A few lawmakers see through the carbon trading scheme.

Byline: GUEST VIEWPOINT By Pat Reiten

We commend Rep. Peter DeFazio's courageous stand and recent vote against the risky carbon allowance trade scheme in the Waxman-Markey bill. The congressman remained true to his reputation and ethic in championing the side of the energy consumer.

DeFazio even drew some unfair and not-so-friendly fire from the Portland media establishment for his thoughtful and well articulated opposition. He's right, and they were - and remain, wrong.

Maybe it's a matter of distance from the Portland bright lights, because Rep. Greg Walden, who with DeFazio represents most parts of Oregon that aren't in or near the Portland metropolitan area, also sees this risky business quite clearly, and also cast a no vote.

Before readers conclude that our company opposes aggressively capping carbon emissions, let me say that it can and should be done.

However, a carbon cap can and should be achieved with reasonable and pragmatic approaches that don't invoke high double-digit rate increases at a time when we can least afford them.

DeFazio wants to aggressively cap carbon emissions, as do we, yet he advocates a regulatory approach along the lines of the Clean Water Act. We believe that working alongside our state regulators - the public utility commissions - would result in the lowest cost, most efficient solutions. The common bond involves throwing the "trade" part of cap-and-trade overboard.

The current proposed risky derivative-style scheme would force utilities into unregulated allowance trading markets, where they would have to compete with hedge funds, investment banks and other speculators.

The plan mirrors the Enron idea of an unregulated market for electricity, an idea that precipitated the West Coast energy crisis in the early part of this decade. We know we don't want any more of that. Oregonians might find it interesting to know that a decade ago, one of the sponsors of the Waxman-Markey bill also sponsored legislation promoting that failed Enron market scheme.

DeFazio and Walden know all too well the enormous risks all taxpayers face with another Wall Street-style trading scheme.

In addition, it's a trading scheme that runs counter to actually achieving carbon reductions.

As the largest regulated utility owner of wind generation in the nation, we find it incomprehensible that our customers would not receive a single allowance for reducing our carbon footprint with the wind energy that we have added to serve our customers. While the Waxman-Markey bill may not have intended that result, the House version still penalizes us for having tried to reduce our carbon emissions.

What other unintended results lurk within the 1,000 pages of this mammoth bill?

We remain hopeful that as the U.S. Senate takes up its version of a cap-and-trade bill, it will still see the perils of a carbon trading scheme as it exists in its current form.

We call on Oregon Sens. Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley to follow the bipartisan lead of DeFazio and Walden and reject the Waxman-Markey bill. It will take courage to stand up to the juggernaut of carbon trading frenzy and the Wall Street lobbyists, but imagine what would have happened if Congress had held the line on derivatives and the mortgage mess just three years ago.

While operating in 30 Oregon counties and serving much of rural Oregon, we've worked hard to provide leadership in pursuit of renewable energy generation - and we certainly don't want to see the vast majority of the state suffer further at the hands of risky profit-mongering.

We join DeFazio and Walden in strongly opposing the trading scheme because it will impose billions of dollars of duplicative costs on our customers - costs that will not reduce greenhouse gas emissions by one ounce.

There are more efficient, more effective, less complex and less costly ways to enforce greenhouse gas emissions caps than Waxman-Markey.

We don't need to put our nation at risk with yet another costly derivative-based trading scheme.

Pat Reiten is president of Pacific Power.