Edwards Says Industry Should Pay For Greenhouse Gases

Saturday, April 14th 2007, 5:10 pm

By: News On 6

FORT MYERS, Fla. (AP) _ America should charge industry for creating greenhouse gases to generate money for investing in clean technology, Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards said Saturday.

``People ought to have to pay that want to generate greenhouse gases,'' Edwards said at a global warming rally that was part of a nationwide day of demonstrations.

Edwards said charging polluters could generate up to $40 billion to invest in clean technology to ``get us off our addiction to oil.'' He also said the United States should ban the construction of new coal-fired power plants

The former North Carolina senator, who was John Kerry's running mate in the 2004 presidential election, said the U.S. needs to put a cap on carbon emissions, and should achieve an 80 percent reduction in greenhouse gases by 2050.

``That is an aggressive goal but an achievable goal,'' Edwards said.

``We need you, we need America to be willing to be patriotic about something other than war,'' he said.

Saturday's event was part of the national Step It Up 2007 campaign, involving more than 1,300 actions planned in all 50 states.