The tipping point

Will January 2007 prove to be a tipping point for U.S. climate-change policy? Already this month we’ve seen a barrage of high-profile activity — and President Bush hasn’t even given his State of the Union address yet.

First there was a rapid-fire succession of four major climate-change bills proposed in the Senate, all of which call for mandatory caps on greenhouse-gas emissions. Then, like a clashing of cymbals after a drumroll, 10 major corporations representing the energy and chemical industries, among others, joined with a handful of major environmental groups in a call for federal emission caps that rivals the most ambitious Senate proposals.

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