| sourced From |
Flanked by captains of Texas industry, Gov. Rick Perry again lashed out at the federal government on Tuesday for considering limits of carbon dioxide emissions.
At a business round-table organized by the governor’s office at the Capitol, Perry said limits on carbon dioxide, which scientists have linked to global warming, would wreck the state’s economy and raise utility bills for Texans.
“Are the Democrats willing to say we’re fixing to raise everyone’s cost of living in America, on science yet to be solidified?” he said.
Around the table with him were the heads of some state agencies and the leaders of trade associations for manufacturers, businesses, utilities, and oil and gas companies.
In April, the federal Environmental Protection Agency issued a proposed “endangerment finding” for certain greenhouse gases, the first step in the agency’s attempt to regulate emissions under the Clean Air Act, should Congress not pass regulations.
Some Republican state lawmakers have said the state should negotiate with Washington instead of taking an adversarial stance.
Kip Averitt, a Waco Republican and chairman of the Senate Natural Resources Committee, passed legislation this past session that instructs state agencies to work with federal authorities to craft greenhouse gas reporting requirements, which could come along with climate change rules in Washington.
And in a letter to the EPA on Tuesday, Larry Soward, a member of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, wrote: “Unfortunately, Texas has no specific plans or initiatives in place to address climate change issues, or their consequences despite the fact that we are the largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the United States.”
Perry’s chief obstacle to re-election, Republican U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, has taken a similar position on climate change legislation.
The main method Washington lawmakers are considering to regulate the gas “is onerous and misguided, and it will raise energy prices for consumers and adversely impact workers and small businesses during a time of economic hardship,” she said.
This session, the state Legislature passed two study bills tied to global warming, one looking at how businesses and homeowners can save money and cut their greenhouse gas emissions, and another examining how carbon dioxide could be stored underground off the Gulf Coast.
Environmental groups somewhat begrudgingly partnered with the Clean Coal Technology Foundation, which represents some utilities, to pass a bill that provides hundreds of millions of dollars to coal plants that capture and store their carbon emissions.
“We’re not champions of coal, but we’re realists,” said Scott Anderson, a senior policy adviser in the climate and air program at Environmental Defense Fund. “Coal is going to be around for a long time.”
445-3643
Related posts: