America’s Climate Security Act
The Lieberman-Warner bill which is scheduled for consideration by the American Senate this month is likely to be the greatest step into creating a worldwide emissions trading scheme. The bill will cap US greenhouse gas emissions at about 30 per cent of their current level by 2050 and an emissions trading scheme will be at the centre of the reduction effort, according to an article in Ethical Corporation.
“Republican presidential candidate John McCain is the strongest endorser of Lieberman-Warner. In October 2007, he said he was “bitterly disappointed” by US inaction on climate change so far. “The Europeans implemented a cap-and-trade system; they stumbled and had their problems but it is still the right thing to do,” he said.
Peter Liese, a German centre-right member of the European Parliament, says a US scheme, which could be up and running by 2012, is crucial both for the establishment of cap-and-trade worldwide, and for a global agreement on greenhouse gas reduction targets after 2012, when the Kyoto Protocol expires.
The US coming on board will be “a very important signal for all other countries; nobody will have an excuse any more,” says Liese, who is in charge of steering through the European parliament the EU legislation that includes aviation in emissions trading.