Unleash the Future

Renewable Energy to Renew America

Posted: 05-Nov-2008; Updated: 07-Nov-2008

CAMPAIGN MEMORANDUM

TO: Environmental Defense Fund Members and Activists

FR: Fred Krupp, President

RE: Our Strategy for Enacting National and International Global Warming Pollution Caps

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The consequences of global warming are potentially devastating, but they are not inevitable.

For decades, Environmental Defense Fund has been a leader at both the national and international level, bringing together diverse partners such as major corporations, government agencies, farmers and advocates for the poor to develop innovative solutions to avert this crisis.

But if our efforts are to be truly effective, we must secure a global cap on greenhouse gas pollution that guarantees a reduction in emissions. Ultimately, all that matters is the number of tons of global warming pollution released into our atmosphere.

Without a worldwide mechanism to ensure needed reductions, the effects of climate change will continue to encroach upon us.

There is reason for optimism, however, provided we act quickly.

The new administration and Congress present us with the greatest opportunity we have ever had to enact effective climate legislation here at home and strike a global compact to reduce emissions worldwide.

Here are the exciting initiatives we will be embarking on as we begin transitioning to a new president and preparing for the international climate conference in Copenhagen, Denmark, in December 2009.

As a member of EDF, I hope you realize how vital our work is to ending the climate crisis and I urge you to remain steadfast in your support as we seek to solve the greatest of all environmental challenges.

National Action: Capping America’s Global Warming Pollution

Environmental Defense Fund has played a significant role in shaping U.S. environmental policy for four decades. In 1990, President George H.W. Bush adopted our emissions trading plan to cut by half the sulfur dioxide pollution that contributed to acid rain. The Economist called our cap-and-trade approach the "greatest green success story of the past decade."

Today, after decades of public education and years of painstaking groundwork, America stands poised to pass what could well be the environmental legislation of our lifetime: a cap-and-trade system to drastically reduce global warming pollution.

While the politics of passing such a law remain complex and formidable, we will begin 2009 with four crucial advantages:

1. A new president will take office with a pledge to support comprehensive climate legislation. President-elect Obama supports a cap-and-trade system and will be far more receptive to our agenda than the previous administration.
    
2. With more than 50 Senators on record in favor of an emissions cap, the Senate will begin deliberations from a strong starting point.
    
3. New legislation is in the works in the House, and 2009 may begin with a draft bill backed by a strong commitment from House leadership.
    
4. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) can regulate greenhouse gas emissions as a pollutant. That means that if Congress fails to act immediately, the new president can compel EPA to act—which, in turn, will encourage Congress to take action.

With these pieces in place, and with lessons learned from the 2008 Climate Security Act showdown in the Senate, Environmental Defense Fund is well positioned to be a leader in passing effective climate legislation next year. Of course, success is far from assured and will be hard-won.

The economy, health care, the war in Iraq and rising energy costs will almost certainly dominate the new president’s agenda. Therefore, our immediate task will be to help Congress, the president and key players in the executive branch—including at EPA and the Departments of Commerce, Transportation, Treasury, Energy and Agriculture—understand that the climate crisis cannot be overlooked, and that an emissions cap is the only way to solve it.

We are already preparing for this vital task. We are reaching out to people who will serve on President-elect Obama’s transition team, showing them how climate action can be part of their larger energy, national security and economic solutions by breaking our nation’s dependence on foreign oil and sparking a boom in the production and distribution of clean energy that will create millions of jobs in the United States.

Thanks to your committed support, Environmental Defense Fund is also keeping the pressure on Congress by continuing our media, lobbying and field organizing to strengthen our call for bipartisan climate action. The 27 companies of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership (USCAP), including GE, DuPont and PepsiCo, are maintaining their call for congressional action to slash our nation’s global warming pollution.

Perhaps most importantly, we are preparing to debunk and neutralize arguments made by special interests that are determined to keep America dependent on dirty fossil fuels. As I write, some 700 lobbyists for the petrochemical and other polluting industries are spending huge sums to spread bogus claims that global warming isn’t happening or, if it is, it "may be beneficial" to people.

What is most worrisome is that they are sowing fears that a cap on global warming pollution would cost American jobs and wreck our economy. For example, the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association offered commentary on a strong climate bill that came before the Senate earlier this year: "Simply put, this bill puts our country's economy at stake and may have little or no environmental benefit."

Additionally, as pressure builds on EPA to implement the Supreme Court's decision affirming the agency's right to regulate carbon emissions under the Clean Air Act, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a strong opponent of climate action, is sounding the alarm and even arguing that Congress should curtail EPA's powers.

At a time when Congress, especially the House, is sensitive to consumer worries about the economy and energy prices, you can imagine the impact this is having.

While we cannot match these special interests in spending, with the help of our most generous and committed supporters, Environmental Defense Fund will leverage our reputation as a leader in climate science and a recognized bipartisan player on Capitol Hill to educate lawmakers on the real facts and solutions to the climate crisis.

Enacting a hard cap on global warming pollution next year is, by necessity, our highest priority. None of us can afford to wait any longer—and we may never have a better opportunity. This is also the single most important reason for you to invest in Environmental Defense Fund once more at the exceptionally generous level you have in the past.

International Action: Copenhagen—The Global Deal

As we help to craft and pass strong legislation in the United States, we are also focused on efforts aimed at a new global agreement in Copenhagen in December 2009. By coordinating our domestic and international work, we can build U.S. action into a larger global framework and create a global deal that ensures the health of our planet for generations to come.

Environmental Defense Fund has been a leader in the international climate treaty talks since their inception. The Kyoto Treaty incorporates policies and language that we formulated. Indeed, a centerpiece of the current global agreement is the cap-and-trade approach that we developed when working with the Clinton administration on the 1997 proposal for the Kyoto talks.

Cap-and-trade was the grand bargain reached in Kyoto—but that agreement did not deal with a number of issues that are now crucial to solving the climate crisis, such as emissions from deforestation and the participation of major developing countries (including China, which has overtaken the United States as the world’s largest annual emitter of global warming pollution).

Our legal and economic experts have developed programs to address each of these critical gaps. We already have strong relationships with key partners in the nations that must play a key role in defeating global warming in the years to come—including Brazil, China, India, and elsewhere.

Brazil has the capacity to substantially affect the speed of global warming because nearly 20% of greenhouse gases are released from deforestation. Research shows that if the current rate of deforestation in Brazil and Indonesia alone were to remain the same through 2012, the emissions from this deforestation would offset nearly 80% of the emission reductions gained worldwide from the Kyoto Protocol.

Reducing deforestation emissions may be the single quickest way to substantially reduce global warming pollution. But those reductions will only happen with the right incentives.

Working with Brazilian partners, Environmental Defense Fund has pioneered a market-based approach to reducing deforestation, a policy that is getting a lot of attention in the talks leading up to Copenhagen. Our team is also working with other rainforest nations, large and small, to help them participate in a global trading system and give them powerful economic incentives to reduce deforestation.

China's global warming pollution has grown as quickly as its economy, and millions of viewers of the summer Olympic games learned that Beijing's air pollution had many athletes worried it would impact their performance. But China is not indifferent to its responsibilities, and is taking significant steps to address its challenges.

In 2005, China enacted the world's strictest fuel-efficiency and emissions standards for vehicles—too tough for 96% of America's SUVs. And in January of 2005, China's Ministry of Environmental Protection halted 30 large infrastructure projects, valued at $14 billion, for failing to address environmental impacts. This was followed by a national investigation of pollutants discharged into waterways in 2006 and by a crackdown in 2007 on permitting new plants with high emissions or energy consumption.  These are strong indicators that China could be an important ally in solving the climate crisis.

For more than a decade, our team in Beijing has worked with Chinese officials on pollution reduction programs such as a cap-and-trade system for sulfur dioxide and enhanced enforcement tools for regulators. Recently, we partnered with several provinces to develop and promote new techniques to help farmers improve their crop yield, cut their global warming pollution and become eligible for revenue from the sale of avoided carbon emissions.

India is another key player, where Environmental Defense Fund has a nascent presence. Until now, India—like China—has had limited participation in the global emissions market. Given their high economic growth, it is essential that they do more.  Our goal is to help developing nations create the monitoring, verification and enforcement systems they will need to join a global carbon market, and to provide the right market incentives for their full and prompt participation.

As a new U.S. president takes his place at the table, our team will work to bring the United States and the European Union closer together on international climate policy. There are still significant differences of position, and the coming months will be critical to resolving them. As the clock ticks, it becomes ever more crucial that Americans and Europeans work together to forge a strong agreement. In fact, the success of the global talks in Copenhagen may well depend upon it.

Other Players

Environmental Defense Fund's commitment to solving the climate puzzle relies greatly on our national and international efforts—but just as global warming is very complex, so is the necessary response, and there are many players not yet mentioned who will be critical to successful climate action. Three in particular deserve at least a brief consideration within the confines of this memo.

• State Efforts:
  

  Environmental Defense Fund is working with the state of California to aid in effective implementation of the historic Global Warming Solutions Act (AB32) signed into law by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2006. The law will reduce greenhouse gas emissions 25% by 2020, pioneering the first-ever economy-wide cap on greenhouse gas pollution. We must get the implementation right, because California’s success will accelerate national legislation and provide a model for global treaty negotiations. We also are working in New Jersey on that state’s version of AB32 and are seeking similar legislation in other states and regions.

  And we are helping to support several inter-state efforts to cap and reduce regional global warming pollution including the West Coast Governors Global Warming Initiative (between California, Oregon and Washington), the Western Climate Initiative (which includes seven U.S. states and four Canadian provinces) and the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (between Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York and Vermont.

• Corporate Alliances:

  Environmental Defense Fund is proud to work with a diverse group of corporate partners to promote cleaner, greener business practices across all sectors of our economy. Recently, we formed a first-of-its-kind partnership with fleet management giant PHH Arval to create PHH Green Fleet.

  Corporate fleets operate over nine million cars and light trucks in the United States, and nearly half of them are leased from fleet management companies. These fleet vehicles are driven an average of 25,000 miles per year—nearly double the mileage, fuel consumption and corresponding emissions of personal vehicles.

  Through PHH Green Fleet, Environmental Defense Fund is helping PHH clients—including one-third of Fortune 500 companies—identify ways to reduce fuel consumption, costs and greenhouse gas emissions. And our efforts are delivering results. Fleets that have fully implemented the program have reduced their emissions by an average of 14 percent, and reduced lifecycle operating costs by 4 percent. We are sharing across the fleet industry the best practices we developed to achieve these emission reductions. As a result, all of PHH's major competitors are creating greenhouse gas programs based on our model.

  
• EDF Membership Support:

  The enthusiastic support of our most committed members provides us with the resources we need to pursue each opportunity … and to create opportunities where none existed in the past. Considering the complexity of the global warming challenge—given the difficult marriage of science and politics that must be made to form a lasting solution—the presence of determined and generous supporters like you cannot be undervalued.

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For more than two decades, Environmental Defense Fund has advanced the science of global warming and led national and international efforts to address it. We know that at its heart, the science of climate change is unforgiving: At the end of the day, politics and intentions are nothing compared to the total number of tons of greenhouse gases that go into the atmosphere. Solving global warming is about guaranteeing a reduction in global emissions.

This can only be achieved with a strict cap on emissions that is lowered over time. By supporting the cap with market incentives, such as a cap-and-trade system, governments can ensure that greenhouse gas reductions will be achieved at the lowest cost and with the greatest stimulus for technological innovation—but these systems must be established immediately.

In the next year, the United States will have a new president, and the Copenhagen conference will establish our future for years to come. We don’t have a single moment to waste as we move ahead to protect the health of our planet—and ourselves.