For your car’s global warming performance, check the sticker

By Jim Motavalli

In a measure previously taken only in CA that provides a model for the entire nation, CT will now require cars sold in the state to display a window label disclosing how much global warming gas (primarily carbon dioxide, or CO2) they emit. It’s a measure we may see echoed soon in other states that follow CA emission laws, including PA and MA.

For most Americans, the connection between auto exhaust and climate change is not an exact science. Contrary to popular belief (and a point confounding even some of the seasoned politicians at the signing ceremony), CO2 is not simply another tailpipe pollutant that can be cut to near nothing by installing a better catalytic converter. Instead, CO2 emissions are closely tied to fuel economy, so the only way to reduce them is to build more fuel-efficient vehicles. And that’s what sent automakers to court when CA regulators required them to reduce their climate impact. The carmakers say in their suit that the CA law amounts to illegal state regulation of fuel economy.

So it’s safe to say that some of the gas-guzzling Expeditions and Excursions that formed the backdrop of Rell’s ceremony at a Norwalk Ford dealership will be getting fairly alarming climate scores (though the company’s 30-mpg Escape Hybrid, also on display, should acquit itself nicely).

State Senator Bill Finch (D-Bridgeport), one of many politicians “bowled over” by Al Gore’s film An Inconvenient Truth, said greenhouse gas regulation is essential if we’re going to avoid “palm trees in Wyoming.” And Rell added, “It’s the right thing for CT.”

The Northeast generally, and CT in particular, has fairly bad air quality, with many counties in non-compliance with EPA standards. That’s why I found it amusing to have a car salesman tell me last week how fortunate we are in this part of the world to have avoided CA’s polluted skies. “It’s all the trees we have,” he said confidently. In fact, our bad air is what persuaded state legislators from ME to NY to embrace CA’s emission laws, which are some of the most stringent in the world.

Unfortunately, even though fuel economy has moved to the top of customers’ concerns when buying a new car, tailpipe emissions and greenhouse gas scores remain way, way off their radar screens. Sales people tell me that customers rarely, if ever, ask about emissions performance.

The CT stickers won’t be seen until the 2009 model year, by which time there will be few global warming skeptics left. The forward-thinking state law also sets up a state fund dedicated to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, funded by a $5 fee applied to vehicle sales and leases.

We don’t have to wait until 2009 to do something about global warming. We can all do our parts to counter rising sea levels, melting glaciers, threatened biodiversity and sharply more intense storms. And we can start by making smart decisions on the dealer lots. With $3-a-gallon gas, who could justify buying a gas guzzler anyway?

Words Fail Us

Hummer propaganda aimed at kids through McDonald's Happy Meals

The New York Times, Melanie Warner, 10 Aug 2006

Sometimes a story comes along that so perfectly captures a culture's pathologies that it should be put in a time capsule, so future generations ... oh, right, there won't be any future generations. It seems that, according to fast-food behemoth McDonald's, this is a "Hummer of a Summer." A new series of TV and radio ads depict happy families on their way to fatten their children and clog their arteries at McDonald's in GM's gas-guzzling Hummer. When they arrive, soon-to-be-obese boys can choose from eight different toy Hummers with their Happy Meal (happily, girls can learn their proper gender roles from Polly Pocket fashion dolls). Charlie Miller of Environmental Defense thinks it's kind of a bummer of a summer: "Anything that sends a message to kids that these are the cool vehicles to buy is the wrong message." At today's prices, it costs about $96 to fill up the gas tank of a Hummer H2 -- but don't worry, a double cheeseburger's only a buck.

Pacific Coast Dead Zones Linked to Global Warming

August 3, 2006 by Roddy Scheer

In the latest bad news related to human-induced climate change, scientists last week reported bottom fish and crabs washing up dead on Oregon beaches are the latest victims of global warming, which is reportedly causing oxygen-deprived "dead zones" along a 70-mile stretch of Oregon's Pacific coast. Marine ecologists attribute these dead zones to increasingly explosive blooms of tiny plants called phytoplankton that die and sink to the ocean floor, where they are then eaten by bacteria that consume the oxygen in the water column. The recurring phytoplankton blooms, which scientists first noticed off the coast of Oregon in 2002, are caused by increasingly strong north winds--a symptom of climate change--that result in massive cyclical upwellings of sea water.

"We are seeing wild swings from year to year in the timing and duration of the winds that are favorable for upwelling," says Jane Lubchenco, a marine ecologist at Oregon State University. "This increased variability in the winds is consistent with what we would expect under climate change."

Unlike localized dead zones that are attributed to agricultural run-off and other forms of pollution in Washington State's Hood Canal and Louisiana's Mississippi River Delta, the coastal Oregon dead zones mirror similar circumstances witnessed recently off the coasts of Namibia and South Africa in the Atlantic and Peru in the Pacific. These cases join the litany of evidence pointing to the increased environmental impact of climate change across the globe.

Source: http://enn.com/today.html?id=10948

It's Like Rain on Your Wedding Day

New Arctic Refuge drilling bill would spend proceeds on alt-energy

The recurring nightmare of drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is back, but with a new twist: proceeds would support alternative energy. Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) introduced a bill last week to open 2,000 acres of the refuge to oil drilling. Backers of the legislation estimate that in coming decades, refuge development could bring in up to $40 billion in revenue -- all of which would go toward providing tax credits for solar power, cellulosic (not corn) ethanol, and coal-to-liquid fuel technologies. The legislation is co-sponsored by drill-obsessed Rep. Richard Pombo (R-Calif.), and also has support from two of California's Democratic representatives. Historically, Arctic Refuge drilling bills have passed the House and been shot down in the Senate. Nunes thinks his new bill has a better chance -- "There are a lot of Democratic senators over there that have a lot of ethanol interests in their state," he said -- but it's still considered a long shot.