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Senate Dems spurn Voinovich on climate-change bill

Tuesday, November 3, 2009 10:09 AM
Updated: Tuesday, November 3, 2009 12:05 PM
BY JACK TORRY
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

WASHINGTON -- Senate Democrats have apparently rebuffed a plea today by Sen. George V. Voinovich for a delay of at least a month in approving a major bill aimed at reducing the impact of global warming.

At a tense hearing today of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee that most Republicans boycotted, Voinovich, R-Ohio, urged Senate Democrats to postpone voting on a climate change bill until the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency completes a detailed analysis of the impact the bill would have on the economy.

An emotional Voinovich insisted that "this is not something on my part that I am trying to con you out. This is a really important issue. I have put hours into it. I do want to work on a bipartisan basis.''

"Madame Chairman, asking for an EPA analysis is not a stalling tactic,'' Voinovich said. "This is not a ruse to prevent the committee from marking up a climate bill. Rather, this is a genuine attempt to make sure that members of this committee . . . have the best information available as we debate and amend a bill that will have consequences for every person in our country.''

Voinovich, the only Republican to attend the hearing, spoke for about 15 minutes. After Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., the committee chairwoman, said the panel would delay only for a day before beginning to amend the bill, Voinovich left the hearing room.

"We are not rushing,'' Boxer said. "We are taking our time here.''

Boxer announced that once the panel approves the bill, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has agreed to delay a floor vote until the EPA has provided a detailed analysis. She insisted, however, that the EPA had already provided the committee with a "full-blown economic analysis'' of the climate-change bill.

But Voinovich rejected Reid's offer, saying "these are not issues that can be simply fixed on the Senate floor. Indeed, the very reason we employ a committee process in the drafting of legislation is so major problems can be resolved prior to moving to the floor."

Environmental advocates who back the current bill say the EPA analysis is adequate already and charge that Voinovich and other opponents of the bill are trying to manufacture reasons not to pass it. But Voinovich said the current analysis paints only the rosiest economic scenario, and that the costs of a climate-change bill could weigh much more heavily around the country, particularly in Ohio.

Boxer has the votes in her committee to amend and approve the bill, eventually, with or without any Republicans.

But because of deep divisions among many Democrats, she almost certainly does not have the 60 votes necessary at this point to end an all-but-certain Republican filibuster when the bill in its current form reaches the floor.

Among Senate Democrats who have raised objections to the current bill is Sherrod Brown of Ohio.

The fact that Brown and a number of other Democrats from Midwestern states that rely on a lot of coal-generated power haven't endorsed Boxer's bill points to the political complexity of an issue that breaks along regional as well as partisan, lines.

Brown has expressed fears that the bill could raise utility rates that could cripple electricity-intensive manufacturers in Ohio, and called for a provision that would place tariffs on other countries that don't move forward with similar steps to reduce greenhouse gases.

Voinovich, too, says large pollution-producing nations such as India and China must pass climate-change laws at the same time as the United States. But Voinovich and others say Brown's tactic would violate international trade laws.

Some backers of the bill favor adding incentives to encourage more use of nuclear power, which doesn't produce greenhouse-gas emissions, in an attempt to lure nuclear-power proponents like Voinovich, but that could alienate a number of Democrats.

The bill is aimed at dramatically reducing greenhouse gases during the next 30 years. It would achieve those reductions through a market-based system known as cap-and-trade, which is designed to give power companies and factories financial incentives to limit emissions of carbon dioxide.

For example, each utility plant or factory would need a permit for the carbon dioxide it emits. Factories that dramatically reduce their emissions could sell the permits they no longer need to other factories or power plants unable to achieve the reductions on their own.

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Originally posted by Rick Zimmer:

Republicans followed through this morning on their threat to boycott a Senate committee's work this week on a sweeping climate change bill.

The only one to show up, the Associated Press reports, was George Voinovich of Ohio, the ranking Republican on the environment committee, and he only attended to explain why the GOP is staying away.