After months of delay, the Senate version of climate-change legislation was introduced on Sept. 30 by two principal sponsors whose committees will have significant jurisdiction over the final product.
The discussion draft bill formulated by Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairwoman Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry, D-Mass., mirrors several provisions of the House version, but calls for stricter limits on greenhouse gas emissions. But the 801-page Senate version also is notable because it contains placeholders in several key areas yet to be resolved that ultimately will determine the costs associated with implementing its version of a cap-and-trade scheme. Two key areas left unresolved in the draft text include how carbon-credit allowances will be distributed to capped entities -- including how many are distributed free and to what industries -- and how the program to develop offsets to help meet the reductions will be formulated.
House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson, D-Minn., largely wrote the House version of the agricultural offsets program, which included a number of troubling provisions that could encourage idling of productive cropland or its conversion to forest. Importantly the House version did leave the management of the program to the U.S. Department of Agriculture rather than the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
The Senate offset provisions are expected to be very strict, which could mitigate some of the potential land-conversion aspects of a cap-and-trade bill. But fewer other offsets may be available to help lower the cost of carbon credits. The Senate Agriculture Committee has jurisdiction over several aspects of the bill, but Chairwoman Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., has not indicated yet how her committee will approach the measure. Lincoln has registered significant concerns over any cap-and-trade legislation, and is unlikely to support the bill if it remains near its current form.
The Boxer-Kerry draft bill would require a 20 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 and an 80 percent reduction by 2050 based off of 2005 levels. That’s significantly tighter than the House version, which would mandate a 17 percent reduction in the near term. The Senate bill's supporters have indicated that this is an opening gambit on the legislation, and they expect it to altered, perhaps significantly, in their bid to try and garner the 60 votes necessary to break an expected filibuster if the bill reaches the Senate floor for a vote.
While initially targeting a fall completion date for the Senate climate-change bill, it appears that consideration of the bill will slip into early 2010. Expectations are that the bill will be considered by Boxer’s Senate Environment and Public Works Committee during October in an effort to complete its work before President Obama attends the U.N. global climate summit, scheduled for December in Copenhagen, Denmark. Obama is expected to use the event to press other countries for a global commitment to reduce carbon emissions, which is viewed as a critical precursor before a congressional vote.