Announcing the two programmes, Bush said: "We will promote renewable energy
production and clean coal technology, as well as nuclear power, which produces
no greenhouse gas emissions."
Clear Skies aims to cut power plant emissions of nitrogen oxides, sulphur
dioxide and mercury by 70%. The Global Climate Change initiative - the US
alternative to the Kyoto agreement on global warming - commits the USA to cut
greenhouse gas "intensity" by 18% over the next 10 years.
Unlike the Kyoto agreement, which Bush rejected in March 2001, the new
policy would be largely voluntary and incentive-driven, instead of
implementing mandatory targets for greenhouse gas emissions.
Bush explained the US rejection of Kyoto: "The approach taken under the
Kyoto protocol would have required the United States to make deep and
immediate cuts in our economy to meet an arbitrary target. It would have cost
our economy up to $400 billion and we would have lost 4.9 million jobs."
The US approach on global climate change links the reduction of greenhouse
gas emissions to the country's economic growth rate. The initiative focuses on
reducing greenhouse gas intensity - the ratio of greenhouse gas emissions to
economic output. Bush said that this was the "commonsense way to measure
progress," adding that the USA must have economic growth: "Growth to create
opportunity; growth to create a higher quality of life for our citizens.
Growth is also what pays for investments in clean technologies, increased
conservation, and energy efficiency. Meeting our commitment to reduce
greenhouse gas intensity by 18% by the year 2012 will prevent over 500 million
tonnes of greenhouse gases from going into the atmosphere over the course of
the decade."
The Global Climate Change plan seeks to lower the country's rate of
emissions from an estimated 183 tonnes per million dollars of gross domestic
product (GDP) in 2002, to 151 metric tons per million dollars of GDP in 2012.
The Global Climate Change Policy Book states: "Reducing greenhouse gas
intensity by 18% over the next ten years is comparable to the average progress
that nations participating in the Kyoto Protocol are required to achieve."