New York Times Editorial - In California, a breakthrough

New York Times Editorial - In California, a breakthrough
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: September 1, 2006


California, long a leader on environmental issues, has done it again, approving a pathbreaking bill that would impose America's broadest and most stringent controls on emissions of carbon dioxide, the main global warming gas. California's action stands in bold and welcome contrast to the U.S. government's reluctance to take aggressive action on a problem of mounting concern among scientists and the general public.

The deal between the state's Democratic leadership and its Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, would reduce California's carbon dioxide emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. This is by any measure a huge undertaking. It will be up to state agencies, chiefly the California Air Resources Board, to work out the details, but the plan allows for market- based mechanisms like emissions trading to achieve the maximum possible gains at the lowest cost.

Taken together with other state actions - including an important agreement among several Northeastern states to limit carbon dioxide emissions from power plants - California's assertiveness has suggested to some people that the United States may be at a transformational moment on climate change, with the states leading a powerful "bottom-up" movement to deal with the problem.

That could well be so, but a global problem cannot be solved by state and regional initiatives, however admirable and necessary. There is no real substitute for determined action at the national level, since states that make the necessary capital investments to reduce emissions could well end up at a temporary economic disadvantage. Nor is there any substitute for American leadership globally; China and India, two big polluters and getting bigger, are unlikely to undertake costly controls while the world's biggest polluter sits on its hands.

Given California's size and economic reach, its initiative will surely help. But Congress and President George W. Bush are by no means off the hook.