Reid's Bold Climate Push: "We Are Going To Try To Do That Sometime In The Spring" - AFP

[hatrack]

The US Senate will act in early 2010 on legislation to battle climate change, Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Tuesday, ending hopes of a breakthrough by next month's global talks.

"We are going to try to do that sometime in the spring," Reid told reporters, with a White House-backed push to remake US health care still dominating the Senate agenda just weeks before the congressional session ends.

The decision confirms that the US Congress will not adopt legislation to combat climate change before the December 7-18 global climate change talks in Denmark's capital Copenhagen.

It also pushes what is likely to be a bitter debate to a mid-term election year, potentially making it harder to corral some of the swing-vote Senators needed to ensure passage of the bill. The US House bill calls for cutting US greenhouse gas emissions by 17 percent from 2005 levels by 2020 and by 83 percent by 2050. The Senate's slightly more ambitious bill calls for a 20-percent cut by 2020.

EDIT

http://www.terradaily.com/reports/US_Senate_to_act_on_climate_bill_in_2010_999.html

[FBaggins]

1. Goodness... these guys don't think small, do they?

A major health care overhaul, a jobs bill, and global climate change... all in the next few months?