For every action, there is an equal and opposite RE-Action! While this principal is a fact of physics, our RE-Action initiative will advocate for true renewable initiatives without the PC slant.
Pass it on! We need your help and involvement to have an effect on the process of making change in real and tangible ways. We want to hear your views regardless of your position on the issues. All we ask is that you do your best to hear all sides of the issues before making your decisions. And if new information is made known that provides a different outcome than currently believed true, bring it on in the interest of truth.
Cap and Trade Legislation
Ask yourself this question. If the cost of YOUR gasoline, home heating, cooling, food, clothes, cars, books, magazines, property taxes (for schools, etc.) and so on all go up according to the energy tax associated with their manufacturer or use, each and every day, how much money will you have to buy solar panels, windmills, geothermal heat / air, electric vehicles and related products to green the planet? Opinions vary widely and strongly whether Cap and Trade bill will simply stop the economic engine of this country or help the Renewable Energy Industry. Many other foreign countries will be able to compete in many of these areas without these taxes. China, now the worlds biggest polluter, and India, not far behind, operate with impunity because they want strong industries in their countries. How will these taxes affect the economy of the United States?
Is the Cap and Trade bill first and foremost a huge tax that everyone everywhere will have to pay indirectly through higher costs of doing business, transport costs, costs to produce goods and services and virtually any products you buy? Will it truly turn the renewable industry around as proponents believe?
Does Al Gore, one of the biggest vocal promoters of Cap and Trade, stand to make millions if not billions of dollars through his secret associations with green industry benefactors and company associations? We intend to follow the money to discover where peoples true motivations are!
We are great promoters of the renewable and green industries, however, is this the wrong legislation at the wrong time? The debate on this should not stop. Our recent poll shows the average person is terribly uninformed as to the pro and con of this issue.
Please help us by filling out our petition with your thoughts on this bill. We will fax blast it to both the US Senate and House of Representatives.
Here is a quick summary of the positions and specifics that were included in the “For or Against Cap and Trade Poll” taken April 23-25, 2010:
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Sign this Poll if you feel Cap & Trade is a Tax that will Help the Renewable Energy Industry.
Sponsored by Senators Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.) and John Warner (R-Va.), the legislation would have established a so-called “cap and trade” program limiting total U.S. emissions of carbon dioxide and providing credits to companies for reducing those emissions. Participating companies would then be able to sell those credits to other businesses that have not yet met those goals. The bill offered bonus allowances for carbon capture and storage, and set-asides for agriculture and forestry sequestration as well as for landfill and coal mine methane mitigation. The goal of the legislation was a 65 percent reduction in global warming emissions by 2050.
Supporters said such legislation is essential to applying the brakes on the frequency and intensity of a variety of deadly and costly weather-related disasters. Opponents argued that the bill would create a disaster of a different sort, driving already rising energy costs even higher and devastating a severely weakened economy.
The political landscape has undergone a sea change since the Lieberman-Warner bill was defeated in June of ‘08. The Obama administration has since offered its own plan — contained in its fiscal year 2010 budget proposal — that aims to cut carbon emissions to 14 percent below 2005 levels by 2020, and then to 83 percent below 2005 levels by 2050. The report goes on to state that “climate change will very likely magnify the cumulative impacts of other stresses, such as air and water pollution and habitat destruction due to human development patterns.”
Perhaps most disconcerting is the unknown. “Further research would improve understanding and our ability to project societal and ecosystem impacts, and provide the public with additional useful information about options for adaptation,” the study’s authors conclude, adding, “However, it is likely that some aspects and impacts of climate change will be totally unanticipated as complex systems respond to ongoing climate change in unforeseeable ways.”
So, while some businesses that rely on fossil-fuel energy clearly would suffer under a cap-and-trade system, many others — new technologies, in particular — could thrive in a clean-energy economy.
By raising the price of carbon emissions, a cap would create incentives to invest in research and development in new energy technologies, new factories to produce wind turbines and solar panels and energy-efficiency retrofits of commercial and residential real estate. That would mean jobs, and lots of them.
This is not lost on an up-and-coming generation. From the nation’s university campuses comes evidence of a reversal in the long-standing shortage of Americans preparing for “clean energy” careers. Educators say the subject is suddenly hot on college campuses across the nation. As someone said, there’s nothing like a crisis to concentrate the mind.
Few would argue with a goal of saving the planet. But there remains much debate and, ultimately, triage decision making to determine who ultimately wins and who loses.
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Sign this Poll if you feel Cap & Trade is a Tax that will Harm the Renewable Energy Industry.
Americans are increasingly concerned about energy. Demand is increasing faster than supplies while much of the world’s oil is delivered in a restrictive market dominated by unstable or hostile nations. Meanwhile, many Americans harbor misunderstandings and myths about energy, the environment, and market forces. They want low prices and plentiful supply, but resist steps that must be taken to achieve these goals. They want to protect the environment but most plans have huge costs and questionable benefits. This confusion leads Congress to enact conflicting policies that harm the nation’s ability to meet its energy needs. Sound policies must enable America to obtain supplies from a wide range of sources in a way that is best for the economy and also addresses homeland and national security considerations.
U.S. energy policy should be based on the creativity of free enterprise. Congress and the Administration should rely on the private sector’s research and development capabilities to deliver traditional supplies and viable new energy sources rather than mandates, regulations, subsidies, and directed research. All sources of domestic energy should be made available and artificial constraints on infrastructure, including costly environmental regulations, removed. Such steps will unshackle delivery of supplies and allow key sources like nuclear energy to achieve their potential. Efforts to reduce dependence on foreign oil or carbon altogether must be grounded in policies that are best for the economy by limiting or removing regulatory and tax barriers that impede private-sector innovation. Internationally, U.S. policy should advance free energy markets by sustaining access to the global marketplace using all instruments of national power. Policies should thwart the capacity of coercive regimes to employ energy supplies as an economic weapon. Americans understand that freedom, opportunity and quality of life suffer when abundant, affordable energy supplies are threatened, not just at home, but worldwide.
Impact of the Waxman-Markey Climate Change Legislation on the States
On June 26, the House of Representatives narrowly passed climate change legislation designed by Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Edward Markey (D-MA). The 1,427-page bill would restrict greenhouse gas emissions from industry, mainly carbon dioxide from the combustion of coal, oil, and natural gas.
If passed by the Senate, the bill would burden families with thousands of dollars per year in direct and indirect energy costs. According to a new study produced by Heritage’s Center for Data Analysis (CDA), forecasts severe consequences-including crushing energy costs, millions of jobs lost and falling household income-if Congress enacts the so-called Waxman-Markey bill.
Inevitably the bill will affect each state differently. Some states are more energy-intensive than others and some rely a great deal on manufacturing to fuel its economy. Regardless, the costs in every state are significant. Increases in electricity and gasoline are a dreadful site for any American. Moreover, the projected losses in jobs and Gross State Product (GSP) illustrate how each state’s economy will be operating well under its potential directly because of the Waxman-Markey bill.