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Senate Should Reject Nuke-Friendly Energy Bill. Thursday, June 23, 2005 Contacts: GREENS TO SENATE: REJECT THE McCAIN-LIEBERMAN ACT, WHICH WOULD SUBSIDIZE DANGEROUS NUCLEAR POWER WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Green Party leaders are urging the Senate to reject the McCain-Lieberman Climate Stewardship Act, calling the bill an effort to subsidize nuclear energy as a way to combat global warming. The bill repeats earlier failed legislation that would combine mandatory caps on carbon dioxide emissions with a credit-trading system modeled after the Clean Air Act, and adds incentives for nuclear development ($6.1 billion in the recently passed House version; $4.3 billion in the Senate bill). Greens have called market-based solutions to global warming severely inadequate and warn that the dangers of nuclear power are insurmountable. "Democrats and Republicans have turned the need for sound energy policy into a choice between suffering the effects of catastrophic climate change and the massive accumulation of deadly radioactive waste from nuclear power," said Jody Grage Haug, co-chair of the Green Party of the United States. "The only rational response to the threat of global warming is a plan that phases out fossil fuel and nuclear power, develops clean, renewable energy sources, and reduces energy consumption." Greens, while criticizing the Kyoto Protocols' modest measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, have called it an important first step, and continue to urge the U.S. to sign on and expand its goals. "By ignoring energy conservation and embracing nuclear power, Democrats and Republicans who say they care about global warming have proved themselves only marginally better than President Bush," said David Cobb, the Green Party's 2004 presidential candidate. "Nuclear power is expensive, it would require the addition of 1,500 new plants worldwide to replace fossil fuel energy, it would present an enormous security and public health risk, and the storage of nuclear waste would be a permanent and growing environmental crisis. "Furthermore, nuclear power does nothing to address the major source of CO2 emissions -- cars, trucks, and airplanes," Mr. Cobb added. "But Congress and the White House have refused to enact and enforce more stringent fuel economy standards, such as the Corporate Average Fuel Economy [CAFE] rules, or introduce consumer incentives to reduce demand, because of industry pressure." MORE INFORMATION Green Party of the United States "Energy: Ignoring the Obvious Fix"
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