LOS ANGELES: California is all set to enact the strictest state law in the United States to limit greenhouse gas emissions and probably spur the reluctant federal lawmakers in Washington to follow suit.
The state's governor, Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger, and leaders of the Democrat-controlled legislature have reached an agreement on the details of a bill, which is now expected to be passed by the Senate and Assembly, before the legislature session ends at midnight Thursday.
Schwarzenegger, who has been at loggerheads with president George Bush in matters relating to the environment, described the agreement as historic and hoped it will help California to become a world leader in reducing carbon emissions. The success of the system will be an example for other states and nations to follow as the fight against climate change continues, he said in a statement.
While the final version of the bill, called the Global Warming Solutions Act, is not yet made public, sources said the legislation will force the state's heavy industry, electric utilities and refineries to cut greenhouse gas emissions by about 25 per cent by 2020, which in turn will return the emissions to the 1990 levels. The companies would be allowed to trade emission allowances in the market, as is done in the U.S. with regard to sulfur dioxide.
Schwarzenegger said he had secured word from the legislative leaders that they would be flexible in changing the program if it adversely impacts the state economically.
According to environmentalists, the United States is the world's largest producer of the heat-trapping gases that are commonly linked to changes in weather like violent hurricanes and rising sea levels. The country has withdrawn from the 160-nation Kyoto Protocol to cut greenhouse gas emissions in 2001, saying the curbs will adversely affect the its economy and that the protocol had unfairly excluded developing countries like China.
Policy experts said the California law could have major impact on Washington's environmental policy. Many feel the companies appear to be ahead of politicians on global warming and are in favor of a national framework on reducing emissions rather than a spate of state regulations.
Schwarzenegger ensured that the legislation includes a market-based system that will eventually give companies tools to meet emissions targets, like carbon credit trading.
The legislation empowers the California Air Resources Board, which enforces the state's air pollution controls, to determine how much industry groups contribute to global warming pollution, to assign emission targets and to set non-compliance penalties. It sets out a two-year time frame, until 2009, to establish how the system will operate and then allows three years, until 2012, for the industries to start their cutbacks. The first major controls are expected to begin in that year.
Governors of New York, New Jersey, Delaware and four New England states had signed an agreement to curb power plant emissions, cutting them by 10 per cent by 2019.
Business captains are not united on this issue. While several leading venture capitalists from Silicon Valley have openly supported the measure, saying it will create new industries and new jobs, California's Chamber of Commerce is opposing it, saying that law will prompt an exodus of industry to other states without greenhouse-gas controls even as the state will be incapacitated in attracting new ventures from outside the states.
California Assembly speaker, Fabian Nunez, Democrat of Los Angeles, and Assemblywoman Fran Pavley, a leading sponsor of the legislation, addressed a conference and said, "We feel that California has always been a leader in protecting the environment."
Nunez said the state has moved it to the next level and that everyone would want to see California carbon free.
