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Jim Hansen Blames Waxman-Markey Climate Bill for US Failure to Get Necessary Emissions Targets at G-8 Summit
Dr. James Hansen: G-8 Failure Reflects U.S. Failure
on Climate Change
Posted on Alternet July 9, 2009
By Dr. James Hansen, Huffington Post
Jim Hansen is director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, but he writes on this policy-related topic as a private citizen.
It didn’t take long for the counterfeit climate bill known as Waxman-Markey to push back against President Obama’s agenda. As the president was arriving in Italy for his first Group of Eight summit, the New York Times was reporting that efforts to close ranks on global warming between the G-8 and the emerging economies had already tanked:
The world’s major industrial nations and emerging powers failed to agree Wednesday on significant cuts in heat-trapping gases by 2050, unraveling an effort to build a global consensus to fight climate change, according to people following the talks.
Of course, emission targets in 2050 have limited practical meaning — present leaders will be dead or doddering by then — so these differences may be patched up. The important point is that other nations are unlikely to make real concessions on emissions if the United States is not addressing the climate matter seriously.
With a workable climate bill in his pocket, President Obama might have been able to begin building that global consensus in Italy. Instead, it looks as if the delegates from other nations may have done what 219 U.S. House members who voted up Waxman-Markey last month did not: critically read the 1,400-page American…
Click here to read the entire article.
Dr Hansen does a better job with science, where he excels. His frustration is understandable. Simple ideas are attractive, but his policy plan is insufficient to solve the problem. His real effect is clear in the gleeful way which denialist websites promote his statements. He is wrong, the bill is not a failure.
Waxman and Markey aren’t fools and they crafted the best bill they could. Hopefully the Senate strengthens it, but if not it’s strong enough already (plus a Renewable Energy Portfolio, promotion of clean technologies and conservation ) to shift us over to clean energy.