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Help Close the Loophole in California's Global Warming Program

Update: Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed AB 1404 on October 11th.

In 2006, you helped California pass the landmark Global Warming Solutions Act, AB 32 (Pavley). It set an ambitious goal for the state to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. In order to meet that requirement, the California Air Resource Board (CARB) will be implementing a package of global warming policies that includes a cap-and-trade program to achieve 20% of the reductions. Assembly Bill 1404 (De León, M. Perez, and Carter) will ensure that Californians can reap the benefits of AB 32 directly by closing a loophole that would otherwise let polluters buy their way out of their AB 32 obligations instead of reducing global warming emissions and dangerous air pollutants at home.

The gaping loophole in California’s otherwise exemplary global warming program would allow polluters to buy “offsets”—credits that polluters can buy for emissions reductions elsewhere as a substitute for making reductions themselves. California’s big global warming polluters should invest in local solutions instead of buying offsets and continuing to pollute as usual. AB 1404 ensures that policies used to reach AB 32’s goals maximize environmental and public health benefits for all Californians.

In particular, AB 1404:

1. Limits the use of offsets to no more than 10 percent of emission reductions;
2. Establishes requirements for verifying and tracking compliance offsets;
3. Requires CARB to prioritize the use of offsets that provide air quality benefits to communities already suffering from disproportionate levels of air pollution.

If big industries are allowed to simply buy credits for emissions reductions happening elsewhere in the world instead of doing their fair share at home, Californians and the environment will lose out — we won’t just be outsourcing our own action on global warming, we’ll also be outsourcing the cleaner air, new green jobs, and health benefits that come along with emissions reductions at home. A recent UC Berkeley study found that if out-of-state offsets are allowed to substitute for half or more of the expected cap-and-trade emission reductions, pollution will increase in nearly every pollutant category. Currently, 30 California counties are failing to attain federal health standards for fine particulate matter. We cannot afford to outsource any efforts that will result in reducing deadly pollution.

Update:

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed AB 1404.