The Republican Party has always been the hero of big industry which is why, with George W. Bush in the White House and a Republican Congress, environmentalists across the US are feeling a little bit edgy. With good reason. Bush went back on a campaign pledge to regulate and reduce power plant carbon dioxide emissions - widely seen as a chief cause of global warming. One industry to benefit significantly from this reversal? Coal.
The big one is the Arctic Nature Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) situated across 20 million acres of North Eastern Alaska. Bush would like to see 1.5 million acres along ANWR's coastal plain opened up for oil exploration. In 1998, the US Geological Survey estimated there could be between four billion and 12 billion barrels of oil lying below the surface. Bush argues that to drill here would decrease the US's dependence on foreign oil. He also cites the current energy crisis in California - despite the fact that only 1 per cent of California's energy is produced by oil. Environmentalists are in uproar. They argue that "the last great wilderness" should not be destroyed for limited resources. Melinda Pierce at the Sierra Club describes the current political landscape as "difficult". ANWR has always been a hot topic, Pierce says, but environmentalists now lack the "ultimate backstop they had in President Clinton" or would have had in Al Gore.
Bush's record in Texas is hardly pristine. In 1999, Houston beat Los Angeles as the nation's smoggiest city. Dick Lewis at the Texas Nature Resources Conservation Commission puts it down - in part - to the difference between actions taken by the two states to reduce auto emissions. It could also be related to Bush's policy of industry self-regulation - inviting industry to voluntarily submit to Texas' environmental laws. In 1998, the US Environmental Protection Agency ranked Texas in the top five on its Toxic Release Inventory.
Spencer Abraham, Bush's Energy Secretary, was among a group of Senate Republicans who introduced legislation in 1996 to close down the department he has now been selected to run. He led the fight against higher fuel efficiency standards. He is a strong opponent of industry regulation and supports Bush's decision on Carbon Dioxide emissions.
Gale Norton, Interior Secretary, supports industry self-regulation and advocates states' rights, i.e. less federal interference in state affairs. Scott Stoermer at the League of Conservation Voters says states' rights should not apply to the environment. "Environmental laws don't fall neatly within state boundaries," he says. Norton supports "environmentally responsible" drilling in the Arctic refuge, something Stoermer describes as an "oxymoron".
Across the US, Republicans are taking advantage of the current climate in Washington DC. In Montana, businessmen lead by the Western Environmental Trade Association, are moving to limit the amount of time spent deliberating over permits for mining, logging and energy development industries. Such limits will not lower environmental standards, they say. For environmentalists, however, it is yet another ominous development in a political landscape which is poles apart from the one they were banking on in Washington . . . the Al Gore administration.