the horizon," Markey told the committee.
Republicans warned that the United States runs the risk of putting stringent new environmental requirements on companies without assurances that major foreign polluters, such as China, will do the same. That, they argue, would hasten the transfer of jobs from the United States to countries with cheaper production costs.
"What good is it for the planet to shift production from here to China?" asked Republican Representative Fred Upton.
December's meeting in Copenhagen is aimed at launching an international pact to succeed the Kyoto Protocol, which gave developing countries such as China wider latitude to emit carbon dioxide than developed countries.
That is one of the reasons the United States, under then-President George W. Bush, did not sign onto Kyoto.
The Obama administration is hoping that post-Kyoto brings progress on pollution controls by developing countries too.
(Additional reporting by John Crawley, editing by Philip Barbara)
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