There's Gore where that came from

Al Gore rallies his grassroots supporters to help pass House climate bill 7

gore, waxman, markeyThe climate dream team? Rep. Henry Waxman, former VP Al Gore and Rep. Ed Markey are set on getting a cap-and-trade climate bill passed ASAP.AP photos / composite by Tom Twigg

NASHVILLE, Tenn.—Al Gore on Thursday kicked off a new phase of his campaign against climate change, calling on his volunteers across the country to rally behind the climate and energy bill now moving through the House.

In an interview here, Gore offered high praise for the compromise worked out between bill coauthors Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and moderate Democrats. “They’re on the verge of a truly historic accomplishment,” said Gore.

Gore spoke with Grist ahead of the first North American summit of The Climate Project, the international campaign he founded to train citizens to present the climate slideshow he made famous in An Inconvenient Truth. Up to this point, Climate Project presenters have focused on educating the public about the science of global warming. The meeting this weekend will give presenters updated information and a new, more activist mission: helping to pass the House climate bill. Gore wants the network of volunteers to “become citizen activists in support of this legislation.”

While some in the environmental community have expressed disappointment in the Waxman-Markey bill, Gore was optimistic.

“I think they’ve maintained the integrity of the bill,” he said. “In its current form as I understand it, I have no doubt that it will accomplish the result we need to begin this transition toward renewable energy, conservation, efficiency, and renewed U.S. leadership in global negotiations.”

Gore praised Waxman’s and Markey’s efforts to reach compromise, which addressed the concerns of moderate Democrats from the South and Midwest. “One cannot discount the importance of having a broad base of support for this legislation,” he said. “Were it to be perceived as unbalanced regionally, unduly harsh in its impact on important sectors of the economy, then its chances for passage in the House and Senate would be sharply diminished.”

Though the near-term emissions target in the current bill is lower than in the original draft, Gore said he believes it’s a good starting point.  It calls for a 17 percent cut below 2005 levels by 2020, but Gore predicts that the other provisions in the bill—like requiring 15 to 20 percent of electricity to come from renewable sources by 2020—will lead to much larger emissions reductions.

“The key role of the legislation is to begin that shift [to lower emissions],” he said. “Once it begins, it will be unstoppable.”

The road to Copenhagen

Gore praised President Obama’s leadership on climate and energy thus far.  He called Obama’s meeting with Democrats on the Energy and Commerce Committee last week “very timely and very successful,” coming at a “moment where the negotiations really could have gone either way.”

“He’s got as good a team in the White House and the Cabinet as this country has ever seen, and I think he’s going about it in a very skillful way,” said Gore.

Gore predicted that the president will continue to be engaged in the process, and will want to go to the international summit in Copenhagen in December where a new global climate treaty will be hashed out.

Gore said the Waxman-Markey legislation could be revisited and strengthened over time as the world community comes to recognize the value of emissions reductions. He drew a comparison with the 1997 Montreal Protocol, which sought to limit substances that deplete the ozone layer.  The first targets in that treaty were weaker than many wanted, but within three years, world leaders strengthened the pact, after realizing it wasn’t hurting the global economy.

“I think this bill is likely to play the same role,” said Gore. “Whatever agreement is reached in Copenhagen, if it mirrors the kind of approach in this bill, it will begin a shift that will pick up momentum as it develops and the world will quickly revisit it.”

Lessons learned

A veteran of the House, Senate, and White House, Gore says he’s learned a lot over the years about political compromise and what’s needed to pass strong legislation. He lived through the brutal fight over the BTU tax that the Clinton administration backed in 1993, which would have been a first step toward reducing carbon dioxide emissions.

The House passed a budget bill with the BTU tax in it without any Republican support, but it was later dropped in order to get the overall budget plan through the Senate.  Republicans then bashed Democrats who had voted for the tax, using the issue effectively in the 1994 elections, which resulted in the first GOP House majority in 40 years. Republicans this year are banking on using the climate bill the same way, putting pressure on freshmen Democrats and those in vulnerable seats.

Gore said he learned from the BTU fight that there needs to be a strong, grassroots call for action from citizens across the country.

“In order to win this struggle, we have to go to the constituents of the Congress,” said Gore. “Just laying the facts on the table and playing an inside-the-Beltway game is not going to do it on this issue. We have to win the feelings and opinions of voters in the country as a whole ... We have to go to the grassroots.”

As for legislators who are not yet on board, he said, “The only way they’re going to face down the special interests is if they hear from their constituents that this is the right thing to do.”

And Gore is making sure they will hear from their constituents.

The Climate Project and its partner organization, the Alliance for Climate Protection, are now “multi-hundred-million-dollar” campaigns “aimed at getting the facts before the people,” he said. Gore formed both groups in 2006, but until now their work has been largely separate. The Climate Project and its 1,200 slideshow presenters have focused on educating the public, while the Alliance for Climate Protection has concentrated on major advertising campaigns.

The two groups are now entering a new phase with a more coordinated, campaign-like focus of generating nationwide grassroots support for a climate bill. Since the beginning of this year, the Alliance has grown from 20 staffers to 120, working not just in Washington, D.C., but in key congressional districts across the country. Together, the two groups are using slideshow presentations, action alerts to supporters, and radio, print, and television ads to help get a climate bill passed. (We’ll have more on their efforts soon.)

“We have a big ally: reality,” said Gore. “But that doesn’t always determine the outcome unless you have a focused message.”

Gore’s two groups are also cooperating with other environmental organizations to make sure activists are targeting lawmakers, and they’re working with allies in the labor and religious communities. “We’re coordinating our work effort in a way that I’ve never seen before in the environmental movement,” he said.

The eventual goal of the Alliance for Climate Protection, according to Gore, is to put itself out of business by the end of 2009. If the U.S. passes a strong climate bill and Copenhagen produces a strong climate treaty, the group will dissolve and redirect its resources in new ways, Gore said. “We’re a time-limited organization, have been from the start,” said Gore.

“Our goal is to get the country and the world past the tipping point beyond which the majority say, ‘OK, we’re going to do this.’”

Kate Sheppard covers energy and environmental politics for Mother Jones. She was previously the political reporter for Grist and a writing fellow at The American Prospect. You can find her work here and follow her on Twitter.

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  1. LaurieWilliams Posted 12:00 am
    16 May 2009

    It is very disappointing to see Al Gore putting his considerable influence behind the fatally flawed approach of the proposed Waxman Markey bill. The current Waxman-Markey bill suffers from weak goals, insufficient to forestall an unacceptable risk of catastrophic climate change. It allows even these weak targets to be met by outside offsets that will be largely fraudulent. It relies on the equivalent of the creative financial instruments that help create the recent financial meltdown. As long-time public-sector environmental attorneys, my husband and I have been speaking out in our personal capacity as parents and citizens. Based on our enforcement experience and my husband's experience with cap-and-trade and offsets, we believe that the Waxman-Markey bill will fail to deliver even the weakened goals that it claims to establish. NRDC, EDF and other individuals and groups that are endorsing the bill are ignoring the complete lack of integrity introduced by massive offsets. They are also relying on the "success" of the Acid Rain program as the basis on which they recommend the cap-and-trade portion of the Waxman Markey bill. (Note: Acid Rain did not have offsets.) In addition, they ignore the many differences between Acid Rain and Climate Change. Acid Rain involved a relatively simple fuel switch to lower sulfur coal at existing facilities. There is no simple fuel switch for existing facilities that will solve the climate change problem. Rather, we need to correct the relative price advantage that fossil fuel energy currently has over clean energy alternatives and to improve incentives for conservation. The proposed cap-and-trade system cannot get us from where we are to where we need to be. There are valuable measures in the Waxman Markey bill, like energy efficiency standards. However, the cap-and-trade and offset provisions should be eliminated and carbon fees with per capita rebates should be put in their stead (phased in fees to gradually make clean energy cost-competitive with fossil fuel energy and monthly rebates to cushion the impact for consumers). If the American public is not ready for an effective climate bill, we should not substitute an ineffective climate bill. We should ask the Administration to provide town hall meetings that improve public understanding of the threat and the potential solutions, staffed by the National Academy of Sciences, our National Security Advisor, and other experts.
    A short synopsis of our arguments: "Why cap-and-trade is not the answer" can be found at: http://www.carbonfees.org/home/EnvirFinance03_09.pdf
    Our 17-page discussion paper (the most complete statement of our argument (2/21/09) "Keeping Our Eyes on the Wrong Ball" is located at: http://www.carbonfees.org/home/Cap-and-TradeVsCarbonFees.pdf
    Thank you! Laurie Williams

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  2. F James Handley Posted 11:03 am
    16 May 2009

     Climate and Policy Experts Warn Watered Down Cap-and-Trade Bill Won’t Prevent Catastrophic Climate Change “The revised Waxman-Markey climate bill is too watered down to qualify
    as a positive step for avoiding catastrophic climate disruption,” said Dr. James Hansen, leading climate scientist and prominent advocate of a revenue-neutral carbon tax to curb climate change....Clinton Administration Undersecretary of Commerce Robert Shapiro, who heads the U.S. Climate Task Force, recently wrote that after the Wall Street meltdown, carbon trading looks like a “dead policy walking.” Both Hansen and Shapiro have urged policymakers to support a simpler and more transparent alternative of
    setting prices through a carbon tax which would increase gradually and
    whose revenues would be recycled back to taxpayers. This would raise
    carbon prices in an orderly, predictable way without subjecting
    consumers to price volatility and without delivering windfall profits
    to companies receiving free allowances or fueling speculative trading
    on secondary markets.“Predictably raising the price of carbon-based fuels is essential to
    promote investment in low-carbon renewable energy and efficiency,” said
    Charles Komanoff, economist and co-director of the Carbon Tax Center.
    Komanoff suggested that “We will need a range of policies to avert
    climate disaster, but without clear, orderly price signals, there
    simply is no hope of creating the economy-wide incentives we need to
    become a low-carbon economy.”“There is a time to
    compromise -- to accept the best that you are likely to get. This is
    not one of those times,” said Tom Stokes, coordinator of the Climate Crisis Coalition.
    “We understand the need to get behind an effective climate bill.  Dr.
    Hansen's scientific findings are serious and compelling. Waxman-Markey
    doesn't comes close to addressing the dire challenge we all face.  As a
    model for effective and fair climate legislation, we urge the Energy
    and Commerce Committee to take a hard look at Rep. John Larson’s carbon
    tax bill, America's Energy Security Trust Fund Act of 2009 (H.R. 1337).  Larson's bill combines aggressive goals, quick
    implementation, predictable carbon fees and an equitable recycling of
    the revenues back to the people."More at http://www.carbontax.org and http://www.pricecarbon.org

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  3. randino Posted 6:26 am
    17 May 2009

    There are a lot of people out there who may not be all that happy with the current proposal, who forget about what we are dealing with.  We are dealing with Washington DC, folks.  We are dealing with the Bunker of the Status Quo.  Of course we are not going to be happy with what we are getting. We are NEVER going to get what we want from the beltway. The battle is not on the playing field. It is in the parking lot.  We need to prepare to take what piece of shit we get from Washington, and then work to use and abuse it to make real change for climate justice.  You better believe that the forces of darkness have already cooked up a few dozen initiatives that they will launch, to bend things their way if the legislation passes. We really need to get a lot more sophisticated and devious in how we approach taking on issues like this. I think the generation of reactionary rule we have just emerged from made us stupid.  We have to learn to work on a lot of different levels, with a lot of different strategies, all operating at the same time.  A hell of a juggling act, but one we have to become adept at if we are to save the planet and our butts.Randy Cunningham, Cleveland OH 

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  4. Royal Enfield's avatar

    Royal Enfield Posted 8:15 pm
    17 May 2009

    The Goracle has spoken.  Respect.

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  5. sanderson508 Posted 10:15 am
    18 May 2009

    of course the bill isn't perfect.   If it were written to the standards of the environmentalists it would not have the remotest chance of passage.   In working towards control by legislation, we must win by dealing with reality not lose by pursuing an unachievable ideal.    

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  6. AideSurendettement Posted 4:29 pm
    18 May 2009

    Bill not perfect and ?... It's an important thing : at least something is written ! we have to be patient and to fight to win our ecological war, but with politicals and so, it's slow : we know that !

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  7. RussellLowes Posted 5:50 pm
    18 May 2009

    There are actually good bills that come out of Congress! I have no problem with some bills, but this one is a monster that will be hard to stop, if it passes. A great example of a great bill passed by Congress is the Wilderness Act. The recent expansion of two million acres was another great bill that was signed into law. There are ways to get a reasonable bill through Congress, and hopefully we will defeat this one and come up with better bills on reducing emissions in the future.

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