Interesting reports on the climate change bill in the Senate. Look who came to Kerry's house:

[beachmom]

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601070&sid=aK4pVdlhDt5E

Long before the House vote, work began on how to get a bill through the Senate. In March, Energy Secretary Steven Chu, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson and other Obama administration officials dined at the home of Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry of Massachusetts. The group pondered how to rally Senate support for a climate bill while preserving its mandate to focus on environmentally friendly alternative energy sources such as cellulosic biomass and nuclear power.

Even so, broad Senate support for cap-and-trade legislation has yet to materialize.

...

Weekly Meetings

Twenty senators led by Kerry and Environment and Public Works Committee Chairwoman Barbara Boxer have been meeting weekly to flesh out ideas. The group was briefed last week by a coal-state architect of the House bill, Representative Rick Boucher, a Virginia Democrat. Electricity generated from coal and oil produces the most carbon dioxide per megawatt-hour, making fossil fuel reduction a focus in the climate debate on Capitol Hill.

Boxer, of California, plans to hold a committee vote on her plan by early August, before lawmakers’ summer recess. ...

...

‘Magic Formula’

Kerry, saying he is confident the Senate can pass legislation, put it this way: “We have to find the magic formula over here.”

Even with Obama’s backing, “it’s going to be very tough,” Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee Chairman Tom Harkin of Iowa said in an interview.

Then we have this:

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aMs9V_EUxE0Y

Senate May Pass U.S. Climate Bill, Reject Treaty, Kerry Says

July 2 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Senate may pass legislation to slow climate change and then fail to approve a global treaty that commits nations to do so, Senator John Kerry said.

Kerry, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, will be a leader in Senate efforts to place the first domestic curbs on greenhouse gases, after the House approved a measure last week. Even if a Senate bill passes, there may not be enough support to ratify an international accord incorporating the U.S. commitments, the Massachusetts Democrat said in an interview.

A possible Senate rejection poses a threat to the 192- nation effort to forge an agreement, which scientists say can help slow warming that’s raising sea levels and changing rainfall patterns globally.

...

Senate ratification of a treaty would require 67 votes, compared with 60 for legislation.

“Sixty-seven votes is a big target here,” Kerry said last week, before Congress left for a one-week break. “We may be able to pass something that puts America on track to accomplish our set of goals. But we may pass it with 60 votes, or 61 or whatever, and that’s not 67.”

That may make it difficult to get China and India on board in reducing emissions.

[wisteria]

1. Very nice way to bring all parties together. n/t