Down in the Lone Star State, they like to say that everything is bigger in Texas. I am not sure they were talking about the lies Texas companies like to try and sell the good people of California, but they should have been. In fact, with April 1st just around the corner, it seems that Texas Oil Companies bankrolling the initiative to suspend AB 32 are counting on Californians to be willing to be fooled again (remember what Enron did to Golden State anyone?)
Anti-AB 32 groups first relied on the now completely debunked “Varshney Study” to “prove” that passing this legislation would be the ultimate job killer and lead to skyrocketing consumer costs. But now that the Legislative Analyst's Office has torn the research to shreds, calling it “unreliable” and “essentially useless”, the anti-AB32 force is focusing on some new junk science to stand in as a replacement.
The California Manufacturers and Technology Association (CMTA) is using an oil industry-funded study conducted by the Pacific Research Institute to support its argument of the negative impacts of clean energy legislation. And it's no surprise that CMTA is the voice promoting this study, since the group has already announced its support for “AB 32 Suspension” in a recent press release as well as shelling out big bucks as one of the main sources funding the “AB 32 Implementation Group” (which contrary to the title, is code for the force working to suspend AB 32).
But like we saw with the Varshney Study, just because you paid a scientist to create it doesn't make it true. So before you buy into the “facts”, make sure you are aware of the variables that are manipulating the data behind the scenes:
The oil industry: Valero is a leading member of CMTA, contributing over $500,000 to help suspend AB32. Also, Valero lobbyist Michael Carpenter happens to be one of the board members of the Pacific Research Institute, which has funded the study.
The author of the study Thomas Tanton: consultant to the oil and gas industry and Senior Research Fellow with the Pacific Research institute where a Valero lobbyist sits on his board. He is also a former VP at the Institute for Energy Research (IER), an organization funded by oil and gas interests, which has received over $200,000 of funding from ExxonMobil.
CMTA's VP of Government Relations, Dorothy Rothrock: was an industry energy consultant for years before joining CMTA. From the moment AB 32 was signed into law Rothrock criticized it – even though unemployment was 4.8% at the time – which makes her support for enacting the initiative when unemployment levels reach that low again very doubtful.
Now that this report is in the same trashcan as the Varshney Study, we're sure that another one is on the way. Wouldn't it be better if the oil companies just stood up and said, look, we don't want progress on clean energy because we will lose in billions in dollars in profits? Wouldn't that be more honest? We doubt that will happen but in the meantime, don't be a fool this April.
AB 32 is a proven job creator and will continue to drive innovation and success for California. It's bad news for big oil companies, and we don't need to create a fake study to know that.
So it’s been over a week since Texas oil refiners (and two of California’s worst polluters) Valero and Tesoro ponied up close to $2 million to launch a petition drive to get an initiative on the November ballot to kill AB 32, California’s nation-leading legislation to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels and encourage job creation in the booming green/clean energy and tech industries. Naturally, Valero, Tesoro and assemblyman Dan Logue (R-Chino), one of the initiative’s primary sponsors, are doing their best to keep Texas Big Oil’s involvement in the petition a secret, refusing to confirm or deny that Valero/Tesoro are actually the sole funders of the signature drive and stand to profit from insuring that Californians continue to breath some of the dirtiest, most unhealthy air in the nation.
Unfortunately for them, the secret is out. Supporters of AB 32, the environment and clean energy started a website, NoOnValero.com, to let Californians know that the effort to kill AB 32 is about Big Oil profits, not saving or creating jobs. They also staged a rally in front of a Sacramento Valero station to tell Valero to mind its own business. Below is news coverage of the event, and you can also visit the No On Valero Youtube channel to hear what the protesters think of Valero’s involvement in trying to kill AB 32.
Not to be outdone, the Teabaggers, America’s favorite racists and climate change/evolution deniers, decided to stage their own pro-Valero rally the next week. That’s right, a rally to celebrate the fact that an out-of-state Big Oil company — a member of one of America’s most hated industries after banks and health insurers — is attempting to further corrupt our political system and compromise the health of Californians. Because apparently Teabaggers, who claim to value what they call “freedom”, think it’s better if unelected Texas CEOs of heavy-polluting corporations write California’s anti-pollution laws. Also, someone may want to tell the Teabaggers that Valero’s involvement in the petition is supposed to be, you know, a secret. And I’ll be curious to hear what Valero thinks of getting the support of a group known mostly for racism, unhinged anger, willful ignorance and irrational, apocalyptic conspiracy theories.
Then again, Valero may need all the support it can get. In a shocking turn, one of the leaders pushing for the anti-AB 32 ballot initiative, conservative Dan Costa of People’s Advocate, is now opposing the ballot initiative due to Valero and Tesoro’s involvement and the seediness of keeping it a secret, possibly in violation of state campaign laws. From the Sacramento Bee:
Ted Costa, of People’s Advocate, said he continues to believe in the thrust of the initiative but that the signature-gathering campaign has been “stolen” by big-money interests that have not identified themselves publicly.
“You ruin the whole organization when you go through this kind of muck,” said Costa.
“I wanted to do a grassroots operation and involve a lot of people,” Costa said. “But they believe they can run this thing out of the country club and to hell with the little people of California. If they have half a million dollars, how come they haven’t reported it?” he asked.
Of course, it shouldn’t come as a surprise to Costa that Logue would be hopping in bed with Valero and Big Oil, even if it seems unseemly or illegal. After all, Logue knows who owns him. From California Watch:
Last year alone, the oil and energy industries donated $14,200 to Logue’s campaign coffers, including $2,000 from Valero. Other Logue donors in 2009 include Chevron, Occidental, and the California Independent Petroleum PAC.
So Big Oil buys Logue through campaign contributions to get him elected, then Logue sponsors a ballot initiative to kill legislation that Big Oil is opposed to, then two Big Oil companies provide the funding to gather signatures for the initiative. Could the dots be any easier to connect? The Circle of Oil continues…
And in another surprise, not only are the authors of the thoroughlydebunked Varshney/Tootelian report claiming that implementing AB 32 would lead to massive economic pain refusing to defend their work from the withering criticism it has received, but apparently they don’t think AB 32 is so bad. From the State Hornet:
“We conducted an independent and unbiased study, and certainly support the spirit of AB 32,” [Dennis Tootelian] said in an e-mail. “Our study estimated the costs, and we have no other comment.”
You’d think he’d have something a bit stronger to say after Tootelian’s co-author on the report, Sanjay Varshnay, received criticism like this:
“For a guy [Varshney] who purports to be a professor, this is an embarrassment to himself and an embarrassment to [Sacramento State],” said Chris Thornberg, economist and founding principal of Beacon Economics.
Thornberg said the report committed fatal flaws in basic statistical analysis. The authors used regression analysis, a statistical technique used to test one variable while controlliing for many others. The report looked at state output, but did not control for the number of workers and amount of capital in California.
“The results are so screwy and crazy,” Thornberg said. “It’s so bad that if a freshman student handed this to me, I wouldn’t even give him an ‘F,’ I would call it incomplete and hand it back to them.”
With only a month to get almost 434,000 signatures, the anti-AB 32 petition drive is off to a pretty rocky start. But one thing that’s for sure is that you should never, ever count the republicans out. They never give up and will fight to the end using the dirtiest tactics, the biggest lies and the most outrageous scaremongering imaginable. Plus, the anti-AB 32 movement was handed a gift this week in the form of a new report by California’s Legislative Analyst’s Office claiming that AB 32 will result in short-term job losses, even though the Union of Concerned Scientists pointed out that the report admits that predicting job losses or gains from AB 32 is extremely difficult, provides no independent research to back its claim of overall job losses, and fails to mention the numerousstudies that have found that AB 32 would be a net job creator with little or no impact on small businesses.
With California’s reputation for setting precedents that the rest of the country often follows, you can bet that powerful players are gearing up for a fight that will only grow in intensity as the days tick down until the petition signatures are due on April 16.
Stealthily and without fanfare, a petition has been launched to get a measure on the November ballot suspending AB 32, California’s landmark legislation to limit greenhouse gas emissions and spur green job growth. So who is funding the signature drive? None other than San Antonio-based oil refiners Valero Energy Corp. and Tesoro Corp. — the #7 and #8 biggest polluters in California. From the LA Times:
Two Texas-based refinery giants have pledged as much as $2 million to fund signature gathering for a ballot initiative to suspend California’s landmark global warming law [AB 32], according to Sacramento sources.
The companies, Valero Energy Corp. and Tesoro Corp., own refineries in California that would be forced under the law to slash emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases.
But neither Valero or Tesoro is owning up to it.
A Tesoro spokesman did not respond to inquiries. But the company’s website invites visitors to lobby Congress to ensure “fair” climate legislation and fight any effort by the Environmental Protection Agency to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act.
Bill Day, a Valero spokesman, declined to confirm or deny the company’s involvement, saying that “any contributions would come out in normal disclosures” under California’s campaign laws.
And neither is Dan Logue (R-Marysville), one of the initiative’s main sponsors. From NYTimes:
Dan Logue, the Republican assemblyman behind the suspension, also refused to discuss where funds had originated.
So forget about the astroturf groups claiming the movement to kill AB 32 is a bunch of small local businesses worried about their survival in a tough economy. The mask is off the anti-AB 32 movement, and behind it is exactly what we thought we would find: big oil, big pollution, big corporations and the corporatist Republicans who love them. That’s why Logue, Valero and Tesoro refuse to admit where the money for the ballot initiative is coming from, even if it means possibly violating California Fair Political Practices Committee regulations. The fact that Texas Big Oil is funding an initiative to keep California’s air dirty and kill its burgeoning green economy is a PR nightmare.
So let’s have no more illusions about what the move to kill AB 32 is all about.
Killing AB 32 is not about job creation or lowering unemployment. Valero and Tesoro don’t care about creating jobs or lowering unemployment in a state over 1,000 miles away from them since that won’t increase their profits. If they did care about job creation, they would be supporting AB 32 since California’s clean/green economy is creating jobs at a rate 2.5 times faster than the rest of the economy while attracting billions in venture capital investment, including an announcement this week that Kyocera will be opening a plant in San Diego to manufacture solar modules. Besides, the Varshney/Tootelian report that AB 32 opponents often cite to prove that AB 32 will kill jobs and hurt the economy has been exposed by numerouseconomists, the Union of Concerned Scientists and the California Budget Project as being fatally, almost cartoonishly flawed, with one pair of economists calling it “one of the worst examples of schlock science we’ve ever seen.” Even Sanjay Varshney, one of the report’s co-authors, admitted that the report is “not exhaustive” and now seems to be backing away from its conclusions.
In fact, Valero and Tesoro want California’s air to become even more dirty and dangerous because they profit from pollution. Instead of being ethical and responsible and cleaning up their own mess, they can make even more by “socializing” and externalizing the cost of pollution — making Californians pay for it in the form of taxpayer-funded environmental cleanups, increased medical bills and lost work days stemming from pollution-related illness, and premature death. Tesoro claims it wants “fair” climate legislation when the most “fair” thing they could do is to clean up their own pollution instead of making others deal with it. And while they adamantly oppose any legislation that puts a price on carbon, the truth is that Valero and Tesoro know that carbon already has a price — the extra profits they make by not cleaning up the carbon pollution they generate.
Call Valero at (210) 345-2000 and/or email Tesoro and tell them what you think of what they’re doing. They’ll try to redirect you to a PR firm, but be insistent. And if anything, tell them that you and all of your friends will never, ever buy their gas again.
We’ve already had out-of-state interests stick their nose in to tell Californians who we can marry. Let’s make sure out-of-state Big Oil doesn’t dictate what kind of air we’re forced breath.
The move by republicans and polluters to suspend/kill AB 32, California’s Global Warming Solutions Act that seeks to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and spur green job growth, was dealt a devastating blow on Friday — one of the authors of the much-cited (and much-criticized) Varshney/Tootelian report (VTR), which predicts an economic catastrophe if California implements AB 32, is now backing away from the report’s claims.
Facing yet another round of criticism — this time in a report by Stanford University economist Jim Sweeney that found VTR to be “highly biased…based on poor logic and unsound economic analysis” and overstates the costs of AB 32 “by a factor of at least 10” — Sanjay Varshney has refused to defend his report’s claims. When asked by a reporter for the Sacramento Business Journal to respond to Sweeney’s criticism, Varshney, who is Dean of the Business School at California State University Sacramento, would only say, “I haven’t really kept up with the debate. It will be very difficult for me to comment.” (You need to be a subscriber to see the full article.)
Hardly what you’d call a full-throated defense, or even a boilerplate response about his confidence in both his methods and his conclusions. And Varshney should be well-prepared to address the kind of criticism found in the Stanford report since it echoes criticisms found by other economists, as well as the Union of Concerned Scientists.
The main and most obvious criticism of VTR is that it only looks at the projected costs of implementing AB 32 ($24.9 billion) while purposefully omitting any of the savings that AB 32 would generate ($40.4 billion) — a net savings of $15.5 billion.
It is a methodology that literally makes no sense. How can you account for the cost of buying a more fuel-efficient car, then not account for the money drivers would save at the pump by driving a more fuel-efficient car? How can you include the cost of building a home so it uses no net energy, then not include the savings for a family living in that home who no longer has to pay energy bills? Yet that is exactly what VTR does, a methodology the Stanford report calls “highly biased and has no credibility.”
Virtually all of VTR’s conclusions are based on this decision to look only at costs without savings, which the Stanford report estimates causes the results of VTR to be inaccurate by a factor of ten or greater. The authors of VTR try to justify their methodology by claiming that the estimated savings generated by AB 32 are “too speculative to consider at this time,” an explanation the Stanford report says has “little credibility” since VTR has no problem citing the costs of implementing AB 32, many of which are also speculative. And, as said before, it makes no sense to include the cost of increasing energy efficiency without including the savings from using energy more efficiently. The Stanford report goes on to highlight more errors and flawed methodology used in VTR, like claiming that saving $30/month by driving a new fuel-efficient car amounts to a $30/month increase in gas costs for those who stick with their current cars. It’s no wonder economists Christopher Thornberg and Jon Haveman of Beacon Economics called VTR “one of the worst examples of schlock science we’ve ever seen.”
Yet VTR — for which Varshney and Dennis Tootelian were paid $54,000 by the California Small Business Roundtable — is virtually the only evidence that AB 32 opponents give for their doomsday predictions that AB 32 will ruin California’s economy, cost the state a whopping 1.1 million jobs (more than have been lost as a result of the current recession) and raise consumer prices. Republican Meg Whitman has mentioned its findings as a reason why she has promised to suspend AB 32 if she is elected governor, as has a representative for her republican opponent, Steve Poizner. VTR has also been cited by numerous newspapers, including the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal, who heralded its findings as proof that there would be no “free green lunch” in California if AB 32 is implemented.
The fact that candidates like Poizner and Whitman (along with anti-AB 32 groups like the AB 32 Implementation Group) would put so much stake in a fatally flawed report that makes no secret of its most glaring failure is telling. But what are AB 32 opponents to do now when even one of VTR’s principal authors won’t defend its findings? Will they spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to fund a petition drive calling for the suspension of AB 32 when their main justification for suspending it — the conclusions of the VTR report — no longer applies? And considering the numerous studies that have found that AB 32 would create jobs, position California as a leader in the growing green/clean energy economy, reduce costs for businesses and consumers, and improve the health of Californians while reducing greenhouse gas emissions, what justification can AB 32 opponents give for defending a status quo that enriches the state’s worst polluters?
California has always represented a better future, and we seem more impatient to get there than anyone else. The examples are endless: the settlers risking everything to reinvent themselves on California’s fertile soil, the surfers who decided they’d rather surf the streets on skateboards than wait for waves, to the dotcom boom that created the internet age. When California is ready to lead, it’s best if you get out of the way. Because when California leads, it often benefits the entire country — and sometimes the world.
And California is ready to do it again, with a plan to guide America to a greener, cleaner, more sustainable future, and pull the nation out of the worst recession since the Great Depression. That plan is AB 32 (aka the Global Warming Solutions Act), California’s nation-leading initiative to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (GHGE) to 1990 levels through a mix of energy efficiency, clean/sustainable energy investment and regulations to force California’s polluters to clean up their own messes. In addition to improving the environment and the health of Californians, study after study show that AB 32 will be a major job creator with little or no impact on small businesses. That’s why over 2,400 large and small businesses, many in California, have joined American Businesses for Clean Energy, a diverse coalition calling on Congress to pass clean energy and climate legislation. And with the green/clean economy creating job growth and venture capital investment at a faster rate than the rest of the economy, California could position itself to lead the nation and the world in exportable green technology and solutions, just as it has with computers, software and the internet.
But this is not the first time California has attempted to lead the nation with a pioneering piece of legislation to reduce GHGE. In 1990, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) passed the Zero Emissions Vehicle (ZEV) Mandate. It stated that any large automaker selling cars in California would have to derive at least 10% of its overall sales from cars that produce practically zero emissions — with 2% of the cars producing no emissions at all — by 2003. That meant that unless an automaker wanted to lose the huge California car market, they would have to begin making all-electric vehicles.
A great cry went up from defenders of the status quo — eerily similar to what is happening now with AB 32 — predicting economic doom if the legislation was enacted. “Electric cars with broad consumer appeal are an idea whose time has come and gone, much like eight-track tapes, Betamax, and New Coke,” said Jo Cooper, president of a major auto industry lobbying group. “It’s not that we can’t [build electric cars]. It’s that we don’t think it’s the right thing to do. In financial terms, it’s insane,” said Donn Walker, a regional spokesman for General Motors, adding, “The internal combustion engine is here to stay. It’s what customers want.” Automakers warned that plants would shut down, jobs would be lost and businesses would flee the state. Many claimed that it would be pointless for a single state (albeit the world’s 8th largest economy) to take such an ambitious step on its own — all claims currently being made about AB 32.
While automakers and lobbyists filed lawsuits to derail the mandate, they also quietly prepared to comply with it should their efforts fail. And in the case of General Motors, they succeeded in creating a great electric car called the EV1, which was leased to a few hundred lucky Californians (including celebrities like Tom Hanks and Mel Gibson) who quickly fell in love with it. Because of California’s leadership, it seemed like the automotive future had finally arrived and America could begin the long farewell to smog, dependence on foreign oil and one of the major contributors to global warming.
Then George W. Bush was elected, with an administration full of former oil executives, as well as Andrew Card, the former CEO of the American Automobile Manufacturers Association and GM’s VP of government relations, as chief of staff. The ZEV mandate was killed and GM took back and destroyed every EV1, despite the leasees’ offer to purchase them. This sad tale of potential lost is told in the excellent, must-see documentary Who Killed the Electric Car? See my ReThink Review of WKTEC? below and my post about it here.
California was denied the opportunity to lead the nation into a new generation of auto fuel efficiency. And look what happened.
The auto industry went in the opposite direction, creating gas-guzzling SUVs that actually decreased America’s overall fuel efficiency. Our dependence on foreign oil increased, enriching countries like Saudi Arabia (home of Osama bin Laden and nearly all of the 9/11 hijackers), as well as Iran and Venezuela, handing them hundreds of billions as we fruitlessly rattled our sabers at them. Stratospheric spikes in oil prices coupled with the Bush recession left many SUV drivers unable to even fill their tanks, causing demand for gas guzzlers to seemingly evaporate overnight. With hundreds of thousands of SUVs left on their lots and few fuel-efficient or hybrid cars on their rosters, GM and other American carmakers were decimated, declaring bankruptcy, closing dozens of plants, laying off tens of thousands of workers and shuttering or selling off several of their brands. In the meantime, Toyota, which continued their investments in fuel efficiency with hybrid cars like the Prius, became the world’s number one carmaker for the first time in 77 years. Nissan’s electric car, the Leaf, will be onsale in December 2010. This week, GM announced it would stop making Hummers, the worst gas guzzler and an “automotive pariah”, forever.
If California had been allowed to lead with the ZEV mandate, America could have been selling electric cars in the late 1990s instead of fumbling to get their half-baked hybrids and electric concept cars into showrooms as they are now. GM’s electric vehicles and the pioneering technology they were based on would be sold around the world, saving and creating thousands of jobs in the US while reducing pollution from tailpipe emissions.
AB 32 has the same potential, if not more, as the ZEV mandate. And despite high unemployment and economic uncertainty that would seem to breed timidity, Californians are still prepared to lead, and are, in fact, proud of their reputation for doing so. In a recent poll by Tulchin Research, 79% of Californians said they are proud of the state’s leadership in innovation and technology, with a staggering 96% seeing it as an essential part of the state’s economy and 66% feeling strongly that policymakers should boost the tech sector and encourage innovation to strengthen the state’s economy.
California is ready to lead. It’s in our DNA. Don’t listen to the scaremongers defending the status quo, who have been so disastrously wrong in the past. Just let us do it.
The #1 argument by corporations and politicians who oppose reducing pollution, fighting climate change and moving America to a cleaner, greener, more sustainable future is that doing so will cost the country jobs and hurt the economy. In fact, since many corporations and politicians claim to believe that climate change is a serious issue that must be dealt with (eventually), the “sustainability = job killer” argument is essentially the only one they have.
And it’s a lie — scaremongering from dirty energy companies so they can keep polluting at current levels, protect their unsustainable energy monopoly and maximize their short-term profits. They claim that responsibly cleaning up their own poisonous mess — instead of “socializing” the cost of dealing with it by spewing it into the air or dumping it in our oceans and streams — will force them to raise energy rates. This is a way to blackmail small businesses into defending the status quo and joining their efforts to kill any legislation that promotes efforts to reduce pollution or invest in sustainable energy. But the dirty energy companies are simply fighting to be the last of the dinosaurs, forestalling the inevitable day when they join the fossils that created their fortunes.
The green economy isn’t some untested theory or pie-in-the-sky fantasy — it’s already here, and its kicking butt. So here are some links that show why reducing pollution and embracing sustainable energy and green technology will create jobs and give our economy the boost it needs.
If you think the green economy won’t create jobs, you might want to tell those dirty hippies at the multinational bank HSBC, who found this in a 2009 report:
Global revenues from climate-related businesses such as energy efficiency rose by 75 percent in 2008 to $530 billion and could exceed $2 trillion by 2020, HSBC Global Research estimated on Friday.
In the 2006 Stern Review on the economics of climate change, climate-related revenues were forecast to climb to $500 billion by 2050.
“We can see that this seemingly huge figure has already been surpassed well ahead of time as more and more businesses adapt their business model,” said Joaquim de Lima, global head of quant research for equities at HSBC.
You also might want to tell the Chinese. A January New York Times article found that China’s decision to become the leader in producing solar panels, wind turbines and other renewable energy technologies is paying off:
Renewable energy industries [in China] are adding jobs rapidly, reaching 1.12 million in 2008 and climbing by 100,000 a year, according to the government-backed Chinese Renewable Energy Industries Association.
The Pew Charitable Trusts released a report finding that, despite “a lack of sustained government support”, America’s clean energy economy grew two and a half times faster than overall jobs from 1998 to 2007.
Pew found that jobs in the clean energy economy grew at a national rate of 9.1 percent, while traditional jobs grew by only 3.7 percent between 1998 and 2007. There was a similar pattern at the state level, where job growth in the clean energy economy outperformed overall job growth in 38 states and the District of Columbia during the same period.
A group of economists at Economics for Equity & Environment released a study this week that found that reducing emissions, becoming energy independent through clean energy and embracing the green economy would generate net job growth. The study goes on to debunk many of the myths that say reducing emissions and investing in the green economy would hurt the larger economy. A study by the Union of Concerned Scientists came to the same conclusions about the green economy generating job growth, as did a recent study conducted by UC Berkeley that examined the effects that implementing the Global Warming Solutions Act (AB 32) would have on California’s economy.
But the clean, green gravy train is leaving the station, and if America isn’t careful, we could miss it. Michael Northrop tells us that “the clean energy gold rush” has already begun. However, due to a lack of policies to provide a stable marketplace for green tech investment, we’re letting that $2 trillion slip through our fingers:
Even with growing unemployment, America seems incapable of recognizing a golden opportunity. With no goal or effective policy framework, not only are we shipping oil dollars to the Middle East, we are watching our solar, wind, and other renewable energy dollars begin flowing to Asia. (snip)
Without the economic security of guaranteed purchase contracts, companies will keep relocating overseas. Evergreen Solar, an up-and-coming solar manufacturer in Massachusetts, recently disclosed all of its manufacturing will be based in China.
So don’t let yourself or anyone else be fooled by the dirty energy industry’s lies. They want our heads in the tar sands because relying on fossil fuels makes them money, regardless of what it does to the environment, your health or anything else. And they’re not the only ones. As Thomas Friedman wrote in a NYTimes op-ed this week:
Indeed, I suspect China is quietly laughing at us right now. And Iran, Russia, Venezuela and the whole OPEC gang are high-fiving each other. Nothing better serves their interests than to see Americans becoming confused about climate change, and, therefore, less inclined to move toward clean-tech and, therefore, more certain to remain addicted to oil.
(AB 32 is important for a number of reasons… – promoted by Brian Leubitz)
Imagine if Toyota made this statement:
“It has come to our attention that, due to faulty gas pedals, a small number of our cars have killed or injured a small percentage of our customers. However, to recall and repair our cars to address this problem would simply be too costly, especially in this difficult economy. So we are delaying a recall for one year, after which time we will re-evaluate the economic climate and decide whether conditions are favorable enough to initiate a recall. We ask for your patience and understanding during this time.”
Naturally, there would be a furious uproar. How dare a company attempt to put short-term economic interests ahead of people’s health and safety? Yet this is essentially what the opponents of AB 32, California’s nation-leading environmental legislation that seeks to reduce greenhouse gases in California to 1990 levels by 2020, are asking Californians to do. And since there is ample evidence that AB 32 would actually provide a needed boost to California’s economy without harming small businesses, what AB 32 opponents are attempting to do is arguably worse.
Not wanting to appear pro-pollution or tone deaf to Californians’ concerns about the environment, opponents of AB 32 — like Meg Whitman and dirty energy astroturf front the AB 32 Implementation Group (an especially Orwellian moniker for a group that doesn’t want AB 32 implemented) — claim they are deeply concerned about the state of the environment in California. And they should — Californians breathe some of the worst air in the nation, with 95% of Californians living in areas with unhealthy air. The top four most polluted cities in America when it comes to ozone (the primary ingredient in smog) are in California, with six California cities in the top ten. When it comes to the most polluted cities ranked by particulates in the air, the top three cities are in California, with six in the top ten.
According to the American Lung Association, “numerous studies have linked air pollution to lung cancer, asthma attacks, heart attacks, strokes and early death as well as increased hospitalizations for breathing problems.” There is also growing evidence that air pollution actually causes asthma in otherwise healthy children, whose smaller lungs require kids to breath at a faster rate. In addition, a study by the University of Massachusetts and the University of Southern California found that the effects of air pollution fall disproportionately on poor and minority communities. A report by the NRDC determined that if emissions in California are not reduced to 1990 levels, over 700 Californians will die prematurely in 2020 alone, along with thousands of cases of asthma and other respiratory illnesses aggravated by pollution.
The response by AB 32 opponents? “Sucks to be them.”
Am I exaggerating? Not really. That’s because by acknowledging that air pollution is a serious problem, AB 32 opponents are also acknowledging that the health risks caused by pollution are real and serious. If they want to dispute that, they can take it up with the American Lung Association. That’s a fight I’d like to see, and one AB 32 supporters should make them have.
With the economy polling as the #1 concern of Californians, I understand why AB 32 is largely being looked at through the prism of job creation. And AB 32 supporters should be winning easily on this front — the non-profit Center for Resource Solutions (CRS) found that three reports undertaken by the California Air Resources Board (CARB), University of California researchers and Charles River Associates/Electric Power Research Institute using very conservative estimates were correct in their conclusion that implementing AB 32 would generate robust economic growth. By contrast, CRS found that the report by Varshney and Tootelian that AB 32 opponents use to justify their job-loss scaremongering relies on outdated models and takes the perplexing step of ignoring any possible savings or benefits from adopting AB 32.
However, I worry that the media, striving for “balance”, will conclude that one discredited report somehow cancels out three vetted ones, and Californians who will never read the CRS analysis will conclude the same. So Californians, influenced by gobs of advertising and lobbying money from the dirty energy industry, will probably go with their gut instinct, which will tell them that upgrading and changing things (like cars, computers or TVs) usually costs money, and when you’re in debt (like California is) or worried about losing your job, it makes sense to hold off on new purchases. Besides, it’s easier to be scared of making a bad thing worse (job loss) than of losing something you’ve never seen (the green tech economy). It’s unfair, but there’s a good chance it’ll happen.
That’s why supporters of AB 32 would be wise not to put all their strategic eggs in the job creation basket. Because by acknowledging the health risks caused by air pollution, opponents of AB 32 are essentially confirming one of the best reasons why waiting to implement AB 32, like Toyota delaying a recall, is simply unacceptable.
Today seems to be the big day to make a media blitz of sorts for the plan to repeal AB 32. Take this choice morsel from the Senate Republican caucus in their email “briefing report”:
The term “global warming” has recently shifted to “climate change” (thus allowing the alarmists to blame any change in weather/climate on humans). Few deny that climate change exists; change is a defining characteristic of climate. Whether mankind causes climate change and has the ability to overcome natural forces to stop it is another story. It should be remembered that CO2 is a gas that occurs naturally in the atmosphere. It is exhaled by humans, and is absorbed by trees and plants to produce oxygen, is not toxic and in fact, is essential to life on earth. The growing body of evidence suggests that CO2 impact on climate change is marginal (if there is an impact at all). Additionally, it has been revealed that much of the data to support AGW heretofore has been manipulated, skewed and compromised to support a highly politicized environmental-industrial complex. The scientific “consensus” of AGW does not exist. The state ignores this reality at its own peril.
Except, oh, right consesus does exist. It is called the 2007 IPCC report, a report that surveyed all the literature, a great deal of scientists, and a whole mess of data. To quote the IPCC:
“Most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations.”
The Republicans counter back with some junk science bought and paid for by the oil companies, and just try to muddy up the waters enough so that they can pretend that the consensus is just a bunch of nerdy eggheads who don’t step outside. Meanwhile, the Sacramento Bee has a profile of Asm. Dan Logue, who is shepherding the AB 32 through the initiative process. After they get done with their comparisons of Logue to Peter Falk’s Columbo (the visual similarity is kind of hard to miss), they move on to the thornier issue for Logue: he hasn’t the resources to get this measure off the ground.
But Logue has not yet started gathering signatures and his drive is gasping for money – lots of it. He says he has $600,000 in commitments, but none has been collected, and $1 million more is needed. (SacBee)
Logue is facing a very steep battle here. There are many industry groups opposed to repeal, and the CalChamber has yet to come out either way. But, in terms of money, Logue is going to face the biggest test there. You see, Arnold Schwarzenegger views AB 32 as central to his legacy in California. Repeal would be the complete repudiation of what little big change he has accomplished in the state. You can be sure that Arnold will do his damndest to ensure that no big donors give to this POS.
No doubt that there is a lot of right-wing craziness out there right now. And they are certainly itching for a fight on AB 32, but whether this actually gets on the ballot to be considered, let alone passing, is an open question. Nonetheless, if you care about the climate change issue, the November 2010 election could be critical with or without this repeal. Meg Whitman has already signaled her intention to suspend AB 32 as soon as she gets a chance. The right-wingers have two cracks at the apple here, and only one needs to succeed to set our state back from our position as a leader on the fight against climate change.
Oh, and just as a toss-away in the Logue story, and a fact worth knowing about the man, the Bee mentions one of his big achievements as a Yuba County Supervisor: attracting a Wal-Mart to Marysville. I’m sure the local businesses sincerely appreciated his efforts.
Steve Poizner appeared on the John and Ken show (you know, the heads on a pike guys). He was there to show that he was one with the Tea Party people, and was going to slash and burn through the state government. He spent a lot of time on how he’s slashed the Department of Insurance. He, it’s easy if you just let the insurance companies watch themselves right? Who needs regulators?
Anyway, he was then asked for contrasts between himself and the Meg Whitman. Here’s a transcript of a portion of his response.
STEVE POIZNER: Well you figure her out, because on one hand she tries to come across tough on the environment because she knows she’s on the spot now in the Republican primary, on the other hand, in 2007 and 2008 she gave $300,000 to the Environmental Defense Fund. Now Google the Environmental Defense Fund, they’re suing farmers over the Delta Smelt? You ask her, how can she do that? How can she actually endorse and campaign for Barbara Boxer in 2006? Now, how come she didn’t vote most of her life?
Emphasis mine. Go back and read that again. Poizner is saying that Whitman is “playing” tough on the environment, while he, in fact, really is “tough on the environment.” What does that mean? Has there been anything more terrifying come out of a candidates lips with respect to the environment than this?
Does this mean that Poizner himself will go around kicking down trees and digging holes in the search for oil in state parks? Or will he just allow corporations free reign of the state?
Whatever the meaning, it opens a window into what it would mean to elect either of these candidates. We are not only talking about suspension of AB 32, we’re talking about candidates that are looking for ways that they can crawl over themselves to sell out the environment. It’s not just insulting to environmentalists, it’s downright scary.
Just as Tom Campbell announced he was dropping out of the California governor’s race to run for the United States Senate, one of the two remaining Republican candidates in the race ramped up his attack on California’s Global Warming Solutions Act (AB32).
Steve Poizner-not to be outdone by fellow candidate Meg Whitman’s announcement in fall 2009 that she would suspend AB 32 on her first day in office as governor-put out a press release this week announcing his support for the so-called “jobs” initiative” (actually an outright attack on AB 32) that will appear on the California ballot in November 2010 if anti-environmental forces can gather enough signatures for it to qualify.
Poizner’s and Whitman’s attacks on California’s landmark global warming law have earned them unflattering nicknames from Calbuzz: “Smokestack Steve” and “Monoxide Meg.”
It is increasingly clear that Californians who care about our state’s natural beauty and the health of our communities must mobilize to “Build a Greener Governor” (http://www.greengov2010.org/) before the candidates, including the undeclared Democratic candidate Jerry Brown, take this race to the bottom on the environment any further.
This anti-AB 32 initiative is just the latest chapter in a sustained and coordinated effort to roll back the progress the Golden State has made against global warming and greenhouse gas emissions that threaten our health, our economy and our planet.
As readers of Calitics probably know, a version of the initiative, AB 118 (Logue) was just rejected on Monday by the Assembly Natural Resources Committee.
As Ann Notthoff, California advocacy director of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), described in a piece that appeared this week in the California Progress Report:
“[T]he Assembly Natural Resources Committee rejected AB 118, legislation that would have overturned California’s landmark global warming law that has enjoyed broad bipartisan support. Not only would AB 118 have jeopardized public health and the environment, it would have imposed economic harm at a time when California is already struggling to regain our financial footing…”
“This bill, gutted and amended just this week, was part of a statewide campaign to stymie California’s economic recovery and deny workers the opportunity to benefit from the emerging new energy economy. [Assemblyman Dan] Logue, along with Rep. Tom McClintock and the association founded by Paul Gann, have filed an initiative nearly identical to AB 118 with the California Attorney General’s office with the intention of circulating it for signatures to qualify for the November 2010 general election…”
“Suspension of AB 32, the State’s landmark Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, would cause economic distress and create an uncertain business environment for thousands of California employers who have played by the rules by investing in clean technology, setting up training programs, retooling equipment and taking other actions to reduce greenhouse gas pollution and stimulate the economy.”
Foes of AB 32 will continue to strategize a way to kill it – whether it’s by a governor’s executive order, legislation or a ballot initiative. CLCV and environmental partners are fending off these attacks by joining with our allies in labor, public health, consumer protection, and sustainable/progressive business communities to move our state in the right direction, by building a greener governor, a greener legislature, and a greener California. One easy step each of us can take is visit http://www.greengov2010.org/, sign up as an environmental champion and start adding our voices to the debate.
