EMERSON SAYS GLOBAL WARMING TREATY BAD FOR U.S. ECONOMY

The Clinton administration has made a "back-door attempt" to regulate greenhouse gas emissions and implement the Kyoto Global Warming Treaty without the approval of Congress, U.S. Rep. Jo Ann Emerson said Friday.

Emerson spoke to about 160 directors of Missouri rural electric cooperatives at a meeting at the Holiday Inn in Cape Girardeau.

The occasion was the annual meeting of the Association of Missouri Electric Cooperatives.

Emerson, who witnessed the treaty negotiations in Japan in 1997, said the agreement, if implemented, would be devastating to the U.S. economy.

"We could lose tens of thousands of jobs," she said.

Last year, the Energy Department warned that global warming treaty regulations could raise electricity prices by 86 percent.

"This would kill our economy," she said.

Emerson said the department unveiled the report one day and withdrew it the next.

The Republican congresswoman from Cape Girardeau said the Clinton administration continues to push for more environmental restrictions even though global warming remains unproven.

"Nobody has really been able to answer the question, is there global warming and if so are fossil fuels to blame?"

The Clinton administration is trying to make big-policy decisions based on "short-cut science," Emerson said.

The Clinton administration has embarked on a national study on climate change as it relates to agriculture, forestry, electric utilities and water resources.

The report is expected to be unveiled next summer. Emerson said the administration then would likely seek to implement new regulations to lower greenhouse gas emissions.

"They don't want us to be using coal-fired electricity," she said.

Emerson said she plans to introduce legislation next week that would require the national study to be reviewed by outside scientists and that the information be made available to the public.

In answer to a question from the audience, Emerson said Vice President Al Gore is in charge of the Clinton administration's environmental policies.

"Al Gore is a nice guy, but he does have wacky environmental ideas," said Emerson.

On another issue, Emerson said she opposes current efforts to deregulate the electricity utility industry.

Emerson said deregulation would restructure the industry. It wouldn't eliminate government's regulation of the industry.

"It's too complex," said Emerson. "People in Congress don't understand it."

Missouri is a cheap-energy state. Deregulation could help high-cost-power states at the expense of low-cost energy states like Missouri, she said. "The fact is rural America loses out."