Andrew Jacob Rouchka

December 2, 2008

Following last Tuesday's election, the Democrats are poised to gain the presidency, six seats in the Senate, and twenty six Seats in the House of Representatives. This political shift is likely to reinvigorate federal environmental protection legislation efforts. Frances Beinecke, President of the Natural Resources Defense Council, released a statement on Election Day, proclaiming that "[t]he election of Barack Obama represents a new day for environmentalists. His election brings an end to eight years of unrelenting assaults on the environment."

Most notably, Barack Obama's New Energy for America plan promises to create five million "green collar" jobs in the renewable energy sector, put one million pug-in hybrid cars on the road by 2015, ensure ten percent of our electricity comes from renewable sources by 2012 (and twenty five percent by 2025), and implement nationwide cap and trade regulation of greenhouse gasses (GHGs).

Increased action in environmental policy will result not only from increased cooperation among strongly democratic legislative and executive branches, but also from the administration's desire to meet the existing call for increased environmental legislation. Recent actions at the State level show broad public support for a cap-and-trade GHG regulation. Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, and Vermont joined together to form the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, the first mandatory, market-based effort in the United States to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. These Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states are not alone. Addressing climate change from an international approach, Arizona, British Columbia, California, Manitoba, Montana, New Mexico, Ontario, Oregon, Quebec, Utah, and Washington formed the Western Climate Initiative to identify, evaluate, and implement collective and cooperative ways to reduce greenhouse gasses in the region.

The new administration is likely to address climate change in particular because it is a global problem requiring a global solution. Democratic control of the Senate and House, will make it easier for Obama to take action, and he plans to hit the ground running. John Podesta, of Obama's transition team, said the team is looking at "virtually every agency to see where we can move forward, whether that's on energy transformation, on improving health care, on stem cell research," and that Obama "intends to move very quickly." Environmentalists can look forward hopefully for national, if not international, climate change regulation from the new administration.

Sources:

Election Results 2008, N.Y.Times, http://elections.nytimes.com/2008/results/president/votes.html

Barack Obama & Joe Biden: New Energy for America, Obama for America, available at http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/newenergy.

Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative: An Initiative of the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic States of the U.S., http://www.rggi.org/home.

Western Climate Initiative, http://www.westernclimateinitiative.org/.

Press Release, National Resources Defense Council, NRDC Looks Ahead to Repowering America with President-Elect Obama, http://nrdc.org/media/2008/081104.asp.

Obama Plans to Overturn Bush Executive Orders, Environment News Service, Nov. 10, 2008, http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/nov2008/2008-11-10-01.asp.