Posted on 01/14/2007 10:50:29 AM PST by NormsRevenge
In the state's biggest, immediate step toward cutting global warming pollution, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger this week began shifting California's 26 million cars and trucks off petroleum-based fuels and toward alternatives that emit less greenhouse gas.
The governor said his new greenhouse-gas standard for transportation fuels -- the world's first -- "leads us away from fossil fuel" and would help "in moving the entire country beyond debate, denial and inaction" on global warming.
State air-pollution regulators expect to work out the details during the next 18 months. The policy would limit the amount of greenhouse gases released for each bit of energy in fuel, then gradually shave those emissions down 10 percent by 2020.
Fuel producers could choose how to meet the new limits, at first probably by blending in more home-grown fuels such as ethanol, biodiesel or biobutanol, or purchasing credits from producers of lower-carbon fuels, such as electricity for plug-in electric-gas hybrids. In time, they could team with automakers to bolster the supply of hydrogen vehicles, electric cars and the like.
Environmentalists called the new plan revolutionary, and energy experts said it would be watched closely by policymakers from Washington to London and Berlin, where similar policies are under consideration. Greenhouse gases from cars, trucks and aircraft are a powerful contributor to global warming, but each mobile source is small and notoriously difficult to regulate. The new policy reaches past those difficulties to take effect at the refinery, the fueling station and perhaps the electrical outlet in the household garage.
Given California's appetite for oil, the policy stands to affect 10 percent of the nation's transportation fuel and ease the leading source of greenhouse gases in the world's eighth-largest economy. Those reductions would start at least two years before California launches mandatory cuts in stationary sources of greenhouse gases, such as refineries, cement plants and electrical power plants.
"This is a big deal. This is the world's first greenhouse-gas standard for transportation fuels," said Eric Heitz, president of the Energy Foundation, a San Francisco-based nonprofit group that monitors energy policy. "This policy will be noticed worldwide."
Several experts predicted a flush of capital for California-based green energy technologies and, for consumers, a dazzling menu of automotive choices from plug-in hybrids to cars running on hydrogen, natural gas and plant-derived biofuels -- to as many as 7 million more such vehicles in 2020, or 20 times more than are on the road now. "The policy will motivate new investment in California in alternatives such as biofuel, electric vehicles and hydrogen fuel and related products including electric motors and batteries," said Daniel Sperling, director of the Institute of Transportation Studies at UC Davis.
"It will stimulate the California economy and reduce oil imports," said Sperling, who is analyzing the policy's impact.
Leaves more for the rest of us :-)
BTTT
That darn global warming froze and burst a pipe in one of my garages yesterday.
Gridlock will be horrible by 2020, but at least the roads won't have to be as wide to accomodate all the 2-passenger autos on the road.
Yep. Just what I was thinking.
$1.25 per gallon here we come.
I hate to say it, but Arnold is probably a WORSE governor than Gray Davis.
Davis was corrupt. Arnold is just plain stupid. He is completely ignoring all of California's real energy problems, such as a lack of power plants within the state and a lack of refineries. Instead, he will only make things worse, by sucking in even more energy from out of state.
Where does he think electricity comes from, in those lovely electric cars? Where does he think it will come from in a state whose power grid has not been properly upgraded for ten or twenty years?
Does he really think that Washington and Oregon and Utah will continue to provide California with power, if they will do nothing to reciprocate?
Don't worry folks! Arnold will soon activate an enormous alien machine he's found and restore the atmosphere! The alien technology will solve global warming.
All I can say is, good luck California. You're gonna need it.
Call me crazy, but I fail to see how this new energy plan is going to "stimulate the 'conomy" when the price of gasoline is going up...
At the rate gas prices are dropping it will hit a buck and a quarter by March...
Mexiforniastan will shortly be riding Schwinn bikes to work on the freeways. Mexiforniastan is what the entire USA will look like after Bushnization of the illegals takes hold and the socialist/liberal/islumic/homo dimocrats take final power of the Republic formerly known as the United States of America. Soon, our way of life will go into the history books like Rome, the dinosaurs, and ancient Egyptians. By 2012 or so, the USA will not even closely resemble the Republic as founded.
Any one with the ability to leave California should do so now.Leave and never look back.
Something tells me we are heading into another MTBE debacle.
The wording in the first paragraph of this article disturbs me greatly. The implication that the the governor or state authorities have the right to say how our cars are used, and that the cars belong to the state says a whole lot about how the journalists at the Contra Costa Times view private property and the rights of the people to live as they please.
Texas will be glad to take your non-PC and polluting Nascar races. ;)
If he messes with our SUV's, he's going to get a Revolution alright.
Yep. Up in Woodside, dang GW froze the horse's drinking troughs and the pipes feeding them. Poor critters were pretty thirsty yesterday morning. It hardly ever freezes up here.
I've come to the same conclusion. He is a stupid utopian idealist with no common sense or understanding of basic economics and technology (but else what would you expect from a body builder / hollywood actor?). Gray Davis wasn't going to do 1/10 of the damage to California that the current governor is going to cause.
Solar: Those photovoltaic cells are expensive. Coal? That's that pesky carbon-based stuff.
Ethanol: Brazil has done a good job of cutting down its rain forests to plant sugar cane. What will the Greenies have to say about we doing the same?
Wind power: The Swimmer doesn't like those thing in Mass., will California go for wind farms in Malibu?
There ain't no easy answer.
Personally, I prefer nukes.
I'm afraid I agree with you. People should have voted for McClintock instead of Arnie, too late for the star struck voters now.
Supposedly there is some question as to whether or not he really earned an MBA from the University of Wisconsin - Madison as has been often reported in the abundance of rags-to-riches stories that have circulated about the Governator throughout the years. Based on this...I'm guessing "No!"
Revolutionary Plan to Ignore the Laws of Economics.
Revolutionary Plan to Ignore the effect that high regulatory burden, restricted choices, high costs and high taxes will cause mass exodus of productive people from the State.
Revolutionary Plan to have a Secular Utopia.
Still $2.46 a gallon here in upstate NY.
That tells me the Calif. should get all the diesel engines it wants. About damn time.
UW - Madison is a hotbed of liberalism. Maybe he did get his MBA and wacky ideas there.
Me, too. It's the only credible answer for the immediate future.
Sounds more like a "lack of energy" plan.
A goods movement concept that embodies the principles of smart growth and employs
wise land use decision making is the “Green Freight Corridor.”80 As part of the broader
Green Freight Initiative, this concept emphasizes buffer zones between goods movement
land uses and adjacent, non compatible land uses. For instance, a green freeway or rail
corridor would be bordered by open space and habitat-restoring wetlands. Residential
land uses then become adjacent to a compatible land use. A green corridor would be
crossed by green land bridges rather than surface road overpasses in order to connect
communities to regional trails and parks, thus encouraging pedestrian and bicycle traffic.
The Green Freight Corridor is an example of the much needed innovative and creative
approach to wise land use decisions and smart growth that will enable Californians to
reap economic, environmental and community benefits.Source: Goods Movement Plan (PDF), pp.VIII-14
Bicycle traffic? No Segways?
Arnie's education as published by most newspapers was a myth... no MBA, no economics degree.
He got a mail order degree from the University of Wisconsin-Superior's distance education program in 1979 - a Bachelor's degree with "an individualized major emphasizing international marketing of fitness and business administration." He was enrolled for one year... showed up a couple times on campus during the year... his curriculum included swimming, archery, and bodybuilding and conducting workshops on bodybuilding and success at the request of the starstruck school administrator, Rhea Das.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1170840/posts?page=35#35
Ping to 31, FYI.
They call it "smart growth" ;-)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1766115/posts?page=45#45
Otherwise known as command-economy, top-down government, collectivism, totalitarianism, etc. etc. Property rights have no place in this brave new world.
We need to build a fence between California and America.
I agree with EGD (#36).
Is it time yet to recall this hopeless left wing RINO jackass?
You comments are spot on, Dan!!!
The backlash against all this economic and environmental voodoo doodoo will be a wonderful thing to behold! It's coming!! Get ready!!!
The train wreck will be devastating in it's harsh reality, but that's the only price to be paid that will actually wake the people of CA up and bring them first to their knees, then to their senses!!!
Why on earth would you "hate to say" something so glaringly obvious and true? Anyone who will stop swooning over his celebrity status and actually look at his actual factual education, business accumen and success outside of a few actual lucky breaks would realize that he is as bogus as a complete fraud, not only upon the Republican Party, but on all the people of CA!!!
To not recognize this is to be completely oblivious to the obvious!!! (I'm sorry to say)
Save us from the wisdom of weight lifters.
Ha Ha Ha!!! Now that picture (cartoon) is worth billions in CA bonds and bondage of our mortgaged freedoms, etc...
The stupid "friends" from the Demonicrat Party that he's surrounded himself with are just orgasmic that they've hijacked a member of the Republican Party as a Governor to implement every wet dream they've had since they invented Earth Day in the 1970's!!!
What makes them multiple orgasmic is the Demo judges he's appointed at their behest to ENFORCE the terrible tyranny of GovernMental EnvironMentalism by these Born Again Pagans for our forseeble future!!!
Talk about your "OXYMORONS!"
And the excitement of his groupies, male and female alike.
He's not there yet, but he's moving fast!
All the citizens of the nation-state of CA should be apprised of the unparalleled infusion of fantastic free enterprise and free market activities that have burgeoned all over each of the 25 million acres at an unbelieveable rate since Schwartzenegger blessed us with such devine governmental intervention on behalf of large landowners who desperately needed this direction and guidance by a committee of powerful and knowledgeable "smart growth" activists appointed by our beloved Governor.
The wealth of these CA citizens just exploded overnight as if by magic, causing them to lay aside their long pursuit of stewardship of land they have now come to realize they just didn't have the knowledge, skills or even the right attitude about their exercising personal control over, just because they held a title to such large parcels.
Some of them were quoted as admitting that even though the land had been in their families since the days of the gold rush, they just felt relieved that the responsibility for future uses of it are now in the hands of superior governmental decision makers for the good of all and future generations. It is simply heartwarming to see the relief written large over all these California land stakeholders faces now that they've been freed of such a monumental responsibility!
Please join me in saluting our beloved Governor who has shown us all how our caring and concerned government stands constantly ready to relieve us of such heavy burdens with the stroke of a pen by Governor Arnold Schwartzenegger... the supreme leader of our new nation-state!!!
He has really enriched all of us in this huge regional area, bigger than most eastern states.
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