Air Board's CO2 plan costly, unnecessary

California's on the verge of a massive, historic redistribution of wealth to benefit a select few and economically punish many, while simultaneously concentrating unprecedented power among unelected government bureaucrats.

The state Air Resources Board has unveiled its much-anticipated plan to implement regulations, mandates and a carbon tax disguised as a “cap-and-trade” restriction on greenhouse gas emissions authorized by the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006. The plan, to be finalized in the fall, will raise prices on everything energy-related, reduce profits for countless industries and aggravate the state's economic problems in order to dramatically reduce greenhouse gases. Unsurprisingly, some environmental activists think it doesn't go far enough.

The regulations “will be felt by everyone at all levels of the economic ladder, no matter where they live, work or play,” said state Sen. Bob Dutton, Republican energy committee vice chairman. “It will also be felt by businesses across the full spectrum from refineries to agriculture to construction to forestry. It will even affect the way local governments do business.”

If anything, Mr. Dutton under-estimates. The plan would financially penalize companies and individuals for emitting greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, a natural gas necessary for plant growth, and subsidize a favored few who reduce emissions. Why cut California's so-called carbon footprint 30 percent in the next 12 years?

Because there is “no greater threat than global warming,” says ARB Chairman Mary Nichols. James Hansen, a NASA scientist credited with kicking off global warming mania 20 years ago, now proclaims “We're toast if we don't get on a very different path” and curb greenhouse gases. The theory is, simply put, that there is not enough plant life to absorb all the CO2 gases emitted, and that excess gases rise in the atmosphere, forming a kind of blanket, creating a warming effect.

But over the past 10 years the world's climate has cooled, not warmed, says the journal Nature. And even global warming theorists concede the next decade will bring more cooling, not warming.

Nevertheless warming alarmists seek ways to tax carbon emissions “and other restrictive, punitive and expensive regulations,” says Dr. Tim Ball, chairman of the natural Resources Stewardship Project and former University of Winnipeg climatology professor.

“All the problems evolve from the false claim that CO2 is causing global warming/climate change,” writes Dr. Ball, who characterizes the frenzy as “foolish, ignorant attempts to resolve the non-existent problem.”

Dramatic CO2 increases over the past decade and their anticipated continuing increase in years to come, coincide with cooling, not warming – the opposite of what alarmists say should be happening.

Alarmism rooted in faulty science, Dr. Ball says, has prompted “governments, eager to be green,” to naively introduce policies like California's. No U.S. government has been more aggressive than California's. And Californians are about to pay for this misguided fervor.

California should learn from Maryland, where the legislature recently rejected a similar Global Warming Solutions Act. “[I]t amounts to an indirect tax on working middle-class families,” one Maryland state senator explained.

Wisely, legislators there listened to reason when warned that such Draconian efforts would dramatically raise energy costs, bring economic slowdown and increase unemployment. But incredibly, California ARB's Ms. Nichols claims California's punitive heavy hand will boost, not depress the economy.