US Senate should nix Kyoto pact

By Alexander F. Annett Copyright 1998 Journal of Commerce December 4, 1998

How does a $397 billion drop in the economy sound? How about paying an additional 50 cents for a gallon of gasoline? Or how would you like to see your electricity bill nearly double and, if you heat your house with gas, your gas bill shoot up by 147 percent? These are just some of the economic consequences Americans will face as a result of the Kyoto Protocol, the global warming treaty the Clinton administration just signed. The source of these findings is the administration's own Department of Energy, which recently analyzed the treaty's requirement that U.S. greenhouse gas emissions be cut by approximately one-third over the next decade (below the levels otherwise predicted for 2010). Though the Senate hasn't ratified the treaty, the White House apparently plans to comply anyway, as it made clear at the recently concluded global warming summit in Buenos Aires. The White House has been moving ahead with the treaty's implementation under the apparent belief that cutting back on U.S. emissions won't affect the economy. That's pure fantasy, since only two ways exist to curb emissions: 1) curtail economic activity, or 2) spend untold billions on costly new equipment and technologies. Though the White House's Council of Economic Advisors has predicted far-less serious economic consequences, the energy department's estimates are even more dramatic than those of the respected WEFA Group and Charles River Associates economic consulting firms. What are the pocketbook implications? Even using the more conservative WEFA estimates, the Kyoto treaty is a bitter economic pill, adding an estimated 9 percent to your grocery bills, 11 percent to your medical bills, and 21 percent to your housing costs. Tally all of the added costs between 2001 and 2020 and you get the equivalent of a 14.5 percent income tax hike on the average family. Unfortunately, the administration is pushing ahead with the Kyoto restrictions despite the lack of a clear scientific consensus that Mother Earth is actually warming. Some scientists cite an estimated 1.08-degree increase in the Earth's surface temperature since 1850 as evidence of global warming. But since the Ice Age ended almost 11,000 years ago, six other major warming and cooling trends have occurred. Three produced temperatures warmer than the current year-round global temperature of 59 degrees, and three produced cooler temperatures. There is also no scientific consensus that the 1.08-degree rise was the result of factory and auto emissions. If so, the temperature increase should have occurred after 1945, when the largest buildup of man-made greenhouse gases occurred. But almost two-thirds of the increase over the past century occurred before 1945. Thus the administration would be foolish to push ahead with the Kyoto agreement. The only reason for doing so would be to keep the peace with the environmental activists so prominent in Vice President Al Gore's political base. Even if the administration chooses to play politics, the Senate needs to look at the big picture. Until it can be proven that the Earth is warming and that human activity is the culprit, the Senate should refuse to ratify the Kyoto treaty. To do otherwise would be irresponsible.

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