Subscribe to RSSShowdown at the Climate Change Corral?
Professor Don Boesch, elected unanimously to represent 31 of his fellow coastal scientists, prepares to duel Bobby Jindal over the significance of climate change.
Editor’s note: As a recovering coastal scientist I can attest to the fact that academics are typically reluctant to engage in political issues. Even tenured faculty members tend to eschew conflicts that sometimes accompany applied science in favor of non-controversial basic research.* Thus, a group of scientists signing onto a protest letter is a newsworthy event.
Many coastal advocates are probably becoming weary of reading that in early December the Jindal administration unveiled a campaign to oppose President Obama’s intention to cap industrial CO2 emissions – and by implication to discredit climate science. This myopic campaign is based on a smelly blend of ignorance, partisan politics and unsubstantiated fear that the Louisiana economy would suffer irreparable harm from serious national CO2 belt tightening.
The campaign continues apace, despite voluminous scientific evidence that, without global CO2 emission reductions, south Louisiana will be largely inundated by the end of the century. As announced on January 22, our senior Senator Mary Landrieu has now sadly signed onto this blatantly political anti-regulatory campaign. She is locking arms in sisterhood with Lisa Murkowski, one of her Republican colleagues from the Senate Women’s Caucus, to oppose EPA’s regulation of CO2. Cynics are calling this an unfortunate Murky alliance.
The mainstream media (MSM), national climate science publications (and LaCoastPost) have been calling attention to the supreme irony of Louisiana officials opposing the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. This is like Alaskan officials enabling the alcoholic skipper of an Exxon tanker. Reaction from coastal advocates began with muted expressions of concern but it seems to be growing toward a crescendo of shock and disbelief that Louisiana politicos could sign onto such an outright contradiction to the goals of our much-vaunted coastal protection and restoration program. This campaign threatens to make all the rhetoric about saving south Louisiana ring very hollow.
Ted Jackson/The Times-Picayune archive This U.S. Geological Survey benchmark was installed in 1932 on dry land at the southwestern end of Couba Island at the edge of Lake Salvadore. In February 2007, it was photographed in two feet of water.
On January 22 Mark Schleifstein wrote an article for the Times-Picayune about a protest letter sent to Gov. Jindal and signed by a group of 32 senior coastal scientists (see below). If Governor Jindal reads the letter he will be reminded of the clear connection between global CO2 emissions and sea level rise and that his campaign could stall federal support for coastal funding.
I find it highly implausible that Jindal, a biology honors alumnus of Brown University and the son and husband of engineers, could fail to comprehend the basic tenets of the greenhouse gas effect. This leads me to conclude that his position is purely political.
So far, the governor has not even acknowledged the conflict, let alone responded to it. The closest thing to an official comment from the fourth floor of the State Capitol came from Garret Graves, Jindal’s coastal advisor. Schleifstein’s article quoted Graves as saying in so many words that the issue is irrelevant because every new coastal project will be designed to take projected sea level rise into account.
A new book called Denialism by Michael Specter, New Yorker staff writer, was described by its author during an interview with Ira Flatow on NPR’s Science Friday. Here’s a quote from the NPR web site describing the author:
Specter argues that Americans have increasingly come to mistrust institutions, especially the institution of science. When it comes to a range of issues from childhood vaccines to genetically modified foods, he argues, people increasingly have come to maintain personal beliefs even in the face of solid scientific evidence.
Bobby Jindal now belongs to this fraternity, based on his having shepherded into law a bill that encourages Louisiana high school science teachers to challenge evolution.** His campaign to oppose CO2 regulation further burnishes his denialist status.
During his interview on Science Friday, Specter stated unequivocally that climate change is the worst crisis that mankind has ever created. He also said that he didn’t treat widespread denial of either evolution or climate change in his book because the evidence for both is so overwhelming as not to justify the use of additional paper and ink.
Len Bahr (len.bahr@gmail.com)
*My professional career was seriously impacted (along with the careers of Walt Sikora and his late wife Jean) on a study in 1981 that we carried out on the (very damaging) effects of shell dredging on Lake Pontchartrain. The Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries got a severance tax from dredged shells in those days and no one was supposed to blow the whistle on harm to the lake bottom.
**SB 733, the Louisiana Science Education Act.
Here is the text of the letter, the signatories and references;
Governor Bobby Jindal P.O. Box 94004 Baton Rouge, La 70804
January 15, 2009
Dear Governor Jindal,
This letter is being submitted by scientists who have worked on Louisiana’s coast.
Trends in global climate change are a central factor affecting Louisiana’s coast, and the challenges the state faces in ensuring its sustainability. As the Louisiana Comprehensive Master Plan for a Sustainable Coast states, the most recent report (2007) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reinforces the multiple lines of evidence and observed trends that demonstrate the process of global warming currently underway.1
These trends, supported by data gathered from around the world, include the retreat of ice sheets and glaciers, observational temperature records, ocean heat content, and sea-level rise.2
Sea-levels are rising globally, due primarily to thermal expansion of the oceans and loss of land-based ice due to increased melting. The continuation of the current global rates of 3-4 mm/yr documented by satellite measurements would result in a rise of over a foot by 2100. However, several papers published subsequent to the IPCC 2007 Report have concluded that global average sea level is likely to rise at least two and potentially more than four feet this century.3 This is because rapid melting of the large ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica, the beginning of which is now being observed, is expected to contribute more to sea-level rise.
The IPCC points out that sea-level rise will not be uniform around the world.4 Coastal Louisiana experiences one of the highest rates of relative sea-level rise, which combines the global rate with the effects of land subsidence. The relative change in water level at Grand Isle has been 9.24 mm/yr, based on monthly mean data from 1947-2006.5 This is equivalent to a rise of three feet in 100 years, even before additional sea-level rise is factored in.
We believe that the scientific evidence is compelling that sea level is highly likely to rise at faster rates than in the recent past and that this poses severe threats to Louisiana’s people, land and coastal ecosystems. We also believe that substantial scientific evidence shows that healthy coastal wetlands are a necessary ingredient for a sustainable system able to respond to sea-level rise, and are thus a critical part of effective flood and storm protection.
The amount of sea-level rise that will be experienced depends on the future trajectory of societal greenhouse gas emissions.6 These emissions are increasing atmospheric and oceanic temperatures, which are leading to concerns about stronger hurricanes, a key vulnerability for Louisiana.7 It is therefore imperative that these factors to be included in the development of policies on coastal protection and restoration, and that such integrated policies be strategically planned and urgently implemented.
Sincerely, (In alphabetical order)
Dr. Thomas Bianchi Texas A&M University
Dr. Piers Chapman Texas A&M University
Dr. Richard Condrey Louisiana State University
Dr. Michael Dagg Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium (LUMCON)
Dr. Christopher D’Elia Louisiana State University
Dr. John Fleeger Louisiana State University
Dr. Mark Hester University of Louisiana Lafayette
Dr. Donald Boesch University of Maryland
Dr. James Coleman Loui iana State University
Dr. James Cowan Louisiana State University
Dr. John Day* Louisiana State University
Dr. Duncan Fitzgerald Boston University
Dr. Ivor van Heerden Louisiana State University
Dr. Martin Hugh-Jones Louisiana State University
Dr. Dubravko Justic Louisiana State University
Dr. Edward Laws Louisiana State University
Dr. Andrew Nyman Louisiana State University LSU Agricultural Center
Dr. Denise Reed University of New Orleans
Dr. Lawrence Rouse Louisiana State University
Dr. Rick Shaw Louisiana State University
Dr. Tor Tornqvist Tulane University
Dr. Robert Twilley Louis iana State University
Dr. David White Loyola University
Dr. Richard Keim Louisiana State University
Dr. Susan Mopper University of Louisiana Lafayette
Dr. Dorothy Prowell Louisiana State University
Dr. Victor Rivera-Monroy Louisiana State University
Dr. Gary Shaffer Southeastern Louisiana University
Dr. PaulTemplet Louisiana State University (retired)
Dr. R. Eugene Turner* Louisiana State University
Dr. Jenneke Visser University of Louisiana Lafayette
Dr. Alejandro Yanez-Aranciba Institute of Ecology Xalapa, Mexico
Response may be sent c/o names with asterisk*
Return Address: Room 1205 Energy, Coast, & Environment Building Louisiana State University Baton Rouge, La 70803
References
1 Louisiana CPRA (2007) Louisiana’s Comprehensive Master Plan for a Sustainable Coast, pp. 25-26, http://www.lacpra.org/.
2 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2007) Fourth Assessment Report, Climate Change 2007 Synthesis Report, “Observations of climate change,” http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_ and_data /publications_ipcc_ fourth assessment report_ synthesis_report. html.
3 Vermeer and Rahmstorf (2009), “Global sea level linked to global temperature,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS), December 7, 2009, www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.0907765106; Kopp, et al. (2009), “Probabilistic assessment of sea level during the last interglacial stage,” Nature v. 462, December 17, 2009, www.nature.com/ nature/ journa l/ v462/ n7275/full/ nature08686. ht ml ; Pfeffer, Harper, O’Neel (2008), “Kinematic Constraints on Glacier Contributions to 21st-Century Sea-Level Rise,” Science v. 321, September 5, 2008, www.sciencemag.org/c gi/content /full/321/5894/1340.
4 IPCC 2007, “Steric Sea Level Changes,” www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch5s5-5-4-1.html.
5 NOAA, “Mean Sea Level Trend 8761724 Grand Isle, Louisiana,” http://co-ops.nos.noaa. gov/sltrends/sltrends_station.shtml?stnid=8761724.
6 IPCC 2007, WGI, Global Climate Projections, “Projections of Global Average Sea Level Change for the 21st Century,” http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch10s10-6-5.html.
7 IPCC 2007, WGI, Understanding and Attributing Climate Change, “Combining Evidence of Anthropogenic Climate Change,” www.ipcc.ch/publications_anddata/a r4/wg1/e n/c h9s9 – 7. ht ml; Elsner, Kossin, and Jagger (2008), “The increasing intensity of the strongest tropical cyclones,” Nature, vol. 455, September 2008, http://myweb.fsu.edu/jelsner/PDF/Research/ElsnerKossinJagger2008.pdf.
19 Comments
2010-01-30
16:42:28
I also liked this one:
http://ossfoundation.us/about
Especially the comment there that 'simplification is the new focus......'
2010-01-30
16:40:00
The 'Holocene Temperature Variations' graph referenced previously is indeed interesting.
A lot of pretty colored squiggly lines with absolutely minimal labeling as to what the lines represent.
This book might help interpret the graph:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/stores/detail/-/books/0393310728/reader/1/102-4379401-6415301
There IS a good discussion of 'weather vs climate' at the OSS site:
http://ossfoundation.us/projects/environment/global-warming/weather-v.-climate
Also other items of interest......
2010-01-28
23:18:31
Mike Guerin
Carbon dioxide is certainly not the only greenhouse gas, methane for instance is a really bad actor from the heat retention aspect. What I'm saying is that CO2 is the overall basic greenhouse gas in this warming episode and it has actually been rising slowly ever since the Industrial Revolution, until the Earth's natural sequestration processes were overwhelmed and now it is rising rapidly, the concentration rises every year. What is it about CO2 that you don't understand? The physics of its greenhouse effect have been known for over 150 years and were first determined by John Tyndall and have been verified since and are well established. Just because the concentration of 375 ppm seems to you to be an extremely low concentration doesn't mean that this concentration can't trap enough heat to cause warming on a global scale.
Temperature variations from year to year don't mean very much when only short periods are considered. I wasn't talking about that. What I said was temperatures during the Holocene Period peaked around 8000 year BP (before present), and have been trending downwards, when compared to the overall average, until fairly recently, the 1880s.
The following Web site has a graph "Holocene Temperature Variations" beginning 12000 years ago:
http://ossfoundation.us/projects/environment/global-warming/myths/images/temperature-records/Holocene_Temperature_Variations_Rev.png
As I said, the trend for temperatures was upwards from the end of the Wisconsin glaciation about 20,000 years BP for 12,000 years until around 8000 years BP after which it has been tending downwards until recently. That's been determined from numerous sources of geological evidence.
2010-01-27
06:14:45
Yes it will rise due to CO2 but that doesn't mean it will rise even a measurable/noticeble amount. CO2 doesn't even come in second in the green house gas department and to say that 375 parts per million is going to raise the temperature as much as they say it will is simply incorrect.
The trend has been up since the last iceage if you look at the temperature over long periods of time. Of course there have been many ups and downs. The temp varies from year to year simple based on if el nino etc.
2010-01-26
23:32:09
Mike Guerin
Your statement "The temperature has been slowly rising ever since the last ice age." is not true by a long shot. The last ice age was the Wisconsin glaciation which ended about 20,000 years ago, and thus beginning the present interglacial period. The global temperature trended upwards i.e. there were warm periods and cold periods but overall the average temperature rose upward until the hypsithermal period about 8000 years ago, lasting several thousand years, and is considered the start of the Holocene, After that temperatures have trended steadily downwards until the second half of the 19th century, around the 1880s. [There's a book you should read by E.C. Pielou "After the Ice Age, The Return of Life to Glaciated North America" 1991, Univ. of Chicago Press, 366pp.]
The warmer and colder climate periods since the end of the Wisconsin glaciation appear to have a period of about 2500 years and are thought to have been caused by fluctuations in solar output and apparently took place without CO2 being the driving force. So you are correct in implying the CO2 is not always the driving force in climate change, and may even have followed temperature increases in the past.
On the other hand, we have precisely measured solar output via satellites and other means since the 1970s and have found NO INCREASE in solar output apart from the activity of the Sunspot Cycle which has a periodicity of about 11 years. Yet CO2 levels in the atmosphere have been rising ever since we began measurements in the mid 20th century and continue to rise every year. The physics of this is clear: CO2 in the atmosphere retains heat. That's the big difference between present conditions now and the previous climate fluctuations of the Holocene.
That is the big reason for concern, because we know where the CO2 is coming from, human burning of fossil carbon fuels, and the indications of global warming are being manifested in the rapidity with which the planet's ice is melting. This rapid melting is undeniable proof the planet is heating up, and CO2 is the most important driving force now.
2010-01-26
22:26:15
CoastGhost,
If "wetlands" were limited to only what I'm inferring you conceive wetlands to be . . . if they were only what the legal definition leads laymen to believe they are . . . if the developer's choices were indeed only between "marshes, swamps, and bogs" and uplands, I'd agree with you.
The land Len has in mind as "coastal wetlands" is virtually all wet. The great majority of the land Blum and Roberts show as gone by 2100 fits as well. (Due to the coastal zone, many of those remaining upland cheniers require state permits even if they don't require federal ones.)
Of course the main stem problem I see here is that the current program is overinclusive. It's far too broad; it sweeps up land no reasonable definition should capture. Too much falls within the scope of indentification as a wetland (even without the aid of the Interim Atlantic and Gulf Regional Supplement to the basic 1987 manual) coupled with the jursidictional issue (Rapanos everywhere with Lucas - and perhaps still Needham - in Louisiana).
Three last quick thoughts:
1. If Smart Growth had been around in 1840 there wouldn't be a Garden District, uplands or not.
2. If the 404 program had been around in 1718, a reasonable case could have been made for docks and a port. The natural levee was an upland so it wouldn't have needed a permit. But, BUT, was the rest of Orleans Parish permittable?
3. "Other needs filling a void" is not news to me. The bio Editilla found came from an essay I wrote in the SWS Bulletin almost 10 years ago explicitily arguing for a reduction in scope of the 404 program even though it would reduce the volume of my business. In fact, the permitting and mitigation maze is so burdensome I spend the great bulk of my time looking for ways the clients can get their projects done without needing permits or with a minimum of mitigation. That "avoid, minimize, mitigate" 404(b)(1) sequence is working far better than the drafters ever thought possible.
2010-01-26
19:06:56
KH-
Wouldnt it be wonderful if ALL in the mitigation industry went out of business? That would mean we are no longer needlessly destroying wetlands for development. Though the bread and butter for many consultants, I'm sure other needs would rise to fill that void
2010-01-26
14:22:25
Maybe some of the 'Wall Street Bankers' would consider doing a piece on 'mitigation banking.'
Bernie has a lot of time on his hands right now I'm sure.....
2010-01-26
18:00:27
HeidiHoe,
Drove by Shel-Boze in Baton Rouge yesterday. Sign said, "Closed. Thanks Baton Rouge for 56 great years." No new house construction plus remodelling getting put off = wholesalers going under.
The mitigation industry, like wetlands as a whole, is dependent upon new construction on raw land, or existing construction expanding into raw land. Turning an old canning plant into condos or lofts doesn't involve Sec 10 or Sec 404. No permits = no mitigation.
Besides, if raw land sells for $30K/acre and mitigation is $40K/ac (I'm ignoring the ratio & multiple, which only make it worse), the land could be free and the wetland mitigation alone still kills the deal. The numbers just won't work. I've had clients go all the way through the process up to a draft permit and walk away from the deal over sticker shock at the mitigation fee.
Any time the underlying dollars don't make sense a clue is being provided. Political viability has little connection to economic viability. Just ask GM's bondholders or the ethanol producers. Key phrase to remember: Poltics is the study of what most people want. Economics is the study of what people want most. (Sorry, didn't think of that, wish I had.)
2010-01-25
01:03:46
The temperature has been slowly rising ever since the last ice age. CO2 is not a driver of Climate Change but instead has historically FOLLOWED temperature.
Yes. CO2 is a greenhouse gas but its importance has been way over stated.
I also find it funny that when media outlets report heat waves in climate change articles that doesn't garner any criticism but when the same is doen (incorrectly granted) about cold weather the Global Warming Communtiy is up in arms.
2010-01-24
20:14:55
Mike Guerin
Au contaire mon fraire, CO2 is the most significant long-term factor in global warming. First it must be understood that both CO2 and water vapor are greenhouse gases (and there are others). It must also be understood that Earth's atmosphere does need some greenhouses gases and for most of Earth's history these two have been present. But it also needs to be understood that the heat trapped by CO2 is responsible for increasing water vapor in the atmosphere, even though any given quantity of water vapor in the atmosphere is very ephemeral, raining back down in a matter of days. [the amount of water in air is governed by the temperature of the air, the warmer the air, more water vapor there can be in the air.] The added water vapor caused by heat retained by CO2 (which has a residence time of over 100 years in the atmosphere) is actually acting as a feedback mechanism making things worse, but the increasing CO2 is the underlying cause. You say science has shown water vapor "is a much bigger player than CO2". I must ask what science are you referring to?
Also, the evidence of global warming has been recorded for decades and is much more extensive than data from the weather stations in Russia: Spring comes earlier in temperate climates across the globe; very nearly every land glacier is retreating; Arctic Ocean ice is disappearing in the summer; Alaskan permafrost is melting; ice shelves in Antarctica are breaking up and sea levels are rising faster and faster.
In order for all that to happen heat energy is required over and above the equilibrium that we have experienced over the last several hundred years. In fact it has been determined from deep ice cores in Antarctic that we now have more CO2 in the atmosphere than any time in the past 600,000 years!
2010-01-24
12:07:37
Len, thanks for the offer but mitigation, complicated as it is, is only a tiny sliver of a much bigger regulatory tangle.
Ever since SWANCC (Jan 2001) some version of a "Clean Water Restoration Act" has been introduced each year. (2009 was the first time any version of that bill has made it out of a committee.) The duck hunters persuaded Bush that the Greens were right about not needing any new rules so he turned off the early effort in 2003.
Rapanos (2006), if read carefully and accounting for the dissent as well, leads to the conclusion that the Corps' existing CFRs implementing 404 are invalid. In fact, one of the two reasons Chief Justice Roberts wrote a separate concurring opinion in Rapanos was to criticize halting the rules re-write of 2003. The arrival of a Democratic majority could resolve the issue by amending the law to conform to the Regs, which is what all the various "restoration" bills do. (That is, where they don't also expand jurisdiction even further.)
How does all that legal mess matter to mitigation? Well, unless you're performing a regulable activity in a jurisdictonal wetland there's nothing to mitigate. So, if I started the analysis at "OK, now you have to mitigate," I'd have skipped a mountain of critical public policy questions which ought to be fully explored in public and understood by the public.
Finally, the intersection of "science" and "law" is an interesting place. Early in 2006 I offered to bet a tableful of steak dinners on the outcome of Rapanos with one of the 31 signers of the letter starting this thread (and the board of the Society of Wetland Scietists but no one took the wager). He (and the board) thought the case was about "science" and "nitrogen," things they understood but thought I did not. Problem was I understood what the case was really about and they did not. Every agument he raised had already been tried and lost in Rice v Harkin. In a way, that sort of science/law disconnect is the REAL nub of the AGW problem. A reasonable person could totally reject the importance of the FOIA2009 file, understand, agree, and accept every tenet of the AGW thesis but still reject the proposed corrective actions. In fact, that's what had happened before the leak (it wasn't theft or hack) of the Hadley file. Most Americans had already decided that the cost exceeded the benefits before they found out how suspicious the support underneath the claims was. Fraud and collusion merely basted a goose already cooked.
2010-01-25
08:05:09
Kelly-
Your response supports my interest in posting on permit mitigation in general and mitigation banking specifically. I don't understand much of your message, e.g., SWANCC, Rapanos, CFRs, etc.
I need to find someone who can describe the subject knowledgeably and objectively but in lay terms.
I know a few people who have been financially involved in mitigation banking, e.g., David Richard, Jack Caldwell, Kelly McHugh, and some DNR folks in CZM, my corps contacts in permits have retired.
2010-01-25
20:01:13
First, I need to correct an oversight; "unless you're performing a regulable activity in a jurisdictonal wetland there's nothing to mitigate" is only true most of the time. If the project is Civil Works by the Corps, mitigation is required for forest impacts, even if entirely in uplands. I mentioned the 2007 WRDA once before on your blog but left it out this time. My bad.
Second, on the larger question of where mitigation comes from and why it's required, I'll have to think about this proposed task. It's just such a large field, plus it's so counter-intuitive, that most "normal" people think I'm making it all up (or I've lost my mind) when I tell them the land under their pickup and the ruts in the gravel road we drove to get there are both "special aquatic sites" according to the Corps.
Really, just figuring out what is and is not a wetland in the first place is a major industry. Since you haven't read Rapanos (not a cut! not!), you won't know that Justice Scalia quoted dialog from Casablanca in the plurality opinion. (Inspector Renault: Waters! What waters? We're in the desert. Rick: I've been misinformed.) Some science guys went ape over the court not understanding the hydrologic cycle, which only illustrates why no sane country will allow scientists to construe statutes.
Think about the problem this way - ask Prof Houck how long it would take to explain what a "conflict of interest" is to Editilla and then go on to answer the rest of her parting shot.
Honest, I appreciate your kind offer, but my gut feel right now is that the task is too big.
2010-01-23
18:25:59
"This myopic campaign is based on a smelly blend of ignorance, partisan politics and unsubstantiated fear that the Louisiana economy would suffer irreparable harm from serious national CO2 belt tightening."
Taxing the energy which is what cap and trade would do would up the cost of living for everyone and further damage the already struggling economy. Science has also shown that CO2 is a minor player in Greenhouse effects and that water vapor is a much bigger player than CO2.
What is ashame is how science has been taken over by a political agendy of promoting an agenda.
Yes some data sets show the climate is warming but what did you expect when many cold weather stations in Russia are removed from the data and fudge factors pushing down past temps and raising current ones is done.
2010-01-23
15:04:46
My father, Percy Viosca, Jr. would have a lot to say on this I am sure. It would be on the side of the 31 coastal scientists.
Isn't it sad that politics wins over scientific facts?
Charlie Viosca
2010-01-23
14:51:16
Kelly-
I've been thinking about posting on the subject of mitigation banking - or perhaps a series.
I would consider a guest post on the subject if you're interested.
2010-01-23
14:08:44
Y'all need to read up on "credit stacking." HQ Corps position is that the current 404 mitigation system fully accounts for all values/credits and thus there are no additional credits of any type to be sold once a wetland credit has been sold by a bank. HQ Corps stronly opposes stacking.
Unless the new statute (haven't read it; don't know)has language to modify the 2008 banking CFRs, all new carbon credits would have to come from a different acre. My hunch is that the proposed law does not overrule/amend the banking CFR because the e-mail I got for the 2010 National Mitigation Banking Conference asks about stacking. While there is strong internal division within the industry about stacking, my impression is that a plurality, perhaps even a majority, of the group supports stacking.
2010-01-23
12:11:01
I think that Gov. Jindal and the oil industry need to think about the opportunities for the state that comes with policies that address the greenhouse gas problem. Let there be no doubt that carbon regulation would hurt an important sector of our economy , but let's also acknowledge that these costs are only half of the story.
Overnight, cap and trade would make our wetlands carbon sequestration tools, thus greatly increasing their value and changing the economics of coastal restoration. For the state's petroleum industry, the have a chance to solve their biggest global problem (carbon) through investment in their biggest local problem (coastal protection.)
I have no doubt that cap n trade will cost Louisiana jobs, and the Governor has to be concerned about that (it's his #1 job). But, the Governor should also be aware that cap n trade will be a big boost our burgeoning coastal restoration industry. It would force the petroleum industry to invest in carbon sequestration, which would translate in job gains in coastal restoration.