Climate in Leaders' Spotlight

S.C. mayors trade ideas to fight global warming

March 1, 2007, Greenwood Index-Journal, Greenwood SC
by Mike Rosier

COLUMBIA — The excuses end and a collective fight begins.

Mayors from across South Carolina gathered Wednesday in Columbia as part of the S.C. Mayors for Climate & Energy Leadership — a new bipartisan organization of Palmetto State leaders who hope to turn previously cool “enviro-speak” into significant action.

Greenwood Mayor Floyd Nicholson was in attendance and picked up on a few ideas that could prove meaningful in the Emerald City.

“Really this is just to make the public aware of what we’re trying to do here in South Carolina,” Nicholson said. “It’s a national issue, but we need to make sure that people are aware of what’s going on here as far as things we have to do for the environment and the direction that we have to take.”

The organization is sponsored by the S.C. Wildlife Federation, the Carolina Climate Network and the National Wildlife Federation.

Wednesday was the first step on a local front, but it’s the opening move in a long-term struggle U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., says the nation and South Carolina can’t afford to lose.

“This is an issue of international and generational importance, and one of the biggest issues facing our generation,” Graham said via telephone from Washington, D.C. “The consequences of doing nothing are devastating. If we don’t get a grip on this thing, the consequences are going to be unacceptable.
“This is also a chance for our state to define itself anew and be a state that provides solutions. South Carolina stands to benefit as much as anyone from the transition away from fossil fuels.”

State mayors have signed South Carolina up for that fight.

“We declare war on the future of the way of life we’re now living,” said Spartanburg Mayor Bill Barnet. “We’re going to work to help people understand that through dialogue and action we can make a difference.”

“This is the moral equivalent of war,” Charleston Mayor Joseph Riley said. “(Global warming and climate change) has challenged the sustainability of our planet and the ability of future generations to be fed. It’s our responsibility to act and to act with dispatch.”

Some action is already under way.

The city of Cayce, near Columbia, is looking into replacing maintenance and service fleets with pickup truck models that are either totally electric or electric-fuel hybrids.

Riley has fast-tracked several energy-saving ideas in Charleston — such as replacing street lights and traffic lights with bulbs that use 80 percent less energy to accomplish the same job.

Greer and Spartanburg are advancing projects that would make biking or walking more attractive alternatives than travel by car, as well as working with building architects to create more energy-efficient designs.

Smaller towns — such as Union — are also getting in on the act.

“We have to be a leader on this issue, both in our country and in South Carolina,” Riley added. “We have to think globally and act locally.”

Graham said climate change will affect the occupancy of the White House as well, adding that 2008 presidential candidates should maintain a strong grasp of the issue — or risk marginalization at the polls.

“This is a growing, worldwide problem,” Graham said. “It would be difficult for a candidate to get elected if you denied that climate change is an issue.”
He also mentioned nuclear power as an “untapped resource.”

“Nuclear power provides just 20 percent of the power here in the United States, whereas it provides 80 percent of the power in France,” Graham said. “Now surely we can be as bold as the French. What they’ve done is figure out how to deal with the waste. Hydrogen-based power is also a reality here in the next 10 to 15 years.”