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Catherine, Alan (facing camera) & Kit "work" the downtown Farmer's Market, spring 2008	(Click to enlarge)   Alan, Sarah, Derek, Jeff, Terry (obscured), Kevin (holding paper roll), Jackie, Mike & Duane: after Jan 2009 BCAN meeting	(Click to enlarge)  District 10 constituents right after meeting State Senator Delores Kelly on the Global Warming Solutions Act (One of 7 constituent meetings with key state legislators we organized in Dec 2008).

(Scroll to end for more photos)


Updated June 5th, 2009:

U.S. CLIMATE BILL PASSES COMMITTEE!
On May 21, 2009, the controversial 946 page Waxman-Markey bill passed in the House Energy & Commerce Committee!  Also known as ACES or the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009.    Read the analysis on Joe Romm's indispensible blog: 'Climate Progress': http://climateprogress.org/2009/05/21/waxman-markey-approved-house-energy-and-commerce-committe/#more-7016

This Climate bill has divided the environmental movement.   Some organizations do not support the current weak bill (Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, Public Citizen and Chesapeake Climate Action Network).   Others, like the Sierra Club, urged their members to thank Congressmen Waxman and Markey for passing the bill out of committee.

Environmental groups agree on the need to urge congress, during this critical time before the bill reaches the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives, to significantly strengthen the bill.  This can be done considering that the House Energy & Commerce Committee, which passed the bill in its weakened form, is more conservative on energy matters than the overall House of Representatives.



A Common Person’s Guide to the Federal Climate Bill (in its current form).
http://www.chesapeakeclimate.org/blog/?p=1337  (June 2, 2009)



CCAN (Chesapeake Climate Action Network)'s  blog (5-22-09):  Local BCAN & CCAN advocates hand-deliver piles of messages to MD Congressman John Sarbanes (House Energy & Commerce Committee member, still a critical player)
http://www.chesapeakeclimate.org/blog/?p=1289     Our (BCAN'S) meeting with Congressman Sarbanes on April 20th 2009 was a great success.



Here's what the New York Times had to say about the bill: (5-21-09):  http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/22/us/politics/22climate.html?_r=1&ref=politics   “the most ambitious energy and global warming legislation ever debated in Congress. . . In the end, 85 percent of all pollution allowances were given at no cost...Mr. Obama’s position during the presidential campaign was that all of the permits should be auctioned".



Excerpt from Joe Romm's blog Climate Progress May 22, 2009:
". . . Many people have asked me how I can reconcile my climate science realism, which demands far stronger action than the Waxman-Markey bill requires, and my climate politics realism, which has led me to strongly advocate passage of this flawed bill.

The short answer is that Waxman-Markey is the only game in town. If it fails, I see no chance whatsoever of stabilizing anywhere near 350 to 450 ppm since serious U.S. action would certainly be off the table for years, the effort to jumpstart the clean energy economy in this country would stall, the international negotiating process would fall apart, and any chance of a deal with China would be dead. Warming of 5°C or more by century’s end would be all but inevitable, with 850 to 1000+ ppm. If Waxman-Markey becomes law, then I see a genuine 10% to 20% chance of averting catastrophe — not high, but not zero..."



The bad news:   Greenpeace, along with Friends of the Earth & Public Citizen feel they can longer support the bill, though most environmental groups support it while engaging in the (uphill) battle to improve it.   Here's an Excerpt from Greenpeace: http://members.greenpeace.org/blog/greenpeaceusa_blog/2009/05/21/why_greenpeace_can_t_support_waxman_mark



Read more at our section:  'Congress' - 'U.S. Climate - Energy bill'



On 5-22-09, the Sierra Club's Carl Pope wrote . . .
http://sierraclub.typepad.com/carlpope/2009/05/so-how-good-is-this-climate-bill-anyhow.html   "Don't feel bad if you're confused about the merits of the this bill...,"   ("a half-finished shell").  The Sierra Club concluded that . . . "the plan approved by the committee establishes a sound framework for achieving its vital goals although Big Oil, Big Coal, and dirty power companies extracted a steep price... We will work with our allies to mount a vigorous effort to strengthen this bill ..."    Pope summarized the bill's serious problems, and also wrote that "...the bill establishes a strong long-term goal -- an 80 percent reduction in carbon pollution by 2050. It contains the strongest energy-efficiency language ever to emerge from a Congressional committee. It makes a huge commitment to protect tropical forests. And it puts the down payment on a number of other critically important initiatives: financing energy efficiency, protecting low-income consumers from energy-price spikes, helping developing countries and U.S. communities protect themselves from natural disasters resulting from climate change, and helping buffer America's wild heritage from the impacts of climate change.