Thursday, Sept. 28, 2006 | 7:58 a.m.
As a new report comes this week that the Earth is as warm as it has been in 12,000 years, local governments are passing resolutions to cut greenhouse gas emissions and officials here are citing concerns about the effects of global warming.
So far, Las Vegas and Henderson have joined the campaign of the U.S. Conference of Mayors to blunt the effect of such warming. Las Vegas, with Mayor Oscar Goodman's enthusiastic support, was the first local government in the nation to sign onto the campaign in July.
Henderson passed a similar resolution last week, joining Reno among cities in Nevada, and more than 300 nationwide, that have joined the campaign.
The Sierra Club is also working to support the Conference of Mayors' initiative, which began in early 2005. The conference followed up during a meeting in Las Vegas in June by forming a technical organization, the Mayors' Council on Climate Protection, to help cities meet the resolution goals.
The resolutions call for a reduction of emissions to 1990 levels by 2012. Henderson and Las Vegas' resolutions note the efforts to control energy use and promote alternative energy in their cities.
Many climate researchers believe that carbon dioxide greenhouse gases from the burning of fossil fuels such as gasoline, coal and oil are heating up the planet. The American Meteorological Society and the National Academy of Sciences, among many scientific organizations, have concluded that global warming is real and having an adverse effect on the planet.
And a report this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences said not only are global temperatures hotter than they have been in 12,000 years, they are close to being the hottest in 1 million years. That would not surprise those who have sweated through the first eight months of 2006, which have been the warmest in U.S. history, and Las Vegas so far has had its third-warmest year on record.
Goodman says local governments must act because of failure at the federal level.
Although the issue is "best addressed by federal authorities," their lack of substantive action means that local government leaders "decided it is best to bring the issue to the public's attention from the local side," he says.
"The way to get the word out is to start locally. Somebody has to do something about this, so it might as well be us."
Convinced by climatologists' data, Goodman believes global warming is real, and says he has anecdotal evidence to boot - a koi pond he's had at his house since 1976.
"In that time I haven't seen anything resembling a baby koi," he says. Until, that is, this year, when a healthy crop of baby goldfish appeared, which he equates with warmer Las Vegas temperatures.
On a heavier note, local authorities are worried about the effect of global warming on water supplies. Among those who have said they believe that climate shifts are reducing the snowmelt into the Colorado River - source of more than 90 percent of the Las Vegas Valley's drinking water - is Southern Nevada Water Authority General Manager Pat Mulroy.
Goodman, a Water Authority board member, and others have argued that the urban region needs to draw on rural Nevada ground water supplies because of the threat to river water posed by climate shifts. Goodman says that's an example of real effects threatened by climate shift.
"We are trying to do something about this and raise public awareness," he says.
Henderson Mayor Jim Gibson agrees: "We've worked diligently to help promote programs and policies that promote conservation and protection of our environment, and have been recognized nationally for our efforts."
The Sierra Club says the local efforts should spur national action.
"Because we haven't seen any leadership from Congress or the White House, states and cities are taking it upon themselves to address these issues," says Brendan Bell, Sierra Club global warming analyst. "They kind of deferred to the federal government for a few years, then said, this is not working for us."
Arizona and New Mexico are considering similar aggressive greenhouse gas cuts that were signed into law this week by California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bell says. And 20 states, among them Nevada, have included requirements for utilities to build clean renewable energy into their electricity portfolios.
The California legislation sets goals of an 80 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emission by 2050, Bell says.
"We can never replace the need for federal and national action on global warming, but what these states are doing is saying, look, this is possible, we have the technology," he says.
Not everyone agrees that setting emissions-reduction goals is the best approach to the issue, or even that global warming is an issue at all.
"We're very skeptical of the claims that global warming is happening at an alarming rate," says Myron Ebell, director of energy and global warming policy for the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a group that has dismissed the scientific conclusions and warnings on the issue for years.
On Tuesday, Ebell called James Hansen, a NASA scientist who co-authored this week's study, an "old-fashioned Stalinist."
Ebell says the course suggested by states, cities and the international Kyoto Protocol - never signed by the Bush administration - is the wrong one.
"Let's assume that everything that you've ever heard about global warming is true ... This course of putting the world on an energy diet can't possibly work," Ebell says.
Economic recession can cut emissions but it isn't a palatable alternative, he says. The answer, if the problem is real, is to allow an unfettered free market to control greenhouse gases.
Although the current U.S. administration has not been viewed as a leader in confronting global warming, that is an issue of perception, not reality, according to a spokeswoman for the White House Council on Environmental Quality.
The federal goal is to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 18 percent by 2012, says Kristen Hellmer: "So far we're on track to meet those goals... On a global scale, we are addressing climate change."
The administration is spending $3 billion annually on climate change issues, she says.
"The administration is not only doing things, they're making progress on these things."
Not all valley governments are signing on to the global warming response championed by Las Vegas and Henderson. Although the Las Vegas resolution encouraged Clark County to support the U.S. Mayors' Climate Protection Agreement, a resolution has yet to appear.
Clark County provides municipal services to about 800,000 people.
Commission Chairman Rory Reid says the county cares about the environment, but staff has only begun looking at a potential resolution. He says the county has led the way with water conservation efforts.
"We're trying to do something similar here," says Reid, who drives a low-emissions, hybrid Toyota Prius to work. "We're right now at the staff level developing an initiative in this regard."
North Las Vegas "doesn't have anything on this coming up on the agenda," says Brenda Johnson, city spokeswoman.
Johnson says North Las Vegas' fleet of vehicles, like those of the county and other cities in the valley, includes hybrid vehicles, and the city encourages carpooling and mass transit.
The Sierra Club, though, is pushing for more, says Lydia Ball, a local organizer: "I hope the city of North Las Vegas will follow the rest of the valley's cities and endorse the agreement as well."
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