House Cap & Trade BIll
June 26, 2009, will go down as an historic moment in world’s efforts to tackle climate change. For the first time, a Congressional body passed legislation that would place mandatory limits on the emissions of the greenhouse gases that cause global warming. By the barest margin of 219 to 212, the House of Representatives voted for a bill spearheaded by Representatives Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Edward Markey (D-Mass.). If it becomes law, the measure would require a massive switch to cleaner sources of energy over the next four decades. “This is the landmark energy and environmental legislative achievement of a generation,” says Phyllis Cuttino, director of the Pew Environment Group’s U.S. Global Warming Campaign. The legislation itself is enormous. It’s more than a thousand pages long, filled with obscure provisions that will keep an army of lobbyists employed for years. It’s been resoundingly panned both by groups on the left, such as Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace, who see it ...