Silicon Valley group knocks Chamber over climate stance

By Jim Snyder - 10/13/09 04:53 PM ET

Reasonable people can disagree about the right policy to address climate change but not about the need to do something, says Carl Guardino, the president and CEO of the Silicon Valley Leadership Council.

So the group, which represents around 300 Silicon Valley employers, felt the need to respond to comments from a U.S. Chamber of Commerce executive this summer questioning the science behind global warming.

Along with the Environmental Defense Action Fund and Joint Venture Silicon Valley Network, the Council is helping to pay for a modest print advertising campaign urging the big business lobby to change its ways and support climate legislation in Congress.

“Going on a U-turn to yesterday and saying that maybe climate change isn’t real, that’s hard to pass the test for the scientists and engineers” that run the companies in Silicon Valley, Guardino said.

The Council’s members include Google, Microsoft, Yahoo!, and Apple, which recently quit the Chamber over the climate issue.

The Chamber has backed away from comments William Kovacs, its point person on climate, made to a Los Angeles Times reporter this summer calling for a Scopes Monkey Trial-type airing of the evidence for and against the position that human activity is causing the Earth to warm.

Tom Donohue, the Chamber’s president and CEO, told reporters recently that the group was not questioning the science, but would continue to oppose the climate bill that passed the House as a threat to the economy. He said the vast majority of the group’s 300,000 members support its climate position. Five companies have quit or downgraded their membership in the Chamber due to its opposition to climate legislation.

Guardino said the Council did not poll its members before joining the advertising campaign. But that supporting efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is longstanding Council policy.

“Silicon Valley is ready to lead the world in the next great technological revolution: clean energy,” the ad states. “That’s why we’ve been so disappointed by the opposition of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to clean energy legislation now moving through Congress.”