For conservatives, a far, far greater threat than catastrophic global warming is the possibility the government might pass national regulations that require businesses and consumers to save energy and reduce pollution (see “The real reason conservatives don’t believe in climate science“). Indeed, so great is this fear, that even members of Congress from one of the states most threatened by global warming — Louisiana — would rather let their state be inundated from unrestricted greenhouse gas emissions than take sensible, cost-effective steps to reduce the risk of that horrendous outcome, as Brad Johnson explains in a post first published here.
Invoking a Nazi reference today, Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA) argued that establishing national energy efficiency standards for buildings would create a “global warming Gestapo.” Scalise attacked the provision in the Waxman-Markey American Clean Energy and Security Act (HR 2454) to create a federal building efficiency code (Section 201), calling it “ludicrous”:
Let’s go to the bill and look at the penalties. Because there are actually civil penalties in this bill. We’re actually creating a global warming police. . . And then further to page 236: “Each day of unlawful occupancy shall be considered a separate violation.” We’re setting up a global warming Gestapo that can literally come in and now this new term, “unlawful occupancy.” Now living in your home is considered unlawful under this bill.
This is ludicrous.
Watch it:
Putting aside Scalise’s inflammatory rhetoric, his understanding of the provision “” which would save working families and businesses millions of dollars, create hundreds of thousands of green jobs, and tackle the nation’s biggest source of global warming pollution “” is flawed. Scalise ignored the difference between energy efficiency building codes and safety codes. Scalise was also seemly ignorant that the legislation explicitly preserves local building codes that meet or exceed the national standard, while providing federal support for states to implement new standards. Federal enforcement would only take place if states failed to act.
Without irony, Scalise argued that fighting global warming would threaten the health and safety of Lousianans in danger of “hurricanes and flooding” and tornadoes:
Safety and health have always been the main driving factors behind a building code. What this bill does in Section 201, it’s literally taking global warming, and using global warming to trump safety and health. Because now, if I’m in South Louisiana, and I want to rebuild after hurricane damage “” which by the way we had 120,000 homes in Louisiana that had more than 50 percent damage due to Hurricane Katrina “” under this bill in section 201, when people are rebuilding those 120,000 homes, they would have to follow the federal building code, and in many cases that would mean they can’t use the same types of strength that they might want to use in their windows. They might want to use stronger windows because they don’t want the storm to blow out their windows. But under this bill, a federal standard could say their windows are out of the federal code.
Global warming likely significantly intensified the devastating power of Hurricane Katrina. As the state of Louisana itself has explained, “Coastal Lousiana is more vulnerable to the effects of global climate change than any other region in the United States. Its low elevation, high rate of subsidence and rapid loss of wetlands expose this area to the worst consequences of climatic change “” a rising Gulf, possibly stronger storms, unpredictable rainfall and warmer weather.”
Full transcript:
SCALISE: Section 201 of this cap and trade energy tax creates a national building code, something that we don’t have in place today. If you look across the country right now, 30 states have their own state building codes. A number of states actually go even to the local level where they have codes that are based on different cities or different parishes or counties.
Just to use Louisiana, for an example, right after Hurricane Katrina, we “” our legislature passed a statewide building code. We didn’t have one before. We created a statewide building code, and we took into account in our code the various segmented differences between regions of our state. In fact, the code is different in South Louisiana where our main threats are hurricanes and flooding, much different than they are in the northern part of the state of Louisiana, where tornados are a bigger threat.
And so if you look at the fact that thirty states have these types of statewide codes, this bill in section 201 creates a federal code that would trump, throw out all of those state building codes that have been worked on for years in many cases. We worked on ours for months, just for our state’s code. Here, with really no debate, we’re creating a federal code that trumps all of the states’ codes and in some cases would actually lower the standards that states have for building.
And if you go back to why we have building codes and why states have done this, the purpose typically is to protect safety and health. Safety and health have always been the main driving factors behind a building code. What this bill does in Section 201, it’s literally taking global warming, and using global warming to trump safety and health. Because now, if I’m in South Louisiana, and I want to rebuild after hurricane damage “” which by the way we had 120,000 homes in Louisiana that had more than 50 percent damage due to Hurricane Katrina “” under this bill in section 201, when people are rebuilding those 120,000 homes, they would have to follow the federal building code, and in many cases that would mean they can’t use the same types of strength that they might want to use in their windows. They might want to use stronger windows because they don’t want the storm to blow out their windows. But under this bill, a federal standard could say their windows are out of the federal code.
And then what does that mean? Let’s go to the bill and look at the penalties. Because there are actually civil penalties in this bill. We’re actually creating a global warming police. To page 235: “The Secretary may set and collect reasonable inspection fees to cover the costs of inspections required.” So number one, they can come in, the federal government can come in and inspect your house and send you the bill. And if they find that you’re out of compliance with this new federal code, “The Secretary shall assess a civil penalty for violations of this section.” And then further to page 236: “Each day of unlawful occupancy shall be considered a separate violation.” We’re setting up a global warming Gestapo that can literally come in and now this new term, “unlawful occupancy.” Now living in your home is considered unlawful under this bill.
This is ludicrous.
If you go “” first of all, let’s go to the U.S. Constitution and look at the tenth amendment. “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to states respectively or to the people.” The tenth amendment of the U.S. Constitution says the states have the right to do what they’re doing if they’re not prohibited by the Constitution. so states have established building codes. This bill comes in and basically says throw out the tenth amendment of the U.S. Constitution and the federal government’s gonna throw out your building code.
I would like to submit the U.S. Constitution into the record, if I can, by unanimous consent so it can be reviewed because I think we also need to go to another section that talks about unlawful occupancy. The only part of the constitution that talks about unlawful occupancy of your home says, in amendment three, “No soldier shall in time of peace be quartered in any house.” So basically, the federal government and the constitution says the protection as a homeowner gives you the ability to determine who comes in your house. Here we’re saying, “Each day of unlawful occupancy shall be considered a separate violation” and you’ll be subject to a federal fine. That’s what this section does.
You’ve got a number of groups that have come out in strong opposition to section 201 and support my amendment. I’d like to read and enter into the record a letter from about nine different organizations including the National Association of Home Builders, the National Association of Realtors, the Building Owners and Managers Association International, the National Apartment Association and a number of others who said, “The proposal creates a new authority for the federal government to police building codes, holds developers and owners of buildings including homeowners liable for not reaching federal energy efficiency mandates, even if the buildings are presumably in compliance with applicable local building codes and establishes a civil penalty for violators of this section of the bill. This measure would have a chilling effect on development and property transfer across the spectrum of real properties.”
Now we’re in a housing slump right now. Why would we want to be passing legislation that creates a federal building code with civil penalties and tells people living in their houses that they’re unlawful occupying that house if they don’t immediate this new federal building code when they’re in compliance with their own state’s federal building code? This is ludicrous. I’ll enter these letters into the record including the one from the National Association of Home Builders which goes further and talks about the legal problems with this, and also the shortfalls, how this would adversely effect homeowners in this country, who would be subject to this global warming police that would be created to come in and drag you out of your house and fine you civilly in federal court because maybe you wanted to protect your family at a higher level than the federal government.
Previous in TP Climate Progress
As I’ve said before, this is to be expected. The Republicans are out of power, the Dems are moving at breakneck speed (by gov’t standards), and Obama and his team are in the process of turning a buttload of lemons into a swimming pool of lemonade. The only strategy the Republicans have left is to be 100% opposed to everything the Dems do, and hope they can slow them down and find ways to appeal to their base. This means they’ll fight like crazy against even common sense efforts like this national building code.
It’s stupid, it’s disgusting, and it’s cynical politics at its worst. And it’s just the beginning.
My one quibble with this article is the suggestion that Scalise is “seemingly ignorant” of the legislation’s actual provisions.
This is wrong. Like Inhofe, Barton and other bought-and-paid-for denialists, obstructionists, shills and tools of the fossil fuel corporations, Scalise is not “ignorant”. He is a deliberate, calculating liar.
Sure, he is peddling lies to ignorant Ditto-Heads, but he himself is not ignorant. He is knowingly, intentionally, maliciously dishonest.
And the bottom line is that he’s paid to lie. He tells lies, for money. It’s as simple as that.
If we had 100% renewable energy, there would be no legitimate reason for government to mandate or promote energy efficiency. The production and consumption of energy is not a problem, and therefore does not require a solution. It is only the environmental effects of energy use that legitimize government attention to its use. Building codes motivated by energy efficiency considerations are the wrong solution to environmental abuse by the energy industry.
The sole constraint on renewable energy consumption should be the cost of production. If we can produce energy in an environmentally acceptable manner, then there should be no limitations on production, consumption or the introduction of new and apparently “wasteful” consumption practices. We might, for example, someday find it useful to remove snow and ice from the highways by heating them using electrical energy. Although such a proposal would no doubt horrify many concerned environmentalists, it is a legitimate potential use for electric power. Whether it should be done or not is purely a question of desire, availability of funding and collective choice. It is not an environmental or a moral issue.
Consumption and prosperity go together as one. Poverty is not a virtue. It is a crime we commit against ourselves.
Federal inspection fees for home construction? National building codes? Same for igloos as for coastal homes? I am sure New england wants to meet Kansas tornado standards and California building code standards for earthquakes.
I can see that we will need to stop all home construction as it is already depressed because of course banks can’t make loans to consturction that is in non compliance.
The Federal police will refuse occupancy permits. My child is finishing a architectural engineering degree and will find a lot of irony in this.
In education, we find a lot of customizing of products and services to communities. Here taking away state codes and laws and making boiler plate national standards is going back to when Natives roamed and all lived in the same kinds of tents.
An example that comes to mind is a friend that is a GP. He built his home with radiant heating systems including some in his short sloped driveway. He is unable to shovel quickly when snow comes in and he gets called for a Hospital emergency. Under federal standards, he would be denied occupancy. How regressive.
Theodore wrote: “If we had 100% renewable energy, there would be no legitimate reason for government to mandate or promote energy efficiency.”
But we don’t have 100 percent renewable energy. Eighty percent of the USA’s primary energy supply is fossil fuels.
Meanwhile, we urgently need to reduce CO2 emissions from fossil fuels as rapidly as possible.
And while it is very important to increase the renewable energy supply as quickly as possible with rapid deployment of currently available wind and solar energy technologies, the reality is that efficiency improvements and the elimination of waste are at least as effective at rapidly reducing emissions as expanding renewable energy supplies, if not more so.
So, debating the role of efficiency, and of government standards for efficiency, in a hypothetical future world of 100 percent clean renewable energy, has no relevance to our present day reality.
And sorry folks, the pseudo-libertarian hyperventilating from people who don’t even understand what the proposed standards do and don’t do, is just silly. Relax, the black helicopters are not coming to get you.
K L Reddington wrote: “… a friend that is a GP …built his home with radiant heating systems including some in his short sloped driveway … Under federal standards, he would be denied occupancy.”
Care to cite the exact language in the existing or proposed Federal standards that you are referring to, that would deny your friend occupancy?
Maybe some amendments need to be made to the section, but lets be realistic here. The federal building standards were intended to improve home energy efficiency. Not to leave homeowners with an inadequately built house that won’t withstand natural disasters to the best of their ability.
I too am not sure why radiant heating would cause someone to get denied occupancy. Radiant heating (along with heat exchanging ground loops) is one of the most efficient ways to heat a home.
Further to my previous post, UK building regs are here. Click on Part L for “Conservation of Fuel and Power”.
http://www.building-regs.org.uk/?building_standards
I am surprised that there is not a similar set up in the US. If W-M brings it in then I’m all for it.
In the early years of the Internet there was a sort of rule in newsgroup discussions–whoever accused their opponent with Nazi parallells automatically lost the debate. It’s quite a sensible rule, as Nazi accusations mean you’re out of real arguments.
Theodore wrote (in part): “Building codes motivated by energy efficiency considerations are the wrong solution to environmental abuse by the energy industry.”
I disagree. Since production of energy inevitably causes environmental degradation, requiring changes that result in using less energy to do the same job is a valid way to protect the environment.
Amory Lovins has for years been pointing out that modifying buildings to improve energy efficiency can save significant amounts of money over the long term. It seems reasonable to suppose that businesses and homeowners would make those changes in order to benefit from the lower costs. But this has been found not to be the case.
I conclude therefore that the additional reason to reduce energy consumption — CO2 emissions — justifies changing building codes to mandate greater energy efficiency.
“Free-market solutions” to environmental problems are great, but only when the free market steps up to the plate.
Increased efficiency will not save the planet. Please read and fully understand Jevon’s paradox:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox
“Jevons Paradox is the proposition that technological progress that increases the efficiency with which a resource is used, tends to increase (rather than decrease) the rate of consumption of that resource.”
It is the same argument that applies to freeway congestion; if you add more lanes to a congested freeway, it will remain congested and might even get worse. Why? Because congestion is a DISincentive to use of the freeway, and removing it becomes an INcentive. And once you set the precedent that congestion will be met with more lanes there is no long-term expectation that the freeways will always be congested, and in fact rather the opposite. The fact that there is not an infinite amount of planet to pave over to provide infinite freeway lanes for an endless number of cars never occurs to anyone.
Increasing efficiency must be met with other efforts to decrease reliance. These two are in no way the same thing. If you think they are the same thing then you are a supporter of BAU and hence part of the problem, no matter how much you think you conserve. The only way to save the planet from fossil fuel CO2 emissions is to cease using fossil fuels at every possible (meaning possible, not convenient within your definition of progress and profitability) turn.
That is why Al Gore is striving for 100% renewables and not, let’s say, 100% improvement in efficiency. Some smart guy ran the models for him and the numbers based on efficiency were way past ugly. The numbers were LETHAL. Anyone with half a brain could figure it out without a model.
If we continue to consume fossil carbon then we have no future. It doesn’t matter in the least how efficiently we consume it. We have perhaps 10 years to understand this. After 10 years if we are still consuming any significant quantity of fossil carbon then I think we can just hang it up. It’s over.
cougar
[JR: The "rebound effect" has been well studied in the energy arena. Historically it has been 10% to 20%. You can search the term here or on Google. But there is reason to believe it is closer to 10% now. Certainly it will be lower in an era of rising energy prices and peak oil.]
Sea level changes are decades away and won’t affect the people with money anyway. That’s why they don’t care. Short sighted cuntheads.
Cougar,
I disagree with your argument. Efficiency ALONE, MAY lead to the paradox you cite. For example, I’m going to use as little energy as I can (within reason) because its cheaper to do so. So there is an incentive to use less energy, which in one way is to become more efficient. If energy prices were going down, I see no incentive to become more efficient. But, the odds are they are only going up. So you not only have becoming more efficient (consuming less with same habits) but also increasing prices to drive your decisions.
To add, efficiency is not alone geared to our use of fossil fuel derived energy, but energy as a whole. If a house uses less energy to maintain a comfortable temperature, this saves energy regardless of the source. So when the time comes that most of our energy is coming from renewable sources, the country will need to produce less energy on a whole.
@Tomas Walch,
It’s still considered a sensible rule, and has been codified as Godwin’s Law. Too bad violaters so often fail to realize they’ve lost the argument.
That speaker is an embarrassment to the Medical Profession! Who let him out?
He proclaims with gusto and immunity that 130,000 homes in New Orleas may fall prey of this cruel attack from Congress!
Where was he after Katrina? Before Katrina?
Did he object to all the Millions that proved inadequate to protect New Orleans?
He is willing to mention that, years later, there may be 130,000 homes that are not ready for occupants? Did he object to the Millions given to the 9/11?
But, now he objects because homes must meet standards that failed to protect his voters when Katrina came?
Does anybody in New Orleans need further proof of Global Warming?
Yet, this man is not worried that the the “most powerful nation in the world” has 130,000 yet to be completed homes? And, he is worried builders may have to meet higher standards than those blown away by Katrina?
But, his argument for State Rights is sound, his southern voters can hear him all the way out there. Yes, “The South Will Raise Again!” Whoope!
Like I said at the beginning, this man left before his treatment was finished.
He wants each state to have their own home standards. How about each state with their own private car fuel standards? Do we really want to discuss that ? Again?
What If I were to ask him: “Sir, do you think each state should have their own Nuclear Power Plant building codes and Construction Regulations?
That man is playing to people that are more ignorant than he is. people that may actually believe all he said. Yes, he is confusing the uninformed and probably kicks his dogs. When I lived in the South, some of us used to say, privately, remember they too may grow up and, more importantly, failing that, they will die off and they will be replaced by college graduates acquainted with science, grief and humanity.
This man does not believe Global Warming is true. Can you imagine if he became Governor of his state? Senator? President?
And you thought we were safe, now that Obama won the election, the neanderthals will go back to the cave to live their last days in hiding, where they do no harm.
But, I already waited 50 years, are there many more like this one?
Jevon’s Paradox doesn’t apply – it assumes we get more efficient at using energy, so our energy bill goes down, and the savings lead us to use more energy.
But Joe & Co are going to be pushing up the price of energy via cap and trade.
Hence we get more efficient at using energy, but our energy bill goes up nonetheless, and so the extra costs lead us push for even more efficiencies.
@greg: Jevon DOES apply, and cap-n-trade proves my point. CNT is a shell game, is a way to make BAU look like progress, moving everyone’s emissions around so they are emitted most efficiently (in the markets sense of the word). What you are saying is that there WILL be disincentives to use the “excess” energy available due to efficiencies so that the excess is reflected as conservation (no use) rather than repurposed (used for other things). We’ll see if that is true or not, but I seriously doubt it. My sense is that so long as we fail to decommission coal and gas power plants, and fail to move people from personal vehicles and into mass (or no) transit, the “excess” will find a use rather than somehow disappear. Simple as that. The uses may be virtuous (say, using an unneeded coal power plant to electrify regional light rail) but it WILL be used.
My whole point was that we need to DO LESS WITH LESS UNTIL WE DO NONE OF IT and not to allow ourselves to think that efficiencies (like CNT) alone will make it all better. Less means less. And none means none. If we don’t use “none” fossil carbon — however virtuous or however shuffled around — we are doomed.
Thanks all for your comments. Just don’t assume you have a trick up your sleeve and can walk away from the game. You don’t, you shouldn’t, and you need to pay close attention. We are at a very narrow passage and I greatly fear most of us are about to fall away.
Building codes should be 100% voluntary. When a building is designed, it should be constructed according to one of many standards. It should be advertised and sold as meeting that particular standard. If the standard develops a bad reputation, then the value of the building should be affected accordingly. The option should exist to build according to no standard at all. Creative designers and their imaginations demand the option. If I want to build a house made of living trees and vines with a lake for a floor, I should be free to do so.