SACRAMENTO, CA - Last year on May 19, 2001, it was 99 degrees here. This year, May 19 logged in at a high of 67, a drop of 32 degrees, a difference one might call significant. But, as in the case of recent coldest-ever winters, no one rushed into print with a piece about what this 32-degree plunge meant for global warming, a concept that is driving bad legislation in California’s capital.

“Global warming is a matter of increasing concern for public health and the environment in the state,” begins AB 1058. This is a bill that could set up mileage quotas on California drivers, penalize those who buy certain kinds of vehicles, and bloat bureaucracy to record levels, all of this on a dubious scientific basis.

The target of the greenhouse gasbags behind this bill is carbon dioxide, which is not, strictly speaking, a pollutant. It occurs naturally in the atmosphere, and that is why the federal and state clean air acts do not regulate carbon dioxide. Neither does any state government. Critics of the bill also note that if worldwide carbon dioxide emissions were cut by five percent, the estimated temperature increase of one degree would be decreased by about 0.06 degrees. By any standard, this is not much of a payoff. While the science is dubious, there can be little doubt of the effect of this bill on Californians.

While in its original form, at least, the bill would not allow the California Air Resources Board (CARB) to impose mandatory trip reductions, this language shows that the sponsors are thinking along these lines. While the bill mentions nothing about “voluntary” quotas, they are a distinct possibility. And voluntary has a way of becoming mandatory, especially since AB 1058 does not spell out how CARB will achieve the reductions sought by the bill’s backers, who include an environmental group called the Bluewater Network.

It is also entirely possible that this law would require manufacturers to retrofit cars with equipment to reduce carbon dioxide. Just what this equipment would be remains to be seen, but it would increase the costs of vehicles in a state where owning a car is not a luxury but a necessity for many workers. The most likely action CARB would take would simply be to limit the number of miles driven or to reduce the size of the vehicles sold. “Sport utility vehicles and light-duty trucks,” are mentioned specifically, as is the phrase “noncommercial personal transportation.”

This writer recently tried various SUVs, didn’t much like them, and bought a vehicle with just as much room but which gets 30 mpg. On the other hand, my neighbor needs to pull a boat, so he opted for a powerful SUV. The greenhouse gasbags want to punish such people. They prefer command and control instead of the market. Their beatific vision is people stacked up in “workers’ housing” and crowding onto trains in the morning. They are watermelon environmentalists: green outside, red inside. In these quarters, it’s not about science. It’s about coercion, with the self-anointed forcing the unenlightened into some master plan.

By the way, it is 64 degrees here today, a full 18 degrees below the norm. Cool, as they say, but still watermelon season.

K. Lloyd Billingsley is editorial director of the Pacific Research Institute in San Francisco. He can be reached via email at klbillingsley@pacificresearch.org.