There is no shortage of emotional rhetoric on either side of this debate. For some global climate change is a coming apocalypse that will forever change and perhaps end life as we know it on this planet. On the other side of the debate, there are those who would argue that there is no problem and that the regulations which might be required to stem climate change would result in complete economic collapse. If, as legislators, we are not gentle in this debate we will be swept into the rhetoric of one or the other extreme. As we have seen in past environmental legislation, we will end up with either the impractical and unworkable, or the ineffective and unsuccessful. We must be wise. The central questions of the debate on how to address Climate Change are scientific. We can not ignore what the preponderance of scientific evidence tells us about Climate Change. As was stated in the U.S. Climate Action Report 2002, "greenhouse gases are accumulating in Earth's atmosphere as a result of human activities causing global mean surface air temperature and subsurface ocean temperature to rise." However, neither can we pretend that the science tells us something that it does not. According to the oft quoted National Research Council report on Climate Change ". because there is considerable uncertainty in current understanding of how the climate system varies naturally and reacts to emissions of greenhouse gases and aerosols, current estimates of the magnitude of future warming should be regarded as tentative and subject to future adjustments (either upward or downward.)" While it would be convenient to embrace the scientific evidence which supports our position and ignore that which is counter, it would be unwise. All of this said, I admire my colleagues for their persistence in the pursuit of the legislation we consider today. However, I respectfully disagree with my colleagues that we are at a point in this debate at which we ought to be considering this kind of a "cap and trade" regime. The scientific evidence showing human activity has an effect on Climate Change is significant. Yet, the science is still ambiguous as to the extent of the problem. It is premature to state that this or any regulatory regime is necessary to, or capable of, slowing down or reversing Climate Change. This is not to say that there is nothing to be done on the issue of Climate Change. As Mr. Mahoney will point out, we must fill the gaps where there is a paucity of research, so that we might answer the lingering questions. There are increases requested for additional research. I assume that this body and the House will work together to make sure those requests are met. Additional research is not where our dedication to this issue should end. There are things we can do to positively effect our net national carbon emissions that have other environmental benefits and which can have a positive effect on the economy. I am referring to carbon sequestration and conservation practices. I know that Mr. Krupp will tell us about some of the innovative projects that his organization has worked on in the Pacific North-West. These are projects that not only suck carbon out of the atmosphere, but have the more tangible benefits of improving water quality and preserving wildlife habitat. In my home state of Kansas, the potential for bringing carbon into the soil is vast. As we speak the Chicago Climate Exchange is working out the details of a project that will all at once provide a new revenue stream for farmers, improved soil conservation techniques and reduce our net carbon output. Some estimates I have seen believe that the potential for sequestering carbon in this pilot project could exceed the amount of carbon that Germany emits each year. I look forward to working with the chairman and this Committee to consider this part of the Climate Change debate. I believe that if we are gentle and wise carbon sequestration is the crossroad at which the various sides of this debate can meet, while additional research is going forward. I look forward to hearing from the wit nesses. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. Senator Feinstein, welcome and thank you for coming before the Committee today. We are aware of your recent accident and we wish you a speedy recovery. STATEMENT OF HON. DIANNE FEINSTEIN, U.S. SENATOR FROM CALIFORNIA Senator FEINSTEIN. Thanks very much, Mr. Chairman, Senator Kerry, Senator Brownback. I am delighted to be here this morning. I would recommend, Mr. Chairman, that the Committee consider three policies that would most comprehensively address the global warming issue. The first is increasing Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards, or CAFE for short, for our Nation's cars and trucks. The second is increasing the use of energy efficient vehicles, buildings, and appliances and expanding our reliance on renewable energy. The third is encouraging the Senate to take a leadership role and join the 29 other countries which have already ratified the Kyoto Protocol. I would like to limit my comments this morning to fuel efficiency because I believe that improving fuel efficiency is the most important first step we can take. It produces the largest bang for the buck. Earlier this year I spent a day at the Scripps Institute in San Diego meeting with various climate change and global warming experts, like Dan Cayan, the Director of the Climate Research Division, Ron Rumunathan, the Director of the Center for Atmospheric Science, Michael Molitor, the Coordinator of Climate Change at UC San Diego's Institute for Global Conflict and Cooperation, and Charles Kennel, the former head of the National Science Foundation. All said that there is overwhelming evidence to show that global warming is real and is happening now. Measurements taken in La Jolla, California, at Scripps, at the Institute of Oceanography, since 1925 and in San Francisco show a rise in the sea level of 9 inches over the last 75 to 100 years at both locations. According to these scientists, these changes we are now seeing in the climate are unprecedented over a period of 400,000 years. So I think that is good evidence that there is a real problem. Carbon dioxide emissions from vehicles in the United States exceed the total CO2 emissions of all but three other countries. Carbon dioxide is the No. 1 greenhouse gas. Therefore, if you attack carbon dioxide you attack the greenhouse problem. CAFE standards regulate how many miles a vehicle will travel on a gallon of gasoline. Better fuel efficiency simply lowers vehicular emissions of pollutants and carbon dioxide. There is what is known as an SUV loophole which allows sports utility vehicles and other light duty trucks to meet lower fuel efficiency standards than passenger cars. So they have lower standards than passenger cars, although SUV's are, in fact, passenger cars. Fuel economy standards for automobiles average 27.5 miles per gallon, while the standards for SUVs and light trucks average 20.7 miles per gallon. So there is a 7 mile differential. When fuel economy standards were first implemented in 1975, a separate tier was permitted for trucks, which were not thought to be passenger vehicles. So it is easy to see that SUVs, which were thrown then into the truck category later and are predominantly used as passenger vehicles, escape the stricter standards. Now, I believe there is no reason to think they should not have to meet the same CAFE standards as station wagons and other cars. Standards for cars have not increased in 14 years and the truck standards have essentially stayed the same since 1981. But since many consumers have traded in their cars for SUVs, overall vehicular carbon dioxide emissions have begun to increase significantly. If SUVS and other light duty trucks were simply required to meet the same fuel economy standards as automobiles, we would reduce CO2 emissions by 237 million tons each year. That would result alone in a saving of a million barrels of oil a day, so it is a consequential change. A provision in the transportation appropriations bill for the past 5 years has prevented the Department of Transportation from even studying fuel economy standards and whether those standards should be increased, and that is the product of the lobbying of Detroit. Finally this past June, Senator Gorton, Senator Bryan and I had a breakthrough on the floor and, thanks to a compromise we were able to reach, the National Academy of Sciences will be working with DOT to look at whether these standards can be increased without costing domestic manufacturing jobs and without compromising safety. Now, we were not able to achieve any kind of a resolution that said just go do it. It is a study. But up to this point we had not even been able to get a study, so it is just a small step forward. I am hopeful that the study will disprove once and for all all the excuses used by car manufacturers and their allies to fight raising CAFE standards in this area. In light of the fuel prices that we have been seeing at the pump this year, raising these standards would also be a big help to the country and to consumers. Closing the SUV loophole would not only save the United States the one million barrels of oil a day, it would also save SUV owners hundreds of dollars a year at the pump. With gas hovering near two dollars a gallon, this is a big deal. I think it also shows that reducing our greenhouse gases can help consumers in very easy to quantify ways. We can measure it. We know what it will do. We know it is the largest single and easiest thing we can do. Now, that is not all we can do. I hope we can explore how to encourage the production of alternative fuel, hybrid vehicle, and fuel cell vehicles. Cars and SUVs are not going to go away, but we can certainly find ways to make them run cleaner and more efficiently. Hybrid vehicles, which run partly on gas and partly on an electric battery that never needs recharging, are already on the market. I understand that fuel cell technology which would make zero emission vehicles, creating water as the only waste byproduct, are just a few years away. If we can figure a way to get more of these vehicles onto the roads, we will undoubtedly reduce our country's carbon dioxide emissions by millions of tons and go a long way toward combatting global warming. I would hope that this Committee would look at a Federal Government fleet purchase and whether we can find ways to ensure that these vehicles meet the highest possible fuel efficiency standards. Federal vehicles alone comprise about 1 percent of all vehicles sold each year in the United States and local government and State fleets compromise another 1 percent. So if both together would agree to use cleaner, more efficient vehicles, perhaps hybrid vehicles, essentially 2 percent of all of the vehicles on the road, government-issue cars, would be environmentally friendly. If government vehicles were required to achieve better fuel efficiency, it would make a real difference in reducing greenhouse gas and provide incentives for car and truck manufacturers to bring these vehicles more freely to market. So I urge the Committee to consider some of these solutions. What we wind up doing or not doing on global warming as early as the next Congress may well be evaluated for generations to come. I would hope that our children and our grandchildren will be able to look back on the country in this early 21st Century and say that the United States was a leader, not a laggard. I thank the chair. I thank the Committee. The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much, Senator Feinstein. We appreciate your long-time involvement in this issue. I know how important it is to the State of California. We look forward to working with you. Senator FEINSTEIN. I thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Senator KERRY. I would like to say something. I would like to thank Senator Feinstein for her testimony and for her leadership on this. I simply could not agree with her more, Mr. Chairman. The technology exists today. We can do this. I do not know anybody here who has not driven down a road and has gotten some truck in front of you and it steps on the gas at a light and belches out incredible plumes of black smoke, particulates that you can see. You have to practically hold your breath in your own car to drive through it. We have allowed a loophole to exist. It is an extraordinary loophole. It does not have to exist, and it exists frankly, Mr. Chairman, for one of the reasons that you have been such a leader in pointing out to Americans, the connection between campaign contributions and what happens in Washington, and the amount of money that gets thrown out by interests that do not want these good things to happen. The technology is there. I visited California and Los Angeles, went for a ride in one of your fleet, compressed natural gas cars, went out to the station where you could refuel. It is extraordinary how fast and easy it is. You see the infrastructure beginning to be built in California, the networks that allow you to get from here to there and refuel. We should be doing that all over the country and the leadership should be coming from governmental fleet entities and from our effort to help put the infrastructure in place and create the tax incentives and the ability to do it. So I thank you for your testimony today, and I hope my colleagues will take note. The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. Thank you, Senator Feinstein. Get well soon. Senator FEINSTEIN. Thanks very much, Mr. Chairman. The CHAIRMAN. On our next panel are: Ms. Ann Mesnikoff, the Washington Representative of the Sierra Club Global Warming and Energy Program; Mr. Jeff Morgheim, the Climate Change Manager at BP of Houston, Texas; Mr. Frederick Palmer, the General Manager and Chief Executive Officer of Western Fuels Association; Mr. Joseph Romm, Director, Center for Energy and Climate Solutions; and Dr. Norman Rosenberg, a Senior Staff Scientist, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Battelle Washington Operations. We want to welcome all of the witnesses. Mr. Morgheim, is that a proper pronunciation of your name? us. Mr. MORGHEIM. Yes, it is, Senator. The CHAIRMAN. Ms. Mesnikoff, is that a proper pronunciation? Ms. MESNIKOFF. Yes, it is. The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. I will not ask the others. We will begin with you, Ms. Mesnikoff, and thank you for joining STATEMENT MESNIKOFF, OF ANN R. WASHINGTON REPRESENTATIVE, SIERRA CLUB, GLOBAL WARMING AND ENERGY PROGRAM, WASHINGTON, D.C. Ms. MESNIKOFF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, members of the Committee. Certainly Senator Feinstein has made my job much easier. I was asked today to focus on the Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards for cars and light trucks and I think Senator Feinstein has been a leader on this issue for the past several years in Congress along with Senators Bryan and Gorton, and we certainly thank her for her leadership on this important issue and bringing us to the agreement we reached this past year to allow the National Academy of Sciences to begin a study. But I would like to point out briefly on that point that even with today's high oil prices, the Department of Transportation still cannot implement the Corporate Average Fuel Economy law. It cannot issue new standards for our cars and light trucks to reduce oil consumption and thereby reduce the greenhouse gas emissions that are coming out of our cars and light trucks. The CHAIRMAN. Why not? Ms. MESNIKOFF. It is an important step forward, but it is a study. It will not allow DOT to actually implement the law and do its job. I would just briefly like to thank you for holding this series of hearings on climate change and I think this, perhaps, might be the most important because it is a serious problem. I think this map, which the Sierra Club-unfortunately, I do not have mounted-produced with other environmental organizations, tells the worldwide story of global warming impacts. It tells about the fingerprints and harbingers of global warming from droughts, spreading infectious diseases, heat waves, and the like. I think it is a story that demands action on what is a very serious pollution problem. And it is a pollution problem, and America's cars and light trucks are 20 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. They guzzle 40 percent of the oil we use and transportation is the fastest growing sector of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States. I think that it is a pollution problem, and the good news is we can do something about it. I think Senator Feinstein made all the |