Edwards on the Issues

Update: John Edwards dropped out of the presidential race on Jan. 30, 2008.

During his single term representing North Carolina in the U.S. Senate, John Edwards received a middling 63 percent rating from the League of Conservation Voters -- a score lower than might have been expected because he missed a number of key votes while campaigning for president and vice president in 2003 and 2004. In his current campaign for president, Edwards has been more aggressive on the issue of climate change than other Democratic candidates, who've ended up following his lead.

Read an interview with John Edwards by Grist and Outside.

Key Points

• First presidential candidate to call for reducing greenhouse-gas emissions 80 percent by 2050, in March 2007. Would launch a cap-and-trade program in 2010 to bring emissions down 15 percent by 2020, as an interim step to the 2050 goal.
  
  
• First major presidential candidate to make his campaign carbon-neutral, in March 2007. He's buying carbon offsets to neutralize the effects of his campaign travel and office energy use, while also cutting energy consumption at campaign offices, buying recycled-paper office products, and encouraging staff to walk to work and take other energy-saving measures. (Tom Vilsack was actually the first candidate to go carbon neutral, but he dropped out of the race in February 2007.)
  
  
• Introduced a detailed energy plan before any of the other candidates.
  
  
• Proposes a $13-billion-a-year New Energy Economy Fund that would invest in renewable energy, efficiency, carbon-capture technology, and cleaner cars; help entrepreneurs start new clean businesses; encourage Americans to buy more-efficient appliances and save energy; and help workers in carbon-intensive industries transition to new job fields. The fund would be financed by the auctioning of permits to emit greenhouse gases and the repeal of some oil-industry tax breaks.
  
  
• Calls for a ban on new coal power plants unless they're compatible with carbon-capture and -storage technology.
  
  
• Opposes nuclear power.
  
  
• Opposes government investment in coal-to-liquid technologies.
  
  
• Has been endorsed by Friends of the Earth Action for his position on nuclear power and early support of strict climate legislation.
  
  

Video & Audio

Watch Edwards explain his positions on climate change and energy issues at a Nov. 17, 2007, Grist-sponsored forum:




Watch Edwards at a Step It Up 2007 rally in Fort Myers, Fla., on April 14, 2007:




Watch Edwards speak about nuclear power at the Democratic presidential debate on Jan. 15, 2008:




Listen to an Edwards podcast on climate change, calling attention to the Live Earth concerts, from July 7, 2007:


Listen to an Edwards podcast on the Step It Up climate campaign, from April 14, 2007:


Listen to a clip of Edwards' interview with Grist and Outside:

Quotable Quotes

• "Our generation must be the one that says, 'we must halt global warming.' If we don't act now, it will be too late. Our generation must be the one that says 'yes' to alternative, renewable fuels and ends forever our dependence on foreign oil. Our generation must be the one that accepts responsibility for conserving natural resources and demands the tools to do it. And our generation must be the one that builds the New Energy Economy. It won't be easy, but it is time to ask the American people to be patriotic about something other than war."
  -- March 20, 2007, in a speech that introduced his energy plan
  
  
• "I do not favor nuclear power. We haven't built a nuclear power plant in decades in this country -- there's a reason for that. The reason is it's extremely costly, takes an enormous amount of time to get one planned, developed, and built, and we still don't have a safe way to dispose of the nuclear waste -- and it's a huge problem for America over the long term. I also don't believe we should liquefy coal. The last thing we need is another carbon-based fuel in America. We need to find fuels that are, in fact, renewable, clean, and will allow us to address directly the question that has been raised, which is the issue of global warming, which I believe is a crisis."
  -- July 23, 2007, in a CNN/YouTube debate between Democratic candidates
  
  
• "I think Americans are actually willing to sacrifice. One of the things they should be asked to do is drive more fuel efficient vehicles."
  -- at an International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers forum in Florida, Aug. 28, 2007
  
  

Platform & Record In-Depth

• Launched ReduceYourCarbon.com, which encourages Americans to decrease their own carbon emissions.
  
  
• Proposes creating at least 1 million "green-collar jobs" by investing in clean energy and energy-efficiency technology. Would also create 50,000 government-subsidized "green-collar stepping-stone jobs" that would train low-income and low-skill workers to move into promising career fields.
  
  
• Supports raising fuel-economy standards for automobiles to 40 miles per gallon by 2016. But in 2002, voted to exempt pickup trucks from higher CAFE standards.
  
  
• Supports a goal to get 25 percent of the U.S. electricity supply from renewable sources by 2025.
  
  
• Voted as having the best climate plan by members of MoveOn.org in July 2007.
  
  
• Would spend $1 billion a year helping U.S. automakers produce more clean, efficient, and biofuel-friendly vehicles, as part of the New Energy Economy Fund.
  
  
• Calls for producing 65 billion gallons of ethanol a year by 2025. Would require oil companies to install ethanol pumps at 25 percent of their gas stations. Would require all new cars sold after 2010 to be flex-fuel vehicles that can run on either gasoline or a gasoline/biofuel mixture.
  
  
• Calls for eliminating $3 billion in annual government subsidies to oil companies, and says he is "very open to the possibility of an excess profits tax" on oil companies.
  
  
• Wants to meet demand for more electricity over the next decade through efficiency measures rather than through increased power production.
  
  
• Says a new international agreement on climate change must include China, India, and other developing nations. Has criticized the Bush administration for pulling out of the Kyoto Protocol.
  
  
• Calls for a national goal to reduce oil imports by 7.5 million barrels a day by 2025, or nearly a third of the oil projected to be used in 2025.
  
  
• Would encourage local generation of electricity and allow small power producers to sell their excess power to the grid. Would require electric utilities to consider distributed generation as a means of lowering costs as compared to new investments in centralized production and transmission.
  
  
• Would cut the U.S. government's energy use by 20 percent and make the White House carbon-neutral.
  
  
• Would create a GreenCorps within AmeriCorps, in which young people would weatherize homes, install solar panels on homes, conduct energy audits, etc.
  
  
• Opposes oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
  
  
• Voted to store nuclear waste at the Yucca Mountain Repository in Nevada in 2002. In 2004, when he joined John Kerry's presidential ticket, he changed his position to match Kerry's in opposing Yucca Mountain. He continues to oppose storing nuclear waste in Nevada.
  
  
• Supports a moratorium on concentrated animal-feeding operations.
  
  
• Proposes a moratorium on the construction and expansion of hog-farm lagoons and has said he would pursue better enforcement of current manure pollution laws.
  
  
• Supports expansion of farmland conservation programs.
  
  
• Introduced an amendment in 2003 that would have blocked the Bush administration from making changes to the "new-source review" program under the Clean Air Act; the admin's changes would let the power industry make major upgrades to facilities without installing the latest pollution-control equipment. The amendment was defeated.
  
  
• Cosponsor of the Clean Power Act of 2003, which would have required utilities to control emissions of carbon dioxide, mercury, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen oxide.
  
  
• In 2002, voted to renew the Price-Anderson Act, which caps liability and the amount of money nuclear-power facilities would have to pay in the event of a nuclear catastrophe. The act was eventually renewed as part of the 2005 energy bill, extending liability protection to the nuke industry until the end of 2025.
  
  
• Voted in favor of an amendment to allow mountaintop-removal mining practices in 1999.
  
  
• In 2003, voted in favor of an amendment to the 2003 energy bill to increase fuel-economy standards for passenger cars to 40 mpg by 2014.
  
  

Still Haven't Gotten Enough?

• Read Grist's 2004 overview of Edwards' environmental record.
  
  
• Read Edwards' energy and environment platform on his campaign website.
  
  
• Read Edwards' official bio.