Gore gets behind emission measure
He urges Mass. to support bill
Former vice president Al Gore has endorsed a bill that would require sharp reductions in carbon emissions in Massachusetts, and some state legislators and leading environmental groups hope his support will spur the State House to approve the measure before the end of the formal session next week.
Gore wrote a letter urging action by the House on the Global Warming Solutions Act - which has already passed the state Senate. More than 100 representatives have signed a letter to House Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi in support of the bill, which would require greenhouse gas emissions to be 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2020, and 80 percent below by 2050.
DiMasi has not taken a position on the bill, nor has the administration of Governor Deval Patrick, though it is generally supportive of a statewide cap on emissions.
"I urge your colleagues to take even bolder steps toward solving the climate crisis," Gore wrote in the letter, which was read aloud during a State House news conference yesterday by state Senator Marc R. Pacheco, who sponsored the legislation. "We have an historic opportunity to shift to a clean-energy economy, and, in the process, create new, sustainable jobs to support the development and deployment of these new technologies."
A number of other speakers said global warming should be seen more broadly than in just economic terms.
"I'm afraid right now that we are more concerned about the business climate than the earth's climate," said state Representative Frank I. Smizik, chairman of the Joint Committee on Environment, Natural Resources and Agriculture. "Until we realize they are not mutually exclusive, we won't be able to address these issues."
Members of the Conservation Law Foundation, Environment Massachusetts, the Union of Concerned Scientists, and other advocacy groups also were there to promote the bill.
The House can vote only if the speaker moves the bill to the floor by next week.
"The bill is still under consideration here," said David Guarino, the speaker's spokesman. "But it should be clear to anyone who has been watching the session that we've already" made significant progress on energy.
Robert Keough, spokesman for the Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs, agreed.
"Under Governor Patrick, Massachusetts joined the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative and became the first state in the nation to require greenhouse gas analysis and mitigation in major real estate projects," he said in a statement. "Comprehensive energy legislation, the oceans management bill, and pending biofuels legislation all put Massachusetts into a leadership position nationally. We support the creation of an economy-wide cap as the next step in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but many details remain to be worked out with the Legislature."
