"Barve wants to get that amendment stripped out," said Cindy Schwartz, director of the Maryland League of Conservation Voters.  She hopes that he'll succeed.

An interesting back story to the bill revolves around Sen. Norman Stone, a Baltimore County Democrat who was one of the original co-sponsors of the legislation. (Sen. Paul Pinsky of Prince George's County is the lead sponsor).

Stone has the Sparrows Point steel mill in his district, and he's a pro-union guy.  He's received $1,300 from the United Steelworkers and the steel plant over the last nine years, as well as another $5,000 from electrical, carpentry, bricklaying and building unions. 

Steelworkers and other unions came out against Global Warming Solutions Act, because industries told them that imposing fees for the burning of coal and other fossil fuels would put them out of business.  Steel, brick and paper mills in Maryland all warned that greenhouse gas regulations would make it impossible for them to compete with factories in other states and countries that lack the pollution limits. 

Stone said he heard complaints about the bill from his neighbors, many of whom work at the steel mill.  They were worried about their jobs. "That's one of the few manufacturing plants that is still left in our area," Stone said. "And when it comes to 2300 people losing their jobs, that's pretty serious business.... a lot of people in my district work there."

Part of the problem is you can't make steel without producing carbon dioxide. And fees imposed on the burning of fossil fuels would hurt in the marketplace, he said.  "The price of steel is so competitive, they can't just pass on the price.  With power plants, you can pass on the costs to consumers," Stone said.

Sponsors of the bill argued that the greenhouse gas regulations would not harm smokestack industries nearly as much as business lobbyists claimed.  And that it would create other "green collar" jobs, such as building wind turbines, installing solar panels and insulating homes.
 
But Stone was unconvinced.  He stripped his name off the bill. Then he introduced an amendment with Sen. Nancy Jacobs, a Harford County Republican, that would have exempted the steel mill from the greenhouse gas regulations.

 Sen. Nancy Jacobs, Harford County Republican.

Jacobs had a different take on it.  She argued that "many, many scientists" do not agree that human activities are contributing to global warming. (An assertion that ignores the fact that many, many more scientists do agree that human activities are causing global warming). "With the economy the way it is, we need to be protecting the economy just as much as we are the environment," Jacobs said.

The exemption failed. But other amendments to weaken the bill passed -- including the Exum amendment, which Stone voted for. It was Baltimore area Democrats like Stone who provided the margin of victory for the Exum amendment, which were also backed by all the Senate Republicans.  And now Stone said he hopes these safety valves on the bill will allow the steel plant to stay open.

"I think it will (remain in business) with those other amendments, if they stay on the bill," as debate moves to the House, Stone said.  "I want to see the greenhouse gases reduced. I think global warming is a real problem.  But this one plant?....I'm not sure it makes the difference over how much global warming we will have."
 
There were also other amendments.

Back on Feb. 29, the O'Malley administration pared back the bill. Instead of requiring a 90 percent cut in greenhouse gases statewide by 2050, an amended version of the bill would set this as a nonbinding goal. The 25 percent cut by 2020 was the only mandate.  The O'Malley amendments also reduced funding to hire staff at the MDE to create the climate change program.

Also on March 20, Sen. Thomas "Mac" Middletown, a Democrat and Senate Finance Committee Chairman who has a power plant in his Southern Maryland district, successfully got through an amendment that would have allowed the governor to adjust the deadlines if the pollution limits would "result in significant increases in electric rates for residents and businesses in the state" or "result in the loss of a significant number of manufacturing jobs in the state to markets that are not required to adhere to greenhouse gas emissions reduction requirements."

 Sen. Thomas "Mac" Middleton, Democrat from Southern Maryland

And the same day, Sen. Jamie Raskin, a Montgomery County Democrat, proposed an amendment that passed.  It requires Maryland to repeal its greenhouse gas regulations and defer to federal rules if Congress creates stronger national limits and a "cap and trade" system for discouraging pollution. Raskin offered the change at the request of the bill's sponsor, Sen. Pinsky, and the Maryland League of Conservation Voters, to counter a bad amendment that would have made the state law subservient to any federal law, even if it was weaker than Maryland's standards.

 Sen. Jamie Raskin, Democrat from Montgomery County

On March 21, the original sponsor of the bill - Sen. Paul Pinsky - failed by 21-26 in an attempt to make it clear that the Exum amendment wasn't a rollback of the MDE's existing authority to regulate carbon dioxide. His fellow senators voted against him, apparently wanting a rollback of environmental rule-making power by the state.

Interestingly, as soon as these weakenings of the bill were approved, the steel mill's sale was announced.  During the run up to the March 20 amendment votes, industry lobbyists argued that the Global Warming Solutions Act would drive jobs away because it would screw up the sale of the Sparrows Point mill, which was on the auction block.  The next day after the prospect of new fees on steel production vanished, boom! Big news. Headlines in newspapers on March 21 announced that international steel company OAO Severstal - led by a Russian billionaire, Alexei Mordashov, who is one of the world's wealthiest men -- announced that it wanted to buy the Maryland steel plant for $810 million in cash.  The possible new owners immediately said they wanted to ramp up steel production, which had been chugging along at about two thirds capacity.

The announcement was a big relief to workers at the 119-year-old steel plant. For most of its history, the plant was owned by Bethlehem Steel, which went bankrupt in 2001. Its most recent owner was Luxembourg-based ArcelorMittal.

Stone said he had no idea if the amendments had anything to do with the sale announcement.

Gene Burner, a lobbyist with the Manufactures Alliance of Maryland, who represents the Sparrows Point steel mill, cautioned that the plant is not yet sold. A bidder has been selected by a trustee, but the deal is not yet closed.  He said the factory likes the Exum amendment, because it "gives some security" that that Global Warming Solutions Act won't put the steel mill out of businesses.  
 
Burner speculated that the $810 million announced sale price -- which was lower than an earlier bid of $1.3 billion -- "possibly" was affected by the Global Warming Solutions Act.

"The timing couldn't be worse, because who owns it is unsettled," said Burner.  "We don't want something now that would hurt what looks like a promising future" for the mill, he said.

Brad Heavner, director of Environment Maryland, which is pushing for the global warming bill, said such threats of plant closings by industry are typical and almost always exaggerated.  Some lobbyists are taking advantage of the economic downturn to promote fear in people that they'll lose their jobs, when that won't happen, Heavner said. Instead, the bill will spur growth that will make the state a leader in cutting-edge clean energy technology, he said.
 
"It's pure demagoguery to use the recession as a reason not to do this," Heavner said. "Because this is the solution, not the problem."