Finally, some of the top climate modelers in the world have done a “plausible worst case scenario,” as Dr Richard Betts, Head of Climate Impacts at the Met Office Hadley Centre, put it today in a terrific and terrifying talk (audio here, PPT here).

No, I’m not taking about a simple analysis of what happens if the nation and the world just keep on our current emissions path.  We’ve known that end-of-century catastrophe for a while (see “M.I.T. doubles its 2095 warming projection to 10°F “” with 866 ppm and Arctic warming of 20°F“).  I’m talking about running a high emissions scenario (i.e. business as usual) in one of the few global climate models capable of analyzing strong carbon cycle feedbacks.  This is what you get [temperature in degrees Celsius, multiple by 1.8 for Fahrenheit]:

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“The carbon-based free lunch is over. But while we can’t fix our climate problems for free, the price signal sent through a cap-and-trade system will drive low-carbon investments in the most inexpensive and efficient way possible,” said Rowe. “Putting a price on carbon is essential, because it will force us to do the cheapest things, like energy efficiency, first.”

“Inaction on climate is not an option,” said Rowe. “If Congress does not act, the EPA will, and the result will be more arbitrary, more expensive, and more uncertain for investors and the industry than a reasonable, market-based legislative solution.”

Exelon issued a press release today announcing CEO John Rowe’s decision to leave the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.  It includes the above excerpts from his speech calling for immediate action by Congress.

More and more utilities have cut the power to the Chamber (see “Will last company to leave the Chamber’s Boardroom please turn off the lights!“) — though they have been in the dark a long time (see “Chamber admits calling for ‘Scopes monkey trial of the 21st century’ was dumb “” but it still apes the deniers“).

Okay, enough puns.  Here’s the background, from Wonk Room:

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G20 Leaders Agree to Phase Out Fossil Fuel Subsidies

World leaders gathered in Pittsburgh for the Group of 20 summit agreed Friday afternoon to phase out fossil fuel subsidies over time, approving language that does not outline a specific timetable for the phase-out and makes clear that poorer citizens may still receive help in paying their energy bills.

But the wording of the statement, championed by the Obama administration, signals the world’s most influential nations are taking an initial, tentative step away from the fossil fuels that power their economies.

“We commit to rationalize and phase out over the medium term inefficient fossil fuel subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption,” the statement said. “As we do that, we recognize the importance of providing those in need with essential energy services, including through the use of targeted cash transfers and other appropriate mechanisms. This reform will not apply to our support for clean energy, renewables and technologies that dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”

The United States and many other countries around the world provide financial aid — in the form of both direct payments and tax breaks — to help produce oil, natural gas and other fuels that produce carbon dioxide, which has contributed to rapid climate change over the past half century. According to the Environmental Law Institute, the U.S. government provided $72 billion in subsidies to the fossil fuel industry between 2002 and 2008.

China Sees Emissions Trading in Next Economic Plan

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Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-NM), the influential chairman of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, opposes efforts to add coal and nuclear subsidies to win votes for climate legislation. In an interview with Grist, Bingaman disagreed with Sen. Joe Lieberman‘s (I-CT) strategy to make the Senate version of the American Clean Energy and Security Act “more attractive to Republicans and conservative Democrats” by “including greater funding for coal and nuclear energy,” saying that instead climate leaders should put forward “a proposal people are confident will work“:

Frankly I don’t believe that gaining support of conservative Democrats depends upon putting more money into nuclear and coal power…. I think what’s really needed to get conservative Democrats supporting cap and trade legislation is to be able to put forward a proposal that people are confident will work and that people are confident will not impose an undue burden on rate payers or on our overall economy.

Watch it:

Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and John Kerry (D-MA) intend to introduce their climate legislation to the Senate on Wednesday. Senators such as John McCain (R-AZ), Russ Feingold (D-WI), Chuck Grassley (R-IA), Blanche Lincoln (D-AR), Mark Udall (D-CO), and Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) have implied they will only support climate legislation that includes increased subsidies for the nuclear, coal, or agribusiness industries. However, as Sen. Bingaman indicates, the only successful strategy to overcoming a Republican filibuster of clean energy reform is to convince the Senate that reform will create jobs, expand the economy and preserve and create prosperity.

Fortunately for advocates of reform, each day brings new evidence that a clean-energy future is just what America needs to rebuild our economy and prevent catastrophe. The UK Meteorological Office has found that global warming is accelerating. Military analysts warn “climate-induced crises could topple governments, feed terrorist movements or destabilize entire regions.” The “Chinese decision to go green,” New York Times columnist Tom Friedman argues, “is the 21st-century equivalent of the Soviet Union’s 1957 launch of Sputnik.” And despite the ideological rantings of polluters who have crippled the global economy, non-partisan analyses repeatedly find that the tremendous benefit of halting global warming by investing in American jobs comes at a pricetag of a postage stamp a day.

“The carbon-based free lunch is over,” Exelon CEO John Rowe explained today. “But while we can’t fix our climate problems for free, the price signal sent through a cap-and-trade system will drive low-carbon investments in the most inexpensive and efficient way possible.” Rowe also announced his company was severing ties with the right-wing U.S. Chamber of Commerce because of its opposition to clean-energy investment.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is the largest lobbying force in the nation, promoting a right-wing agenda as the “voice of business.” The Chamber claims that federal regulations to limit global warming pollution would “strangle the economy” and has even called for a “Scopes monkey trial” on the science of global warming.

Today, Exelon CEO John Rowe announced that his company — the largest electric utility company in the United States — would not renew its membership in the U.S. Chamber of Commerce because of its opposition to global warming action. In his keynote address to the annual conference of the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE), the nation’s largest association of energy efficiency experts, Rowe said that the Chamber’s multi-million-dollar campaign against clean energy legislation is incompatible with Exelon’s commitment to climate change leadership. As Rowe said when he accepted a leadership award from the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce in 2008:

Exelon has staked out an industry-leading position on the issue of climate change and, in the spirit of Daniel Burnham, we have launched our own “not so little plan” to eliminate the equivalent of our entire carbon footprint by the year 2020. I do not know if it will stir men’s souls, but I hope it will stir policymakers and others in our industry to action.

Confirming Exelon’s decision to ThinkProgress, a spokesperson explained that “Exelon is a big supporter of climate legislation.” Exelon is the third energy company to sever ties with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in the past week, joining Pacific Gas & Electric and PNM Resources.

Cross-posted at ThinkProgress.

Questions of the Day:  Is this just a desperate attempt by The Washington Post to drive traffic to its website, by publishing outrageous crap designed to stir controversy?  Is it just a coincidence that Marcus Brauchli, the Post’s new executive editor (as of September 2008), had been the WSJ’s editor, and that Raju Narisetti, who was named a managing editor at the Post in January, had been a deputy managing editor at the WSJ?  You can ask the Post Ombudsman, Andy Alexander, for his answer by e-mail at ombudsman@washpost.com or by phone at 202-334-7582.

Fred Hiatt keeps delivering self-inflicted body blows to the dwindling reputation of the Washington Post editorial page — see Editorial page editor Hiatt just recycled a right-wing WSJ op-ed by Reagan’s chief economist Martin Feldstein. It’s d©j  vu all over again today, but now with a Lomborg op-ed as the piece of recycled garbage.

Just last month, the right-wing Wall Street Journal editorial page ran a disinformation-filled piece from Lomborg (debunked here, “The Bjorn Irrelevancy: Duke dean disses Danish delayer“).  It had  lines like:

… agreements to reduce carbon emissions are costly, politically arduous and ultimately ineffective….

But his research demonstrates the futility of trying to use carbon cuts to keep temperature increases under 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit)….

Hiatt, who  is as zealously anti-environmental as he is pro-recycling, apparently feels that Lomborg’s lies aren’t getting a fair enough hearing in the media, so he runs a piece titled, “Costly Carbon Cuts” with lines like:

… many politicians are vowing to make carbon cuts designed to keep expected temperature rises under 3.6 degrees (2.0 Celsius). Yet it is nearly impossible for these promises to be fulfilled.

Now you’re probably saying to yourself, wait a minute, Joe, Hiatt’s version of Lomborg’s piece is completely different than the WSJ‘s because he forced Lomborg to put temperature in Fahrenheit with Celsius in parentheses like a real American editor, not the reverse, like those world-government, Europhile types at the WSJ ed board.  But I digress.

Lomborg has done the denier two-step with Hiatt — going straight from denying the problem to saying it’s hopeless to even try to solve.  And I’m sure future generations, if no one else, will note that if we don’t keep total warming below 3.6 F or 2 C, it will be because of people like Lomborg and Hiatt who are devoting all of their efforts to convincing opinionmakers that it can’t and shouldn’t be done!!

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This is a Wonk Room repost.

On the final day of the Clinton Global Initiative, the Wonk Room caught up with Ira Magaziner, the senior advisor for policy development in the Clinton White House and now the chairman of the William J. Clinton Foundation’s Climate Initiative. We discussed the Clinton Climate Initiative‘s approach to the challenge of global warming, including its work to advance energy efficiency projects in the world’s cities from the Empire State Building to Lagos, Nigeria. Magaziner also directly addressed why critics argue that advocacy of clean energy is a socialistic economy killer, citing Adam Smith’s recognition of the need for governmental action to address market externalities. As we neared the conclusion of the interview, Magaziner tied all the threads of the conversation together into one impressive discourse on building a clean-energy economy:

CREATIVE DESTRUCTION “” PAST VS. THE FUTURE

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“Your manuscript is both good and original. But the part that is good is not original, and the part that is original is not good.”

Those words, “attributed” to the 18th century English essayist Samuel Johnson, are a perfect summation of the oeuvre of The Breakthrough Institute (TBI).  So it is with their latest attack on the climate and clean energy bill — “Climate Bill Analysis Part 20 [!!!]: Over-Allocation of Pollution Permits Would Result in No Emissions Reduction Requirement during Early Years of Climate Program.”

And no, I can’t bring myself to link to their crap — that is apparently what the status quo media is for (see “Memo to media: Don’t be suckered by bad analyses from TBI and “The Audacity of Nope: George Will embraces the anti-environment message of TBI” and “TBI is lying about Obama, misstating what CBO concluded about Waxman-Markey, and publishing deeply flawed analyses” and “Will America lose the clean-energy race? Only if we listen to the disinformers of TBI“).

Indeed, this time I don’t even need to debunk their “analysis” — which looks strangely like the evil twin of a blog post I wrote two weeks ago that they never even reference (see “EIA stunner: By year’s end, we’ll be 8.5% below 2005 levels of CO2 “” halfway to climate bill’s 2020 target“).

No, someone in the media has actually done a bang-up job of it already, truly a fine piece of journalism by Greenwire, “Institute’s critique of Waxman-Markey draws fire” (subs. req’d), which I  excerpt at length below:

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President Barack Obama, who initially planned to let First Lady Michelle Obama represent the United States in Copenhagen this week, when the International Olympic Committee chooses a site for the 2016 summer games, plans to travel there too….

“There is no greater expression of the support our bid enjoys, from the highest levels of government and throughout our country, than to have President Obama join us in Copenhagen for the pinnacle moment in our bid,” said Chicago 2016 Chairman and CEO Patrick G. Ryan.

This is the best news I’ve heard in a while.

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