Senator Neal Kedzie, ranking member of the Wisconsin Senate Environmental Committee, has issued an open letter regarding Governor Doyle’s Global Warming Task Force.  This letter comes on the heals of heavy skepticism regarding the effort to prove man-made global warming.

Senator Kedzie writes:

For most of my tenure in the legislature, I have initiated and advanced environmental protection legislation, basing my decisions on sound science with a goal of balancing the needs environmental preservation with the needs of economic stability.  To be certain, any legislation relating to global warming or climate change should adhere to that basic principle due to it’s far reaching implications. But now, the credibility and intent of the science has come under suspicion.

Well said, Senator Kedzie!  If you would like to write your legislators regarding this important issue, please log in to Power Lines and make your voice heard.

After agreeing to support the Governor’s Global Warming Task Force Report as a complete package, three key environmental groups have walked away from the agreement, threatening support for the entire package.

The Citizens Utility Board, Clean Wisconsin and the Wisconsin Sierra Club all agreed to the removal of Wisconsin’s moratorium on new nuclear energy as part of the Global Warming Task Force package.  In a Capitol press conference and press release, they reneged on that position before the bill was even drafted.

“The first organizations to abandon the agreement were the Citizens Utility Board, Clean Wisconsin and the Wisconsin Sierra Club,” said Bob Seitz, Executive Director of the Wisconsin Utility Investors, Inc (WUI).  “When key members break their word, look for the whole package to unravel.”

“They can’t have it both ways,” said Seitz.  “Either you ‘support the state’s existing law on new nuclear reactors’, as their release said, or you support the task force package that changes that law.”

“CUB, Clean Wisconsin and the Wisconsin Sierra Club have made their choice,” said Seitz.  “They prefer to unravel the global warming package in order to ‘support the state’s existing law on new nuclear reactors.’  Those are their words, not mine.”

Repeal of the nuclear moratorium was the only concrete provision in the package that makes carbon-free base-load energy production possible on a large scale in Wisconsin.  It is critical to the agreement.

“The Task Force spent many months crafting this agreement,” said Seitz.  “With the agreement broken, the process returns to square one, building a new consensus.”

The Governor’s Global Warming Task Force, including the three organizations listed above, agreed that utilities should be allowed to recommend new nuclear generation “if they believe it is the most cost-effective and beneficial means to meet GHG reduction goals and their obligations to serve over the long term.”

Now, these same organizations want to keep the expensive mandates in the package but tie the hands of utilities attempting to meet those mandates safely and at the least cost to consumers.

The “Carbon Free Nuclear Free Coalition” press release states (Task Force members reneging on their position are highlighted), “The Carbon Free Nuclear Free coalition includes 13 organizations opposed to an expansion of nuclear power in the state. Members include Physicians for Social Responsibility, Clean Wisconsin, Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice, Sierra Club, League of Women Voters Education Fund, Nukewatch, Wisconsin League of Conservation Voters, Peace Action Wisconsin, Citizens for Safe Water Around Badger, Citizens Utility Board, Coulee Region Progressives, Wisconsin Environment, and the Wisconsin Public Interest Research Group (WISPIRG).”

According to their release (emphasis added), “A coalition of 13 environmental, public interest and consumer groups will hold a news conference at noon on Tuesday, Dec. 1, in the State Capitol Rotunda to support the state’s existing law on new nuclear reactors, targeted by the nuclear industry for repeal.”