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This Week’s Top Story: ACES React.

The American Clean Energy and Security Bill passed the House last week by a paper-thin margin (219-212). Forty Democrats voted against — most saying it was too weak — and eight Republicans voted for it.

Here’s John Broder’s article for the New York Times.

The bill now heads to the US Senate where eventual passage is generally accepted, though how much weaker the bill becomes before arriving on Obama’s desk is still very much up in the air.

Here’s a smattering of opinions on the bill from around the world.

SolveClimate: Obama: House Climate Talks Were ‘Constructive’ Blueprint for Senate
“Obama said he expects “a series of tough negotiations.” Perhaps more telling, he described Rick Boucher’s strong-arming for the coal industry in the House as “constructive” and a blueprint for the Senate. (Boucher himself bragged that he ensured coal a long, bright future.). “

Reuters: China welcomes U.S. climate bill, says more needed
“China’s top climate change official said the bill was a positive break with the stance taken by the Administration of former President George W. Bush. “We think that we should give a positive evaluation to this bill,” he said. “But in the area of tackling climate change, especially on the issue of cutting emissions, if they could take some more positive, effective measures it would give a bigger impetus to the year-end talks.”

Reuters: Australian PM hails U.S. greenhouse bill passage
“”That is good news for the world,” Rudd told reporters. “And can I just say to those who are delaying action in the Australian parliament, look at what is happening in the United States.””

Climate Progress: The U.S. House of Representatives approves landmark (bipartisan!) climate bill, 219 – 212.
“This bill makes possible an international deal in Copenhagen this December — as well as a bilateral deal with China, hopefully sooner.  Had the bill failed, the chance of humanity avoiding catastrophic climate change would be all but eliminated. …  And for those who say this doesn’t do enough — I agree 100%.  But it [begins] a process and establishe[s] a framework that [can] be strengthened over time as the science warrant[s].”

DotEarth: The Specter of the ‘93 Energy Tax
“In an effort to blunt the momentum of the  energy and climate bill that  the House narrowly passed on Friday, Republicans are raising the specter of the failed effort by President Bill Clinton to craft an energy tax in 1993.”

NYTimes: Krugman: Betraying the Planet
“Indeed, if there was a defining moment in Friday’s debate, it was the declaration by Representative Paul Broun of Georgia that climate change is nothing but a “hoax” that has been “perpetrated out of the scientific community.” I’d call this a crazy conspiracy theory, but doing so would actually be unfair to crazy conspiracy theorists. After all, to believe that global warming is a hoax you have to believe in a vast cabal consisting of thousands of scientists — a cabal so powerful that it has managed to create false records on everything from global temperatures to Arctic sea ice. Yet Mr. Broun’s declaration was met with applause.”

Breakthrough Institute: Democratic Congressmen on ACES Climate Bill: “Doing nothing actually results in more renewable energy than approving ACES”
“Rep. Doggett is citing analysis by the EPA, which found that ACES would reduce the amount of renewable energy deployed in the United States relative to business-as-usual, increase the amount of coal-fired electricity generation relative to 2005 levels, and provide no incentive for a move to cleaner cars.”

Worldchanging: U.S. House Acknowledges Planetary Atmosphere!
“We need to be thinking about how to completely eliminate excess climate emissions from our economy. We need to set the stage for Copenhagen, and we need to get President Obama to take that stage and help make history. And then we still have to create a new model of sustainable prosperity and rebuild our entire material civilization to support it.”

AP: Kahn: Climate Bill Winners & Losers
“The sharply debated bill’s fate is unclear in the Senate. A major struggle is expected with 60 votes needed to overcome a certain Republican filibuster. How much it will affect other industries is still a matter of intense debate, though the primary winners and losers are already emerging.”

HuffPo: Stavins: National Climate Change Policy: A Quick Look Back at Waxman-Markey and the Road Ahead
“So, the Waxman?Markey bill has its share of flaws, but it represents a reasonable starting point for Senate deliberation on what can become a national climate policy that will place the United States where it ought to be -? in a position of international leadership to help develop a global climate agreement that is scientifically sound, economically rational, and politically acceptable to the key nations of the world.”

Finally this week:
Elizabeth Kolbert profiles NASA’s Jim Hansen in June 29, 2009 issue of the New Yorker, Hansen pretty much invented climate science and climate modeling. He’s a cap-and-trade opponent, favoring a straight carbon tax. He doesn’t comment directly on ACES in the article, but he does say, “I had high opes that Obama understood the reality of the issue and would seize the opportunity to marry the energy and climate and national-security issues and make a very strong program … Maybe he still will, but I’m getting a bad feeling.”

Other stories of note:

NYTimes: Algae Farm Aims to Turn Carbon Dioxide Into Fuel
“The ethanol would be sold as fuel, the companies said, but Dow’s long-term interest is in using it as an ingredient for plastics, replacing natural gas. The process also produces oxygen, which could be used to burn coal in a power plant cleanly. … The exhaust from such a plant would be mostly carbon dioxide, which could be reused to make more algae.”

BBC: China ‘to block’ Hummer takeover
“A Chinese firm’s bid to buy the gas-guzzling Hummer car brand will be blocked on environmental grounds, according to Chinese state radio.”

New Scientist: Ozone hole has unforeseen effect on ocean carbon sink
“The Southern Ocean is a major carbon sink, guzzling around 15 per cent of CO2 emissions. However, between 1987 and 2004, carbon uptake in the region was reduced by nearly 2.5 billion tonnes – equivalent to the amount of carbon that all the world’s oceans absorb in one year.”

Reuters: Scotland agrees to world’s toughest 2020 climate goal
“Scottish lawmakers Wednesday backed a binding goal to cut greenhouse gases by 42 percent by 2020 from 1990 levels, edging Germany into second place in a ranking of the most ambitious developed world targets.”

Reuters: Swiss glaciers melting faster than ever before: study
“”The last decade was the worst decade that we have had in the last 150 years. We lost a lot of water,” said Daniel Farinotti, research assistant at the ETH.”

Earth2Tech: Is China On the Cusp of Becoming a Huge Solar Panel Market?
“On top of all this, the country has what Polly Shaw of Suntech Power, called the “most aggressive” renewable portfolio standard in the world. It aims to get 20 percent of its electricity from renewable sources by 2020, with some 100 gigawatts of wind capacity and 1.8 gigawatts of solar. The country is already rethinking its solar target, and will “probably” revise it to 10 or even 20 gigawatts this year, Shaw said.”

NYTimes: Sears Tower to Be Revamped to Produce Most of Its Own Power
“The plan, to begin immediately, aims to reduce electricity use in the tower by 80 percent over five years through upgrades in the glass exterior, internal lighting, heating, cooling and elevator systems — and its own green power generation.”