The Senate climate bill may get a Republican push now that a prominent senator has offered support for a compromise bill.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who does not support the Kerry-Boxer climate bill as written, nonetheless has signaled a willingness to sign off on a compromise bill, reports Reuters.
In a co-written guest column in the New York Times, Graham and Sen. John Kerry (D.- Mass.), said they "refuse to accept the argument that the United States cannot lead the world in addressing global climate change."
The Senate version of the climate bill would push for a 20 percent cut in emissions by 2020, while the House version calls for a 17 percent cut by 2020.
In the column, Graham and Kerry suggested that the government should set minimum and maximum prices for carbon permits, to prevent undue market manipulation.
They also said that the U.S. should consider trade sanctions against nations that do not install carbon cuts. A key Republican criticism thus far has been that the U.S. might undertake costly efforts to limit emissions while developing economies gain a competitive advantage by virture of being able to pollute freely.
The column also called for more nuclear plants, with accompanying funds to research how to best dispose of the nuclear waste.
They wrote that climate change legislation is a chance to "get serious" about breaking U.S. dependence on imported oil. But they also wrote that the U.S. should embrace so-called clean coal, saying that the U.S. should become the "Saudi Arabia of clean coal."
