This was release a week ago by NRDC, forwarded by Jane Clark

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Do the Math: White House Global Warming Plan Cooks the Books

CO2 Pollution Would Continue Increasing at Same Rate as Past Decade
Enron-Style Accounting Trick Hides Growing Damage Behind Veil of Progress

WASHINGTON (February 14, 2002) - The global warming plan announced by
President Bush today uses a brazen accounting trick to mask the fact that --
even if his voluntary emissions targets are actually achieved --
heat-trapping carbon dioxide pollution would keep increasing at almost
exactly the same rate it has for the past 10 years, according to analysis by
NRDC (the Natural Resources Defense Council).

Based on the president's own projections, emissions would increase 14
percent over the next ten years, which is precisely the rate at which they
grew during the last ten years -- a fact obscured by the plan's foggy
accounting tactics.

The president's non-binding goal is to reduce "emissions intensity" (carbon
dioxide pollution relative to economic output) by 18 percent over the next
10 years. Yet from 1990 to 2000, emissions intensity fell 17.4 percent.
That's because economic growth already tends to outpace carbon dioxide
increases, and has for several decades. But it still allows unsafe emissions
growth to proceed unabated.

"The president's plan uses Enron-style accounting tricks to hide growing
environmental losses behind fuzzy pollution numbers," said David G. Hawkins,
director of the NRDC Climate Center. "The benchmark for global warming
policy is whether it cuts global warming pollution. This plan calls for more
pollution growth, at the same dangerous pace as the past decade."

A White House fact sheet claims the Bush target is similar to the global
warming targets of the rest of the world. In fact, the new plan would result
in U.S. emissions 30 percent above 1990 levels in 2012. Meanwhile, the rest
of the industrialized world has committed to reduce emissions to near 1990
levels under the global warming treaty abandoned by the White House last
year.

Rollback of Power Plant Pollution Rules
The president also announced new targets for three pollutants from U.S.
power plants that would delay by up to 10 years life-saving emission cuts
now required under the Clean Air Act. The Bush plan allows three times more
toxic mercury emissions than current law would allow, and postpones
forthcoming mercury limits by a decade. It would allow 50 percent more
sulfur emissions -- which cause acid rain and premature death from
respiratory disease -- than current law and push back clean-up standards
from 2012 to 2018. It would also allow hundreds of thousands tons of
additional smog-forming nitrogen oxide pollution, and delay their clean-up
for a decade beyond current requirements.

"Delaying cleanup of these plants will cause more asthma attacks and more
cardio pulmonary disease for thousands of Americans. And we will see
thousands more premature deaths," John Walke, director of NRDC's Clean Air
program said.

Cost Effective Solutions At Hand
Global warming and power plant pollution problems can be solved safely and
effectively, with cleaner more efficient energy technologies -- using both
conventional fuels and renewable sources like wind and solar power.
Legislation to clean up power plants and raise fuel economy standards, both
opposed by the administration would stop U.S. global warming emissions
growth completely within 10 years.

The U.S. Senate is currently considering the Clean Power Act, introduced by
Senator Jeffords (D-VT), which would limit all four major pollutants from
power plants (carbon dioxide, mercury, sulfur and nitrogen) further and
faster than the Bush plan, saving thousands of lives and countless hospital
visits. Now before the Environment committee, the bill has bipartisan
support of 19 co-sponsors.

Truth in Accounting
The administration plan calls for a voluntary emissions intensity target of
151 metric tons per million dollars of gross domestic product (GDP) by 2012,
compared with 183 metric tons today -- a 17.5 percent gain. White House
press materials round up to 18 percent. Using the administration's own
economic growth forecasts, that translates into a 14 percent increase in
global warming pollution over the next 10 years. Both the intensity and the
absolute pollution increase will be the same over the next decade as they
have been for the last 10 years.

The Global Warming Threat
The National Academy of Sciences last year warned that global warming could
trigger "large, abrupt and unwelcome" changes in our climate. The
2,500-member Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says average earth
temperatures could rise as much as 10 degrees over the next century, the
fastest rate in 10,000 years. Announcing that 2001 was the second hottest
year on record, the World Meteorological Organization recently confirmed
that "temperatures are getting hotter, and they are getting hotter faster
now than at any time in the past."

The Natural Resources Defense Council is a national, non-profit organization
of scientists, lawyers and environmental specialists dedicated to protecting
public health and the environment. Founded in 1970, NRDC has more than
500,000 members nationwide, served from offices in New York, Washington, Los
Angeles and San Francisco.

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