By Debra DeHaney-Howard
April 21, 2008

President George W. Bush announced on April 16 a new national goal to stop the growth of U. S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2025 and urged other nations to develop national goals and plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.  During a White House Rose Garden speech, Bush commented on a number of policies his Administration has pursued to address climate change.  He said, “We’ve pursued a series of policies aimed at encouraging the rise of innovative as well as more cost effective clean energy technologies that can help America and developing nations reduce greenhouse gases, reduce our dependence on oil, and keep our economies vibrant and strong for decades to come.”

Speaking to efforts to reach the new emission goal, Bush said, “We will pursue an economy-wide strategy that builds on the solid foundation that we have in place.  To reach our 2025 goal, we’ll need to more rapidly slow the growth of power sector greenhouse gas emissions so they peak within 10 to 15 years, and decline thereafter.  By doing so, we’ll reduce emission levels in the power sector well below where they were projected to be when we first announced our climate strategy in 2002.”

Bush noted that the new emission goals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions could be reached through existing energy policies.  He said, “We worked with Congress to pass energy legislation that specifies a new fuel economy standard of 35 miles per gallon 2020, requires fuel producers to supply at least 36 billion gallons of renewable fuels by 2020 passed by Congress last year, and new efficiency standards for lighting and appliances. Taken together, these landmark actions will prevent billions of metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions from entering the atmosphere.”

Commenting on ways to achieve reductions, Bush said, “There are a number of ways to achieve these reductions, but all responsible approaches depend on accelerating the development and deployment of new technologies.  The wrong way is to raise taxes, duplicate mandates, or demand sudden and drastic emissions cuts that have no chance of being realized and every chance of hurting our economy.”

Notably, the U. S. Senate is expected to debate the Lieberman-Warner “America’s Climate Security Act of 2007” (S. 2191) after Congress returns from its Memorial Day recess. The climate legislation, cosponsored by Senator Joseph I. Lieberman (CT) and Senator John W. Warner (VA), aims to cap greenhouse gas emission from power plants, manufacturers, petroleum refiners and other sectors of the economy and also allow these companies to trade pollution allowances in order to meet the mandatory cap.  Specifically, the bill would reduce emissions by 18 to 25 percent below 2005 levels by 2020, and by 62 to 66 percent by 2050. It also sets up a market-based emissions trading program to help companies meet the cap.