Bush has to tackle global warming, now

Age
Friday 2/2/2007 Page: 15

The US President is under increasing pressure from his supporters.

PRESIDENT Bush is playing catch-up. His warning in last week's State of the Union address about the "serious challenge of global climate change" and his commitment to cut domestic petrol consumption by 20 per cent during the next decade was an attempt to seize back the initiative in a public debate that was running away from him.

But he is falling short. Constituencies that are important to him are demanding tougher action. Unless he makes further substantial adjustments to policy, support for the Administration on this important issue is likely to fall. Leaders representing an unusual coalition of interests - the evangelical movement, big business, the national security establishment and environmental groups - have united in their call for the President to outline a more aggressive response to global warming.

With leading Republicans such as Californian Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and presidential aspirant Senator John McCain also publicly promoting their green credentials at every opportunity, Bush has been left with little room for political manoeuvre.

Perhaps most interesting of all has been the environmental advocacy of the religious groups. With white evangelicals making up nearly a quarter of the American electorate, Bush's victory in 2004 depended heavily on winning their votes - 78 per cent voted for him, according to the National Election Pool exit poll.

However, last year, 85 evangelical leaders co-signed a statement that called for greater use of renewable energy and more stringent legislation to curb carbon dioxide emissions, including a market-based cap and trade program that the President is yet to support.

Citing both the social justice implications of global warming on the world's poor and mankind's God-given responsibility to exercise "proper" stewardship over the Earth, the Christian leaders are running radio and television campaigns in states with influential legislators. The combination of this targeted advertising and an extensive educational campaign among the various congregations is having a discernible impact on the Republican voting base.

Attitudes to global warming are also shifting within another important Republican constituency, big business. Earlier this month 10 major companies among them General Electric, DuPont, Alcoa, Caterpillar and Duke Energy joined leading non-government organisations under the banner of the US Climate Action Partnership.

In a joint letter to Bush, these captains of American industry called on "lawmakers to enact a policy framework for mandatory reductions of greenhouse gas emissions" and in so doing issued a direct challenge to the President's approach that supports only voluntary reductions.

What gave this corporate initiative added significance was that a number of the companies themselves are either energy producers, distributors or highend users. This meant their policy proposals could mean additional costs for them.

Overlaying the domestic debate on global warming has been another important issue, that of energy security. Cognisant of America's over-reliance on imported oil, distinguished members of the national security establishment are also pushing for an increase in the use of renewables and better vehicle fuel economy programs.

Figures such as former CIA director James Woolsey and Ronald Reagan's national security adviser, Robert McFarlane, have been calling for a one-third reduction in American oil consumption and a one-third reduction in carbon dioxide emissions over the next 25 years.

With imports already comprising nearly 60 per cent of US oil consumption, they believe that America is increasingly vulnerable to foreign interests who may be willing to deploy the oil weapon. Woolsey has teamed up with senior environmentalists, labour and industry representatives in a group called the Energy Future Coalition.

Bush now has an opportunity to lead his country and the world in tackling climate change. It is to be hoped that his recent comments are the start of an ambitious new agenda of initiatives that seek to reduce carbon dioxide emissions using new technologies and market-based mechanisms.

With advocates of more stringent measures already prominent among his voting base and within the business and national security communities, he will find many fellow travellers. Climate change is not and has never been a partisan issue. Indeed, one of the strongest and early advocates of preventive measures was Margaret Thatcher, a doyen of conservatism.

In a speech in 1990 to the World Climate Conference in Geneva, she said: "But the threat to our world comes not only from tyrants and their tanks. It can be more insidious though less visible. The danger of global warming is as yet unseen but real enough for us to make changes and sacrifices so that we do not live at the expense of future generations. We must remember our duty to Nature before it's too late. That duty is constant. It is never complete." As Bush puts together the final details of his climate change policy in this, the last years of his term, one hopes he heeds Thatcher's warning.

Joshua Frydenberg is a former senior adviser to John Howard and a director of a leading international investment bank. He recently participated in the Australia- America Leadership Dialogue in California.