Gore turns heat on Congress

Former Vice President Al Gore yesterday called on Congress to create a polluter tax and immediately freeze carbon emissions during a much-hyped appearance before House and Senate panels tasked with finding ways to halt climate change.

The Democrat, who starred in the Oscar-winning global-warming documentary “An Inconvenient Truth,” outlined a 10-point plan to preserve the environment for future generations.

“We do not have time to play around with this,” Mr. Gore said. “Our world faces a true planetary emergency.”

He acknowledged that “the phrase sounds shrill,” but insisted that it is no exaggeration.

Democrats lauded the politician-turned-environmental activist, but some Republicans accused him of using faulty science to sell movie tickets and cautioned that his proposals could cripple the economy.

“You’re not just off a little, in fact, you’re totally wrong,” said Rep. Joe L. Barton of Texas, the ranking Republican on the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

The only scientist to testify at either hearing called Mr. Gore’s assertions “wildly exaggerated.”

Bjorn Lomborg, adjunct professor at the Copenhagen Consensus Center in Denmark, said Mr. Gore has “good will and great intentions,” but “he has got carried away and come to show only worst-case scenarios [that are] unlikely to form the basis for sound policy judgment.”

Sen. James M. Inhofe, Oklahoma Republican and critic of those defining global warming as a looming problem, demanded that Mr. Gore give “yes” or “no” answers to his questions, including on a pledge to “consume no more energy in your residence than the average person.”

This was a thinly veiled reference to Mr. Gore’s home, which uses more than 20 times the national average of electricity, the Tennessee Center for Policy Research detailed in a report recently.

“We purchase wind energy and other green energy that does not produce carbon dioxide. That does cost a little more now,” Mr. Gore said, explaining his more than $2,000-a-month bill for electricity and natural gas, prompting Mr. Inhofe to charge he was refusing to take a personal energy ethics pledge.

“We live a carbon-neutral life, Senator,” Mr. Gore said, but Mr. Inhofe was just getting started.

Senate environment panel Chairman Barbara Boxer, California Democrat, twice had to intervene to “get control” of the hearing.

Mr. Gore gave near identical testimony in his morning appearance before a joint hearing of House Energy and Commerce energy and air quality subcommittee and the House Science and Technology energy and environment subcommittee and the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee in the afternoon.

He delivered 516,000 postcards to lawmakers that he collected on his Web site, urging action on climate change and told legislators at both hearings that he thinks Americans are hopeful that the new Democratic Congress would make changes that could drastically slow down the effects of warming.

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