The US view of climate change has shifted since 1997 - more is needed

The past six years have seen real progress in how we think about climate change and what we are doing to address it. In 1997 the debate on this issue was whether to do anything. There were many, in the scientific, environmental and government communities, saying we had a very serious problem, and others, in industry, in the States, and in the Congress who either didn't believe it was a problem or there was any rush to deal with it.

Now the debate is about what to do and when to do it. Even President Bush had to re-think after he assigned the National Academy of Sciences to look into the matter and they reported: "GHGs are accumulating in Earth's atmosphere as a result of human activities, causing surface air temperatures and subsurface ocean temperatures to rise."

The changes observed are most likely due to human activities. While natural variability may have contributed as well the main point remains; the earth is warming and humans have some responsibility for that warming.

Back in 1997, the nations of the world gathered in Kyoto to establish binding limits on worldwide emissions of greenhouse gases. The Kyoto Protocol was derided by some in the United States as a fantasy, impractical to implement and unfair in that it did not enlist developing countries in this "global" effort.

While some criticisms of the Protocol were and remain well founded, 111 countries have ratified this watershed agreement, and its entry into force only awaits action by Russia. What's more, now the focus has shifted from negotiation to implementation, we are seeing the beginnings of serious discussion about what comes after the first budget period in Kyoto and how to engage developing countries, as well as the United States, in the global effort to reduce emissions.

We also are seeing the countries that are part of Kyoto starting to get serious about achieving its goals. The European Union has adopted a carbon dioxide emission-trading program and Great Britain has committed to a 60 per cent cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

In 1997 the perception was that business adamantly opposed doing anything about climate change. Then things started to change. Lord John Browne, CEO of British Petroleum (BP), announced that his company accepted the science that global warming is caused in large part by the burning of fossil fuels. Browne went on to pledge that BP would voluntarily reduce its global greenhouse gas emissions by 10 per cent below 1990 levels before 2010. It has met that target already, eight years ahead of schedule.

In the six years since making its pledge, BP and 37 other companies have joined in the Pew Center's Business Environmental Leadership Council, which is committed to achieving real progress on this issue. Twenty-three of these companies, BP included, now have specific targets for reducing emissions and several more will announce targets in the coming months.

These companies have moved from acknowledging the science about climate change to showing what can be done to create a climate-friendly future while maintaining our economic competitiveness to becoming advocates for strong government requirements to address this issue.

In 1997, global climate change was not a priority at the state level. Today, a majority of states have programs that, while not necessarily directed at climate change, are achieving real reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

On Capitol Hill in 1997 the only congressional action on this issue came as requirements that the United States do nothing. The Byrd-Hagel resolution, passed unanimously in the Senate, laid out strong reservations about the Kyoto Protocol without offering any alternative. There were other amendments and so-called "riders" to appropriation bills that sought to prohibit the State Department, the EPA and other agencies from doing anything whatsoever.

In 2003, instead of Byrd-Hagel, we now have Byrd-Stevens - a measure establishing a White House office dedicated to formulating a national strategy to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations.

In 1998, Republican Senator John Chafee and Democratic Senator Joe Lieberman were blasted by skeptics for writing legislation that would give companies credit for early reductions of greenhouse gas emissions. Last year, we had Senators Hagel and Voinovich, offering credit for early reductions, and Senators John McCain and Joe Lieberman offering an economy-wide cap and trade bill.

The McCain-Lieberman proposal brings together several features that would be critical to the success of a national climate change strategy. It would establish binding targets for reducing U.S. emissions and provide companies with the flexibility to reduce emissions cost-effectively, thanks to the creation of a nationwide system allowing emissions trading, providing credit for carbon storage and providing additional flexibility to companies taking the lead on this issue.

There are still skeptics and those who prefer to do nothing. Some of these continue to argue that the science is uncertain and that action to deal with climate change will ruin the economy. These individuals are working very hard to see that we do not have a legitimate national policy on this issue.

I do not believe they will prevail. There are many certainties in the science and many actions that can be taken with no negative economic impact. With careful planning, execution, and continued technological development we can address this problem and still have a growing global economy.

The first thing that must happen is for the United States to address how it will supply and use energy. The electric power and transport sectors create over 80 per cent of U.S. emissions, so the extent to which we weigh the climate impacts of our energy choices will determine whether we can and will reduce these emissions.

The current debate on U.S. energy policy is not close to the hard-nosed assessment we need. In this year's House-floor debate congressmen were not even allowed to bring up climate change amendments and the Senate ducked debate on energy and climate policy by simply passing last year's Senate energy bill.

That's not all bad - that Senate bill included the Byrd-Stevens provision as well as a provision establishing national reporting of greenhouse gas emissions. It was also agreed that the McCain-Lieberman proposal will come up for a vote this fall.

In an effort to develop a clearer future energy picture for the United States, the Pew Center recently teamed up with Peter Schwartz and the Global Business Network to convene experts from the business, academic and NGO sectors to envision future energy scenarios and the implications of these for U.S. policy on climate change to 2035.

The group settled on three future energy scenarios:

The first was titled Awash in Oil and Gas. In this oil and gas remain cheap and abundant, production technology continues to improve, OPEC collapses, and a highly competitive global oil market emerges. U.S. oil import dependence is rarely mentioned, there is little incentive to improve energy efficiency, and carbon emissions rise rapidly. Seventy per cent of the coal plants operating in 2000 are still operational in 2035.

In the second scenario, Turbulent World, energy supply disruptions and threats to energy facilities lead to aggressive U.S. energy policy measures. The House of Saud falls, oil price spikes and federal focus is on energy security, including vehicle efficiency standards of 50 miles per gallon by 2020 and a crash program to develop and commercialize hydrogen and fuel cell technologies. Threats to nuclear facilities and transmission failures lead the public and policy makers to prefer alternative energy systems. Because of its domestic abundance, coal is favored, continues its dominant role in electricity generation and becomes an increasingly important source of hydrogen.

The third scenario, Technology Triumphs, envisions a future in which four forces - state policies, technological breakthroughs, private investment and consumer interest - project climate-friendly technologies into the marketplace. Significant advances in renewables, distributed generation, and efficiency result (especially combined heat and power, building-integrated photovoltaics, and fuel cells). Many states adopt greenhouse gas standards for vehicles, move forward with initiatives to control power plants, and implement renewable portfolio standards.

An economic model developed by Argonne National Laboratory was used to project how each of these scenarios would affect the United States' energy technology and CO2 emissions over the next 30 years. It is useful to identify commonalities among the scenarios.

For example, natural gas use and distributed electric generation increase in all three hypothetical futures, continuing current trends. Another commonality is that in 2035 we are still using a lot of today's technology because of inertia in the energy sector.

With national climate policy deliberately excluded from each of these scenarios the most striking finding of the analysis was that emissions rise even with the most optimistic assumptions. In Technology Triumphs, emissions rise by 15 per cent over 2000 levels by 2035; by 20 per cent in Turbulent World, and by 50 per cent in Awash in Oil and Gas.

Each scenario envisions a future in which the only national policy measures are voluntary. The fact that none of these scenarios - even the most optimistic - resulted in any reduction in emissions highlights the fundamental need for a mandatory carbon emissions policy. To state it more clearly, no combination of voluntary programs and research and development incentives will put us on a path that sustains economic growth, enhances economic security, and allows the U.S. to participate appropriately and proportionally in protecting the global climate.

Right now voluntary effort is all we have. Rather than establishing a target for emission reductions - as many of the companies mentioned have done - the Bush administration's climate strategy sets a voluntary "greenhouse gas intensity" target for the nation. The idea is to reduce the ratio of greenhouse emissions to U.S. economic output, or GDP, with a target of an 18 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas intensity by 2012 . This White House target will allow actual emissions to grow by 12 per cent over the same period.

That's not progress. Progress means a real-world domestic energy policy engaging business and society to reduce the U.S. contribution to this problem. It means adopting a clear, mandatory goal for emission cuts, with sensible, business-friendly rules that give companies flexibility to meet the goal cost-effectively. That would be progress and would put the federal government in the company of the many businesses, entire countries and U.S. states that are already addressing this issue.

In 2002, we released a report, Greenhouse and Statehouse: The Evolving State Government Role in Climate Change, that surveyed the current level of state activity and showed that measures which are controversial at federal level, such as renewable portfolio standards and mandatory reporting of emissions, have been implemented at state level with little dissent.

Texas and 13 other states, for example, now require utilities to generate a specified share of their power from renewable sources. Five states have carbon sequestration programs, three have reporting programs for greenhouse gas emissions - two of which are mandatory. In addition, two states have overall caps on their emissions, and one, California, is working on direct controls on emissions from motor vehicles.

Then there is the effort of New York State, under Governor Pataki, to create a regional market in which power plants can buy and sell carbon dioxide credits. To date, nine of ten states contacted by the governor have indicated that they are interested. This work is vitally important, in reducing emissions, in showing that progress is possible and in demonstrating that we can protect the climate and promote economic growth.

As businesses, states, and localities begin to take greenhouse gas emissions seriously and take action to reduce their contribution to the problem they create a climate that is conducive to broader changes at national and international levels.