Okay, not only was the “Share This” button NOT causing any of the terrific people who read this blog (don’t be shy, you know who you are!) to send any of my posts to the social networking sites for popular consumption — but apparently some spammer was using it and the Mail feature for nefarious purposes. That was also artificially inflating my page view statistics, which I did not like.

So I decided to go with the Digg button plus counter. Please patronize this button!

If you like ClimateProgress and appreciate the daily content and would like more people to see it — now I sound like NPR during a pledge break, but hey at least I’m not asking for money — Digg the posts you like. The most popular stories rise to the top of the Digg page where millions of viewers will see them, becoming informed on global warming and ultimately saving the planet from general destruction. One does need a lot of Diggs to get noticed on, say, their environment page — but if Desmogblog can do it, why not ClimateProgress?

Once you sign up to Digg, it is incredibly easy — plus you will be able to enjoy all the benefits of Digg, including being able to meet people with similar interests and read blog posts others like.

Also this will give me instant feedback on how many people like a given article, so I can deliver better content.

In addition, I (or rather the brilliant web folks here) have also improved the Feed — and added an explanation of what that is — and even added a way to subscribe to the feed by e-mail, as some had requested.

More improvements will be coming.

I see no point whatsoever in passing a climate bill this year that includes a safety valve. I have blogged on this before, but it bears repeating as we appear to be getting to the endgame negotiations in the Senate on the Lieberman-Warner bill. Bottom line:

If you want to get a 60% to 80% greenhouse gas cut in four decades, you just can’t waste time with safety valves. We need to get to a price of $30 to $40 a ton for carbon dioxide as soon as possible — and if it needs to go higher than that because conservatives block the progressives and moderates from legislating aggressive technology deployment strategies that would keep costs low, well, as the saying goes, “We’ll burn that bridge when we come to it.”

If you just want to pass a bill that makes it seem like you’re doing something while in fact doing little, then go for it! But surely a year’s delay (waiting for a somewhat wiser Congress and an infinitely wiser President) is better than a pointless bill.

In an article, titled “Sponsors of Senate emissions bill seek compromise on cost provisions,” Greenwire (subs. req’d) reports today:

Senate sponsors of a major global warming bill are trying to find compromise on the vexing question of how to cap U.S. emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases without damaging the economy….

Electric utility companies, labor groups and several senators who hold critical votes on the measure still want to set some type of price ceiling on the annual price of a carbon credit….

“There’s a really serious conversation going on in a lot of venues about how this doesn’t become that last issue standing, and it’s a take-it-or-leave-it for environmentalists,” said Tim Profeta, a former senior aide to Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.)….

Senate Environment and Public Works Chairwoman Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) opposes the inclusion of a “safety valve” in the climate bill originally drafted by Lieberman and Sen. John Warner (R-Va.)….

The safety valve is a favored concept among economists and business types who maintain that a set carbon ceiling gives them enough certainty that the new global warming program would not sink their businesses. They insist it can also help to assure nervous lawmakers about the limited economic effects of the legislation.

It is favored among people who simply don’t get how dire the situation is. You know, maybe 10 or 15 years ago we could have given a safety valve a chance, but you just can’t ignore scientists for three decades and then think it is going to be peaches and cream. We need the full dose of anti-biotics now, not some watered down dosage that allows the fever to fester.

In one bill introduced last year from Sens. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) and Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), carbon prices in the cap-and-trade system would not go above $12 per ton in the first year. After that, the ceiling would rise 5 percent per year above the rate of inflation.

I believe it was $12 per ton of carbon dioxide – $12 per ton of carbon would be utterly meaningless. If you doubled that safety valve, $24 per ton of CO2 and 10% rise per year above inflation, that would probably be the lowest safety valve that could be tolerable — but again, waiting a year would still be better than a safety valve.

Yes, as Greenwire notes, “Three Republican senators — Specter and Alaska’s Ted Stevens and Lisa Murkowski — crossed a major threshold by signing up as cosponsors for the bill in part because of the safety valve,” but as I blogged earlier:

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