FACTBOX-Climate change bill pending in U.S. House

June 22 (Reuters) - Climate change legislation pending in Congress would cost U.S. households only about $175 annually in higher energy and consumer prices, far less than the $3,100 "burden" opponents have claimed would result, according to an estimate by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office.

Democratic leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives hope they can soon pass a climate change bill that would significantly reduce industry emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases associated with global warming.

Here are details of the House Democratic version of the bill:

Here are details of the House Democratic version of the bill:

* U.S. emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases would be reduced 17 percent by 2020 from 2005 levels. This is less ambitious than the 20 percent initially sought, but slightly more aggressive than the approximately 15 percent Obama proposed.

The legislation sets further pollution reduction goals -- 42 percent by 2030 and 83 percent by 2050, with the latter just slightly higher than Obama suggested.

* About 85 percent of pollution permits under the program would be given out, and around 15 percent would be sold. Local electric distribution companies would get 30 percent of all permits for free and would have to protect consumers from electricity price increases.

Other recipients of free permits: 15 percent to cement, steel, glass and other heavy industries; 9 percent to local natural gas distribution companies; 3 percent for firms making electric and advanced technology vehicles and 2 percent for oil refiners.

The free permits are designed to ease industry's burden and prevent large energy price increases for consumers. In 2026, many of the free permits would begin switching to those that much be purchased. Obama wanted all of the permits to be sold, but has indicated flexibility.

* Under "cap and trade," fewer and fewer pollution permits would be available to companies over the next several decades. Also, companies that pollute less than their limit could sell some of their permits to others struggling to meet environmental requirements.

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The Carbon Counter

National debt used to be the big number we all lived in fear of. Now it's greenhouse gases.

Climate change is likely to have all sorts of nasty consequences over the next century—among them, according to a brand-new report from the U.S. Global Change Research program, an increase in torrential downpours in the American northeast.

So it was uncomfortably fitting that a major climate-consciousness-raising event took place in just such a downpour. As reporters and dignitaries huddled under leaky tents just outside New York's Madison Square Garden on Thursday, Deutche Bank switched on its mammoth Carbon Counter billboard. The counter, towering 70 feet above busy Seventh Avenue and dramatically visible to hundreds of thousands of commuters who take the train to and from Penn Station, displays a real-time count of heat-trapping greenhouse gases we're pumping into the atmosphere—about 2 billion metric tons every month, added to the 3.6 trillion tons already floating around up there.

U.S. Senate panel approves comprehensive energy bill

U.S. President Barack Obama has made transforming the country into a leader in clean energy innovation a key goal of his administration. During the campaign, he set a goal to generate 25 percent of power from renewable energy by 2025.

The Senate legislation's mandate is much less aggressive, mandating that power plants meet targets to gradually produce more renewable power, beginning with 3 percent of their output between 2011 and 2013 and rising to 15 percent between 2021 and 2039.

Sanders and other lawmakers have attacked the panel's renewable power mandate as too low, while others have said it will hurt those states without much solar or wind resources.

New Assessment of National, Regional Impacts of Climate Change

Climate Change Impacts

Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States: Report Home Page The most comprehensive, authoritative report on Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States was released on Tuesday June 16th, 2009. This report presents, in plain language, the science and impacts of climate change on the United States, now and in the future. It focuses on climate change impacts on U.S. regions and various aspects of society and the economy such as energy, water, agriculture, and health. A comprehensive series of web-pages were developed that highlight the findings and major conclusions of the report and contain complete downloadable files of the report, as well as a host of additional content on climate change impacts on the U.S