Today the Los Angeles Times brings us this piece bemoaning the fact that negotiators in Bali have been stuck in debate about a carbon emissions cap without addressing the "most fundamental question of what it will take to achieve meaningful reductions." The piece then toes the Bush administration's line that it's not emissions reduction targets we need, but "Technology! Technology! Technology!" And to get technology, say Bush and friends, we need massive investments, not regulations.
But they are missing the fact that major investment on the part of the federal government (or private investors) is not going to come without the impetus that binding targets will give us. Without targets, dirty energy will remain cheaper, and thus more appealing, both at home and abroad. It's regulation that spurs the new technology that Bush and friends are so fixated on.
Brad Plumer points to recent Carnegie Mellon research that illustrates this quite clearly. Researchers looked at the number of patent filings for sulfur dioxide-control technologies for power plants. The number of patent applications was pretty dismal for nearly a century, despite government investment, but shot up exponentially when Congress passed the Clean Air Act in 1963. So the Bush administration's singular fixation on the research and development of new technology without the necessary regulation component is essentially worthless. It's this simple: Innovation needs regulation, and the planet needs both.
--Kate Sheppard
