The recently introduced American Power Act in the United States’ Senate purports to reduce substantially greenhouse gas emissions, i.e., carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, etc, along with creating potentially millions of “green-collar” jobs in those parts of the country suffering unprecedentedly high rates of unemployment.  While it remains to be seen whether this piece of legislation will ultimately clear the daunting hurdle that is the Senate floor, it is apparent already that the bill falls far short in terms of facilitating the transition away from the burning of fossil fuels to the production and utilization of clean, renewable sources of energy in the United States.

The bill seeks to reduce overall greenhouse gas emissions 83 percent by 2050, accomplished intermediately along the way through a variety of steps and stages.  That may sound initially impressive – especially when one considers some the previous gestures made by the government in addressing climate change; however, the methods for achieving the bill’s slated emissions cuts are inherently duplicitous.  This is due in large measure to its promotion of the market-friendly policy “Cap and Trade.”

This policy aims at providing so-called heavy polluters with government-issued “allowances” qualifying emissions of greenhouse gases in their various production spheres.  Officials would then, over time, decrease the total number of allowances and, therefore, theoretically compel producers to cut their emissions; however, this seemingly harmonious of all plans to save the environment collapses under the weight of its own contradictions.  These stem precisely from the exchangeability of the allowances themselves.

Fiercely energy-hungry nations (e.g., the United States) in response to the limits set by the issuing of carbon allowances would attempt to bribe countries like India, China, Brazil, South Korea, and Nigeria with billions to appropriate theirs, effectively grinding their development to a halt and, therefore, allowing production and subsequent consumption of energy in the developed world to continue unabated.  This would effectively nullify the stated purpose of the policy entirely, leaving a familiar system intact with the added “bonus” of facilitating the growth of parasitic eco-speculators.

Cap and Trade, therefore, is not a panacea, a cure-all to climate change.  Its fundamental flaw stems from a reliance on market mechanism and affording a leading position in the struggle to reduce emissions to governments, speculators, and capitalists: those foremost responsible for the environmental crisis we find ourselves in today.  It is a strategic dead-end.

Also included are references to “offsets.”  Through these, polluters can partially buy themselves out of the emissions cap set for them by saving energy or providing domestic and or international carbon sinks.  Since carbon sinks can be natural, such as trees, or manmade, such as landfills and carbon capture from burning coal, there exist opportunities for corporations to avoid reducing their overall emissions.  Furthermore, this draft does not address the production and burning of biomass, giving energy corporations an incentive to switch to it.  This can lead to greater levels of deforestation and destruction of sensitive habitats.

A major factor in the bills’ approach to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is the promotion and growth of nuclear power facilities.  It provides tens of billions of dollars in loan guarantees and other subsidies for the construction of new plants and other “innovative” nuclear sources of energy production.  Moreover, the bill compromises important safety and environmental safeguards in order to help make nuclear-power production more profitable to the bosses.  This is highly disquieting to say the least.  An explosion, for instance, at a nuclear plant due to “cutting corners” would have enormous environmental consequences far surpassing those witnessed at the former Deepwater Horizon oilrig, effectively rendering parts of the country virtually uninhabitable.

One of the more controversial aspects included is the encouragement of greater offshore drilling operations.  The legislation’s oil and natural gas provisions lack any defined plan for reassessment or implementation of corrective regulations in response to the Gulf disaster.  Essentially, it seeks to appease local politicians and financially desperate residents who would otherwise be apprehensive – especially now – concerning drilling operations taking place along their coastlines by allocating roughly 37.5 percent of the total revenues brought in to their treasuries.  With states and local governments furiously attempting to balance their budgets in the wake of a sweeping national public-debt crisis, such a policy would lead inevitably to an unprecedented run on coastal oil, leaving more environmental disasters just waiting to happen.

The Kerry-Lieberman bill makes a complete mockery out of the words “clean” and “renewable.”  At its heart lie further concessions to Big Oil and natural gas companies, while making no serious attempt whatsoever to effect a transition from dependence on fossil fuels to sustainable, renewable sources of energy production and consumption.  The bosses’ politicians (both Democrat and Republican) revealed, yet again, their complete impotence in achieving fundamentally critical tasks set for them, demonstrating the class nature of their regime and whom they are looking out for in turn.

Counterpoised to this “progressive” environmental legislation, the working class, the urban and rural poor, and all the socially oppressed under capitalism, need to organize and fight for an emergency environmental program of their own, one emphasizing the qualitative transformation away from burning fossil fuels to produce, transport, and consume materials towards ever renewable sources of energy production and consumption.  Its guiding aim should be the promotion of a balance between economic development and nature.

Such a program, however, would collide head-on with the cynical profit motives of the energy corporations.  They would almost certainly make every attempt to prevent the implementation of such demands.  That is why the working class and its allies need to fight for the complete nationalization under workers’ control of all these companies – including all air and rail lines and the shipping industry – without a cent paid out in compensation to either former owners or shareholders.  Without doing so, we leave the fate of our planet to their mercy.

We, thus, need to fight for massive investments in wind, wave, and solar power, paid for by the capitalist state through taxing the rich and corporations but run under the control of the unions and the workers and popular movement.  Such a generalized useful public-works program is the real antidote to climate change, providing long-term, quality jobs to millions of unemployed workers in the process.

At the same time, we need to phase out destructive forms of energy production like nuclear power in favor of the above-mentioned alternative forms.  Workers along with their respective committees and unions at such facilities, environmental groups, and representatives of community organizations surrounding them must have the authority to inspect every nuclear plant to determine whether a facility is safe or not and needs closing.  Only they, and not capitalist owners or state bureaucrats, can ensure their safe running.

We need to fight for the rapid end of production of internal combustion engine vehicles, promoting instead heavy investment and expansion of public transportation across every city and town in the country and making it free to ride for all at the expense of the bosses and their state.  Make them pay the bill!

By fighting for these demands along with forcing governments (including our own) to impose a global target maximum 1 degree Celsius increase in global temperatures, we can begin to reverse the damage done to the environment over past centuries resulting primarily from the expansion of capitalism.  This is the program both the working class and the urban and rural poor really need.