Net Greenhouse Gases Inventory Bill Up for Consideration - Again

In August, Tyree, an environmental scientist, and OVEC's Tonya Adkins presented "Social Injustice and Global Warming" "at a meeting of the Huntington-Cabell Branch of the NAACP.

When the 2007 WV Legislative Session begins in January, the WV Department of Environmental Protection’s Net Greenhouse Gas Inventory Bill will be up for consideration again.

In 2006, the bill was voted down in the Senate Judiciary Committee.  The WV Environmental Council reported that Chris Hamilton, a lobbyist with the WV Coal Association, testified to the committee that the bill would lead to regulations, “which would shut down the coal business.”  The Coal Association’s fear tactics will certainly be employed again this year.  However, their case will be more difficult to make in 2007 because of Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth and an enormous volume of scientific evidence of the dangers of global warming has increased public awareness.

The Net Greenhouse Gas Inventory Bill would:
--Inventory and track current and future significant greenhouse gas emissions    
 from power plants, vehicles and other sources.  Gases to be inventoried include carbon dioxide, methane and others that contribute to global warming;

--Establish a DEP program that collects and reports data on greenhouse gas emissions;

--Determine whether West Virginia is a net emitter or sink for greenhouse gases and determine if these gases can be used as an asset for economic development;

--Establish a baseline database of industries that have voluntarily reduced their greenhouse gas emissions prior to establishment of rules mandated by law.

West Virginia certainly has a critical need for a greenhouse gas emissions law.  According to a June 2006 U.S. Public Interest Research Group report:

--Since 2000 average temperature increases in cities across the state ranged from 0.3 to
1.2 degrees.  In Charleston and Huntington, between 2000 and 2005, the average temperature was 1.2 degrees above normal;

-- Between 1960 and 2001 carbon dioxide (the main gas driving global warming),
  emissions from fossil fuel combustion more than doubled (rose 115%);

--87% of this carbon dioxide increase was from coal emissions.

Knowing our current and future emissions rates will help us prepare for future climate change disasters in the Mountain State. The US Environmental Protection Agency projects there will be a marked increase in flooding, property damage and runoff from a predicted 20% increase in precipitation.  Storm intensity will increase, which will increase the threats from coal sludge dams, which are not designed for storm events made worse by global warming.

Global warming is a critical emergency.  NASA scientist James Hansen projects that humanity has less than 10 years remaining to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions. If we don’t a global tipping point will be breached, which will result in catastrophic weather pattern changes.  He thinks this climate shift will cause the earth to become a “different planet” not seen since our species evolved.

A September 2006 NASA Goddard Institute of Space Studies report revealed that earth’s present atmospheric temperature is as high as it’s been in over 12,000 years of earth history.

Another study released in September 2006 by the British Antarctic Survey determined that the current atmospheric carbon dioxide level (380 ppm) is higher than it has been in over 800,000 years.

An October 31 report written by Sir Nicholas Stern, a former chief economist at the World Bank, projected that if global temperatures rise by just another 3.6 degrees this century, 40% of the world’s species would face extinction, 4 billion people could face water shortages, and Greenland’s ice mass would begin to melt irreversibly causing coastal flooding.  Economic impacts could soar to over 20% of the entire world’s output.