Forrest for the Trees

A rogue’s gallery of carbon-based industry reps and climate denialists are meeting today at the Capitol. Make no mistake: This is part of a growing Astroturf effort to derail congressional action on climate change, similar to the campaign to kill health care reform.

The sad thing is, the “Cap & Trade Summit” is sponsored by three state agencies, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, the Texas Railroad Commission and the Texas Public Utility Commission. They have no shame.

Take a look at some of the speakers on the schedule for today. Briefly:

Karen Campbell – The Heritage Foundation: Exxon and other fossil fuel companies have given millions to the Heritage Foundation in support of this right-wing group’s efforts to confuse the public about climate science.

Margo Thorning – American Council for Capital Formation: An Exxon-funded anti-tax group that protects Big Business and has been actively protesting action on climate change at least since the Kyoto Protocol.

Kathleen White – Texas Public Policy Foundation: White is a former TCEQ commissioner and climate change denialist who now spends her days writing commentaires against the Waxman-Markey bill for the corporatist TPPF. White’s writings borrow liberally from “studies” produced by Exxon-funded groups.

Who else?

Repsentatives from Valero, the Texas Association of Manufacturers, Devon Energy Corporation, the Texas Oil & Gas Association, the Texas Alliance of Energy Producers, Texas Westmoreland Coal Co…. and coal-intensive utilites AEP, TXU, NRG, El Paso Electric, and Luminant.

Finally, at the last panel session, the taxpayer-sponsored summit allows some folks to speak who offer a modicum of balance, though three of them still hail from industry:

*Michael Webber ‐ Professor UT Department of Mechanical Engineering and Center for International Energy and Environmental Policy*Paul Sadler ‐ The Wind Coalition*Bob Avant – Program Director Texas AgriLife Research Texas A&M University*Robert Webb ‐ Texas Renewable Energy Industries Association *Barbara Budde – Catholic Diocese of Austin *Tom “Smitty” Smith – Public Citizen

I don’t think an objective supporter can look at this line-up and can conclude anything other than this is an orchestrated effort to weaken the Waxman-Markey bill.

In any case, I’ve carved out a couple hours to attend the event. Look for a video and blog post later today.

Updated with video

This morning I attended some of the “Cap & Trade Summit” at the Capitol. I missed Gov. Perry’s address unfortunately but you can catch his remarks here.

I did hear about two hours’ worth of speeches by the commissioners for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, Public Utility Commission and Railroad Commission as well as reps from some corporate-funded “free market” organizations.

The auditorium was maybe half-filled and there were more than a fair share of corporate lobbyists. Not too many people present weren’t wearing expensive suits.

While each speaker went on and on about the costs of the Waxman-Markey bill, I heard not a single mention of the costs of doing nothing. I heard nothing about the costs borne by a warming planet: inundated cities, acidifying oceans, extreme drought, loss of surface water, increases in infectious diseases, changes in agriculture and food supples, and so on.

I heard nothing about climate science other than some oblique references to how it may not be settled. I heard little about alternative proposals (though the speaker from the Exxon-funded Heritage Foundation did talk about giving prizes to individuals who conserve energy). Among the 30 or so speakers, not a single actual climate scientist could be found.

The omissions were deliberate, I think. In a revealing moment, Dr. Michelle Foss, the Chief Energy Economist and Head of UT’s Center for Energy Economics, said that PUC Chairman Barry Smitherman had asked her – and presumably the other speakers – to steer clear from discussing climate science.

Foss was there as an academic representative but she has deep financial connections to fossil fuel industries. According to her “Professional Summary,” she is co-owner of Harvest Gas Management, a “Texas-based exploration and production enterprise with coal seam gas operations in north-central Louisiana.”

She’s also done proprietary research for Shell Oil, El Paso Energy Corp, ExxonMobil, Reliant Energy, Conoco and many others. Also, Foss presented at the Exxon-funded Heartland Institute’s March climate confusion conference (theme: “Global warming: Was it ever really a crisis?”).

Among the 30 or so speakers, not a single actual climate scientist could be found.

What I did hear was a lot of fear-mongering about the economic effects of Waxman-Markey. The right-wing “think tank” crowd – the corporate-funded Texas Public Policy Foundation, the Exxon-funded Heritage Foundation, and the Exxon-funded American Council for Capital Formation – took the lead, presenting the audience with the results of economic modeling, which, to simplify things greatly, painted a doom and gloom picture of Waxman-Markey.

To believe them, the bill will slice several points off GDP, cost families thousands of dollars every year and lead to massive job losses. (Karen Campbell, of the Heritage Foundation, warned, “So maybe you don’t get your kid those braces.”) This message is the functional equivalent of “death panels,” IMHO.

But before that the commissioners from the three state agencies made some brief remarks.

The TCEQ commissioners, Buddy Garcia especially, were more than a tad defensive about their environmental policies.

“We utilize science and we utilize the law,” Garcia mewled. “It is not just some effort to bypass the feds and try to pollute the earth. And no strategy is going to cool – er, control the climate.”

Repeat: No strategy is going to control the climate. This is literally an unbelievable statement that no responsible environmental policymaker could possibly believe. Even if you’re opposed to action on climate change, even if you think global warming is a hoax, you can’t possibly believe that humans have zero warming or cooling effects (“control) on the climate.

But, wait, TCEQ Chairman Bryan Shaw says Texas has already figured out a “solution” for climate change.

“We’ve been working toward incentivizing and pushing toward more energy efficiency which has led to reduced greenhouse gas emissions, but done so in a way that’s furthered economic development,” he said.

This is a frequent talking point for Shaw. Basically, he’s making the argument that increased efficiencies lead to reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. In a narrow sense, he’s correct.

Producing energy more efficiently or reducing consumption through home weatherization, for example, does reduce emissions of CO2. But as a strategy to halve global greenhouse gasses by 2050 (the UN’s target for avoiding temperature increases greater than 2 degrees Celcius) it’s akin to putting out a forest fire with a garden hose.

Moving on… PUC Chairman Barry Smitherman had this to say: “Perhaps, as the Governor said, if I knew for certain that taking all this money away from Texans might actually save the planet, I might be okay with it.” Might!

And then there was PUC commissioner Donna Nelson:

To the extent that you are testifying today and you believe the science is uncontroverted that CO2 causes global warming please don’t be condescending to those of us who still have questions.

Second, the air has no boundaries and a lot of people have talked aobut the fact that if India and China don’t sign on, to the extent there is a real issue we will, you know, pass costs on to the citizens of Texas and the citizens of the US and there will be no benefit from that cost.

So I think pure and simple what we’re talking about is a tax. If you look at the legislation… it’s not an honest effort to reduce CO2 emissions; it’s an effort to raise taxes and an effort to raise a disproportionate amount of taxes from Texans.

And that was really the theme of this summit: Waxman-Markey is a tax-and-spend policy that will drastically increase the role of the federal government in people’s everday lives and produce dubious benefits for the environment. Better to do nothing. QED.

I didn’t stick around to hear from the speakers from industry, who were scheduled for four hours of testimony. For balance, the final panel of the day includes an environmentalist and consumer advocate (Tom “Smitty” Smith of Public Citizen) as well as lobbyist Paul Sadler, speaking for the Wind Coalition, Robert Webb of the Texas Renewable Energy Industries Association and someone from the Catholic Diocese.

Environmental groups have complained that the summit made little attempt at an objective appraisal of the Waxman-Markey bill.

In a letter sent to PUC Chairman Barry Smitherman, author of If Jesus Were An Investment Banker and a free-market ideologue, Jim Marston of the Environmental Defense Fund noted the lack of balance in the summit’s line-up. (Full disclosure: Marston is chairman of the Texas Democracy Foundation, the board that oversees the Observer.)

The letter calls for a “fair review of the facts regarding the bill and the economic impacts of climate change on Texas” and includes a list of peer-reviewed studies examining both costs and benefits of Waxman-Markey. Smitherman’s response?

In a nutshell, he tells Martson in a response letter that the environmental and academic community had “ample opportunity” to address climate concerns at an EDF-organized conference earlier this year.

“[T]he focus of this upcoming summit is the likely impacts to Texas from passage of climate change legislation, in particular the Waxman-Markey bill,” wrote Smitherman.

Never let it be said that the good people of Andrews, Texas aren’t charitable. They’re so willing to lend a helping hand to those who ask that they voted in May to authorize the issuance of $75 million in bonds to help Harold Simmons, one of the world’s 200 richest men, build a massive radioactive waste dump near their town.

To be fair, the election was really close: 642 to 639. So close that the founders of “No Bonds for Billionaires,” sisters Melodye and Peggy Pryor, lawyered up and sued the county, arguing in the suit that at least 90 voters illegally cast ballots in the election.

I’ve read their lawsuit and the responses from the county and Waste Control Specialists. Here’s my take, ripped from the latest issue of the Observer.

The suit contends there was a raft of irregularities, including at least three unregistered voters; voters using someone else’s voter ID number; people born in other countries who didn’t affirm their U.S. citizenship on voter-registration applications; and mismatches between signatures on polling place sign-in sheets and voter-registration cards.

Attorneys for Waste Control Specialists—third-party interveners in the suit—trashed it in a response filed with the court. “Based on nothing but speculation and questions,” the response reads, “contestants would have the Court reject ninety votes and deprive these individuals of their fundamental right to vote.”

The county’s response appears to undermine the allegations, documenting that many of the voters in question are longtime Andrews residents and voters. Many of the allegations of illegal voting stem from minor mistakes on voter applications, the county says. The four “illegal” voters were in fact registered, according to the secretary of state’s database.

At this point, I’d put my money on Andrews County and Waste Control. Invalidating elections ain’t the easiest thing in the world and I’m not sure the Pryors and their attorney have the goods.

In any case, I still marvel at how a billionaire and his proxies could talk a relatively poor community, which prides itself on “Free Enterprise,” into financing a risky private radioactive waste venture. But, I’ve been writing about the Andrews radwaste dump long enough that I shouldn’t be surprised by anything.

For those of you in Houston, I will be on KPFT today at 4:30pm discussing my recent story on threats to Texas public beaches.

When I was a kid growing up in South Texas, my parents would often take long, looping Sunday drives on the beat-up county roads near Yorktown, Goliad, Cuero, Kenedy – the little towns in the farm and ranch country of that part of Texas.

For a restless kid in the backseat, it wasn’t exactly Disney Land but some of the sights are still vivid in my mind.

In particular, I remember asking my dad about a strange earthen feature we’d frequently pass near Kenedy, a two- or three-story mound of earth flattened on top like a plateau. It was huge and totally anomalous on the mostly flat landscape.

My dad told me it was a uranium mine. I had no idea what that was but it sounded exotic … and perhaps a bit dangerous. I haven’t thought much about it since but the memories came leaping back upon reading Greg Harman’s new article on the resurgence of uranium mining in South Texas.

His story for the San Antonio Current opens:

A string of lakes across Karnes County sparkle as blue as any found in the resort towns of Colorado, New Mexico, and Wyoming. Each is graced with the gentle slope of a nearby hill, where wildlife forages on its way to and from the waterline.

These former mine sites were blasted open during the uranium boom that swept South Texas in the 1950s and ’60s, when the U.S. military was racing to keep pace with the growing Soviet atomic-bomb program and the newborn Atomic Energy Commission was struggling to develop beneficial uses for the monstrously destructive power we had tapped.

Today, 17 of Texas’ earliest open-pit mines remain abandoned on private property. Land owners like to fish these man-made water features.

More than a few have learned to water-ski here, despite the fact that the Texas Railroad Commission has found the sites to be emitting abnormally high levels of cancer-causing radiation.

In the story, Harman connects the dots between San Antonio’s efforts to expand nuclear power, the resurgence of uranium mining across South Texas (Karnes County, Goliad, Kingsville and elsewhere) and the once and future impacts to people’s health and the environment, especially groundwater.

The mining of uranium is no longer a crude strip-mining effort. The industry now does it “in-situ” by dissolving the uranium into the groundwater with a solution and then pumping the mix to the surface where the native water is separated from the valuable uranium.

Once treated, the water is returned to the aquifer. (Note: It’s much more complicated than this. For the deets, go here.)

While the industry touts the process as “environmentally safe,” Harman discusses in detail some of the limitations and risks inherent to in-situ mining. Goliad County is the epicenter of the fight between locals concerned about groundwater contamination and the uranium extractors.

Up the road in Goliad County, Uranium Enrichment Corp is working hard to open an in-situ operation.

The groundwater district and the county government charge that the company has already fouled the local aquifer by punching nearly 100 exploratory holes in the subsurface water sands.

Instead of closing these holes within 48 hours as state law demands, many of them were left open to the elements for several weeks. With air and rainwater shooting down the shafts, Groundwater District president Dohman says the uranium reacted to the oxygen and began to dissolve out of the water sands, polluting the Evangeline Aquifer.

The whole article is worth a read.