WASHINGTON  – Three Democratic governors told a Senate panel Tuesday that efforts to curb global warming and spur the development of cleaner sources of energy have created jobs and new businesses in their states, a trend that could expand nationwide if Congress passes federal legislation.

All three states – New Jersey, Colorado, and Washington – have adopted measures to achieve reductions in the gases blamed for global warming and standards requiring a certain percentage of electricity from renewable sources.

But this view was not shared by all state leaders testifying Tuesday before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, including North Dakota’s Republican governor and a Democratic state legislator from Arkansas, highlighting regional differences in addressing climate change.

A bill passed earlier this summer by the House that is now under consideration by the Senate would impose the first nationwide limits on greenhouse gases and require electric utilities to produce at least 12 percent of their power from pollution-free sources such wind and solar energy by 2020.

“If there is a lesson…for other states and the nation as a whole, it is that good energy policy and climate policy can energize the economy and help create good-paying private sector jobs,” said Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter, Jr., although he did not specifically endorse the House-passed bill.

To illustrate his point, Ritter described the transformation of Pueblo, Colo., from an old steel town to a center of wind turbine production.

Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire said her state has already created in two years nearly twice the 25,000 new “green” jobs it set as a goal to reach by 2020. Those workers include architects who design energy-efficient buildings, venture capitalists investing in new technology, and farmers growing the next
generation of biofuels, she said.

New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine said the state has committed to reducing its greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent and is looking to construct wind farms offshore. He told the panel national leadership was needed to create the energy future the country needs.

But Republican Gov. John Hoeven of North Dakota said the legislation under consideration would cause job losses in his oil-producing state. The prospect of a climate change bill already has halted new technologies to harvest oil and natural gas, Hoeven said.

He was joined by Arkansas state Rep. John Lowery, a Democrat and the owner of Lowery Oil Co., who said that while the bill may create green jobs for the West Coast and Northeast, it would harm middle America.

“It might be popular for some in Washington to demonize oil and gas, fertilizer and chemical companies, and farmers,” Lowery said, “but where I come from, they are an integral part of our communities.”

The House bill would set up a cap-and-trade system. Under such a regime, limits would be placed on emissions of greenhouse gases and a market would be created where business could buy and sell permits to pollute.

“As I’ve stated before, cap-and-trade benefits the coasts at the expense of the heartland,” said Sen. James Inhofe of Oklahoma, the panel’s top Republican.

Lawmakers from the West Coast and Northeast, which have less manufacturing and have already taken strides to clean up their energy supply, contend the bill will be an economic boon.

“We are facing two historic challenges today – the current recession, and the dangers of unchecked global warming,” said Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., the committee chairwoman. “And we have the opportunity to address both with a single solution.”

WASHINGTON  – House Democrats narrowly won a key test vote Friday on sweeping legislation to combat global warming and usher in a new era of cleaner energy. Republicans said the bill included “the largest tax increase in American history.”

The vote was 217-205 to advance the White House-backed legislation to the floor, and 30 Democrats defected, a reflection of the controversy the bill sparked.

The legislation would impose limits for the first time on carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas pollution from power plants, factories and refineries. It also would force a shift from coal and other fossil fuels to renewable and more efficient forms of energy. Supporters and opponents agreed the result would be higher energy costs, but disagreed widely on the impact on consumers.

President Barack Obama has made the measure a top priority of his first year in office. The president, along with White House aides and House Democratic leaders, scrambled for the votes to assure passage. Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has pledged to get the legislation passed before lawmakers leave on their July 4 vacation.

The Senate has yet to act on the measure, and a major struggle is expected.

In the House, the bill’s fate depended on the decisions of a few dozen fence-sitting Democrats, mainly conservatives and moderates from contested districts who feared the political ramifications of siding with the White House and their leadership on the measure.

Democrats left little or nothing to chance. Rep. Ellen Tauscher, D-Calif., confirmed by the Senate on Thursday to an administration post, put off her resignation from Congress until after the final vote on the climate change bill.

“The bill contains provisions to protect consumers, keep costs low, help sensitive industries transition to a clean energy economy and promote domestic emission reduction efforts,” the White House in a statement of support for the legislation.

Republicans saw it differently.

This “amounts to the largest tax increase in American history under the guise of climate change,” said Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind.

While the bill would impose a “cap-and-trade” system that would force higher energy costs, Republicans for weeks have branded it an energy tax on every American.

But Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., said there was a “moral imperative to be good stewards of the earth.”

The legislation, totaling about 1,200 pages, would require the U.S. to reduce carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions by 17 percent from 2005 levels by 2020 and about 80 percent by the next century.

U.S. carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels are rising at about 1 percent a year and are predicted to continue increasing without mandatory caps.

Under the bill, the government would limit heat-trapping pollution from factories, refineries and power plants. It would distribute pollution allowances that could be bought and sold, depending on whether a facility exceeds the cap or makes greater pollution cuts than are required.

Obama on Thursday called it “a vote of historic proportions … that will open the door to a clean energy economy” and green jobs. “It will create millions of new jobs,” Pelosi insisted.

Both Obama and Pelosi preferred to focus on the economic issues rather than on what environmentalists view as the urgency of reducing carbon emissions blamed for global warming.

The Rust Belt coal-state Democrats who have been sitting on the fence worry about how to explain their vote for higher energy prices to people back home – and how the vote might play out in elections next year.

Republicans have been quick to exploit those concerns.

“Democratic leaders are poised to march many moderate Democrats over a cliff … by forcing them to vote for a national energy tax that is unpopular throughout the heartland,” Republican leader John Boehner of Ohio said.

There was widespread agreement that under this cap-and-trade system, the cost of energy would almost certainly increase. But Democrats argued that much of the impact on taxpayers would be offset by other provisions in the bill. Low-income consumers would qualify for credits and rebates to cushion the impact on their energy bills.

Two reports issued this week – one from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office and the other from the Environmental Protection Agency – seemed to support that argument.

The CBO analysis estimated that the bill would cost an average household $175 a year; the EPA put it at between $80 and $110 a year.

Republicans questioned the validity of the CBO study and noted that even that analysis showed actual energy production costs increasing $770 per household. Industry groups have cited other studies showing much higher cost to the economy and to individuals.

WASHINGTON  – The chairman of the House Agriculture Committee says farmers can support a proposed Democratic bill to limit greenhouse gases and combat global warming.

Democratic Rep. Collin Peterson of Minnesota urged support Wednesday for the climate bill after a series of concessions aimed at easing the impact higher energy costs will have on farmers and rural areas of the country.

Peterson said the changes made the massive bill something “that can work with agriculture.”

A vote on the bill could come on Friday. Republicans say it will lead to soaring energy costs. Peterson said farmers will be able to mitigate higher energy prices by selling pollution “offsets” earned by capturing carbon dioxide.

WASHINGTON – The president’s new science adviser said Wednesday that global warming is so dire, the Obama administration is discussing radical technologies to cool Earth’s air.

John Holdren told The Associated Press in his first interview since being confirmed last month that the idea of geoengineering the climate is being discussed. One such extreme option includes shooting pollution particles into the upper atmosphere to reflect the sun’s rays. Holdren said such an experimental measure would only be used as a last resort.

“It’s got to be looked at,” he said. “We don’t have the luxury of taking any approach off the table.”

Holdren outlined several “tipping points” involving global warming that could be fast approaching. Once such milestones are reached, such as complete loss of summer sea ice in the Arctic, it increases chances of “really intolerable consequences,” he said.

Twice in a half-hour interview, Holdren compared global warming to being “in a car with bad brakes driving toward a cliff in the fog.”

At first, Holdren characterized the potential need to technologically tinker with the climate as just his personal view. However, he went on to say he has raised it in administration discussions.

Holdren, a 65-year-old physicist, is far from alone in taking geoengineering more seriously. The National Academy of Science is making climate tinkering the subject of its first workshop in its new multidiscipline climate challenges program. The British parliament has also discussed the idea.

The American Meteorological Society is crafting a policy statement on geoengineering that says “it is prudent to consider geoengineering’s potential, to understand its limits and to avoid rash deployment.”

Last week, Princeton scientist Robert Socolow told the National Academy that geoengineering should be an available option in case climate worsens dramatically.

But Holdren noted that shooting particles into the air – making an artificial volcano as one Nobel laureate has suggested – could have grave side effects and would not completely solve all the problems from soaring greenhouse gas emissions. So such actions could not be taken lightly, he said.

Still, “we might get desperate enough to want to use it,” he added.

Another geoengineering option he mentioned was the use of so-called artificial trees to suck carbon dioxide – the chief human-caused greenhouse gas – out of the air and store it. At first that seemed prohibitively expensive, but a re-examination of the approach shows it might be less costly, he said.

WASHINGTON – Calling climate change an urgent challenge, President-elect Barack Obama promised Tuesday that Washington would take a leading role in combating it in the United States and throughout the world.

“My presidency will mark a new chapter in America’s leadership on climate change,” Obama said in a video message to governors and others attending a Los Angeles summit on the issue.

In the roughly four-minute message, Obama reiterated his support for a cap-and-trade system approach to cutting green house gases.

He would establish annual targets to reduce emissions to their 1990 levels by 2020 and reduce them another 80 percent by 2050. Obama also promoted anew his proposal to invest $15 billion each year to support private sector efforts toward clean energy.

President Bush has been criticized for failing to do enough to combat climate change and Obama has promised quick action to address the issue. He may have to start tackling the issue through administrative actions, given that leaders in the Democratic-controlled Congress have indicated that they aren’t likely to act until 2010 on a bill to limit the heat-trapping gases blamed for global warming.

At a news conference Tuesday, a coalition called the U.S. Climate Action Partnership – made up of 32 leading corporations, including electric utilities and oil companies, and environmental groups – urged Obama to press Congress to approve legislation next year for a mandatory cap-and-trade system to limit the release of carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels and other greenhouse gases. Opponents of such action argue controls on carbon dioxide emissions will increase energy costs.

Under a cap-and-trade program, the government would establish a ceiling on the amount of carbon dioxide that can be released into the air from burning fossil fuels. A utility or industrial plant would have to purchase emission allowances for every ton of pollution released. Anyone who exceeds the cap must either make pollution reductions or buy additional allowances, while those who cut emissions below the cap would be able to sell allowances.

Initially the cap would be relatively high and then be lowered gradually to achieve the targeted pollution reductions.

Obama favors auctioning off all of the allowances and using the proceeds to invest in energy efficiency and alternative, non-fossil energy that does not add to global warming. Others argue the allowances should be provided for free to reduce the economic costs and then be freely bought and sold in the market place.

Several environmental groups praised Obama’s focus on global warming, including Environmental Defense president Fred Krupp. He said Obama is “clearly rejecting the timid, business-as-usual approach” to dealing with climate and energy problems. “His plan to reduce emissions …will jump-start job creation in new energy industries, and take a huge step toward solving climate change.”

In his remarks to the summit, Obama criticized Washington for failing to lead on the issue in the past.

Said Obama: “I promise you this: When I am president, any governor who’s willing to promote clean energy will have a partner in the White House. Any company that’s willing to invest in clean energy will have an ally in Washington. And any nation that’s willing to join the cause of combating climate change will have an ally in the United States of America.”

Scientists, environmentalists and government and industry officials were attending the two-day Governors’ Global Climate Summit in Los Angeles, held ahead of a U.N. gathering in Poland next month.

Obama said he won’t attend that conference but that he has asked Congress members who will to report back to him. “Once I take office, you can be sure that the United States will once again engage vigorously in these negotiations, and help lead the world toward a new era of global cooperation on climate change,” Obama said.

NEW YORK – The spot light on the race for the White House is shifting to Sarah Palin and Joe Biden.

Thursday’s vice-presidential debate in St. Louis could be a pivotal moment in a race already filled with surprising twists.

Palin outlined the contest in an interview broadcast on the “CBS Evening News.” The Alaska governor says she’s, quote, “the new energy, the new face, the new ideas,” while she says Biden has “the experience based on many, many years in the Senate.”

Anchor Katie Couric asked Palin about her views on contraception, abortion, gay marriage and climate change. Palin said she supports safe and legal contraception. But she opposes the morning-after pill because of her belief that life begins at conception.

As for climate change, she says she wouldn’t “solely blame all of man’s activities.” But Palin acknowledges, “It’s real” and that something needs to be done about it.

FORT WAINWRIGHT, Alaska – Vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s assertion that she believes humans contribute to global warming – made in her first major interview since joining the Republican ticket – is more definitive than her previous statements.

Palin said she didn’t disagree with scientists that “man’s activities” could be contributing to the problem.

“Show me where I have ever said that there’s absolute proof that nothing that man has ever conducted or engaged in has had any effect or no effect on climate change,” Palin told ABC News in an interview broadcast Thursday and Friday. “I have not said that.”
 
However, in the past Palin has expressed doubts about the connection between emissions from human activities and global warming. She told the Internet news site Newsmax last month, “A changing environment will affect Alaska more than any other state, because of our location. … I’m not one, though, who would attribute it to being man-made.”

In a letter to Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne in December 2006 about listing the polar bear as a threatened species, Palin questioned what human activities could be regulated to help the bear.

“When a species’ habitat (in this case, sea ice) is declining due to climate change, but there are no discrete human activities that can be regulated or modified to effect change, what do you do?” she wrote.
 
In an interview with a Fairbanks newspaper within the last year, Palin said: “I’m not an Al Gore, doom-and-gloom environmentalist blaming the changes in our climate on human activity.”
 
Republican presidential candidate John McCain, a convert to the cause of fighting global warming, has said humans have caused climate change and he has proposed capping the greenhouse gases blamed for the problem.

In the ABC interview, Palin said she believes that “man’s activities certainly can be contributing to the issue of global warming, climate change. … Regardless, though, of the reason for climate change, whether it’s entirely, wholly caused by man’s activities or is part of the cyclical nature of our planet – the warming and the cooling trends – regardless of that, John McCain and I agree that we gotta do something about it.”

Questions about Palin’s knowledge of foreign policy dominated the interview with ABC’s Charles Gibson. Palin repeated her earlier assertions that she’s ready to be president if called upon, yet sidestepped questions on whether she had the national security credentials needed to be commander in chief.

McCain has defended his running mate’s qualifications, citing her command of the Alaska National Guard and Alaska’s proximity to Russia.

Pressed about what insights into recent Russian actions she gained by living in Alaska, Palin told Gibson,

“They’re our next-door neighbors and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska, from an island in Alaska.”

Palin, 44, has been Alaska’s governor for less than two years and before that was a small-town mayor. Asked whether those were sufficient credentials, Palin said: “It is about reform of government and it’s about putting government back on the side of the people, and that has much to do with foreign policy and national security issues.”

She said she brings expertise in the effort to make the country energy independent as a former chairman of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission.

Palin said that other than a trip to visit soldiers in Kuwait and Germany last year, her only other foreign travel was to Mexico and Canada. She also:
      -Appeared unsure of the Bush doctrine, which President Bush laid out in a West Point speech in June 2002. Asked whether she agreed with that, Palin said: “In what respect, Charlie?” Gibson pressed her for an interpretation of it. She said: “His world view.”

The doctrine essentially holds that the U.S. must help spread democracy to stop terrorism and will act pre-emptively to stop potential foes.

“I believe that what President Bush has attempted to do is rid this world of Islamic extremism, terrorists who are hell bent on destroying our nation,” Palin said, though she added “there have been mistakes made.”

Pressed repeatedly on whether the United States could attack terrorist hideouts in Pakistan without the country’s permission, she said: “If there is legitimate and enough intelligence that tells us that a strike is imminent against American people, we have every right to defend our country. In fact, the president has the obligation, the duty to defend.”

Bush watched portions of the interview and “thought she handled herself well,” White House spokesman Tony Fratto told reporters Friday. Asked how Bush viewed Palin’s response to questions about his doctrine of pre-emptive action, Fratto said, “I don’t have anything on that.”
      -Said “we’ve got to put the pressure on Iran” and its nuclear program. Asked three times what her position would be if Israel felt threatened enough to attack Iranian nuclear facilities, Palin repeatedly said the United States shouldn’t “second guess” Israel’s steps to secure itself.
      -Called for Georgia and the Ukraine to be included in NATO, a treaty that requires the U.S. to defend them militarily. She also said Russia’s attack into Georgia last month was “unprovoked.” Asked to clarify that she’d support going to war over Georgia, she said: “Perhaps so.”
 
On the environment, Palin said she disagreed with McCain’s position against oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska.

“We’ll agree to disagree,” she said, “but I’m gonna keep pushing that and I think eventually we’re all gonna come together on that one.”