RALEIGH – I’m really starting to warm to the idea of a state legislative commission on climate change.

With a Senate bill to create the commission likely to pass the House this week, it’s not like I have much of a choice in the matter, anyway. But the more I think about it, the more I believe that a climate-change panel could do some really important work here in North Carolina.

After all, we have a long track record of state government creating commissions that go on to accomplish great feats of innovative statesmanship. It’s a tradition: whenever the General Assembly or governor have a commission appointment to make, they scour the state looking for the most qualified, experienced, open-minded professionals to fill the post. They never use the appointment to reward their partisan cronies or curry political favor.

In the case of the proposed climate-change commission, its charge is sweeping and its conclusions not at all preordained. Those who carefully follow the national and international debate on the issue of global warming realize that there is significant disagreement among climate scientists as to the extent and causes of the phenomenon. They know that computer models predicting catastrophic, human-induced warming over the next century have the serious defect of being unable to predict the past when the available data are fed into them.

Furthermore, careful observers of the debate acknowledge that the Earth’s climate has changed significantly over the centuries without any possible influences from human activity. Given a background variation in the climate that includes ice ages and heat waves far in excess of anything predicted by global-warming models – as well as shorter cycles that seem related to sunspot activity – the notion that driving our cars and heating our homes will destroy the “fragile” ecological balance of the planet seems wildly out of sync with reality.

There are, of course, thoughtful people who disagree. Some are scientists. Many others are political or environmental activists who desperately need an apocalyptic justification for their preferred anti-capitalist policies. It is impossible to imagine that the pool of potential members of a North Carolina commission on climate change will be limited to these two groups. It will surely include scientists who express more caution or skepticism. It will include economists and business executives who have a clear understanding of the significant economic damage that would be wrought by precipitous regulation.

Armed with a broad spectrum of views and the best-available information, this commission will inevitably conclude that North Carolina should not adopt draconian policies to reverse a trend that is poorly understood, probably exaggerated, and in some ways likely to be benign. Doing so will demonstrate once again that our state is full of talented, engaged leaders who make wise decisions, who ignore the pleas of interest groups and the frothy sensationalism of the news media.

Yes, I’m feeling much, much better about all this. Gov. Mike Easley should sign this bill forthwith and get to work on his appointments, as should legislative leaders. The sooner the commission gets formed, the sooner it can begin its important work. North Carolina will become a shining example of political leadership for the entire country.

Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation.