Obama And McCain On Climate Change

Both presidential candidates are pushing pollution-cutting efforts like these. Just recognizing climate change as an issue is a big change from the past eight years.

Both candidates say they'll join international climate change efforts that the Bush administration has ignored, and will press China and India to cut greenhouse gases.

Back home, both would start with modest greenhouse gas reductions - then increase cutbacks for 40 years into the future.

McCain said while in Santa Barbara: "Until we have achieved at least a reduction of 60 percent below 1990 levels by the year 2050."

Obama goes further.

"I've put forward very substantial proposals to get 80 percent reductions in greenhouse gasses by 2050," said Obama.

Both would reach those goals largely thru a "cap and trade" program that works like this:

The government sets an annual cap or limit on carbon emissions and issues permits up to that limit to companies that release greenhouse gases.

If a company reduces its emissions, it can sell or trade its unused permits to a company that can't meet emission goals.

"Leadership must begin at home. That's why I've proposed a cap and trade system to limit our carbon emissions and to invest in alternative sources of energy," Obama said in May in Miami.

And McCain, in Santa Barbara, said: "I have proposed a new system of cap-and-trade that over time will change the dynamic of our energy economy."

The candidates sound the same, but there are differences.

McCain would give companies most of the emissions permits for free based on their previous emission levels. Then if they cut back, they can make money selling unused permits.

He said in Portland. "In all its power, the profit motive will suddenly begin to shift and point the other way toward cleaner fuels, wiser ways, and a healthier planet."

Obama would sell all emission permits at auction, so companies would have to pay for every ton of carbon they release. Money raised would be used to develop renewable energy and to subsidize consumers' energy bills.

By one estimate a cap and trade program could raise the average family energy bill more than $700 a year.

In the August, 2007 Democratic primary debate, Obama said: "There are some things that we can do to conserve energy, but all those steps are going to require a little bit of hardship and a little bit of pinching."