warmer in Kansas, three-quarters of a degree warmer or 3 degrees warmer in Kansas, we can't now tell.

But it isn't just the rise in the average temperature that is going to effect the viability of corn growing in Kansas. I would suggest to you that it is also the likelihood of spells of unusual hot weather during the tasseling time that the corn is on the stalk. And so if we go through a transition period that increases the likelihood that you will have 10 days over 90 degrees during the tasseling period, even if the annual average doesn't go up that much, you can lose significant fractions of the corn crop.

But there is a further complication in the uncertainties that bedevil us and that is that even harder to predict than the change in regional temperatures is the regional distribution of precipitation, and because our models are so crude right now, we can't tell whether the rainfall that is traditional in Kansas is going to move to west Texas or is going to stay in Kansas at this point and we won't be able to for a considerable amount of time. We know that if the world warms by, say, 2 to 5 degrees, on average 7 percent more range or 5 to 7 percent more precipitation will fall worldwide.

But because of the way in which these nonlinear systems are coupled, we can't tell whether that will mean more intense storms in Kansas, more rain over the whole year, or just no rain when you need it during the critical periods of the corn growing cycle.

Mrs. MEYERS. I do appreciate that. I have read things in the past that indicate that it takes a very slight change in temperature to affect the Midwest agricultural region very severely, and so I am glad you clarified that. We certainly don't want that to happen, because when you were describing this use of ethanol, I had visions of Kansas being the new Saudi Arabia.

I would like to ask all of you, I think I can probably guess what your answer will be, and all of you have alluded to it somewhat in your testimony, but I would like you all to comment on the Btu tax that has been suggested by the President and what the impact of that will be.

Mr. LASHOF. I think that the Btu tax, as part of the overall package that the President has recommended, makes a good deal of sense, it has the one advantage compared with other taxes, and nobody likes to pay taxes if they can help it, that in addition to helping to fight the deficit, it will have some effect in reducing pollution and in particular in reducing global warming. The tax itself is quite modest.

It is about a 4 to 8 percent increase in the average price of energy at the consumer level. It will have, therefore, modest benefits in terms of increasing efficiency, but they are nonetheless real.

I think the other important point, though, about the way in which the package is put together is that the traditional problem, traditional reason why we have had difficulty passing energy taxes or pollution taxes of various kinds has been that taken by themselves, they tend to be regressive economically, and I think that the Clinton administration has done an extremely good job of putting together a package where you have an energy tax introduced at the same time as other measures in the Tax Code, most notably the earned income tax credit and the higher rates on the wealthiest taxpayers that make the Tax Code as a whole, more progressive.

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Mrs. MEYERS. I think the problem that this tax may have, is that it seems to effect different regions in different ways. Kansas, and the Midwest generally, are very large, not densely populated States, so that people have to do a lot of driving to market or to get to a hospital. They are also very energy-intensive States because of farming, and also those states have a hard winter.

Now, those are the three factors that determine how an energy tax will affect a State. Large less densely populated States; energyintensive States; and States with a fairly hard winter, are going to find this-I think-a very difficult tax to deal with.

Those who don't have all three of those factors may not find this tax so difficult to deal with.

Mr. LASHOF. Well, I think that any kind of tax that you put forward will affect different regions in different ways. This tax is very broad-based in its design. It affects all types of energy consumption and, in fact, the bulk of the revenues will not be collected directly from people who are using energy in their home, but, in fact, it will be incorporated in the price of products which is then sold all around the country.

So the price of corn may go up a little bit and it would be incorrect to assume that all of the costs, say, of running tractors and buying fertilizer in Kansas is a tax that ultimately is paid by people who live in Kansas. In fact, much of that will be incorporated in the price of products and meat that is sold around the country, so it is actually spread out, and when you do the distribution, this tax has been shown to be quite, quite even. I am not saying that there is no differentials, but it is quite uniform around the country. Mr. GEJDENSON. If the gentlelady will yield, I think one of the reasons the administration chose the Btu tax is that it does, while no perfect tax in this area exists as far as equally distributing the burden, that this one comes closest to not creating regional disasters, even though the carbon tax would be far more beneficial environmentally. There are certainly economic regions of the country that would be devastated by the carbon tax.

The oil import fee would hit the Northeast in certain areas and there was the feeling that the Btu tax would spread it most evenly. Mr. BARRODY. Mr. Gejdenson, may I?

First, generally, on the question of the Btu tax.

Mr. GEJDENSON. You are not feeling lonely at that end of the table, are you?

Mr. BARRODY. No, I feel honored to be in this company, sir. The Global Climate Coalition has long taken the position consistently that we would be opposed to any tax increase for energy to try to force changes and, we would say, dislocations on the economy for global climate purposes. We have not, since the proposal is still relatively new-let me say what we have done first.

We have, therefore, consistently opposed the imposition of a carbon tax. The Btu tax is a relatively new proposal from our perspective. We have not, therefore, formally decided on the question yet, and I think it is fair to say it is primarily devoted as a part of the President's program more to revenue concerns than anything else. But having said that, and reminding you that I am also on the staff of the National Association of Manufacturers, I would call to your attention and would share with you subsequently and with

the chairman and Mrs. McKinney, testimony that our President delivered last week before the Senate Energy Committee, in which, among other things, the geographical distribution of the affect of the tax was something we suggested was real and much more significant than Mr. Chairman you suggested, the Btu tax would fall State by State in very different ways.

Mr. GEJDENSON. Do they recommend an alternative revenue source?

Mr. BARRODY. Yes. The committee-in fact, the committee chairman had established or suggested that the purpose of the hearing was to look at the relative merits of an Btu tax versus a broadbased consumption tax, value added or something like

Mr. GEJDENSON. And your people argued in favor of the value added tax?

Mr. BARRODY. Yes, and again, this was testimony for the National Association of Manufacturers, not the Global Climate. If I could elaborate just a moment, I don't feel alone, but I do feel that I have been differential over the last period of time.

Mr. GEJDENSON. These guys are pretty tough. If you disagree with anything they say, go ahead and take your shots.

Mr. BARRODY. I hope they will give me the same forbearance I have given them.

A number of things have been said. I will just try briefly to comment on them. First, it seems to me that there is an implicit premise in this discussion that the National Action Plan, which these hearings are about, need not, should not, is wrong, in fact, to consider taking into account the effects of such old solutions as the National Energy Policy tax which, after all, was passed way back in 1992 and the Clean Air Act amendments which was passed all the way back in 1990.

Our point is that just because they aren't, but predate the conventions taking effect doesn't mean they should be disregarded at all and that seems to me to be the planted premise of many of the statements that the National Action Plan is inadequate. In fact, another point, the National Action Plan suggests that the effects of policies it outlines will get us very close to stabilization, and it does not, as I said, take into account a full analysis of the effects of the National Energy Policy Act, the Clean Air Act amendments, the Intermodal Surface Transportation Act and other recently passed pieces of legislation, not to mention the Btu tax, should it take effect, that will have on greenhouse gas emissions by the United States of America, but even not taking them adequately into account, it suggests we may be only 12 percent away from the stabilization level by the year 2000.

So I think we need to take all that into account. Another implicit premise is that the United States of America is not sufficiently showing leadership in this issue. I would say that the National Action Plan suggests a show of leadership by its very fact.

We acted first in response to the "prompt start" resolution, we have tabled a plan, and it is a plan which it is suggested will get us 11⁄2 to 6 percent from stabilization on its own terms. We have lots more to learn, it may get us closer than that.

But my final point is simply on this question of leadership, that I think as this committee-this subcommittee newly looks at our

international role in global climate, that we need to remember that over the last slightly more than 20 years, the United States of America as a society, has undertaken to clean up its air and water and no one would say that we have completed that job by a long shot, but we have undertaken commitments for which we have spent now in excess of $12 trillion.

The first point about that is, if that is leadership, it is a show of leadership, the likes of which no other country in the world can emulate.

Second, in the process of spending that enormous amount of resources, we have developed dramatically effective technologies and knowledge that will allow us to build on those technologies which can then enable us to allow the rest of the world to develop with less carbon, greenhouse gas emission intensive activities.

The short of all that, and I apologize for the bit of harangue, is that I think that we have shown some leadership and we ought not to act as if we haven't.

Mrs. MEYERS. I would agree with that, and I think I am as torn as some of the members of the committee are, or of those testifying, because I am an environmentalist and I want us to take real leadership in the concern about global warming.

But I also would like to ask one more question based on this concern. I do think that as Mr. Barrody suggests, we have to do it in conjunction with the rest of the world, because to go back to a Kansas analogy again, you could just say, yes, it would just add a bit to the price of corn. But we don't set the price of corn in Kansas. That is set on worldwide markets, as almost everything is set on worldwide markets, so that if the United States is acting alone and way out in front of other countries, then we are going to be the ones who are losing jobs, losing markets to other countries.

I don't want that to happen either. So I would like it if you could all comment on where are we in our progress in relation to the rest of the industrialized world.

Mr. GEJDENSON. Will the gentlelady yield for one second?

I want them to answer your question, but it is my understanding that it was America's position in Rio against setting standards that would have had a worldwide implication. In that sense I agree with the gentlelady that what we did was to undercut a rational worldwide solution to the crisis by being the obstacle to setting some kind of international standard. Whatever we do helps because it is all one planet, but it is clearly better if we are all pulling in the same direction together. I think part of what we did at Rio undercut that and it primarily answers, obviously, the gentlelady's question.

Mr. GLAUTHIER. I would like to respond to that question and also to Mr. Barrody's statement. I think you are absolutely right, that we do need to do these things together, and, in fact, the negotiations on the treaty were done with generally 140 or more countries all participating to try to work out a common approach to this. In the end, all that we have agreed to as a starting point is to try to slow down the growth rate of our emissions, to stop our increase in emissions and get them back at least to 1990 levels, and then address the question of what next, and I think all of us in the environmental organizations would agree that the next step is that the

U.S. and like-minded countries want to push for negotiations to begin on what that common next step should be, and we think there ought to be a negotiation on a protocol, for example, to the convention that would actually lead to reductions in greenhouse gas emissions after the turn of the decade, but that needs to be something that is clearly done on an international basis.

The steps we have agreed to now are the steps we should be taking to reduce the growth in our gases. They are steps that have economic benefits and we believe have strong competitiveness advantages for us, and we see other countries like Germany and Japan taking those already. So so far we haven't asked for anything that is really going to put us at a disadvantage.

I would like to comment just briefly on the point that was made by Mr. Barrody. I think that he and I may agree on the point that we should take full credit for everything that is being done in our other programs, the Clean Air Act, the Surface Transportation Act, the recently enacted energy plan. The point we have been making is partly the orientation of this plan.

It ought to say that we have a goal, here it is, let's see how well we are doing, let's see what additional steps are needed, and then let's figure out what they should be, rather than just adding up what is happening in the world and commenting on it. So we should take full credit. It should be credible.

It should be done by independent sources where the data is sound, and we all agree that these are the reductions we are actually achieving.

Mr. GEJDENSON. Mr. Mintzer.

Mr. MINTZER. I would like to respond to the two questions that you raised, this one about should we act alone and the earlier question you raised about the Btu tax. I think that you put your finger on the nub of the problem in that the universal character of the global warming problem makes it essential that we act jointly with our allies and colleagues. It is universal in the sense that it is the emissions of these gases are linked to a range of economically important activities that cut across all sectors of American society and across all the countries with which we deal in trade.

So in order to construct an effective solution, we have to address those activities, not just in one sector, not just in terms of how it affects corn in Kansas, but how it affects all the important economic activity in the United States, but even as Mr. Barrody pointed out, if we did that and ignored the actions of our trading partners, including those in the developing countries, we would be inviting failure to our overall objective.

But I think it is worth noticing where we are in terms of our other trading partners. In particular, the United States is the only EOCD country, the only industrialized country, that hasn't adopted a target of specific, a specific, concrete target for stabilizing greenhouse gases or reducing them. The remaining partners in the EOCD have indeed adopted as a goal at least at the very minimal, inadequate as it is, of stabilizing emissions of carbon dioxide by itself at the 1990 level.

Mrs. MEYERS. Have they actually done this? At one point in time, I know that the European Community had adopted a goal, but then