"As the New York Times pointed out in a July 22 editorial, the House-passed cap-and-trade bill, while it imposes a cap âfrom all industrial facilities that tightens slowly over time,â does not âimpose any performance standards on existing (coal) power plants.â Moreover, the House version âexplicitly removes these plants from the reach of the Clean Air Act.â In short, the Times laments, the House bill doesnât âimpose lower-emissions standards on the older, dirtiest plants.â
As Kate Sheppard recently wrote on Grist.org, the Senate may ratchet up the irony by cushioning the coal industry even more than the House has. âThe coal industry got a lot of goodies in the House-passed energy and climate bill,â Sheppard wrote, âbut itâs pressing for even more in the Senate version.â Among other things, the coal industry wants more for sequestration technology (even though itâs already getting some $60 billion under the House version), and it wants the gravy train known as free pollution credits to last longer than the House has prescribed.
Having been bloodied by the healthcare debate, and in desperate need to go to the Copenhagen climate conference in December with a mandate from Congress, logic strongly suggests that Obama will accept whatever the Senate does to further water down the anti-coal aspects of cap-and-trade, even as he publicly denounces anyone who charges that he âsold outâ to the coal lobby."
http://seekingalpha.com/article/156...-senate-brawl-over-cap-and-trade?source=yahoo