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Oil Industry Backs Protests of Emissions Bill
HOUSTON Hard on the heels of the health care protests, another citizen movement seems to have sprung up, this one to oppose Washingtons attempts to tackle climate change. But behind the scenes, an industry with much at stake Big Oil is pulling the strings.
Hundreds of people packed a downtown
theater here on Tuesday for a lunchtime rally that was as much a celebration of oils traditional role in the Texas way of life as it was a political protest against Washingtons energy policies, which many here fear will raise energy prices.
Something we hold dear is in danger, and thats our future, said Bill Bailey, a rodeo announcer and local celebrity, who was the master of ceremonies at the hourlong rally.
The event on Tuesday was organized by a group called Energy Citizens, which is backed by the American Petroleum Institute, the oil industrys main trade group. Many of the people attending the demonstration were employees of oil companies who work in Houston and were bused from their workplaces.
This was the first of a series of about 20 rallies planned for Southern and oil-producing states to organize resistance to proposed legislation that would set a limit on emissions of heat-trapping gases, requiring many companies to buy emission permits. Participants described the system as an energy tax that would undermine the economy of Houston, the nations energy capital.
Mentions of the legislation, which narrowly
passed the House in June, drew boos, but most of the rally was festive. A high school marching band played, hot dogs and hamburgers were served, a video featuring the country star Trace Adkins was shown, and hundreds of people wore yellow T-shirts with slogans like Create American Jobs Dont Export Them and Ill Pass on $4 Gas.
The buoyant atmosphere belied the billions of dollars at stake for the petroleum industry. Since the House passed the bill, oil executives have repeatedly complained that their industry would incur sharply higher costs, while federal subsidies would flow to coal-fired utilities and renewable energy programs.
Its just a sense of outrage and disappointment with the bill passed by the House, said James T. Hackett, chief executive of Anadarko Petroleum, who attended the rally. He defended, as an environmental measure, the use of buses financed by oil companies and Energy Citizens to carry employees to the rally. If we all drove in cars, it wouldnt look good, he said.
While polls show that a majority of Americans support efforts to tackle climate change, opposition to the climate bill from energy-intensive industries has become more vigorous in recent weeks. The Senate is expected to consider its own version of the bill at the end of September.
A public relations firm hired by a pro-coal industry group, the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, recently sent at least 58 letters opposing new climate laws to members of Congress. An investigation by the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming found that a total of 13 letters sent by the firm, Bonner & Associates, were forgeries. The committee is currently investigating another 45 letters to determine whether they are fakes. The letters purported to be from groups like the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and Hispanic organizations.
Bonner & Associates has acknowledged
the forgeries, blaming them on a temporary employee who was subsequently fired. The coal coalition has apologized for the fake letters and said it was cooperating with an investigation of the matter by a Congressional committee.
For its part, the oil industry plans to raise the pressure in coming weeks through its public rallies so that it can negotiate more favorable terms in the Senate than it got in the House. The strategy was outlined by the American Petroleum Institute in a memorandum sent to its members, which include Exxon Mobil, Chevron and ConocoPhillips. The memorandum, not meant for the public, was obtained by the environmental group Greenpeace last week.
Its a clear political hit campaign, said Kert Davies, the research director at Greenpeace.
In the memorandum, the president and chief executive of the American Petroleum Institute, Jack N. Gerard, said that the aim of the rallies was to send a loud message to the Senate. He said the rallies should focus on higher energy costs and jobs. Its important that our views be heard, Mr. Gerard wrote.
Cathy Landry, a spokeswoman for the American Petroleum Institute, confirmed the contents of the memorandum, but said that the rally was not strictly an institute event and that Energy Citizens included other organizations representing farm and other business interests.
The House bill seeks to reduce greenhouse gases in the United States by 83 percent by 2050 through a mechanism known as cap
and trade, which would create carbon permits that could be bought and sold. President Obama initially wanted these permits to be entirely auctioned off, so that
all industries would be on the same footing, but the sponsors of the bill agreed to hand out 85 percent of the permits free to ensure passage of the legislation.
The power sector, which accounts
for about a third of the nations emissions, got 35.5 percent of the free allowances. Petroleum refiners, meanwhile, got 2.25 percent of these allowances, although the transportation sector accounts for about 40 percent of emissions. That means oil companies would have to buy many of their permits on the open market, and they contend that they would have to raise gasoline prices to do so.
But Daniel J. Weiss, a senior fellow
at the Center for American Progress, a research and advocacy organization, said that refiners would be allowed to keep the value of the free allowances they received, while public utilities would be required to return the value of their permits to customers.
There is a myth out there that this is a giveaway to utilities, Mr. Weiss said. Its not true. The oil industrys goal is to block or weaken efforts to tackle global warming.
The rallies have opened a rift within the industry. Royal Dutch Shell, an initial supporter of climate legislation, said that it had told the institute that it would not participate in the rallies, although its employees would be free to attend if they wanted to. ConocoPhillips, meanwhile, has opposed the bill since its passage and, in a note on its Web site, encouraged employees to attend the rallies.
Since Mr. Obamas election, the oil industry has lost some clout in Washington. The rally on Tuesday gave voice to the feeling among employees of oil companies that their industry
was being battered.
I experienced Carters war against the industry, and Im tired of being pushed around, said David H. Leland, a geological map maker for NFR Energy. We provide a product for a reasonable price, and were going to be punished for doing a damn good job.
Clifford Krauss reported from Houston, and Jad Mouawad from New York
The 2012 NWO Agenda 10/10 ~ Warning America!!!!!
http://obamaclimatechange.com/
http://www.poodwaddle.com/clocks!!!!!
by CommonDreams.org
In a stunning blow to mountaintop removal blasting operations in the Coal River Valley of West Virginia this morning, two fearless protesters scaled massive trees and unfurled banners from their 80-foot-high platforms. Within 300 feet of the Massey Energy's Edwight mountaintop removal blasting site, above Pettry Bottom and Peachtree
in Raleigh County, West Virginia, the protesters called on the federal agencies to crack down on the scandal-ridden West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (WV DEP) and the stop the unsafe and reckless blasting in the area.
As part of a growing coalfield uprising, this dauntless action has brought the gripping images and realities of the mountaintop removal nightmare in the Appalachian coalfields to the Beltway-bound offices of the EPA, the Council on Environmental Quality and the transitioning Office of Surface Mining.
Mired in scandal, the WV DEP
has been the focus of a series of protests, complaints and growing internal dissent recently. Outraged coalfield residents and protesters even changed themselves to the DEP offices in Charleston, WV this month : http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-biggers/breaking-coalfield-uprisi_b_256415.html
Last Friday, Charleston Gazette
reporter Ken Ward broke the story on a blockbuster internal memo from a WV DEP biologist that criticized the agency head Randy Huffman for his gross oversight over the long-lasting adverse impacts of mountaintop removal mining that are indeed significant.
See: http://blogs.wvgazette.com/coaltattoo/2009/08/21/wvdep-dissent-biologist-says-huffman-wrong-on-mtr/
As the 13th direct action in
the coalfields this year, today's daring protest raises the stakes in the coalfield uprising, as residents called on federal regulators to respond to the failed state agency's lack of enforcement and its blatant circumvention of regulations, as millions pounds of ammonium nitrate/fuel oil explosives continue to blast every day in the lush mountain communities in West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee and southwestern Virginia.
I am sitting in this tree to halt the blasting that endangers the residents of Pettry Bottom and Clays Branch, protester Laura Steepleton said. The people of Pettry Bottom, Clays Branch are living below a land slide waiting to happen and the only barrier between fallen trees, mud, boulders and water and the Pettry Bottom community is a wooden stake and tarp fence. The DEP needs to step in and protect its citizens - not Massey Energy - stop the blasting above Petty Bottom, and end mountaintop removal.
Associated with the Climate Ground
Zero and Mountain Justice campaigns, the tree sitters say they will not willingly descend until blasting ceases above Pettry Bottom, Massey Energy pays the full cost of healthcare and home repair for Pettry Bottom and Peachtree residents, and the Federal Office of Surface Mining commits to supervising the full reclamation of the Edwight mine.
Here's a shot of what flyrock can do to a house in the blasting area:
Last month, Clay's Branch area resident Bo Webb wrote former Vice President Al Gore an urgent letter to intervene in the Coal River Valley. Webb described the nightmare of living in a blasting area and recounted how federal violations have been skirted by state environmental regulators, who openly sought to work around federal regulations:
As you know, the Obama administration recently announced a series of regulatory initiatives to strengthen oversight and regulation, minimize adverse environmental consequences of mountaintop coal mining. While I have great admiration for President Barack Obama, energy advisor Carol Browner, and his new EPA administrator Lisa Jackson and CEQ chief Nancy Sutley, the reality is that their regulations can easily be avoided through loopholes.
While federal regulators were able to temporarily halt blasting above my home, I recently learned from the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection that the green light has been given to renew the blasting closer to the coal seam, in an area that is even closer to our Clay's Branch homes.
The rest of Webb's letter is here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-biggers/urgent-july-4th-declarati_b_224864.html
Here's a video of the blasting near Clay's Branch and its shower of flyrock, silica dust and heavy metals on area residents:
As the top source of information in the coalfields, Ken Ward's Coal Tattoo's blog has been packed with WVDEP news lately, including a recent OSM report that scolded the embarrassing state agency's lackluster enforcement of blasting and flyrock regulations:
Here's an example from the report: The OSM found:
Due to the significant danger of flyrock, it is recommended that in all cases, OEB institute the cessation of blasting activity in the area where flyrock originates and
adjacent areas until an investigation is completed an prescribed changes are implemented by the company to ensure there is a reasonable expectation that flyrock will not occur again from the same cause.
WVDEP's response to that recommendation?
OEB does not feel it is necessary to issue an [imminent harm cessation order] or cease blasting on all flyrock cases. It is the inspector's call as to whether or not the individual incident warrants an IHCO. However, OEB will take multiple incidents into consideration in determining if blasting should cease.
As one of the most devastating blows to Gov. Joe Manchin's embarrassing WV DEP chief Randy Huffman, WV DEP biologist Doug Wood's internal memo last week pointed out the destructive and long-term impacts of mountaintop removal:
We know have clear evidence that in some streams that drain mountaintop coal quarry valley fills, the
entire order Ephemeroptera (mayflies) has been extirpated, not just certain genera of this order. We also have evidence that some streams no longer support the order Plecoptera (stoneflies). Some genera of stoneflies are particularly sensitive to high total dissolved solids just as some mayfly genera are.
So, in streams below valley fills where stoneflies have survived, that order's diversity has been diminished. There are other genera and species of other orders of benthic macroinvertegrates that have been negatively impacted by streams draining mountaintop coal quarries, not just a few genus [sic] {Note --the sic is Woods correcting Huffman's choice of words} of mayflies
The loss of an order of insects from a stream is taxonomically equivalent to the loss of all primates (including humans) from a given area. The loss of two insect orders is taxonomically equivalent to killing all primates and all rodents through toxic chemicals.
For updates on today's action,
go to:
http://climategroundzero.net/
Here's a video of today's action:
Jeff Biggers is the author
of The United States of Appalachia [1], and the forthcoming, Reckoning at Eagle Creek: The Secret Legacy of Coal in the Heartland (The Nation/Basic Books).
Article printed from www.CommonDreams.org
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/may/01/q-and-a-copenhagen-summit/
http://www.repoweramerica.org/
Obama’s Green Dream Team
The men and women who have the power and budgets to clean up the environment and, more important, have the ear of the president.During the first seven months of the Obama presidency, the administration charted
a new course for a green economy. It approved a stimulus package with roughly $50 billion for renewable energy and environmental projects while devoting other funds to everything from Cash for Clunkers to improving energy efficiency in the homes of Native Americans. So, who is behind the White House's environmental efforts?
The League of Conservation Voters calls them President Obama's "Green Dream
Team": Carol Browner, the White House climate czar; Lisa Jackson, the EPA administrator; Ken Salazar, U.S. secretary of the interior; and Steven Chu, U.S. secretary of energy. These men and women have the ear of the president, as well as the power, budget, and commitment to right what many environmentalists see as the wrongdoing of the Bush administration. This fall they will try to pass landmark climate-change legislation in the Senate; approve and oversee countless projects
funded with stimulus money and push for international standards for carbon emissions at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. They've been lauded by green advocates and lobbyists and pilloried by Republicans and moderate Democrats (particularly from states where industries such as coal still dominate). Whatever your feelings may be about their agenda, one thing is certain: they've only just begun.
Carol Browner keeps the lowest public profile of the foursome but arguably has attracted the most criticism. She's the first-ever White House czar on climate
change, a position that some conservatives say is too vaguely defined. Yet, she's hardly new to Washington. She served as the EPA administrator under President Clinton, worked as Sen. Al Gore's legislative director, and remains close to John Podesta, President Clinton's former chief of staff who ran the Obama transition team. Originally, she supported Hillary Clinton's bid for the Democratic nomination. But thanks to Podesta, she ended up on Obama's original tight-knit transition team and never left that fold.
She has always been viewed as a staunch environmentalist who once called President George W. Bush the "worst environmental administrator ever". Critics argue this makes her a poor ambassador to Republicans and moderates in Congress. This question of whether Browner can build consensus will be crucial in the coming months. She's the administration's go-to arm twister: the person who wooed House members and counted votes to narrowly pass the climate-change bill on June 26 in the House, 219 to 212. Her goal is to get multiple federal agencies working together, rather than independently of each other—which has historically been the case in D.C. One success story so far is how Browner helped to broker a partnership between the EPA and Department of Transportation to
come up with new fuel-efficiency standards that will require cars made in 2012 and beyond to ultimately get at least 35.5 miles per gallon. And, in the fall, all eyes will be on her to push the climate-change legislation through the Senate: a topic she didn't want to broach on the record. Through a White House spokesman, Browner said in an e-mail: "As we continue our dialogue with the Senate, we are confident that most senators share the president's goal of providing clean
energy incentives that will wean the U.S. off of our dependence on foreign oil by transforming our energy economy."
Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar is another Washington insider, who spent four years in the Senate representing Colorado. Salazar originally raised his national profile by working with Republicans on the immigration bill, but he's studied energy and environmental policy for years. He's also worked as Colorado's attorney general and as the director of the Colorado Department of Natural Resources. Still, he's not a total tree-hugger; his family background in farming and ranching gives him some street cred in those industries.
Salazar speaks in a low-key, friendly style—an attitude that can belie the
complexity of some of his initiatives, such as renewable-energy projects, particularly solar. His agency hopes to set aside tracts of public land in Nevada, Arizona, California, and Wyoming for solar energy facilities. "On the renewable-energy front, I don't think there's much more that we could be doing," he says.
Salazar arrived at the sprawling Department of Interior, in part, because he grew up in the West (an informal prerequisite for past secretaries). His appointment initially bothered some environmentalists who questioned what they saw as his close ties to the ranching and mining industry. But heading up an agency that has a $17.2 billion budget and that oversees 500 million acres of land isn't a job that everyone wants—particularly since the department historically has been fraught with scandals.
Like Salazar, Lisa Jackson oversees a huge, complex agency at the EPA. Her reputation was built on her ability to navigate bureaucracies as well as her pragmatic and direct attitude. She worked for the EPA for 16 years in both Washington and New York before taking a post in the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, where she eventually rose to commissioner. There, she was known for setting up standards to reduce the state's greenhouse—gas emissions (a foreshadowing of the fuel efficiency standards that her agency and the Department of Transportation worked on this spring). Some environmentalists in New Jersey, though, were critical of the way she oversaw the state's constellation of Superfund sites, arguing that she was too close to the industries and companies that caused the pollution. So far, as the EPA administrator, she's received praise for diplomatically and strategically tackling problems from fuel efficiency to stricter rules surrounding the protection of endangered animals. Moving forward, she says the EPA will need to spend an "awful lot of time" monitoring the spending of the stimulus money. "If states don't spend the money, we'll move it," she says.
Secretary of Energy Chu was President Obama's wildcard pick—the first Nobel prize-winner in physics to occupy the top energy slot. Chu is a passionate scientist who views global warming as the most pressing concern of the day, but he admits that he's no bureaucrat. Early on, he ran into trouble when he talked off-the-cuff about OPEC production and oil prices without, he says, fully understanding the issue. Even now he's not the master schmoozer, but he has the respect of the country's scientific community who is grateful to have one of their own in office.
In the coming years, Chu will oversee the $39 billion that the stimulus has added to his department's budget. Even if he's not the one personally lobbying senators to support the climate-change bill, Chu loves to talk about global warming. He can't help himself. "We have door No. 1 and door No. 2," he says. "We're going to save the planet, or we're going to wish things were the way they were."
This eclectic group—with all of their expertise in science, energy policy, and advocacy—still can't be shielded from the skepticism and quandaries that will inevitably arise over the next three and half years. Among the challenges: when Congress returns from its August recess, it will deal with a mountain of competing agendas including passing health-care reform. It's possible that one of the president's key projects, the climate-change bill, could morph into an overlooked stepchild, as many conservatives hope it will become. "They had to pay off everybody to get it out of the House," says Myron Ebell, director of energy and global warming policy at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank. "There's negative momentum coming out of that."
If the Senate does not pass the bill, its death could have a domino effect, and slow movement on global environmental policy. It will be hard to negotiate carbon-emission standards at the December meeting in Denmark if the U.S. government can't pass stricter policies on its own turf. "Copenhagen will either be a milestone or a tombstone," says William Antholis, managing director of the Brookings Institution.
Members of the cabinet admit to feeling the heat. They all want to pass the bill, but they also need to work on conservation projects and push the economy in the direction of green technology. Already, there's pressure to act faster. Much of the stimulus still hasn't been doled out, and those green jobs? Well, there's money for them but the actual jobs don't yet exist. And, of course, there's doling out of the stimulus money. "They need to ensure the stimulus money is well spent," says William Reilly, a former EPA administrator under President George H.W. Bush. "It'll be very challenging to get the funds out responsibly in the time frame that they promised—and make sure there are no embarrassments a year or two down the road."
This is a huge to-do list for a crew that took office less than a year ago and who are still hiring their staffs. Even fans say they may have expected too much, too soon. "I think they're doing pretty well," says Eileen Claussen, president of the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. "But then again, I've been around D.C. for a long time." And, it's only time that will be the true measure of their success. The question now: can they sustain the political capital, goodwill, and momentum of these first several months?
Century's Environmental Leaders!!!!!
http://www.guardian.co.uk//the-age-of-stupid-documentary
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