State senate leader Kevin de Leon, who supported the cut, accused oil firms of deploying “scare tactics”.
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Yesterday, Democrats in the California state legislature caved to pressure from the powerful oil industry and dropped a critical piece from a historic new climate bill.
“I’m more determined than ever to make our regulatory regime work for the people of California – cleaning up the air, reducing the petroleum and creating green jobs”.
Unable to overcome fierce opposition from the oil industry and resistance from some Democrats, Gov. Jerry Brown and legislative leaders announced Wednesday that they will remove a major portion of an ambitious proposal to combat climate change.
The Western States Petroleum Association released a written statement that said that “today’s announcement was an acknowledgement that California’s energy future, economic competitiveness, and environment are inextricably linked”.
“When the bill came up for its final vote on the floor of the state Senate recently, it hung about a couple votes short for a while, amid concerns raised by the tech industry, companies like Amazon, which want to be able to deliver its packages by drone and would like to deliver them as the crow flies – or as the drone flies, you might say”.
The decision to abandon that aspect of the legislation comes after Brown’s senior aides offered a compromise, to replace the 50% cut in petroleum use with an equivalent target for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and other pollutants from gasoline-powered transportation.
“The only difference is my zeal has been intensified to a maximum degree, and nothing is going to stop the state from pushing forward”.
Although the goals behind SB 350 – slashing petroleum use, boosting renewable energy use and improving energy efficiency in buildings – all are laudable, concerns about increased costs for consumers, especially, apparently won the day.
“In the end – with two days left – we could not cut through the million-dollar smokescreen created by a single special-interest with a singular motive and a bottomless war chest”, he said on Wednesday.
The governor said opponents agreed to pass the legislation if he agreed to dramatically scale back its power, but he refused.
“I think that was the most problematic component of SB350 because it hit everybody in ways we don’t even know, how technologically we were going to accomplish the goal”, Huff said in an interview.
Despite checkmating Brown on what was considered the most egregiously expensive elements of the climate change bills, Ken Devore, a lobbyist for the California chapter of the National Federation of Independent Business, stated that his membership is still adamantly opposing the Governor’s climate change agenda. He is expected to attend the United Nations climate change conference in Paris in November.
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Catherine Reheis-Boyd, the group’s president, said she remains committed to working with Brown and legislative leaders on climate change and energy policy.
