[GPCA Updates] GP RELEASE Greens: Obama & Congress are wrong on 'clean coal', nuclear energy, cap & trade

Wed May 20 17:37:12 PDT 2009

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GREEN PARTY OF THE UNITED STATES
http://www.gp.org

For Immediate Release:
Wednesday, May 18, 2009

Greens: Obama and Congress are wrong on 'clean coal', nuclear
energy, and emissions trading

• Green Party Speakers Bureau: Green leaders available to speak on
energy policy, transportation, and the climate crisis
http://www.gp.org/speakers/speakers-ecological.php
http://www.gp.org/speakers/speakers-energy.php

WASHINGTON, DC -- Green Party leaders, while praising President
Obama's efforts to focus public attention on emissions and the
climate crisis, said that the White House and Congress are either
going too slow or in the wrong direction on many energy policies.

CAR EMISSIONS

Greens said that the President's plan for new emissions and mileage
standards for cars and light trucks is a step in the right
direction, but falls short.

"The new requirements will have minimal effect unless we also see
measures to reduce car traffic, such as regionally sensitive carbon
taxes, congestion taxes, a halt in new highway construction, and --
most urgently for working Americans -- a massive public
transportation project to replace the reliance on cars," said Wes
Rolley, cochair of the Green Party's EcoAction Committee.

COAL

Greens have expressed dismay over President Obama's embrace of the
'clean coal' myth promoted by the coal industry.

"Clean coal is a PR fabrication.  The environmental effects of coal
extraction have proven disastrous.  Mountaintop removal and strip
mining have devastated whole landscapes in West Virginia, Tennessee,
and other states, destroying mountains, valleys, and forests and
dumping poisons into rivers, streams, and water tables.  The amount
of energy used to transport energy in trucks and trains adds further
pollution.  Scrubbing coal removes some particulates but ultimately
doesn't end the emission of greenhouse gases, the cause of global
warming," said Carl Romanelli, former Pennsylvania Green candidate
for the US Senate and co-chair of the Luzerne County Green Party in
the heart of anthracite country.

See also: Coal is not the answer, http://coalisnottheanswer.org

NUCLEAR ENERGY

Greens strongly opposed 'Clean Energy Investment Bank' legislation
sponsored by Senate Energy Committee Chair Jeff Bingaman, Rep. Jay
Inslee (D-Wash.), and Sen. Pete Domenici (R-NM), which would provide
unlimited taxpayer loan guarantees for the construction of new
nuclear reactors.

"Nuclear power is dirty and dangerous.  There is no safe way to
handle nuclear waste or mine uranium or eliminate the many security
risks they pose.  The Clean Energy Bank will encourage unclean and
unsafe nuclear and coal energy, with giant taxpayer-funded bailouts
for companies like Duke Power, Southern Company, UniStar Nuclear and
Exelon," said Jill Bussiere, co-chair of the Green Party of the
United States and former member of the Kudzu Alliance, which opposed
construction of the Shearon Harris nuclear plant in North Carolina
during the 1970s.

Along with security problems, nuclear energy is simply too
inefficient and expensive as a solution to global warming, requiring
massive construction and huge amounts of fuel.  Green Party leaders
quoted a June 2007 Keystone Center report: "Hypothetically, an
aggressive scenario to achieve even modest global reductions in
greenhouse gas emissions would require building 21 large (1,000
megawatt) nuclear reactors worldwide every year for fifty years, and
more than five per year (275 total) in the United States.... [T]he
amount of resulting waste would fill '10 nuclear waste repositories
the size of the statutory capacity of Yucca Mountain."
(http://www.keystone.org/spp/energy/electricity/nuclear-power-dialogue)

See also:

• "Florida Greens file petition against NRC licensing of Levy Cty.
nuclear plant": Green Party of Florida press release, February 14,
2009 http://www.gp.org/press/pr-national.php?ID=181
http://www.floridagreens.org

• "Greens blast legislative move to repeal nuclear moratorium; call
attempt an effort to undermine renewable energy": Illinois Green
Party release, April 2, 2009
http://ilgp.org/groups/media/ILGPpress-releasses/greens-blast-legislative-move-to-repeal-nuclear-moratorium-call

• "Nuclear Nonsense: Why Nuclear Power is No Answer to Climate
Change and the World’s Post-Kyoto Energy Challenges" by Benjamin K.
Sovacool and Christopher Cooper, Environmental Law and Policy
Review, Volume 33, Fall 2008 Issue 1
http://members.elpr.org/archives/33/sovacool_cooper.pdf

• Nuclear Information and Resource Service http://www.nirs.org

EMISSIONS TRADING

Greens have criticized emissions trading ('cap and trade'), calling
it a concession to polluting industries that will impede efforts to
curb global warming.  In many instances, emissions trading
encourages greenhouse gas emissions, since companies with low
pollution will be able to sell their conservation credits to the
highest bidders, giving major polluters a license to maintain or
increase pollution levels.  Party leaders called emissions trading
schemes like the Waxman-Markey "American Clean Energy and Security
Act of 2009" a capitulation to polluting industries.

"Democratic leaders in the US House are planning to give away 85% of
the greenhouse gas emission credits.  Giveaways bypass the trading
and auction strategies that cap and trade advocates have promoted as
a free market solution.  Such allowances are a signal that Congress
is more willing to satisfy industry demands and 'grandfather'
polluters than to demand the necessary extensive reductions," said
Tony Gronowicz, political historian and 2005 New York City Green
Party mayoral candidate.

See also:

• "Good News, There's a Climate Bill -- Bad News, It Stinks" (on the
"American Clean Energy and Security Act") by Daphne Wysham,
AlterNet, May 19, 2009 http://www.alternet.org/story/140084

• Carbon Trade Watch http://www.carbontradewatch.org

GREEN SOLUTIONS

The Green Party strongly opposes emissions trading schemes, and
instead favors bans on new coal fired-power plants, new nuclear
power plants (as well as early retirement of current nuclear
reactors), and all mountaintop coal removal. The party endorses a
reduction by 90% of mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants
by 2012, targeted carbon taxes, investment in renewable
noncarbon-based energy technology, and reduction of CO2 and SO2
emissions by 80% by 2020.

Greens call for a reorganization of the US economy that would create
millions of new jobs in conversion to safe clean energy,
conservation, and expansion of public transportation to replace car
traffic.

"President Obama must launch a project to stem global warming that's
comparable to the concerted and internationally cooperative effort
to defeat the Axis powers during World War II.  The lives of future
generations in America and throughout the world are vastly more
important than the current demands of energy industries," said Budd
Dickinson, co-chair of the Green Party of the United States and a
retired energy engineer.

MORE INFORMATION

Green Party of the United States http://www.gp.org
202-319-7191, 866-41GREEN
Fax 202-319-7193
• Tally of Green election victories
http://www.gp.org/2008-elections/election-results.html
• Green candidate news
http://www.gp.org/2008-elections/candidate-news.php
• Green candidate database for 2008 and other campaign information:
http://www.gp.org/elections.shtml
• Green Party News Center http://www.gp.org/newscenter.shtml
• Green Party Speakers Bureau http://www.gp.org/speakers
• Green Party ballot access page http://www.gp.org/2008-elections

Green Pages, Vol. 13, No. 1
The official publication of record of the Green Party of the United
States
http://gp.org/greenpages-blog

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