Graham completes break with Kerry climate plan, backs Lugar energy bill with no emissions cap

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Wednesday threw his support behind a new energy bill sponsored by Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) even though it lacks mechanisms to create a cost for emitting greenhouse gases that Graham has called fundamental in the past.

The action comes weeks after Graham backed away from the climate change bill he had been crafting with Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.).

Graham touted Lugar’s bill – which includes a suite of conservation and low-carbon energy programs but omits carbon limits – when the two Republicans appeared at a Capitol press conference Wednesday afternoon.

Graham said he “thoroughly enjoyed” his work with Kerry and Lieberman to recast the sweeping cap-and-trade bill that passed the House and sputtered in the Senate. But he then embraced the Lugar plan.

“Senator Lugar has found a way forward that I think will be attractive to the business community, to Democrats and Republicans alike, and I would like to be his partner and see if we can find common ground with other people like Sens. Kerry and Lieberman who are interested in the same goals,” Graham said.

He added: “Those three goals are, simply stated, break our dependence on foreign oil, create jobs in America that will never go to China through energy independence and try to find a way to clean up the air here in America and purify the water.”

But Graham’s support for the measure represents a stark shift in his position. During the months he was negotiating with Kerry and Lieberman, Graham repeatedly said imposing a cost for industrial carbon emissions is vital.

“[T]he idea of not pricing carbon, in my view, means you're not serious about energy independence. The odd thing is you'll never have energy independence until you clean up the air, and you'll never clean up the air until you price carbon,” he said in January, according to the publication E&E News PM.

Lugar and Graham touted the new bill – which has quickly come under attack from several environmental groups as too modest – as a way to cut oil reliance and greenhouse gas emissions.

Lugar said the measure would by 2030 cut reliance on oil imports by more than 40 percent, cut consumer electric bills and cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent, which he touted as a step toward what are far more aggressive White House emissions targets.

He argued that a cap-and-trade plan would be a bad idea, alleging it would impose costs that the public would find especially unacceptable if there is an oil supply disruption caused by shortages, political embargoes or natural disasters.

“In this context, breaking our oil dependence, with all the national security, economic and environmental benefits that would come, this would be such a victory and should be our top priority,” he said.

Lugar’s bill includes required long-term increases in vehicle efficiency; enhanced building codes; building retrofit programs; expanded loan guarantees for nuclear power plants; new federal support for industrial energy efficiency gains and many other measures.

But environmental groups are criticizing the Lugar plan, claiming it falls far short of more effective policies for curbing emissions and spurring a transition to alternative energy.

Dan Lashof, director of the Climate Center at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said the plan has some good ideas that should be rolled into a broader energy and climate bill.

“But this proposal is no substitute for the comprehensive clean energy and climate bill we need to hold polluters accountable, break our dangerous addiction to oil and curb climate change,” he said in a prepared statement.