EPA lawyers equate cap and trade to Challenger disaster

November 10, 2:44 PMClimate Change ExaminerTony Hake

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Two lawyers for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) have created a video that is highly critical of the climate change legislation passed by Congress and endorsed by President Obama. In the video, Laurie Williams and Allan Zabel say the effort to push forth the bill can be equated to the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster when scientists' warnings were ignored and resulted in catastrophe.

• Watch the controversial video below - The Huge Mistake

Williams and Zabel firmly believe that a reduction in carbon dioxide emissions are a necessary part of the equation needed to solve anthropogenic global warming. However, like many climate alarmists, they believe that a cap and trade tax program will do nothing to solve the perceived problem.

“The push to launch this climate bill reminds us of the ill-fated launch of the Space Shuttle Challenger,” Zabel says. “The people responsible for the launch refused to listen to the rocket designers with the experience to know the shuttle was fatally flawed. This failure to listen resulted in tragedy.”

Williams continues, “We are speaking out because our political leaders are getting bad advice and are not listening to those who understand the flaws of the climate bill.”

The video provides an overview of the cap and trade system and then goes on to say an “energy revolution” is required to address the problems of climate change. The authors propose wind, geothermal, nuclear and solar power as alternatives but acknowledge that without incentive to industry, a transformation will not happen.

Cap and trade will not create confidence that clean energy will become profitable and so it will not ignite the huge shift in investment needed to begin the clean energy revolution.
~ EPA lawyers Laurie Williams and Allan Zabel

Citing the cap and trade program used in Europe, the two point out that the system that has already been implemented there has raised energy costs and done nothing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. In fact, Europe’s emissions have exceeded the caps put in place.

Carbon offsets, whereby a company could pay to ‘offset’ its own carbon emissions are shown to be a measure which are not quantifiable and accomplish nothing. The filmmakers refer to offsets as “The Big Rip-Off.”

As an example, the authors explain that the act of paying someone to not tear down a forest does not eliminate the demand for the forest and the product it produces. “The only result of an offset program is an increase in greenhouse gases” that shifts the emissions from one source to another according to Williams and Zabel. 

Former United States Vice President Al Gore has been a big proponent of carbon offsets, oftentimes citing his own purchase of them to offset his own large carbon footprint.  Such purchases have been made through a company on which he serves as chair, Generation Investment Management.  Highlighting the big money involved in carbon offsets, it has been said that Gore will become the first "carbon millionaire" in part thanks to his investments in offset schemes.

Williams and Zabel outline a series of steps that they believe is important to stemming greenhouse gases. Among their solutions are ways to make clean energy economically competitive with fossil fuels. The two advocate a set of ‘carbon fees’ that would increase the cost of fossil fuels to the point that alternative sources can compete on price.

The two lawyers have become very outspoken and it has drawn the attention of the EPA management who requested that the pair remove the video until changes were made to it. They have complied with the request but it has been reposted elsewhere. The video below is the unaltered version.

In an op-ed piece in the Washington Post last month, Williams and Zabel outline many of the same arguments they make in their video. In their conclusion they say, “The House and Senate climate bills are not a first step in the right direction. They would give away valuable rights in cap-and-trade permits and create a trillion-dollar carbon-offsets market that will not lead to needed reductions. Together, the illusion of greenhouse-gas reductions and the creation of powerful lobbies seeking to protect newly created profits in permits and offsets would lock in climate degradation for a decade or more.”

Related:

• Un-redacted Treasury Department documents provide insight into high cost of cap and trade
• EPA suppresses report calling into question global warming science