West Virginia is falling behind in efforts to deal with global climate change and needs to develop a state action plan, lawmakers were told Tuesday.

The state's coal industry and electric power plants also make West Virginia's part of the key to a national solution, according a leading climate change policy advocate.

"We need West Virginia engaged on this issue," said Nikki Roy, director of congressional affairs for the Pew Center on Global Climate Change.

Roy said that West Virginia is among a minority of states that have not yet started developing their own climate change action plans.

Thirty-six other states have begun emissions reductions programs, are planning vehicle pollution limits tougher than the federal government's, or are establishing renewable energy requirements, according to the Pew Center's Web site, www.pewclimate.org.

In West Virginia, a state law passed in 1998 prohibits any limits on greenhouse gas emissions.

Roy said that the state is falling behind, as the rest of the nation - and most of the world - tries to grapple with the biggest environmental problem facing the planet.

Scientists have reached a consensus that the Earth's atmosphere is warming, and that the warming is caused by a human-induced buildup of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, Roy said.

Already, signs of the problem are being seen, Roy said, citing the findings of the U.N.-chartered Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Global sea level rise has increased, he said. Mountain glaciers and snow cover have declined. The average Arctic sea ice extent has shrunk by 20 percent since 1978. More intense and longer droughts have been observed around the world.

"We're going to have some amount of climate change," Roy said. "What we're hoping to do is put the brakes on fast enough so we don't have the catastrophic effects."

Roy briefed legislators on climate change issues Tuesday afternoon. About two dozen lawmakers showed up for the event, held in the House chamber the week after the regular session ended.

Delegate Barbara Evans Fleischauer, D-Monongalia, organized the briefing, after unsuccessfully sponsoring legislation this year to try to deal with global warming.

West Virginia has a new energy plan, written and approved by the Manchin administration. But that plan's goal is to develop a series of new liquid coal plants that critics say would actually increase the state's carbon dioxide emissions.

Roy said that the state and its coal industry need to focus on finding safe and economical ways to capture power plant carbon dioxide emissions and pump them underground.

West Virginia is falling behind in efforts to deal with global climate change and needs to develop a state action plan, lawmakers were told Tuesday.

The state's coal industry and electric power plants also make West Virginia's part of the key to a national solution, according a leading climate change policy advocate.

"We need West Virginia engaged on this issue," said Nikki Roy, director of congressional affairs for the Pew Center on Global Climate Change.

Roy said that West Virginia is among a minority of states that have not yet started developing their own climate change action plans.

Thirty-six other states have begun emissions reductions programs, are planning vehicle pollution limits tougher than the federal government's, or are establishing renewable energy requirements, according to the Pew Center's Web site, www.pewclimate.org.

In West Virginia, a state law passed in 1998 prohibits any limits on greenhouse gas emissions.

Roy said that the state is falling behind, as the rest of the nation - and most of the world - tries to grapple with the biggest environmental problem facing the planet.

Scientists have reached a consensus that the Earth's atmosphere is warming, and that the warming is caused by a human-induced buildup of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, Roy said.

Already, signs of the problem are being seen, Roy said, citing the findings of the U.N.-chartered Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Global sea level rise has increased, he said. Mountain glaciers and snow cover have declined. The average Arctic sea ice extent has shrunk by 20 percent since 1978. More intense and longer droughts have been observed around the world.

"We're going to have some amount of climate change," Roy said. "What we're hoping to do is put the brakes on fast enough so we don't have the catastrophic effects."

Roy briefed legislators on climate change issues Tuesday afternoon. About two dozen lawmakers showed up for the event, held in the House chamber the week after the regular session ended.

Delegate Barbara Evans Fleischauer, D-Monongalia, organized the briefing, after unsuccessfully sponsoring legislation this year to try to deal with global warming.

West Virginia has a new energy plan, written and approved by the Manchin administration. But that plan's goal is to develop a series of new liquid coal plants that critics say would actually increase the state's carbon dioxide emissions.

Roy said that the state and its coal industry need to focus on finding safe and economical ways to capture power plant carbon dioxide emissions and pump them underground.

"The game is all about capturing it and putting it underground," Roy said. "When people look at a future for coal, that's a big part of the issue."

Several lawmakers didn't greet Roy's suggestions warmly, and offered to debate him over whether climate change is real.

Roy responded that many uncertainties still exist and are being studied. But the major issues - whether the climate is changing and whether that change is the result of industrial pollution - are resolved, he said.

"In the mainstream of the peer-reviewed literature, those are not controversial positions," Roy said.

Roy said that his group favors federal legislation to create some sort of carbon dioxide emissions cap, along with a program to allow companies to buy and trade emissions allowances.

Quick passage of such legislation would benefit the coal industry by eliminating regulatory uncertainty that inhibits investments in new power plants, Roy said.

Environmentalists at Tuesday's event questioned such legislation, saying it ignores the on-the-ground impacts of mountaintop removal coal mining.

"I would like to see us putting more of our energy into trying to find ways to burn coal with less damage," said Sen. Jon Blair Hunter, D-Monongalia.

And Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Stephanie Timmermeyer defended her agency's efforts to start a greenhouse gas emissions inventory for the state. Lawmakers approved that program last year, after rejecting it several times.

"While some may look at that as a baby step, for our state, which is a carbon-based state, that is a huge step," Timmermeyer said.

Delegate Nancy Guthrie, D-Kanawha, asked Roy what he thought of American Electric Power's plan to build a coal gasification plant in Mason County. AEP's proposal, approved last week by the state Public Service Commission, does not currently include carbon sequestration technology.

"Unless we can find out how to take carbon dioxide and put it underground and keep it there, we have some real problems," Roy said.

"Honestly, it's a gamble," he said. "We don't know if we're able to do it or what the technological problems will be."

To contact staff writer Ken Ward Jr., use e-mail or call 348-1702.