Bond: Climate change legislation slams farmers
Sen. Bond
WASHINGTON — It’s barely news any more when Sen. Christopher “Kit” Bond, R-Mo., aims a broadside at anti-global warming legislation given his adopted role as one of Congress’s most persistent critics.
Nor is there much new in the deepening regional rivalry over climate change legislation pitting the Midwest and South against the East and West.
But Bond plowed some different ground this morning at the opening of Senate Environment and Public Works Committee hearings when he zeroed in on what he regards as dangers to the business of farming posed by the newest version of the legislation, sponsored by Sens. John Kerry of Massachusetts and Barbara Boxer of California.
For one thing, Kerry-Boxer, unlike House-passed legislation, does not include a five-year moratorium on the Environmental Protection Agency figuring the damage to the environment globally from the production of biofuels in the United States.
Problems occur when, for instance, carbon-rich forests are destroyed in Brazil or perhaps Malaysia in response to the growing global demand for biofuels or to increase food production to make up for diversions of food crops to energy.
Farm states fought successfully in the House to delay the so-called indirect land-use rule, used to calculate green house emissions when determining whether ethanol and biodiesel qualify for the many benefits of being categorized as a renewable fuel. But the Senate bill wasn’t so lenient with agriculture.
Responding later to Bond, Frank O’Donnell, president of the Clean Air Watch advocacy group in Washington, said: Sen. Bond wants to create an alternate reality in which land-clearing has no impact on climate change. If he has his way, it could get mighty hot.”
Bond also expressed dismay at seeing the EPA — and not the Agriculture Department – charged with running a program potentially important to farmers. The so-called offsets program allows farmers to score valuable credits in cutting carbon pollution by planting trees or taking other pro-environment actions. But the ag industry wanted the farmer-friendly Agriculture Department rather than the EPA to oversee the program.
Bond asserted that the climate change bill would take lands out of production, “and that means higher food prices for all of us.”
He added: “I don’t know if the EPA even understands … these land production dynamics and the regional disparities in crop and production cost estimates. America deserves better.”
Judging by his comments, Bond isn’t swayed by benefits in the legislation to Missouri’s burgeoning wind power industry. He spoke of the value of increased nuclear power, energy conservation and production of electric cars, adding: “These will generate more good jobs, produce more revenue instead of costing the tremendous amount of taxpayer subsidies for wind and solar.”
Global warming… er… climate change (because you can’t sell something called global warming when we are setting record low temps… is a HOAX!
People… this, like much of the far left agenda, has nothing to do with climate and everything to do with control.
Sen Bond is correct to oppose it.
I hear a low rumble out in the country that much of Missouri’s wind energy infrastructure has been built on faulty wind-speed research. Would love to see you and the folks back in St. Louis look into it.
Did Senator Bond really say with a straight face that nuclear power is cheaper than wind and solar? That’s outrageous. During the nuke plant construction heyday of the late 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s, cost overruns averaged 207 percent and half of the plants ordered were cancelled. This resulted in about $300 billion foisted upon taxpayers, ratepayers, and shareholders.
Today nuclear cost estimates continue to escalate, while numerous studies have proven that a combination of approaches, such as energy efficiency and renewable energy, can be the fastest, cheapest and most environmentally friendly way to meet our future energy needs while reducing global warming pollution.
The truth is, Wall Street won’t finance new nuke plants because of the financial risk, so the industry has turned to Congress and our tax dollars for loan guarantees. A bill that passed out of a Senate committee earlier this year would allow the Dept. of Energy to hand out more than $130 billion to nuclear and fossil fuel projects, according to the Congressional Budget Office. On top of that, the industry is seeking billions more in tax breaks and other incentives that would shift even more risks and costs onto taxpayers.
For more, check out this briefing paper from the Union of Concerned Scientists: http://www.ucsusa.org/nuclear_power/nuclear_power_and_global_warming/nuclear-loan-guarantees.html. It refers to another UCS study that — using federal energy models — found that we can reduce our global warming emissions most cost-effectively with energy efficiency and renewables.
Uhh…we’re not setting record low temps. 1998-2008 was the warmest decade on record. And if you’re talking about the “global cooling” rumors that have been going around, they were recently debunked by independent statisticians who did an analysis of global temperatures. The planet is still warming:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33482750/ns/us_news-environment/
And I wonder if Kit Bond is worrying at all about how Missouri’s farmers will feel when their corn and soybean yields drop by 22% (EPA estimate) and they lose ground and income due to droughts and agricultural pests (June 2009 NOAA report predictions). Yup, life will be so much more affordable when there isn’t any food to pay for.
The costs of paying for climate change far outweigh the costs of preventing it. The Congressional Budget Office estimated the climate bill would cost the average household $175 per year, or about the price of a postage stamp per day. At the same time, the bill encourages energy efficiency measures and technology through tax incentives, including programs that farmers could take advantage of.
The climate bill will protect farmers’ jobs, incomes, and crop yields, while creating new opportunities for growth and investment in the state’s clean energy sector. The truth is, Missouri can’t afford to *not* fight climate change. Kit Bond may be a lost cause, but Claire McCaskill must give strong support to the Senate climate bill and vote in favor of it when the time comes.