House poised to take up climate bill today

WASHINGTON - The House could vote today on a measure to cap U.S. greenhouse-gas emissions, with Democratic leaders predicting a tight victory for a behemoth bill that has grown more complex with each compromise.

The heart of the bill, which runs to 1,201 pages, is a plan to reduce emissions 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020. To do that, it would create a "cap-and-trade" system, in which polluters would be required to accrue buyable, sellable credits for all the greenhouse gases they produce.

But the bill also contains a highly complex system of caveats, safety valves and rule changes meant to satisfy unhappy Democrats. The result is sweeping legislation that could transform the U.S. energy industry - and allow both Wall Street and the Iowa corn belt to build a side business in carbon.

Democratic leaders said yesterday that they had gathered enough votes to win passage of the bill, which could be voted on today or tomorrow.

"Well, you never know until you take the vote, but we are making progress, and I'm very pleased," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) told reporters.

Democratic leaders scurried to line up enough votes, and enlisted former Vice President Al Gore, the country's most prominent voice on the urgency of addressing climate change, to make phone calls to wary lawmakers. Yet they said the vote could still be delayed by a backup of floor action or by worries they did not have enough votes.

But any talk of confidence is a sign of a remarkable turnabout for Democrats.

Since this bill passed the House Energy and Commerce Committee last month, they have been bogged down in a feud between coastal liberals, who supported a hard cap, and the Rust Belt and farm states. Those representatives were worried the bill would add a crushing new cost to electric power and gasoline.

They worked out a compromise this week, the second time that Democratic leaders have given ground on the bill. The legislation now gives some emissions credits free to rural electric cooperatives, so they can sell them and use the money to cushion consumers.

And it gives the U.S. Department of Agriculture, not the Environmental Protection Agency, oversight over a key program. That would allow farmers to sell "offsets" for carbon dioxide that their crops soak up from the air or for reducing greenhouse gases from animal waste.

Yesterday, President Obama pushed for passage in a speech from the White House Rose Garden. Though he mentioned the threat of global warming, he mostly emphasized non-environmental benefits, such as new jobs in clean energy and reduced reliance on foreign oil.

"The energy bill before the house will finally create a set of incentives that will spark a clean-energy transformation of our economy," he said. "Make no mistake: this is a jobs bill."

Democrats still expect a large number of their number to oppose the legislation, but with 256 members of their caucus, they ca spare almost 40 defections and still pass the bill. A few environmental groups have said the bill is now fatally flawed, but most still seem to support the bill, though with hopes that it might become more stringent in the Senate.

Republicans and some business interests have said the bill would add huge new costs to the economy and drive jobs to countries where emissions are still unregulated and free. The GOP byword for the bill has been "cap and tax."

Recent government reports have played down the bill's cost: an EPA study said it might cost an average family between $80 and $111 a year. The Congressional Budget Office's estimate was $175 per household.

But Keith McCoy, of the National Association of Manufacturers, said his group opposes the bill because so much is still unknown about how it would actually work.

The House is considering legislation that would:

Reduce greenhouse gases 17 percent by 2020

and 83 percent by 2050 through a cap-and-trade program that allows pollution permits to be bought and sold.

Limit emissions from major industrial sources. Control carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels and limit six other greenhouse gases.

Require electric utilities to produce at least 12 percent of their power from renewable sources such as wind and solar energy by 2020.

Impose tighter standards on new coal-fired power plants and provide $1 billion a year for capturing carbon dioxide from such plants.

Establish standards requiring new buildings to be 30 percent more energy-efficient by 2012 and 50 percent more efficient by 2016.

Protect consumers from rising energy costs by giving rebates and credits to low-income households.

- Associated Press

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