North Dakota Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem is announcing a lawsuit against the State of Minnesota over the latter state’s restrictions on using power from coal plants, among other sources.

“It is unfortunate it has come to this. As Minnesota seeks to rebuild its economy, it will need energy,” said Stenehjem in a press release. “Much of that energy will need to come from sources outside Minnesota.”

In its lawsuit, North Dakota alleges that the Next Generation Energy Act violates the Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution, unconstitutionally interfering with North Dakota’s energy production. The NGEA imposes prohibitions on energy imported from North Dakota, and while the law does make some exemptions the State of North Dakota is alleging that those exemptions benefit only Minnesota-based businesses and projects.

Read the rest at Plains Daily.

a href=”http://www.globalclimatescam.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/epa-200×200.jpg”>Fifty three of the Senate’s 59 Democrats gave unelected, overpaid bureaucrats at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency a green light yesterday to do pretty much whatever they choose in their quixotic crusade against global warming. All 41 Republicans and six brave Democrats voted for Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s resolution nullifying the EPA’s recent usurpation of authority under the Clean Air Act to regulate the U.S. economy to combat greenhouse gases. Thankfully, this craven surrender of congressional authority isn’t the last word on the issue, assuming that the November elections produce a Senate with enough backbone to reassert the legislature’s rightful power.In the meantime, it’s vital to understand how bureaucracies function. Whatever else they may do, leading bureaucrats always do two things, regardless of which party controls the White House or Congress: They limit choices available to the rest of us by imposing regulations that increase government power and thus justify expanding their budgets and staffs; and they protect themselves and their turf by suppressing internal dissent, often at any costs.

Read the rest of this editorial at the Washington Examiner.

The Environmental Protection Agency is poised to seize new power to regulate emissions of carbon dioxide unless Congress acts to stop them. 

Carbon dioxide is neither a pollutant nor a threat to human life or the environment. Despite new predictions that the Earth is entering a new cooling phase, the EPA intends to cap carbon dioxide emissions to stop nonexistent global warming. The impact this will have on business, jobs and the economy is staggering. Carbon dioxide is emitted as a byproduct of virtually every energy source. Everything from transportation, heating, electricity, manufacturing and more will be impacted.  

Senator Lisa Murkowski plans to bring to the Senate floor on June 10th, her resolution to disapprove the EPA’s finding that greenhouse gas emissions endanger public health and welfare and therefore must be regulated using the Clean Air Act. The resolution is brought under the rules of the Congressional Review Act. It cannot be filibustered and needs only 51 votes to pass. 

Senate passage of S. J. Res. 26 will send a strong message to the White House and will put pressure on the House to vote on the resolution. It appears that the vote will be very close and could go either way. It’s critical that Senators hear from their constituents.

Take Action!

• Click here to contact your Senator
• Rallies are planned around the nation on Thursday, June 3rd at the local offices of Senators who will be back home for a Senate recess from May 28th through June 7th. Visit your senators’ local offices in person and register your support for the Murkowski Resolution.

Click here for more information about the EPA’s plans and the Murkowski Resolution.

Senator Lisa Murkowski (R - Alaska)

By Phil Kerpen

President Obama has been very made clear that his top domestic priorities are health care and global warming. We all know what happened on health care. Now the date is set for the key Senate showdown on global warming: June 10. That’s when the Senate will vote on a resolution introduced by Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski (S.J. Res. 26) that would overturn the EPA’s global warming regulations. It’s not subject to filibuster. There is no place for weak-kneed senators to hide. In just two weeks we’ll know where every member of the Senate stands.As I’ve previously discussed here in the Fox Forum and documented on www.ObamaChart.com, the Obama administration is not waiting for Congress to enact a national cap-and-trade program to move ahead with its global warming agenda.

Under the watchful eye of White House Climate czar Carol Browner (who originally developed the legal theory of using the 1970 Clean Air Act as a global warming law, bypassing Congress) the EPA is moving forward on a staggering regulatory power grab that includes about 18,000 pages of appendices and will eventually regulate nearly every aspect of the U.S. economy.

Read the rest of this editorial at Fox News.

By Reuters

Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.) are scheduled to formally unveil on Wednesday a compromise U.S. climate change bill they want passed this year.

Besides bringing down emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases blamed for global warming, it would expand offshore oil drilling and nuclear-power production in a move to appeal to a broader number of senators.

Here are highlights of the bill, called the “American Power Act,” according to a summary of the legislation being circulated to senators and obtained by Reuters:

Carbon emissions reductions
By 2020, carbon pollution would be cut by 17 percent from 2005 levels. By 2050, a reduction of more than 80 percent would be achieved. These are the same goals included in the climate bill passed by the House of Representatives in June. The short-term goal is slightly less than the 20 percent cut approved in November by the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.

The summary did not specify, but sources have said the carbon-reduction requirements on utilities would begin in 2013.

Carbon price collar
Carbon prices would rise at a fixed rate over inflation. Initially, floor and ceiling prices for carbon pollution permits required of electric utilities would be set at $12-$25. The floor would increase at 3 percent annually over inflation and the ceiling at 5 percent annually over inflation.

In the event of unusually high carbon prices, a strategic reserve would ensure the availability of “price-certain allowances.”

Backers aren’t calling it “cap and trade,” but in practice, that is what it appears to be.

Read the rest of this story at Cnet.

New oil drilling, if it happens, is many years away, while cap-and-trade legislation is here and now

By Philip Elliot, AP

Reversing a ban on oil drilling off most U.S. shores, President Barack Obama on Wednesday announced an expansive new policy that could put new oil and natural gas platforms in waters along the southern Atlantic coastline, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and part of Alaska.

Speaking at Andrews air base outside Washington, Obama said, “This is not a decision that I’ve made lightly.” He addressed the expected outcry from disappointed environmentalists by saying he had studied the issue for more than a year and concluded it was the right call given the nation’s voracious thirst for energy and the need to produce jobs and keep American businesses competitive.

“We’re announcing the expansion of offshore oil and gas exploration but in ways that balance the need to harness domestic energy resources and the need to protect America’s natural resources,” Obama said, standing in front of a Navy F-18 fighter scheduled to fly on Earth Day with a half-biomass fuel mix.

The president said his decision is part of a broader strategy that also includes expanding the production of nuclear power and clean energy sources, to “move us from an economy that runs on fossil fuels and foreign oil to one that relies more on homegrown fuels and clean energy.”

Read the rest of this story at CNS News.

By Juliet Eilperin

Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) will go ahead and mark up climate legislation in her committee Tuesday, she announced Monday morning, even if the Republicans try to block her.

Under committee rules and precedent, two members of the minority are customarily required in order to provide a quorum for a markup. But Boxer and her aides will rely on a provision in the rules that will allow the Democrats to proceed as long as a majority of committee members are present, and can report out the bill if a majority is present and votes in favor of the bill. Democrats outnumber Republicans on the panel by a ratio of 12 to 7.

While committee Republicans have objected that the Environmental Protection Agency has not performed a full economic impact analysis of the bill authored by Boxer and Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.), Boxer rejected this complaint in a statement.

“This bill has had comprehensive legislative hearings, with 54 expert witnesses in nine panels. Committee rules provide that the Chairman’s Mark be circulated three days before a business meeting, and we released it, along with the EPA’s economic analysis, ten days before the markup,” she said. “No climate bill has ever had this level of review and the Obama administration stands behind the EPA’s analysis.”

“We urge Ranking Member Inhofe, with the utmost respect, to bring the committee Republicans back to work on this issue. We will give them the opportunity, as we proceed this week, to reconsider their decision,” she added. “We look forward to working with them if they decide to participate, but if they do not, we will move forward in accordance with the rules of the Senate and of this committee.”

Matt Dempsey, spokesman for the committee Republicans, said the minority was united in its opposition to moving forward.

Read the rest of this article at Washington Post.