Washington, DC—Today, Energy & Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Energy & Environment Subcommittee Chairman Ed Markey (D-MA) released a draft energy and global warming bill that demonstrates broad support for action on the issue, following President Obama’s call for the legislation. It uses a framework advanced by major U.S. businesses. Federal Global Warming Program Director Emily Figdor issued the following statement in response:
“This is a pragmatic bill that tries to balance a historic opportunity to unleash clean energy in order to rebuild our economy and stop the climate crisis, with the diversity of views on the Energy & Commerce Committee.
“We’re just beginning to pour over the details of the more than 600-page draft bill. But some things are already clear. First and foremost, we applaud the draft bill’s strong clean energy standards that will transform our economy and the strong pollution-reduction requirements that reflect the latest climate science.
“On the flip side, we’re disappointed that the bill includes sky-high levels of carbon offsets, which provide less-certain reductions in emissions, and large subsidies, including funds from ratepayers, for still-unproven carbon capture and storage technology.
“We applaud Chairmen Waxman and Markey for their longstanding leadership on energy and global warming and for their hard work on this draft bill. We look forward to working with the entire committee and the rest of Congress to pass a strong bill that repowers America with clean energy, helps rebuild our economy, and solves global warming.”
