Big Oil Goes Into Big Lie Mode With Campaign
By Nadia Prupis / Common Dreams
California lawmakers are preparing to face off with the state’s powerful fossil fuel industry in a battle over two potentially groundbreaking climate change bills.
The more contentious legislation in question, the Clean Energy and Pollution Reduction Act of 2015 (SB350), would increase California’s share of electricity from renewable energy sources to 50 percent and reduce the state’s use of oil in half by 2030—the equivalent of removing 36 million cars and trucks from the roads over the next 15 years—through new technology and more efficient planning.
The second piece of legislation, the California Global Warming Solutions Act (SB32), would raise mandates for oil refineries and power companies, among other big polluters, to lower their greenhouse gas emissions.
Introduced by state Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de León, SB350 has picked up a slew of endorsements from state lawmakers—including California Governor Jerry Brown—along with a firestorm of opposition from oil and gas industry lobbyists.
Brown has indicated his eagerness to sign the bill, particularly in light of the state’s unprecedented drought, now entering its fourth year, which recent scientific reports revealed is being exacerbated byclimate change. In a statement last week, Brown said, “It’s time for Republicans, foot-dragging corporations and other deniers to wake up and take sensible action before it’s too late.”
But those same corporations are pushing hard against SB350.
Fliers sent this week to California households by the Western States Petroleum Association (WSPA), which represents the fossil fuel industry, warn that the bill will implement “gas rationing to control when families can fill their tanks, surcharges on non-hybrid mini-vans and SUV’s, penalties and fines for drivers who use too much gas,” and other effects.
Unlike previous environmental bills, SB350 “is something entirely different,” said WSPA spokesperson Tupper Hull. “It is an attempt to essentially put oil companies out of business.”
But while the oil and gas industry spreads what lawmakers in Sacramento are calling a “doomsday” message, Berkeley-based energy consultant Bentham Paulos clarifies in a piece for Grist, “The problem? There is no such bill.”
“Big Oil hates a California climate bill so much that it’s telling outright lies about it,” Paulos writes.
As de León told the Sacramento Bee last week, “The irony is they’re scaring the very same people who are most harmed by the product, working-class folks. There is a perverseness to it,” referring to the environmental impacts felt most deeply by low-income communities.
These dynamics set the stage for a likely volatile end to the state’s legislative session, which will break on September 11, and draw battle lines over California’s economic and environmental future.
“WSPA is a powerful actor in our state capital and they fight dirty,” Brett Fleishman, senior analyst at climate advocacy group 350.org, told Common Dreams on Friday. Passing SB350 would represent “the first major victory of the political system over Big Oil.”
“It would be a case study for state governments and the federal government,” Fleishman added. “SB350 is a really important and strong step that would take on climate change head on.”
However, as 350.org fracking campaign coordinator Linda Capato Jr. told Common Dreams, a strong step is still just a step—particularly in a state that faces opposition from a massive oil and gas industry.
“SB350 isn’t doing enough to turn off the spigots,” Capato Jr. said. “We need to step up even further. What are the industries that are causing climate change?…. Even if SB350 passes, we’re still pulling [fossil fuels] out of the ground.”
The bill “is one step, and it’s a small step…. It’s a step that we needed 20 years ago,” she said.
Still, she said, the impact of the bill could be far-reaching. “California leads the nation,” Capato Jr. said. “We have a very strong responsibility.” Policy that is enacted in the state “will be replicated in other places.”
As de León said at a recent press conference, “This is a fight worth having because it’s a fight for our children’s health, it’s a fight for the economic future of the greatest state in the country. It is not hyperbole and it is not over dramatization to say the world is watching very closely.”
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I called my Assembly member (Shirley Weber) today to let her know I strongly support these bills and expect her to vote in favor of them. Please call your Assembly member and urge them to vote yes on these bills. We must counter what big oil is doing to undermine these bills in order to safeguard the future for our children. You can check who your Assembly member is at http://findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov/
The carbon reduction mandates in SB 350 will be met “by impoverishing entire regions of California and bankrupting entire industries. California accounts for only about 1 percent of the carbon emissions of the planet. We could return our standard of living to the Stone Age and we would not move the needle on carbon emissions.
The Flintstone cars are going to look pretty silly in the showrooms, and they’re really going to slow down the carpool lane.
There’s no rational reason for Californians to pay ever higher prices for energy in order to achieve absolutely nothing. We should not tie a tourniquet around our own necks. SB 350 and SB 32 should be killed before they kill us.
I dunno. This chopper trike looks pretty cool to me.
http://www.bettajetta.com/images/FlinstoneCar2.jpg
Clean energy initiatives SB350 and SB32 are magnificent climate justice steps in the right direction.
California’s exceptional commitment to clean energy acknowledges the scientific reality we humans don’t have the luxury of lots of time in effectively transitioning FAST to green energy sources and efficiency. California, Germany, and Scandinavia deserve praise for not being complacent about critical need for challenging actions to counter Earth’s energy imbalance that’s intensifying global warming and dreadfully destructive weather events – the huge costs of which are not included in the price of gasoline.
It’s really difficult for the human race to comprehend the exponential function where, for example, there’s a period of slow growth in global warming and ice melt that then changes to an accelerated build up with at a 10-20 year doubling rate – exacerbated by various positive feedbacks. In 1970 humanity was pumping 40 million tons of CO2 into the atmosphere EVERY DAY – or 14.5 billion tons annually. In 2015, CO2 emissions have almost tripled to 110 million tons EVERY DAY – or 40 billion tons annually. This growth has led to an atmospheric CO2 concentration of 400ppm today – 40% higher since over two centuries ago, 30% higher since 1960. Human-induced CO2 emissions have become almost exponential.
Never in recorded history has the CO2 atmospheric concentration risen so much in such an incredibly short time frame. In prior ice ages, such an increase would have taken thousands and thousands of years excluding an ultra-unique, massive natural event. Human CO2 emissions are now almost exponential. The change since 1970 is so extraordinary that it overwhelms all natural atmospheric forces including the sun. (see: .
Dr. James Hansen’s recent study, which must still be peer-reviewed, projects a 10 feet sea level rise before 2100. This is based on evidence ice sheets in contact with warming oceans are vulnerable to a non-linear melt down. Rising air temperatures are the main cause of recent dramatic disintegration of ice shelves. But Hansen’s study suggests that the warming of oceans may be playing a more significant role in destroying them … as positive feedbacks amplify the exponential rate of ice melt.
In contrast to Hansen’s calculations, the IPCC’s projected 3 feet sea level increase excludes ice sheet melt. The Greenland, West and East Antarctica ice sheets are evidencing considerable instability and rapid loss of ice mass in recent years. NASA has just announced that a sea level increase of 3 feet is already LOCKED IN – thus unavoidable by young people and future generations.
Hansen concludes this all means the IPCC’s 2 degrees Celsius target by 2050 is far too high. We are now on a CO2 emissions trend leading to a 3 to 4 degrees Celsius increase by 2050 – ominously sharply raising Earth’s existing dangerous energy imbalance. To avert this disaster scenario, global CO2 emissions must be rapidly reduced by +-6% yearly to achieve at least a 350ppm atmospheric CO2 concentration by 2100.
(see: https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn26243-world-on-track-for-worstcase-warming-scenario)
Congratulation California for recognizing it’s morally as well as socially and economically indefensible to not be phasing out of fossil fuel CO2 emissions as rapidly as possible … including ambitious actions to vastly improve energy efficiency.